***
Daniel stood at the window and watched her go.
He had not meant to come to the morning room. He had been closeted in his study for days, avoiding everyone, trying to convince himself that he had made the right decision. He had taken his meals alone, refused all visitors, rebuffed every attempt Rosanne made to draw him out.
But this morning, something had driven him from his refuge. A restlessness he could not name, an ache he could not soothe. He had told himself he was merely going to speak with Rosanne about household matters, that it had nothing to do with the faint hope that Lillian might be there.
And then she had been there. Sitting in his morning room, looking beautiful and composed and utterly unattainable. Looking at him with those steady eyes that had always seemed to see straight through to his soul.
He had frozen. All the careful words he had prepared, all the cold formality he had practised, had evaporated in an instant. He had said her name,Lillian,and watched her flinch at the intimacy of it.
I hope your father continues to improve.
Heavens, what a coward he was. She had been standing there, waiting for him to say something meaningful, something that acknowledged what had passed between them, and that was the best he could manage. A polite inquiry. A formal courtesy. The words of a stranger.
He had seen her face when she turned to leave. He had seen the hurt she was trying so hard to hide, the tears she was fighting to contain. He had done that to her. He had taken the warmth and hope she had offered him and crushed it beneath the weight of his own fear.
And now she was gone. The gig was disappearing down the drive, carrying her away from him, and he was standing at the window like the coward wretch he was, watching her go and doing nothing to stop her.
Call her back, whispered a voice in his mind.Go after her. Tell her you are sorry, that you were wrong, that you love her still.
But he could not. The fear was too strong, the walls too high. He had spent so many years building those walls, and he did not know how to tear them down.
He did not know if he even wanted to.
"That was cruel."
Rosanne's voice came from behind him, sharp with anger. He turned to find her standing in the doorway, her small hands clenched into fists at her sides.
"Rosanne….."
"No. Do not start, Daniel." She advanced into the room, her eyes blazing. "I have watched you hide in your study for four days. I have watched you refuse to see her, refuse to speak to her, refuse to acknowledge that she even exists. And now—now you walk into a room where she is sitting, and you speak to her as though she were no one. As though she meant nothing to you."
"She does not."
"Do not lie to me!" Rosanne's voice cracked. "I have known you my entire life, Daniel. I have watched you guard yourself against every human connection, every possibility of warmth or happiness. And I have watched you fall in love with Lillian Whitcombe despite every defence you possess. You cannot tell me she means nothing to you. I will not believe it."
Daniel turned back to the window. The gig had vanished now, swallowed by the grey morning. Lillian was gone.
"It does not matter what I feel," he said quietly. "It cannot matter."
"Why? Because of our parents? Because you are terrified of becoming them?" Rosanne came to stand beside him, her reflection visible in the glass. "Daniel, you have spent your entire life trying to be the opposite of Father. Cold where he was passionate, controlled where he was volatile. But in doing so, you have become something just as damaged. A man so afraid of feeling that he would rather destroy his own happiness than risk being hurt."
"You do not understand."
"I understand better than you think." Her voice softened, losing some of its edge. "I grew up in the same house, Daniel. I witnessed the same arguments, the same chaos, the same destruction. But I did not draw the same conclusions you did. I did not decide that the solution was to feel nothing at all."
"Then what did you decide?"
"That love does not have to be like theirs. That passion does not have to mean destruction. That it is possible, it must be possible, to care for someone deeply without losing yourself in the process." She reached out and touched his arm. "Lillian is not our mother, Daniel. She is steady and calm and practical. She would not consume you. She would ground you."
"You do not know that."
"I knowher. And I know you." Rosanne's grip tightened. "You have been happier than I have ever seen you. Not deliriously happy, not the manic joy that Father sometimes displayed; but quietly, steadily happier. More present. More alive. And it is because of Lillian."
Daniel said nothing. He could not deny it. He could not deny that Lillian's presence in his life had changed something fundamental, had opened windows in the dark house of his soul that he had not even known existed.
But that was precisely why he had to let her go.
