Page 53 of A Bachelor’s Lessons in Love

“Once thought?” she echoed the word, puzzled.

The man’s gaze lifted, his eyes meeting hers, and the moment stretched between them. Long, and heavy with something unspoken. For the first time since the previous night, Felicity saw something as potent as anger and frustration, but an entirely different emotion. Something more dangerous. Something she did not dare name, even as her heart sped up.

Edward was the first to look away, returning his attention to Voltaire’s mane. “I will do better,” he said at last, his voice quieter than before. “For Daphne’s sake. But I cannot, will not apologize for protecting her.”

Felicity considered him for a moment, letting her pulse slow to normal. Then, slowly, she stepped away from the stall. “Then I suppose we understand each other.”

“It seems we do, Captain.”

“Good.” She turned. “I will see you at dinner, then.” Felicity walked down the central walkway of the stables and back into the morning light. She didn’t look over her shoulder once. But she felt his gaze following her long after she left the stables.

* * *

Hours later, Felicity and her niece were in the drawing room, Daphne seated by the window, embroidering handkerchiefs with colorful flowers to match the younger woman’s gowns for the season.

For Felicity, it was slow going. She enjoyed embroidery, generally, as it let her mind rest while her fingers worked. Today, however, her thoughts kept distracting her. Every jab of the needle made her think about Edward—not that she wanted to stick him with a pin or anything. Not anymore. But it felt somewhat satisfying to think of his stubbornness every time she pushed the needle through the cotton.

Except when she lifted the handkerchief to examine her work, her apron came up with it.

Felicity groaned. She hadn’t made such a novice error in… Well. She didn’t know how long it had been.

“I suppose it serves me right,” she muttered, giving the hoop a tug and realizing it would be best to remove the thread more delicately. “Daphne, darling. Your scissors?”

Her niece did not answer.

Felicity looked up. “Daphne?”

The young woman’s embroidery hoop lay cast aside on the table beside her. Her hands were folded in her lap, fingers twitching as though she wished for a more interesting way to employ them.

Felicity had seen that exact expression before, years ago; when Daphne had been eight years old, made to sit through an unbearably long sermon, and had nearly vibrated with impatience in the pew beside her.

But this was not the same child who had once tugged at Felicity’s sleeve and whispered shy complaints about the length of the vicar’s droning voice. Daphne was nearly grown, and her frustration was not born of childish restlessness but of something far weightier.

“You’re brooding,” Felicity said lightly, putting her hoop and apron down.

Daphne huffed, her breath fogging the glass where she leaned against the windowpane. “I am thinking.”

“Thinking usually requires less glaring at the garden below.”

Daphne turned her head slightly, enough to give Felicity a sidelong glance. “Does it?”

Felicity smiled despite herself, but she knew better than to tease overly much. She had been a young woman once, hemmed in by rules, watched too closely, told that everything was for her own good.

She rested her hands over her skirts, studying the profile of her nearly grown niece with a tender heart. “Shall I guess the subject of your brooding thoughts?”

Daphne sighed, finally turning fully from the window. “Do you think I am foolish?”

The question took Felicity aback. “Foolish? Of course not. I have always thought you rather level-headed. Intelligent, too.”

“That is not how he treats me.”

Felicity did not need to ask who she meant.

Daphne crossed her arms, her expression tightening. “He—Colonel Halstead—watches me as if I am a child who might put a pin in her mouth and swallow it. It is growing intolerable.”

Felicity inhaled slowly, considering. Though she agreed with her niece, it would not do to encourage such thoughts about the girl’s guardian. They were, after all, supposed to be united. “You are frustrated,” she said at last. “That is understandable.”

Daphne let out a short, breathy laugh. “I have been almost continually frustrated. I must be beyond that by now.”