“No. There’s only two options here. Either it is all a misunderstanding, and he’s not put forth the effort to clear it up—and doesn’t deserve you. Or he’s done wrong, and he knows he doesn’t deserve you,” Bash insisted, gaze determined.
“He doesn’t know, though. I never told him I?—”
“Know you grew up under your ma and pa’s great love story, but sometimes love’s not enough. Sometimes the bastard and the lady don’t live happily ever after. Sometimes the world’s just too broken for it. And if it is, then the next man will love you even better.”
“Bash, please. You could come with?—”
“No. I let you and your sister run roughshod all over me—but not when your safety is at risk. Now, if you agree to sneak back into bed without a fuss, I’ll not tell your pa what you were up to. That’s the best I can offer you. He trusts me to prevent trouble. I don’t mean to disappoint him.”
Eliza ground her teeth together and barely resisted the urge to stomp her foot in a petulant display. “Don’t be surprised if Sophie makes your life a misery next time we’re at the club.”
“Soph’s been making my life a misery since the day I met her. Off to bed with you.” He grabbed her around the shoulders and spun her back in the direction she’d come from, then marched her to the gate.
“Bash,” she protested one last time.
“Bleeding hell, woman. Go to bed!” he ordered with a final shove.
Defeated, Eliza trudged back into the house. She made no attempt to hide from any of the servants milling about. What would be the point? Bash wouldn’t abandon his post tonight for anything.
She crawled back into her bed, refusing to give further contemplation to Bash’s words even as they swirled through her mind. He was wrong—he must be. Benedict did care for her. She’d never been more certain of anything. No one could speak to her, look at her, kiss her, touch her with such tenderness, devotion, and passion and remain ambivalent.
It was impossible.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Benedict spentas little of the next day indoors as possible. After a sleepless night, he rose with the sun to explore the grounds.
Fog had a tendency to linger in the valleys, including the one his home occupied. Thick wisps danced around him as he strode through it, soft and dreamy—like the silk of Eliza’s nightdress.
He instantly shook that thought away and decided to distract himself by felling the rotting oak a few miles down the long drive. He’d ignored it for far too long, but that morning, the promised satisfaction of axe against wood overpowered his usual disinterest in such a task.
Benedict rounded the house, seeking the old gardener’s shed—long unused by anyone, save himself and occasionally the elder Weston, who still occupied the stable master’s cottage despite the meager and infrequent pay.
And then his eyes landed on it.
Tucked away in a quiet corner, half shaded by a small copse of overgrown trees, was a greenhouse. His feet took him toward the structure without the slightest permission from his head.
It was tall, with elegant arched panes cast in iron. The roof peaked at a central decorative pinnacle adorned with scrollwork.Nature and neglect had left their mark: the glass clouded and cracked, and the framework rusting.
Once, nearly three decades ago, the structure had been a source of beauty, a retreat for his mother from the devastation that was her marriage. Benedict could still recall the fresh, earthy scent of the kitchen herbs entwined with the powdery whisper of his mother’s flowers. Suddenly, with a fierceness that surprised him, he craved her arms around him.
He shook off the unexpected melancholy as he turned the handle and opened the door. Far from the dreamy, nostalgic scent of his memories, a wave of decaying, musty dampness smacked Benedict. Fallen leaves crackled beneath his boots as he toed his way inside. A long wooden table topped with terracotta pots lined one glass wall. Once, they had held something beautiful.
There was a metaphor there—Sinclair men and the harm they brought upon the women in their lives. Benedict was too tired to flesh it out, but the sentiment remained. He could only hope that the people in Eliza’s life who cared for her would repair the damage he’d wrought. No one had been around to save his mother’s gentle heart from his father.
Benedict started to turn around, to escape this prison of loving memories and impossible dreams, but a flash of purple caught his attention. No, not purple.Violet.
In the dirt between the slate slabs lining the earthen floor was a tiny violet. Breathless, Benedict knelt to examine it. He wished desperately that he knew the name Eliza had used for this specific variety as he caressed one delicate petal with a fingertip. It was silky, nearly as tender and graceful as Eliza’s neck beneath his lips.
There, kneeling among decades of decaying earth, Benedict finally allowed his heart to crack open. His chest burned for thepain he’d caused his Eliza even as he finally acknowledged the devastation of his own loss.
His violet was lost to him—the only person who had ever touched him with kindness, with such trust and love as he had never known. How was he to live each day knowing she was never to be his? And because of his own choices… It was a cruel fate indeed—certainly one he had more than earned.
The irony hadn’t escaped Benedict. Were he a better man, a man free from vengeance, he never would have known her, never looked at her twice. And that would have been the greater loss. Yes, the only thing worse than having lost Eliza would have been never to have known her at all.
Slowly, with sore knees and chest, Benedict rose and abandoned the greenhouse—only for a moment.
He returned quickly with a broom and began the meditative task of sweeping away the cobwebs from the corners and the leaves from the floor—careful to avoid his precious violet.
