Page 98 of How to Cross a Marquess (The Way to a Lord's Heart 3)

She’d been young and timid once, Fenella thought, and for a while it had seemed that limitation would be with her always. But it wouldn’t. She could take on anything after this. She would never again doubt her own competence. She skipped a step, and another, despite her fatigue.

Lally gazed up at her. She shrugged. “Don’t know what you mean,” she said. “But lots of times I don’t. Dad reckons I never will. Says I’d best get used to it.”

Fenella was filled with a desire to do something for Lally. She didn’t deserve the way she’d been treated by Mrs. Crenshaw. “Is there anything you would like?”

The girl’s brown eyes were both hopeful and wary. “Reckon I won’t be joining Robin Hood’s band.”

“No, that was a lie.”

She nodded as if she’d expected this, and perhaps heard similar things before. She trudged on at Fenella’s side.

“I could give you some books about Robin Hood,” Fenella offered.

“I’m not much for books. I don’t read very good. And you have to sit still inside and take care not to spill.”

Of course books weren’t it. Fenella tried to think of something else. She wished she could find Lally a fairy mound or troop of merry, harmless outlaws.

“I’d like some flowers,” said Lally.

“Flowers?” Did she mean a bouquet?

“Dad said the garden at the mill was a sight to see before my mum died. All sorts of flowers. But he didn’t keep it up. He’s sorry about that, but he was right busy and the plants were finicky.”

This last sounded like a quote.

“I love flowers, and I could take care of them.” The girl nodded as if she expected an argument. “I could. Water them and all. I’ve pulled the weeds.”

“I’ll have plants brought to you,” said Fenella, delighted the request was one she could grant. “By someone who can tell you all about how to care for them.” She’d have the castle gardener find just the right person to talk to Lally.

“Where will you find them?”

“In the gardens at my house.”

“That castle?”

“Yes.”

Lally made an astonished sound. “You really will? Even though I took those letters for Maid Marian?”

“I promise.”

The girl’s answering smile was brilliant.

Perhaps they could do more, Fenella thought. They might settle a small pension on her in the future. Or some such arrangement. She’d ask Roger. Fenella’s heart soared. Soon she would see Roger and throw herself into his arms. After that, well a good bit after that, she would ask him. She laughed.

Lally joined in. The girl put her hand in Fenella’s, and they walked side by side up the hill to the mill.

Twenty

A slant of late-afternoon sun illuminated the rows of leather-bound books in Chatton Castle’s library, but Roger didn’t notice. He was here because he never sat in this room. Neither had Fenella, and so it reminded him of nothing in particular. Not that this stopped the rush of tender memories, which hurt more than anything he had ever experienced before. Part of him simply refused to believe that she wouldn’t walk through the door in another minute and ask him what in the world he was brooding about.

His mother and Macklin had herded him home. He hadn’t wanted to come. But even he had been forced to admit that lingering on the shore opposite Lindisfarne—in the stinging rain of a squall, when everyone else had departed—was doing no good. Fenella was gone, such a short time after he had understood, at last, that she was just the woman for him. No one survived a night in the North Sea.

If only he had realized the truth sooner. If only he’d had more sense. If only… His mind teemed with regrets. None of which made a particle of difference. All was disaster. He couldn’t really see where his life would go from here. Onward in numbing routine, he supposed, all his plans in ruins. He’d thought he had a second chance. This had turned out to be a cruel illusion.

Every bit of his attention was occupied by mourning. He didn’t hear a cart arrive outside, and when the chamber door opened quietly, he didn’t turn around. “Go away,” he said to anyone who might imagine he could be comforted.

“Very well. I just wanted to tell you I was home,” replied a woman’s voice, familiar and yet altered by a rasping croak.

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