Page 89 of The Gentlewoman Apprentice

Charlotte quieted.

“She looked me in the face and asked, and I laughed and lied.” He kept his eyes on the window. “I told her it was improper, that I would never accept such an assignment. I was a coward.”

“That is not the same as what she did.”

“Is it not?” He turned back to Charlotte, whose arms had tightened across her chest. “She concealed her business from me. I kept my identity secret to protect myself.”

Charlotte’s jaw worked, the muscle ticking beneath her ear. She would not concede easily. She never did.

“You are describing a woman who, with calculated ambition, deceived you for her own gain, and you compare her actions to that of a man who was merely shy.”

“You know I am not shy. I am afraid.” His voice roughened against his will. “I sat in this room writing letters to a woman I loved instead of standing in front of her and saying so. She laid herself bare in those letters, Charlotte. Every fear, every wound, every hope. And I gave her watercolors and anonymity.”

Charlotte’s arms loosened by a fraction. Her attention dropped to the letters on his desk, the ribbon trailing from the stack like a thread pulled from a seam.

“She is not blameless,” Charlotte said, but her voice had lost its edge.

“No. Nor am I.”

A long silence settled between them, filled with the faint ticking of a clock.

“What will you do?” Charlotte asked.

He did not know. The letter lay on his desk, Margaret’s handwriting as familiar to him as his own. The ramifications of my distrust are deep and painful, not least the loss of your regard. That was not the language of a woman without remorse.

“I cannot answer that.”

Charlotte rose, adjusting her gloves with brisk efficiency. At the door she paused to look over her shoulder, her expression stripped of its severity. “She did improve your shop and love your father. That much I will grant her. But that does not mean you should not protect yourself.”

The door closed behind her. Peter sat with his hand over the letters, the lavender scent fading, and felt the first true loosening in his chest since Margaret had gone.

He picked up one of her letters and scanned it until he stopped on a foreboding line: Perhaps I value independence over relationships too much. His heart ached for the life she had known, furious at those who taught her not to trust. She seemed to tell him she could never accept his affection, nor had she asked for it in her most recent missive. His wound, tender and bleeding, lay fresh and too painful to bandage, and it required time to heal.

He gathered a paper and quill and began another letter.

29

Monday arrived, the first day of the second full week that Meg’s shop would operate. The tension between the joy in her success and remorse for her role in Peter’s loss remained, but she moved forward in the only way she knew how. As she descended the stairs to eat breakfast, Miss Reed stopped her greeting her with a smile so familiar, Meg’s shoulders eased a fraction.

“A letter for you.” She extended it with no small amount of trepidation on her brow.

Meg thanked her and excused herself to read the missive.

Dear Miss Cooper,

I confess, however delightful our exchange, your letters leave me raw. Once, I believed I understood you, but I am working to reconcile the facets of your character hitherto unknown. Stretched and quite unable to think clearly, I must beg we desist.

Peter

Paper crackled as Meg refolded Peter’s final missive, tucking it into the ribbon with the others. The swish of paper against paper was as resonant and final as a lock clicking into place. She wiped a tear with the back of her hand, tucked a wayward strand of hair into her cap, and returned to her responsibilities.

Meg traveled through her tasks in The Golden Thimble with half her soul. The other half, wretched and mourning Samuel’s loss and Peter’s dismissal, she shut away. Her smile never faded, and she ordered Miss Matilde and Miss Reed about their work with an obstinate cheerfulness that never brushed her heart.

“Miss Margaret. A request for the gold brocade. Look.” Matilde indicated an image in a pattern book. “Go to the measuring room.”

Pleasure trilled through Meg. She would have changed a great many things, but the excitement of dressmaking, of fashioning a gown to match the woman inside it, always satisfied. It was all that remained to her. That and the knowledge that she shared her passion with those around her. Matilde’s enthusiasm had blossomed over their months together. No longer did the girl pine after home but had gathered knowledge and applied her vivacity to the needle. Meg had not prepared for the power a shared interest had for binding people together. It worked over her in cautious waves of gratitude until she embraced the regard she developed for Miss Matilde and Miss Reed.

In the fitting room, Lady Halverton reclined in a chair, drinking tea.