Louise watched them all with the strange detachment that came from existing between worlds, neither fully of society nor entirely outside it.
“You’re unusually quiet, dear.” Lady Merrow steered them toward a less populated path. “Our walks usually involve you attempting to keep me from saying something scandalous to unsuspecting passersby.”
Louise pulled her cloak tighter against the wind. “I was simply thinking.”
“Ah.” Lady Merrow studied her with those sharp eyes that missed nothing. “Would these thoughts involve my nephew, by any chance?”
Heat flooded Louise’s cheeks despite the cold. “Why would you think that, my lady?”
“Because you get the same expression he does when trying to solve an impossible puzzle. All furrowed brow and compressed lips.” Lady Merrow paused to untangle Buttercup from his own lead. “Also, because you’ve been stealing glances at each other like besotted adolescents for days now.”
Louise focused on the path ahead, unable to deny the observation. “May I ask you something, my lady?”
“You may ask anything. Whether or not I answer depends entirely on the question.”
“What was she like … Aaron’s mother?”
Lady Merrow’s steps slowed. For a moment, Louise thought she had overstepped, but then the older woman smiled with such tenderness it transformed her face.
“Margaret was sunshine personified. Rather like your Emily, actually. Sweet, curious, finding joy in the smallest things.” Lady Merrow bent to adjust Buttercup’s collar, her voice softening with memory. “She had this laugh that made you want to share every amusing thought, just to hear it again.”
“Aaron said his father was madly in love with her.”
“Obsessed would be more accurate.” The warmth disappeared from Lady Merrow’s tone. “Charles didn’t love Margaret so much aspossessher. He wanted to own her light, to keep it locked away where only he could enjoy it.”
They paused beside a small pond where ducks huddled against the cold. Buttercup whined hopefully, but Lady Merrow gripped his lead tightly.
“She died shortly after Aaron was born.” Lady Merrow’s words came carefully now, weighted with old grief. “Charles went mad with it. Locked away everything of hers, forbade anyone to speak her name. And Aaron …”
“He grew up thinking he killed her.”
“You understand him better than I realized.” Lady Merrow turned to study Louise’s face. “Yes. Charles never said it directly, but children know. They always know when they’re considered a poor replacement for what was lost.”
Louise thought of Aaron showing her his mother’s sketchbook, the wonder in his voice at discovering her words of love.
“You visited him, though. You didn’t let him grow up entirely alone.”
“I tried. Charles barely tolerated my presence, but I was Margaret’s sister. He couldn’t completely bar me without causing talk.” Lady Merrow resumed walking, her pace brisker now as if outrunning hard memories. “I watched that sweet boy turn into something icy and controlled because it was the only way to survive in his father’s house.”
“There were other women?” Louise kept her voice neutral, though her chest tightened at the thought.
Lady Merrow’s laugh held no humor. “Charles collected mistresses like some men collect art. Beautiful things to possess, enjoy, and discard when they no longer pleased him.”
“Aaron mentioned that his father wasn’t kind to them.”
“Kind.” Lady Merrow tested the word like something bitter. “The late Duke preferred not to leave marks that society might question. Oh, he struck women when he thought no one would know, when they were too powerless to speak of it. But his true cruelty lay in subtler destructions.”
Louise waited, sensing more beneath the careful words.
“He would lavish attention on them and make them feel like the center of the universe. Then, when they believed themselves special, irreplaceable, he would withdraw completely. Take a new mistress and flaunt her while the previous one still lived under his protection.” Lady Merrow’s grip on Buttercup’s lead tightened. “He destroyed them slowly, all while maintaining the appearance of a generous protector.”
“How horrible.”
“Aaron watched it all. A boy forced to witness his father’s casual cruelty, unable to intervene, learning that this was what powerful men did to women who trusted them.” Lady Merrow stopped walking, turning to face Louise fully. “Is it any wonder he fears becoming that man?”
Understanding flooded through Louise like ice water. Aaron’s hot and cold behavior, his desperate control, his insistence on maintaining boundaries even as he broke them.
He wasn’t rejecting her. He was terrified of becoming his father, of destroying her the way the late duke had destroyed so many others.
