Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
Hazel stood before the bookshelf for a long moment, letting her fingertips drift across the worn spines. Some titles were practical, such as histories, essays and journals, but one volume stood out at once. It boasted deep blue leather and a faded illustration of a ship embossed on the front.
The Mariner of Moonlit Haven: A Romantic Sea Adventure.
Hazel’s lips curved.
“Oh… I think I know what you might enjoy,” she murmured.
She retrieved the book carefully and almost reverently, then carried it to the chair beside the Dowager Duchess. The older woman watched her with a faint, curious tilt of her head. Her expression was still distant, but it was no longer clouded with such heavy sorrow.
Hazel settled into the chair and opened the first page. The typeface was charmingly old-fashioned, the kind that begged to be read aloud. So, she began.
Her voice was soft at first. It was hesitant and uncertain if she had any right to take up the space, but the words flowed beautifully.
It was the story of a daring young captain, a perilous storm at sea, and a mysterious island hidden by fog.
It was a tale meant for escapism, meant to lift one away from worry.
She hoped that it might lift the Dowager just a little.
A few minutes passed before Hazel sensed movement in the doorway.
She looked up just in time to see Mrs. Atherton arriving with a tray laden with tea, scones, and a small pot of jam.
Mrs. Atherton paused, beaming as she took in the scene: Hazel reading and the Dowager Duchess listening with softened eyes.
Hazel gave her a small, welcoming smile.
Mrs. Atherton returned it tenfold, in an expression bright enough to warm the entire house, before she silently set the tray on a nearby table.
She did not interrupt. She did not speak.
She simply nodded at Hazel with a look of heartfelt gratitude and slipped back out of the room.
Hazel’s chest tightened at the gesture. She continued reading. The Dowager Duchess’ gaze, once unfocused and distant, grew attentive. Her breathing steadied. The wrinkles between her brows eased. Even her posture seemed to shift, settling into the chair rather than leaning away from the world.
Hazel read on, allowing the rhythm of the sea and the promise of adventure to fill the space between them.
She stole a glance at the older woman now and then.
Each time, she found the sorrow lighter.
It was not gone, but it was gentler now.
And with every scene she spoke aloud, Hazel felt her own heart warm with purpose, with a quiet connection she did not need to understand to value.
Hazel had just begun the chapter where the hero was dangling from the mast in a gale, shouting poetic declarations into the storm, when suddenly, she heard movement. She glanced up for just a moment, only to see that the Dowager Duchess was standing.
Hazel’s breath caught in her throat. She instantly set the book aside, half-rising from her chair in alarm. “Oh, Your Grace, please… do you need—?”
But the older woman did not answer. She merely remained very still, her gaze drifting toward the tea tray as though contemplating an action she had not taken in a very long time.
Hazel froze. Mrs. Atherton had said she had good days. Perhaps this was one. Perhaps Hazel had unintentionally disrupted something fragile. The Dowager took one slow, deliberate step.
Hazel’s hands fluttered uncertainly above her lap. “Would you like me to—?”
The Dowager paused, not because she was unwell, but because Hazel had stopped reading.
“Oh,” Hazel whispered. “You want me to continue.”
The Dowager did not nod, nor speak, nor fully turn. But there was a stillness in her posture that Hazel recognized instantly. It was akin to a wordless request.
“All right,” she murmured, sinking carefully back into her seat. She lifted the book again. “Where was I… yes. The captain found his footing again, though the waves roared like living beasts…”
She read on. And slowly, with extraordinary effort and clear determination, the Dowager Duchess resumed her quiet journey across the room.
She took a step, then paused. Another step, and another pause.
All the while, Hazel continued reading.
With the last step, the Dowager reached the tea tray. She reached for the teapot with steady hands and then poured a delicate stream into one cup. Hazel faltered, stunned. But the Dowager only glanced over her shoulder, looking expectant. Hazel swallowed and resumed reading at once.
The older woman poured a second cup, placed both on the tray with careful precision, chose one for herself, and carried it back to her chair. She lowered herself slowly and elegantly. As she did so, the faintest sigh of effort left her lips.
Then she lifted her teacup and continued to listen. It was such a small thing, but it felt monumental. Hazel found her place in the book and continued.
“…and though the ship groaned beneath the wild winds, he swore he would not turn back, for somewhere in the Sapphire Isles awaited a fate he could not abandon…”
Hazel reached for her own teacup. The warmth seeped through her gloves, the taste sweet and smooth on her tongue.
But she didn’t stop reading, not for a single moment.
Because the Dowager Duchess was sitting beside her, with her eyes half-lowered in calm attention and her tea cradled in her hands, listening more closely than anyone had listened to Hazel in a long time.
Hazel turned the next page softly. She had just reached the part where the captain declared he would rather face a thousand tempests than abandon the mysterious heroine on the Sapphire Isles, when a soft knock sounded at the door.
Mrs. Atherton peeked in, then pressed her hand to her chest. “Oh…oh my.”
Hazel lowered the book slightly, smiling at her in quiet greeting.
The housekeeper stepped inside with the reverence of someone entering a chapel. “I am so sorry to interrupt, Your Grace,” she whispered, as though even her voice might disturb the fragile peace in the room, “but it is time for Her Grace to rest.”
Hazel nodded at once. “Of course.”
Mrs. Atherton approached the Dowager with gentle, practiced hands. But before she guided her away, she turned to Hazel and said in a trembling whisper. “I have not seen her look this lovely in… in ages.”
