She blamed herself for believing that what had passed between her and Rhys in the garden had meant anything at all.
He had looked at her as though she mattered. He had spoken her name as though it contained everything he wanted and could not have. He had stepped closer, close enough that she could smell him, close enough that she could feel the warmth of his body, close enough that she had almost forgotten every practical consideration that made such closeness impossible.
And then he had gone to London and found comfort in the arms of a beautiful widow.
Mel allowed herself five minutes.
She discovered, to the peril of her peace, that her heart was utterly surrendered to him: a truth she could no longer conceal from her own reflections.
The realisation arrived with the particular clarity of things that have been true for some time but only now become visible. She had allowed her affections to become deeply entangled with Rhys, not the duke, not his title, she had surrendered her heart to Rhys himself.
The man who read bedtime stories in different voices. The man who carried Thistle’s rocks in his pocket. The man who had looked at her in the kitchen and seen something worth staying for.
She cherished him deeply, and he had gone to London and confirmed every fear she had ever had about him being capable of truly committing to anything.
The five minutes ended and Mel folded the gossip sheet with precise movements, creasing the paper along its original lines until it was a neat rectangle that could be set aside and never looked at again. She stood from the table, smoothed her skirts, and checked her reflection in the small mirror by the door.
Her face was composed and her eyes were clear. No one looking at her would know that anything had changed.
She went upstairs and taught Latin.
Anna was conjugating verbs with her usual systematic approach, creating elaborate charts to track her progress through different tenses. Viola was working on a translation exercise, her pencil moving slowly but steadily across the page. Thistle was supposed to be practicing her letters but had somehow acquired a cricket that she was observing with scientific intensity.
“Thistle,” Mel said, her voice perfectly even.
“The cricket will still be there after lessons. For now, please return to your work.”
“But Miss Grace, it’s doing something very interesting with its legs. I think it might be a new species.”
“All crickets are interesting. That does not excuse you from completing your letters.”
Thistle sighed dramatically but complied, relocating the cricket to a small box she had apparently prepared for just such an eventuality. Mel watched her with the familiar blend of exasperation and admiration that Thistle always inspired, and felt nothing.
That was not quite true. She felt everything. But she had learned, long ago, how to feel everything while appearing to feel nothing, and that skill was serving her now as it had served her through every crisis of her adult life.
The lesson continued. Mel corrected Anna’s verb charts, praised Viola’s translation and reminded Thistle three more times that the cricket would survive an hour of neglect. She was patient and encouraging and entirely professional, every word and gesture exactly what it should be.
They held their father in the highest of their esteem and they deserved to keep adoring and cherishing him without the complications of adult failure.
That afternoon, Mel took them for a walk along the cliffs. The October wind was sharp, carrying the salt spray from the waves below, and the children ran ahead with the boundless energy of young creatures who had been confined to a schoolroom for too long.
Thistle found an interesting rock formation that she insisted on documenting in her nature journal. Anna collected several shells that met her exacting standards for symmetry and colouration. Viola walked beside Mel, her small hand tucked into Mel’s larger one, her quiet presence a comfort that required no words.
“Miss Grace?”
“Yes, Viola?”
“When is Papa coming back?”
The question landed like a blow, but Mel’s expression did not change. She had known this question would come. She had been preparing for it since she read the gossip sheets that morning.
“Soon, I expect. He had business to attend to in London.”
“I miss him.”
“I know you do.”
“Do you miss him?”
