“Watch your tongue, dear,” the dowager duchess said mildly, her hands never faltering as she stitched a tidy spray of violets.
Anastasia sighed. “Embroidery is just so dreadful. Why do men get all the fun activities while we sit here, poking at fabric?”
Aunt Hyacinth chuckled, still focused on her work. “It is an essential skill that eligible young ladies should have. Men admire women who are good with needlework.”
Anastasia huffed, stabbing the hoop as though it had personally offended her. “Well, that is just positively criminal. If I were ever to take holy vows, they should not be for chastity or poverty or obedience, but for a lifelong abstention from needlework.”
Aunt Hyacinth lifted her brows in that particularly arched way only widows of a certain age seemed to master. “Youexaggerate.”
“I do not think I do, Aunt. I am certain more young ladies than you imagine despise needlework just as much as I do. They lack the courage to say so. It is only right.”
Aunt Hyacinth sighed, though her needle kept its steady, graceful rhythm. The sun streamed through the tall windows of the solar, glancing off the spines of books and casting golden light across Anastasia’s lap, where unruly skeins of thread tangled themselves. She jabbed at the hoop with more force than grace, attacking the linen as though it were a sworn enemy.
If the Duke saw this, he would scowl for an hour. And I would almost welcome it. Anything to break this dreadful silence.
It had been several days since Benedict’s departure, and Frostmore felt strangely hollow without him. The corridors were too still, the meals too predictable. She would never admit it aloud, but she found herself missing him—not fondly, of course, but in the way one might miss a thunderstorm after too many days of dull skies. His composure had been maddening, yet it had given shape to her days. Without it, she felt unmoored.
At last, her aunt leaned over to inspect her work, and—shockingly—laughed. A warm, unguarded laugh that made Anastasia blink in surprise.
“My dear girl, what is this?” Aunt Hyacinth dabbed delicately at her eyes. “No lady in her right mind would choose such colors. It looks like… a riot upon the canvas.”
“It is a sunset,” Anastasia said defensively, turning the hoop for inspection. The stitches were uneven, the hues clashing boldly, but to her mind, it was full of life.
Aunt Hyacinth shook her head in amusement. “Wild imagination, indeed. A proper lady would have stitched roses.”
“I thought this would look more impressive. A sunset is far more memorable than another dull bouquet.”
“Speaking of memorable things, Anastasia. You might have spoken more kindly when Mr. Gray called yesterday. It was no small thing, his traveling all this way.”
Anastasia’s needle stilled mid-stitch. “Mr. Gray called… on me?”
“On Benedict’s instructions, I suspect. No one else would have thought of inviting a gentleman so far from London for tea. And he definitely did not come all the way here for me.”
Ah. Of course. Even in his absence, Benedict found ways to manage her fate. The realization stung more than she cared to admit.
“He is considered eligible,” her aunt continued gently. “Well placed, with steady prospects.”
“He was polite,” Anastasia allowed, though her lips quirked faintly. “But if you had heard him speak, Aunt… You would think he wanted a wife with less wit than the furniture. He barely drew breath long enough for me to answer. If the Duke sent him as some sort of trial, then I failed it most spectacularly.”
Her aunt gave her a long look, half exasperated, half amused.
Anastasia shrugged a little sheepishly. “I tried, truly I did. But I could no more sit quietly under his endless lectures than I could sew roses instead of sunsets.”
“Well, I have to admit that it does look… unique.”
Anastasia’s lips curved despite herself as she turned her attention back to her work. “I wonder what His Grace would say if he saw it.”
Her aunt’s brows rose, but Anastasia hurried to add, “Not that it matters,” hoping that this would quell any thought that had taken shape in her aunt’s mind. “Why should I care what he thinks? It amuses me, that is all. He carries himself as though he were a god and the earth were just a mere universe he had found himself in.”
And still… I like imagining his face when he sees it—disapproving, severe. It is very diverting to picture him frowning at every stitch.
Even though he was certainly not kind to her, he did not do what others did. He did not drag up her past and use it like a weapon, did not look at her as though her scandal were the sum of her. When he judged her, it was for what she did—her words, her choices, her behavior—and there was something almost clean about that. Honest. Dangerous, too. And when she managed to earn his disapproval on her own terms, the thrill of it was sharp and unsettling—as though she had found a way to matter to him without ever meaning to.
Aunt Hyacinth gave her a look that was far too knowing. Anastasia shifted in her chair, heat rising in her cheeks.
“Do not look at me that way, Aunt.”
“Which way?”