Hazel’s breath caught. The Dowager Duchess glanced at her then, and Hazel felt honored in a way she had not expected. Not as a duchess, not as Greyson’s wife, but as a guest permitted into something private, delicate, and deeply human.
She rose from her chair. “Thank you for allowing me to visit,” she said softly.
Mrs. Atherton shook her head with a flustered flutter of gestures. “Oh, Your Grace, no, no. Thank you. You have no idea how much this meant. I thought… I thought perhaps she would not take to you so quickly.” She wiped at her eyes discreetly. “No one has held her attention like this in years.”
Hazel’s heart clenched. Her gaze shifted to the Dowager, who had closed her eyes but still seemed peaceful.
Hazel swallowed, and her voice dropped to a quiet, earnest murmur. “Would it… would it be all right if I came again?”
Mrs. Atherton’s face lit up as though Hazel had offered to resurrect the sun itself.
“All right?” she repeated, nearly laughing from delight. “Your Grace, it would be wonderful. Oh, she would love that. I would love that. And His Grace—” She caught herself, suddenly proper. “Well… he would be grateful too, I am sure.”
Hazel’s stomach fluttered at the mention of Greyson, but she pushed the feeling aside. This was not about him. This was about his mother.
She smiled. “Then I shall return.”
Mrs. Atherton beamed, her joy so bright that Hazel felt warmed by it. “Whenever you wish, Your Grace. The door is always open to you.”
Hazel inclined her head in thanks, closing the book carefully and placing it on the table beside the Dowager’s chair. As Mrs. Atherton guided the older woman toward her room, Hazel lingered for a heartbeat longer. She had come here seeking distance. Instead, she had found a connection.
With a soft exhale, Hazel gathered her things and slipped quietly out of the room, already knowing she would return far sooner than she had planned.
Greyson stepped out of the carriage, holding a small bouquet of white frost lilies, delicate blooms that appeared for only three weeks in early spring.
His mother had always cherished them. As a child, he had clumsily gathered handfuls of them from the Callbury gardens. As a man grown, he bought them from the only hothouse in London capable of coaxing them into season early.
A gesture, perhaps, but an important one.
He ascended the steps to the townhouse and knocked. Mrs. Atherton opened the door almost immediately, beaming as though he had brought sunshine instead of flowers.
“Your Grace! What a lovely surprise. Twice the joy in one day.”
Greyson paused. “Twice?”
“Oh yes,” she said happily, stepping aside to usher him in. “It was wonderful of you both to visit on the same day, though truly,” she gave a light laugh, “you might have come together.”
Greyson stopped mid-stride.
“Both?” he echoed sharply. “Mrs. Atherton, who are you referring to?”
She blinked at him, but her smile was slowly faltering. “Why, your wife, of course.”
Greyson’s pulse lurched. “Hazel was here?”
Mrs. Atherton’s cheerful expression dimmed into uncertainty. “Yes… Oh dear, is something the matter?”
Greyson stared, momentarily unable to answer. Hazel was here, in his mother’s private sanctuary, the one place he had never brought anyone but Jasper.
“My wife came here?” he said again, slower this time, feeling the words heavy in his throat.
“Yes, Your Grace,” Mrs. Atherton said softly. “Just earlier this afternoon.”
Greyson struggled for composure. “How did it happen? What… prompted her to come?”
“Oh, well,” Mrs. Atherton began, brightening again as the memory returned, “Her Grace knocked on the door, and I let her in, and she sat with the Dowager for over an hour. Read to her from that sea adventure she loves. The Mariner of Moonlit Haven, you know the one.”
Greyson did know it. His mother had read it three times in a single summer, delighted by every improbable storm.
Mrs. Atherton continued, her voice warm and full of awe. “I have not seen Her Grace, the Dowager, I mean, look so peaceful in years. She even poured tea herself.”
Greyson’s throat tightened painfully.
“She poured tea herself,” he repeated, barely above a whisper.
“Oh yes,” Mrs. Atherton said, pressing a hand to her heart. “Your wife has an effect on people. A gentle one. Her Grace was… different today… lighter.” She hesitated, then added with soft sincerity. “Your mother enjoyed every moment of her visit.”
Greyson stood very still. Hazel had come here of her own accord. She had sat with his mother. She had read to her, stayed long enough to bring quiet into a room where grief had lived for years.
He closed his eyes, a breath leaving him in a slow, unsteady rush.
He thought of Hazel with her soft voice, Hazel who mothered everyone she met without meaning to, Hazel who would throw herself between the world and anyone who needed her.
And she had gone to his mother when he had barely mentioned his mother to her.
Mrs. Atherton stepped closer. “Your Grace… are you well?”
Greyson opened his eyes. A dozen emotions surged: relief, gratitude, confusion and something dangerously close to awe. But, above them all was one razor-sharp realization. Hazel had done this, without being asked, simply because caring for others was as natural to her as breathing.
“Yes,” he said finally. “Quite well.”
Mrs. Atherton smiled again, reassured. Greyson looked down at the bouquet in his hands, at the frost lilies he had believed would be the brightest part of his mother’s day. But Hazel had already brought her far more.
“I should like to see my mother,” he said quietly.
“Of course, Your Grace,” Mrs. Atherton replied, stepping aside. “She is resting now. But she will be very happy to know you’ve come.”
Greyson nodded. As he crossed the threshold into the sunlit room where his mother slept, he couldn’t stop thinking about Hazel’s visit. She had changed something in his world today. And he doubted he would ever be able to look at her the same way again.