“But you are not free. You are more bound now than ever to your guilt. Misplaced guilt, if you ask me. And she is not free either. She does not want this. She does not want to be apart.”
“And you know this how?” he asked, slightly amused as he looked at the woman who had been like a second mother—or maybe grandmother—to him.
“I know it because I received a letter from the convent. As you may remember, long ago, I was a lady’s maid to a baron’s daughter. She is a nun now at that very convent.”
“Oh yes,” he said. “I remember you mentioned it.”
Mrs. Greaves nodded.
“And she knows my wife?”
“She knows her well. And she believes that Lady Wexford is as wretchedly unhappy as you are. That she may regret having runaway, but that she does not wish to return out of fear of how she will be received, and how your future might look given your reluctance to allow happiness into your heart.”
“It is not that I will not allow happiness into my heart,” Lucien said. “It is that I am guilty of wrecking the life of one young woman, and I do not wish to?—”
“But you are,” Mrs. Greaves said bluntly. “You are wrecking it at this very moment. I am blunt, I know it. And you may dismiss me from service if you like, but you must hear this. It was never your fault that what happened to your wife. Your marriage was an ill-conceived one from the beginning. Lady Arabella was an ill fit for you, and you for her. It was neither one of your faults. It was not her fault for seeking happiness, even if she did it in the wrong way. And it was not your fault for letting her go.”
“I could’ve stopped her that night,” said Lucien desperately. “I could’ve forced the carriage to stop, asked her to stay until the storm had passed. I could’ve told her that I would let her go to be with her lover if she wished, if she waited until morning when it was safe.”
“You could have, but she never listened to you. She made up her own mind. She would likely have gone anyway. In any case, you couldn’t have known what was going to happen. How could you have known that the carriage would turn over and she would die? You couldn’t have. Nobody could have.”
He knew this was true. He had heard Rhys tell him this. He had heard Mrs. Greaves tell him before as well. And yet somehow,this time, the words landed differently. Because the truth was, he had already understood this. He had known it.
He couldn’t have prevented Arabella from leaving, and he couldn’t have prevented the carriage from crashing. However, he had already repeated the mistakes he had made then with Marianne. Because he could have stopped her from going. He could have acted differently. He could have been honest with her. He could’ve told her what was holding him back. And he hadn’t.
“Mrs. Greaves, I am grateful for your kindness and that you are trying to fix what has been broken yet again. However, Lady Wexford and I do not have a future.”
“But you could. And you’re throwing it away over old guilt. You and she both. You have both been foolish. She ran away instead of trying again. And you pushed her away because the walls around your heart have grown so high that you can barely see past them. You have a chance. She thinks of you still. Sister Bernadette told me. Go to the convent and speak to her. Win her back.”
Lucien chewed the inside of his lip. He couldn’t go, could he? He couldn’t arrive and confront her once more. See her again when all she wanted was peace and quiet. When she wanted solitude. He could not force his presence upon her. And yet... What if she loved him as much as he loved her? What if she missed him as much? He hadn’t had a chance to tell her the truth. He would have. He would’ve revealed the depth of his heart to her, but she had already made her decision. And he had given up.
Arabella had rejected him so many times, and then the moment he had heard that Marianne was going back to the convent, he had been reminded of all that pain and all that rejection.
How must she have felt the many times he rejected her? He closed his eyes. He had done to her what Arabella had done to him. But then, there hadn’t been a chance for him and Arabella to reconcile because they never had anything between them. Nothing truly. Nothing but duty. But there was a chance here, wasn’t there? And he would be a fool not to take it.
He looked up. “Will you look after Henry for a few days?”
“Of course I will,” Mrs. Greaves said. “And if I may say so, going after her is the only right thing.”
He nodded and got up, hoping that he was right to take her advice.
CHAPTER 33
MARIANNE
Marianne sat in the common room, sewing a small linen shirt for one of the orphans. Around her, the other women worked quietly. She sat between Juliet and Sister Mary Agnes. Across from them was a new girl. She could not have been above seventeen, belly swollen, eyes always red, just as so many other unfortunate souls before her.
“You're getting quite good at that,” Sister Mary Agnes said, looking at Marianne's stitches. They were sewing items for the orphanage for winter. The work had always steadied her. Using her fingers to create something useful had always been her way of quieting her troubled mind.
Once, she had felt the same when in the chapel, when doing menial tasks, but this time around, such solace eluded her. It had taken time to come to terms with this reality. She had supposed the peace would return the moment she stepped through the doors, but no.
“Thank you,” Marianne said. “Though I'm nowhere near as good as you.”
“Nonsense. You have a gentle hand. That's what matters. You will do well if you choose to remain here with us.”
Juliet snorted but said nothing. Marianne knew what she was thinking. That they were biding their time here. Marianne was not going to take her vows. But she couldn't return either. Even though foolish fancies of Lucien had plagued her nights. Thoughts she'd pushed away the moment they surfaced. But thoughts that left an echo anyhow.
Even during the daylight hours, now her mind kept drifting back to Wexford Hall. To Henry. To Lucien. What were they doing? Did the boy pine for her? Did Lucien think of her at all, or had he moved on, relieved to be free of her presence?
