Page 70 of Lord Hartwell’s Refuge

Tamsin looked down at Athena, walking next to her on a loose lead. Behind them about ten paces followed Jones, the groom. Apollo was with Roman, somewhere, but she’d begun taking Athena on walks. She admitted one thing more to her friend. “And…and he was right about Anne.”

Matilda made a small sound.

Tamsin narrowed her eyes. “You needn’t sound quite so pleased about it.”

Her friend grinned. “I said nothing.”

“You made a sound.”

“I breathed!” the widow protested.

“I would describe that as a rather critical breath, then.”

Matilda’s eyes sparkled impishly. She was so much more expressive than her brother. “I have known you for a great many years. You ought to be accustomed to the sound of my breathing by now.”

Tamsin tried not to smile, and failed. It felt good, in all honesty, to share in the amusement. With things strained between herself and Roman the past two days, she’d needed this escape.

Not that things were unpleasant. Roman had been unfailingly courteous when she saw him. So had she.

Courtesy was an extraordinarily poor substitute for the easy companionship, once one had swiftly grown accustomed to the latter.

“She does depend upon me too much,” Tamsin admitted at last. “Anne, I mean.”

“Yes.” Matilda continued twirling the handle of her parasol.

The quickness of that single word made Tamsin frown. “You might have pretended to consider before agreeing.”

“Why would I do that, Tamsin? You already know my opinion.”

“Do I?”

This time, Matilda huffed and stepped off the path toward one of the benches. “Come and sit for a moment. Enjoy the view of the boats going by on the river. I always do.” Once they were both on the bench, Athena sitting happily at her mistress’s side, her friend took up the conversation again. “Tamsin, Anne Mayweather has expected you to look after all her problems since we were girls.”

Her stomach twisted somewhat unpleasantly. “No, she has not.”

Matilda turned fully toward her, brows raised high.

Family loyalty meant something here, surely. Tamsin cast about for a more truthful and honest answer which did not feel like a direct criticism of her stepmother. “Well. She has not expected me to take care of all of them.”

Another look, accompanied by a slight flaring of her friend’s nostrils. How did Matilda manage to make that look sophisticated rather than foolish?

“Matilda.” Tamsin crossed her arms, accidentally tugging Athena’s lead. The dog turned her head, too, so both her walking companions were staring at her.

Airily, her friend shrugged her shoulders. “I am merely breathing again.”

“Do stop it, then.”

That made Matilda smirk. “I think it is a rather essential function to continue living, dear friend.”

Tamsin adjusted the dog’s lead again, folding her hands more demurely in her lap. “My stepmother has never been cruel,” she said after a moment.

That brought a different sort of sigh from her friend, one far more long-suffering. Of course. Matilda’s mother was quite similar to Anne Mayweather in a number of ways. “No. That is true.”

“And she loves us. Even though I am her stepdaughter,” Tamsin added, “she has never made that a slight in our household. Not common, I am given to believe, with stepmothers.”

“I know.” Matilda closed her parasol and laid it across her lap, her gaze drifting to the boats on the river.

“She simply becomes…overwhelmed.” Tamsin looked up at the trees lining the path, their leaves now entirely yellow and waiting to fall as the weather grew cooler.