Chapter Two
The night at Greystone Hall was quiet in a manner Serena had not expected.
In her previous positions, there had always been noise, the bustle of servants, the sounds of a village or a city, the steady hum of a household in motion.
Here, the silence was nearly complete, broken only by the occasional creak of old timber settling and the distant hoot of an owl somewhere in the gardens below.
Serena lay awake, staring at the ceiling, and tried to persuade herself to sleep.
She was only just beginning to drift when she heard it, a small sound, barely audible through the wall separating her room from Rosie’s. A whimper, perhaps. Or a muffled sob.
She was out of bed before she had consciously resolved to move, her feet finding the cold floor, her hands reaching for her wrapper. She paused at Rosie’s door, listening.
The sounds were clearer now. Rosie was crying, not the loud, broken sobs of a child’s tantrum, but something quieter and far more distressing. It was the sound of grief held inside for too long and no longer contained.
Serena opened the door.
The room lay in shadow, lit only by the pale glow of moonlight through the window. Rosie was curled in her bed, Marianne clutched to her chest, her small body trembling with the force of her tears.
“Rosie,” Serena said softly as she crossed to the bed. “Rosie, my dear, what is it?”
The little girl looked up, her face wet and stricken. “I want my mama,” she whispered. “I want my mama to come back.”
Something in Serena’s chest, that carefully guarded place she had sworn to protect, cracked just a little.
“Oh, sweetheart.” She sat on the edge of the bed, and when Rosie reached for her, Serena gathered the child into her arms without hesitation. “I know. I know you do.”
“She promised,” Rosie sobbed, her words muffled against Serena’s shoulder. “She promised she would always come back. But she didn’t. She went away and she didn’t come back and I waited and waited and she never came.”
Serena closed her eyes, holding the small, shaking body close. There were no words that could make this right. No comfort that could undo the cruelty of a promise broken by death. All she could offer was presence, the simple and insufficient gift of being there.
“I know,” she said again. “I know it hurts. It is the worst kind of hurt.”
“Did your mama go away too?”
The question was so innocent and so direct that Serena felt her breath catch.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “When I was a little girl. She went away too.”
Rosie pulled back a little, looking up at her with red-rimmed eyes. “Did you cry?”
“Very much.”
“Did it stop hurting?”
Serena considered the question with care. She could lie, could offer the comforting fiction that time healed all wounds and that the pain would disappear. But she had learned long ago that children recognised falsehood, and that even well-meant lies only deepened the hurt.
“It changes,” she said at last. “It does not stop, not entirely. But it changes. The hurt becomes softer, gentler. You learn to carry it, instead of letting it carry you.”
Rosie’s brow furrowed as she tried to understand. “Like carrying Marianne?”
Serena smiled despite herself. “Yes. Very much like that.”
The little girl was quiet for a moment, thinking. Then, in a voice that was very small, she asked, “Will you stay?”
There it was. The question Serena had been dreading, the one she could not answer honestly without dismantling her own carefully constructed defences.
“I will stay as long as you need me,” she said, and told herself it was not quite the same as promising forever.
Rosie appeared satisfied. She nestled closer, her grip on Marianne loosening, and allowed Serena to stroke her hair in slow, gentle motions.
“Miss Collard?”
“Yes, my dear?”
“You smell nice. Like flowers.”
Serena felt her heart give a little more. “It is lavender. I put it in my soap.”
“I like it,” Rosie murmured, her voice already drowsy. “Mama smelled like roses. But lavender is nice too.”
Within minutes, the little girl was asleep, her breath evening out into the slow, steady rhythm of childhood slumber. Serena continued to hold her for a while longer, not wanting to risk waking her, not wanting to let go.
She was still sitting there, Rosie curled against her chest, when she became aware that she was being watched.
She looked up.
Lord Greystone stood in the doorway.
He was dressed informally, in shirtsleeves without a cravat, his hair disordered, and he was looking at her with an expression she could not easily name. Surprise, perhaps. Or something more complex.
“I—pardon me,” he said quietly. “I came to…” He stopped, his gaze settling on the sleeping child in Serena’s arms. Something passed over his face, raw and painful, and then was gone.
“She had a nightmare,” Serena said softly. “She is sleeping now.”
He inclined his head, but did not move. He remained in the doorway, as though he wished to come closer and could not bring himself to cross the threshold.
“She has them often,” he said after a moment, clearing his throat.
“I am sorry to hear that, my lord,” she said quietly. “The truth is, children who have suffered loss often do.”
Something flickered in his grey eyes. Guilt, she thought. Guilt for being unable to prevent them, or perhaps simply for being alive when his brother was not.
“I should have…” He stopped again, his jaw tightening. “I ought to help with these things. I am their guardian. I am supposed to…”
“My lord,” Serena said, her voice quiet but firm. “You cannot mend everything. Some wounds can only be tended, over time, and with patience.”
He looked at her then, truly looked at her, as though seeing her clearly for the first time. For a brief moment, the mask he wore slipped, revealing the exhausted and grieving man beneath.
“You speak with great certainty,” he said.
“I have some experience with wounds, my lord.”
Silence settled between them, weighted with all that remained unsaid. At last Lord Greystone nodded once and stepped back from the doorway.
“Good night, Miss Collard. I trust you can manage from here.”
“I can, my lord. Good night.”
He turned and walked away, his footsteps fading into the stillness of the sleeping house.
Serena remained where she was, holding Rosie and watching the empty doorway.
She had come to Greystone Hall expecting difficulty.
She had expected grief-stricken children, a distant employer, and the familiar challenges of her profession.
What she had not expected, what she could not have anticipated, was the way Lord Greystone had looked at her just now.
The way he had stood in the doorway, wishing to help and not knowing how, longing for connection and yet afraid to attempt it.
He was as wounded as his nieces and nephew, Serena realised. As lost, as lonely, and as in need of being seen.
And that, she thought as she finally laid Rosie back against her pillows and tucked the blankets carefully around her small body, was a very dangerous thing to notice.