"Thank you," Aubrey said quietly. "For helping me, even though this must be difficult for you."
Steven moved toward the door, then paused. "I'm helping you for Eleanor's sake. Because if there's even a chance that you can make her happy, then she deserves to have that chance."
He opened the door, then looked back one more time.
"But if you hurt her again? If you fail her after all of this? I'll be there to pick up the pieces. And this time, I won't take no for an answer."
Steven left, closing the door behind him.
Aubrey lay in the silence, his mind spinning with everything he'd learned.
He reached for the letter on his bedside table, the letter he'd written to his wife. He looked at it now and realised how inadequate those words were. Eleanor didn't need his apologies written on paper. She needed them demonstrated in action.
She needed to be courted. Properly. The way she should have been from the beginning.
And Aubrey had exactly twelve days to figure out how to woo his wife while trapped in a bed, unable to walk, with a household full of people watching his every move. He picked up his pen and began to write his plans.
Twelve days to show Eleanor she was seen, valued, chosen.
Twelve days to convince her that her home was with him.
He would make every single one of them count.
Chapter seventeen
First Day of Wooing a Wife
1
4
December 1868
The entrance hall was chaos—the organised chaos that always accompanied the Midleton family's departures. Trunks being loaded, nursemaids corralling children, Michael conferring with the coachman about the route to his family's estate inDerbyshire.
Eleanor stood on the front steps, her arms wrapped around herself against the December cold and tried not to let her emotions show on her face.
"Aunt Ellie!" Catherine launched herself at Eleanor's skirts, her small face crumpling. "I don't want to go! I want to stay with you!"
Eleanor crouched down, pulling the three-year-old into a fierce hug. "I know, darling. But you must go see Grandmama and Grandpapa Midleton. They've been waiting all year to see you."
"But you won't be there." Catherine's lower lip trembled. "And Uncle Aubrey won't read us stories anymore."
Eleanor's chest tightened. Aubrey had been reading to the children each evening—somehow managing to entertain all three of them despite being confined to his bed. The twins had been captivated by his dramatic renditions of Greek myths, while Catherine had simply curled up beside him like a contented kitten, sucking her thumb.
"Uncle Aubrey will read to you again," Eleanor promised, though she had no idea if it was true. "When you visit next time."
"Promise?"
"I promise to try my very best."
The twins appeared next, James and William flanking her with identical serious expressions.
"Aunt Ellie," James said solemnly, "Father says Uncle Aubrey is getting better. That means he won't die?"
"No, darling. He won't die. He's healing very well."
"Good." William nodded decisively. "Because he said he'd teach us to fence when he's better. And dead people can't fence."
