And,blast it all,Mason chuckled.
It was a truth Cordelia had discovered only recently that some gardens possessed an atmosphere entirely inappropriate to brooding.
The Dowager Duchess and she were seated together on the garden bench for perhaps an hour now. And this was an hour filled with idle chatter, occasional laughter, and the sort of quietunderstanding Cordelia had long ago decided was reserved for people who wore pearls with ease.
The Duchess was not as Cordelia had expected. She was older, yes, and elegant in a way that made one feel slightly rumpled by comparison, but there was a vitality in her, something fierce and wounded that shone through her polished exterior like the flicker of a lantern in the dark.
But that was not all. She was also the sort of mother Cordelia had always wished for but was never fortunate enough to have. The Dowager deeply cared for her son, and she showed it in every gaze and every word, for it was a love that transcended anything tangible, and it merelywaspure and unadulterated.
Cordelia liked her immensely.
“I do believe you’ve managed to wake up the house, my dear,” the Duchess said, sipping her tea with that particular kind of amusement that made Cordelia feel simultaneously flattered and accused.
“Well,” Cordelia replied, plucking a leaf from the mint shrub beside them and examining it as though it might offer legal counsel, “someone had to. It’s a beautiful house, but if you don’t mind me saying, it had all the cheer of a mausoleum when I arrived.”
The Duchess gave a soft, genuine laugh.
Then the older woman glanced toward her, a little more solemnly. “And what of your own house, my dear? Where did you come from before fate or a rather reckless horse brought you under my wheels?”
Cordelia faltered.
“Oh, I… well, I come from all sorts of places,” she hedged, folding the mint leaf into smaller and smaller pieces. “But most recently, I was staying in Surrey. Before that, Bath. Before that, London, of course, when I was a child.”
“And your parents?” the Dowager asked gently. “Were they kind to you?”
Cordelia hesitated. She always did when that question arose. The world seemed so fond of placing people into neat little categories: loving childhood, tragic loss, distant father, doting mother. But her reality had been something more complex and more quietly painful.
“My mother,” she began, tone lighter than the words that followed, “was the diamond of her season.”
The Duchess nodded but said nothing. That, somehow, encouraged her.
“She was… stunning. People used to speak of her beauty with actual reverence. It was how she measured her worth, I think…her power, her purpose. And then she married. And then I happened.”
There was a bitter twist to her smile now, but she kept it.
“She didn’t take well to the… effects of childbearing. Particularly when the ton began to whisper about how she had faded. I suppose they were jealous in their way. But she listened to them. And once I grew old enough to resemble her, well, it became rather difficult to know whether she despised me or simply could not bear her own reflection.”
The Duchess was very still.
“She never struck me,” Cordelia added quickly. “She wasn’t cruel in that way. But she had a gift for words… sharp ones. Always about my appearance or my manner, or my laugh.” Her fingers twisted the mint leaf into a crushed little heap in her lap. “I always wanted her to be proud of me. Even when I swore I didn’t.”
A long silence followed. Cordelia dared not look up. At least, the Dowager spoke. “My children,” she said softly, “that is… my child has always been my pride and joy.”
Cordelia lifted her head, blinking. “Child?”
The Duchess’ face didn’t change, but something behind her eyes did, something resembling an old sadness that flickered andsettled like dust resettling in an abandoned room. She did not correct herself.
Cordelia, despite her curiosity, did not press. She knew too well the kind of grief that required guarding.
Instead, she said, “Your Grace, I must say… if I had known there were women like you in the world, I might not have been so determined to shun the ton.”
The Dowager chuckled. “We are a rare breed, my dear, but not extinct.”
The warmth between them settled into something more lasting, something steady and soft, like a shawl placed over cold shoulders without asking. Cordelia breathed deeply, feeling safe for the first time in a while.
Chapter Five
The library had been yet another sanctuary of Mason’s for the simple reason that it was an entire room designed for order and solitude, the two principles upon which he had based much of his adult life.
