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The clock chimed, heralding that they’d been away for some time. Eleanor sighed and shook her head. Her shoulders slumped a little, and she looked so very tired.
“You should return to your guests,” Liliane said gently. “You’ve given me a couple of wonderful weeks, Ellie. I love you for that.”
Eleanor nodded slowly. “But remember this. You know as well as I how passionate some of these young bachelors are. If you find a man who is passionate aboutyou, your stepmother will not be enough to thwart him. If you can only marry, you’ll be free to live as you ought. I know that sounds frightening, but it is really the only thing.”
It sounded so easy when Eleanor worded it like that, but not wanting to upset her friend, Liliane nodded. She could pretend that marriage was possible and that everything would be fine. That was, until her father inevitably left. Then, reality would set in all too harshly.
Chapter 2
Harry Lyndon, the recently named Duke of Gillingham, watched as the English countryside rolled by. He was a tall man with a proud countenance, piercing blue eyes, and thick, dark hair. Presently, he slouched against the velvet cushions of his carriage, his form seemingly too large for the small space.
The Dowager Duchess Violet Lyndon, his mother, sat across from him in a bright blue coat. Her hair was dark like her son’s and her eyes the same shade of blue, but while Harry was all sharp, chiselled lines, his mother was a soft creature and always had been.
“We’re nearly home,” she said.
She sounded a little different than how she usually did. His mother was American, and although she had mostly lost her accent in favour of an English one, any time she returned to Massachusetts, her old accent surfaced most forcefully.
Harry nodded. “It is strange how I expected this all to have changed somehow, isn’t it?”
“A little. But I understand the feeling,” his mother said. “You have not been away from England for so long since you were a boy. I don’t know if you remember that.”
Harry shook his head.
“When you were three, I took you to meet my mother and father,” Violet explained. “We stayed in Boston for almost a year that time, too. Your father stayed for a few months and met with some of the intellectual circles there. I am trying to remember if he met with anyone you might know.”
Harry turned his head towards the window, avoiding his mother’s eyes at the mention of his father. She seemed to mention the man so easily and readily, while Harry could scarcely bring himself to even discuss his father. It was as if by not mentioning him, Harry might be able to avoid the terrible reality that his father wasgonefor just a little while longer. How did she do it?
His father had not died suddenly. No, he’d been ill for years, so his death had been expected or should’ve been. Knowing logically that one’s father might die andacknowledgingit were two entirely different things, though. It was as if by being outside England, his father’s home, Harry felt as though he could prevent time from continuing its merciless march forward.
In Boston, he’d constantly thought of his father—how glassy his eyes had been, how the sweat drenched his brow—as he took his last breaths, but he’dmanaged. He’d kept all the grief and despair locked away tightly inside himself, but now, returning to England made him feel as though he’d just opened Pandora’s box, and all those feelings ached to burst free.
Already, he’d been greeted the moment he set foot in England withYour Grace. The title felt undeserved. Wrong.
The carriage came to a sudden halt.
“Well,” Mother said. “Here we are.”
The journey had ended far too soon, but Harry still made himself smile and nod. He needed to be strong, for his mother, if for no one else. Once they’d left the carriage, Harry offered her his arm. They stepped over the familiar cobblestones and entered the familiar door. A tight lump formed in Harry’s throat. It was entirely irrational, but it seemed as if the estate no longerbreathedthe same way with his father absent.
“Shall we have tea?” Violet asked. “I am feeling rather parched.”
“Tea sounds lovely,” Harry said as he acknowledged the family’s old butler with a nod.
Servants hurried about outside, retrieving the trunks and baggage from the journey. Harry joined his mother in the parlour and tried to ignore the coldness that settled into his bones. His father was really and truly gone.
“Oh, I’ve missed this room!” his mother exclaimed, spreading her arms wide. She sank into a nearby chair and smiled encouragingly at Harry.
He slowly lowered himself into the seat opposite hers.
“My one regret is that I am not sharing this room with adaughter,” Violet said. “It would’ve been nice if you’d taken a liking to a girl in America.”
Harry clenched his jaw. Oh, he’d taken alikingto many young women in America, but not in the way his mother probably wanted. “Mother.”
“Don’t chastiseme.”
He sighed and curled his hands over the arms of the chair. This discussion wasn’t worth having again. Harry’s mother and father were—had been—an unusual couple. An English duke and an American heiress. A love match.
Most men in thetonwere raised to think of advantageous marriages, something which Harry himself would’ve been content with. He had imagined himself marrying a wealthy woman, someone with good breeding, for appearances and heirs. Once heirs had been produced, Harry would have lovers to fulfil his needs.
