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George moved closer, taking two cautious steps until he stood directly beside the cot, casting a long shadow as he looked down at Oliver. "He laughs at everything."

Helena looked up at him, eyes searching his guarded face. "Not with everyone."

She leaned back slightly against the shadowed wall, her fingers softly smoothing the knitted blanket over Oliver's chest. "He knows your voice, Your Grace. Even when you speak in those stern, formal tones you reserve for society, he senses the strength behind them. He feels safe whenever you draw near."

"He is merely reacting to the cadence of a masculine tone," George replied, shifting his stance to place one hand behind his back while the other rested against the headboard. "Infants of his tender age possess no complex thought. He would react with the exact same glee to Caspian or even Gibbs."

"You underestimate him, just as you often underestimate yourself," Helena replied gently, her voice holding a teasing warmth that felt like a soothing balm to his bruised conscience. "He listens most attentively when you are in the room. Why not give him something proper to listen to while he drifts off to sleep?"

George raised his brow, looking at her in the dim light. "I have no desire to recite parliamentary reports or estate balance sheets to an infant. I doubt my thoughts on county drainage systems would make for a compelling bedtime lullaby."

Helena let out a soft chuckle, her eyes sparkling in the gloom with an irresistible light. "I was not suggesting an estate report, Your Grace. I was wondering if you might have real stories to share; perhaps something from your own childhood. Maybe stories particularly involving Lord Edward."

The name fell like cold iron weight. Edward. At the mention of his late brother, a sharp ache ripped through the very core of George's chest, making his shoulders lock. The faint warmth in his eyes vanished instantly, replaced by agonizing grief that he had buried beneath stern duty and responsibility. The wound of Edward's death was still raw, a festering bleed within his soul that no title, wealth, or societal victory could ever mend.

George stiffened. "I do not see the point of such a cumbersome venture when the child would not understand a single word."

Helena did not retreat at his harsh tone. She looked up at him, her eyes softening with empathy as she recognized the agony in his eyes. She pressed him gently, her tone sweet, quiet, and devoid of judgment.

"He does not need to understand the plot of the tale, Your Grace. He only needs to hear your voice. He needs to know the sound of the man who guards his future and holds his world together."

George stared down at her, caught completely in the emerald light of her eyes. There was an earnest sparkle in her gaze; a plea not for herself, but for the healing of his own guarded spirit. She was offering him a chance to bleed, a chance to share burdens he had carried alone for so long.

The wall he had built around his heart felt dangerously fragile beneath her patient, understanding stare. He remembered a warm summer evening at the estate decades ago, the sound of Edward's bright, unrestrained laughter ringing through the oak trees as they raced toward the lake without a care in the world.

He opened his mouth, the ghost of a long-buried memory rising to his lips against his own will. "Edward used to⁠—"

The words slipped into the quiet air, fragile, heavy, and full of aching nostalgia. Then, abruptly, he stopped.

The sentence died in his throat, choked off by the suffocating terror of his own grief. The realization of what he was doing, opening the dark vault of his pain before her, sent a quake through his veins. He snapped his mouth shut as he pulled himself back from the brink of vulnerability.

George turned his face away into the deep shadows, his jaw set in a hard line as he regained his composure. The icy distance returned to his eyes, guarding him once more from the danger of her warmth.

"No," George said, his voice flat and devoid of the momentary softness that had threatened to unman him. "It is late, and I shall not indulge in idle tales tonight. The boy needs sleep, not foolish reminiscences."

Helena watched him, her emerald eyes filled with compassionate sadness, yet she did not argue or force him further. She simply nodded softly, accepting his boundary with that miraculous grace that humbled him to his very core.

"As you wish, Your Grace," she murmured softly.

George took a step backward, stepping away from the cot and away from the irresistible pull of her presence. "I shall bid you both goodnight, Your Grace."

"Goodnight," Helena replied gently, her voice following him like a soft lullaby.

George backed out of the nursery, closing the heavy mahogany door until only a thin sliver of firelight remained visible. He stood alone in the dark corridor, back pressed against the wall and heart pounding in an erratic rhythm.

He paused there, his hand lingering against the polished wood. Every fiber of his being, every instinct in his soul screamed at him to push the door open once more, to step back into that dimly lit room and finish the story he had started. He was deeply, terribly tempted to return and seek the comfort Helena so freely offered.

He closed his eyes, his knuckles turning white against the doorframe as he fought against his own pride and fear. In the end, they won. George pulled his hand away, turned his face into the darkness of the hall, leaving the sanctuary of the nursery behind him.

George had been dreading the ball for days.

It was absurd, of course. He had grown up among the ton. He had attended daring engagements in Paris and acquitted himself wittily through countless conversations from the tedious to the salacious. He could hold his own with lords and dowagers, solicitors and members of Parliament.

Nothing, except Helena.

He could not stay away. He could not go to her.

The realization was as unwelcome as it was undeniable. Every attempt to maintain a proper distance between them seemed only to make matters worse. When he tried to direct her, she resisted him. When he withdrew, she followed with that infuriating combination of curiosity and determination. And when his carefully constructed defenses slipped, even for a moment, she somehow found her way through them.