Chapter Eighteen
Serena found Ella in the schoolroom, reading a book with the particular intensity that suggested she was using literature to escape from something.
“Ella.” Serena kept her voice gentle. “May I speak with you for a moment?”
The girl looked up, and Serena saw at once that something had already shifted. Ella’s grey eyes—so like her uncle’s—were watchful now, guarded, as though bracing herself.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong, precisely.” Serena crossed to the table and sat opposite her. “But there is something you ought to know. Your aunt and uncle—Lady Crane and Sir Harold Crane—are coming to visit. They will arrive on Thursday.”
Ella’s expression closed. The open, curious child who had begun to re-emerge over recent weeks withdrew behind familiar defences, replaced by the composed, prematurely knowing girl Serena had first encountered.
“Aunt Elspeth,” Ella said flatly. “I see.”
“I see you remember her well.”
“I do.” Ella closed her book, her movements careful and controlled.
“She and Mama were sisters, but they were not... they were not close. Aunt Elspeth thought Mama married beneath her. She never said so outright, but I could always tell. The way she looked at Papa. The way she spoke of our house. The way she—” She broke off, her jaw tightening.
Serena waited.
After a moment, Ella went on more quietly.
“After the funeral, she wanted us to go to Bath and live with her. She said it would be better for us—that Uncle Nate was too young, too irresponsible, that we belonged with family. She said Mama would have wanted it.” Her hands curled into fists on the tabletop.
“She said many things about Uncle Nate. None of them kind.”
A chill traced Serena’s spine. “What did your uncle say?”
“He showed her the will. Papa named him guardian, not her.” Ella looked up, and there was something unsettlingly adult in her gaze. “She was furious.” A beat. “She isn’t coming merely to visit, is she, Miss Collard? She’s coming to try to take us away.”
Serena longed to deny it—to offer easy reassurance, comforting falsehoods. But she had promised herself, and the children, that she would not lie to them.
“I cannot say for certain what her intentions are,” Serena replied carefully.
“But your uncle is concerned. He wishes to ensure that everything here is beyond reproach while she is present—that the household runs smoothly, that you are well cared for, and that there is nothing she might seize upon.”
“Because if she finds fault, she will use it against him.” It was not phrased as a question.
“Perhaps.”
Ella absorbed this in silence. Then she said quietly, “We cannot let her take us. This is our home. Uncle Nate is our family. I know he struggled before—but he’s better now. He has been, for weeks. Ever since you came.”
The words cut deep. Ever since you came. And now—because of her—everything stood in jeopardy.
“I know,” Serena said softly. “And I promise you, Ella, I will do everything in my power to ensure you remain here, with your uncle, where you belong.”
“You won’t leave?” Ella’s voice wavered, the child breaking through the composure. “Promise me you won’t go. Not while she’s here. Not—” She swallowed. “Not ever.”
Serena’s heart clenched. She thought of the letter she might one day have to write, of the farewell she might one day be forced to make. Of Nathaniel’s request for restraint, for distance, for the quiet erasure of what lay between them.
But she looked at Ella—brave, frightened, trying so hard to be strong—and knew she could not abandon them now.
“I promise,” she said. “I am not going anywhere.”
Ella studied her face intently, searching for any hint of evasion. At last, she nodded.
“Good. Then we have work to do.” She straightened, resolve settling over her features. “Aunt Elspeth notices everything—dust on the mantels, creases in the linen, scuffed floors. If we mean to give her nothing to criticise, everything must be immaculate.”
“That is a very sound assessment.”
“And Samuel and Rosie must be prepared—Samuel especially. He has been doing so well, but if Aunt Elspeth presses him, if she tries to force conversation…” Ella frowned. “He might retreat again.”
Serena reached across the table and laid her hand over Ella’s. “We will not allow that. We shall prepare them gently, and remind them—again and again—that they are safe, and loved, whatever happens.”
“And Uncle Nate?” Ella asked, striving for casualness. “Will you make sure he is prepared? When he is under strain, he sometimes withdraws.”
Serena thought of Nathaniel’s face as he handed her the letter—the fear, the resolve, the fierce need to protect.
“Your uncle understands the stakes,” she said. “He is determined to safeguard you all.”
“I know.” Ella’s expression softened. “He has changed, hasn’t he? Since you came. He’s more like himself. Like before.”
Serena wondered if Ella realised just how true that was.
“Your uncle loves you very deeply,” she said, choosing the one truth she could offer without reservation. “Everything he does is for you.”
“I know,” Ella replied. Then, more quietly, “I love him too.”
Serena felt her eyes sting.
“We will face this together,” she said. “And we will show Lady Crane that this family—unconventional though it may be—is precisely what you need.”
Ella nodded. “Together.”
They sat in silence for a moment, united in purpose if not in full understanding.
Then Ella smiled faintly. “I suppose I should warn Samuel and Rosie that they must be on their best behaviour—though persuading Rosie not to mention Marianne’s imaginary tea parties may prove a challenge.”
Serena laughed despite herself. “Marianne is a very important member of this household. I see no reason she should be excluded from conversation.”
“Aunt Elspeth will think it childish.”
“Aunt Elspeth is free to think as she pleases. Our task is simply to show her the truth—that you children are happy, well cared for, and thriving under your uncle’s guardianship.”
“And under yours.” Ella held Serena’s gaze steadily. “You are part of this family too, Miss Collard. Whether you choose to admit it or not.”
The words were meant kindly, but they struck with unexpected force. Part of this family. If only it were that simple—if such a place could be claimed openly, without censure, without risk, without threatening everything they were trying to protect.
But it could not. Not now. Perhaps not ever.
“Thank you, Ella,” Serena said at last, because she could find no safer response. “That means more than you can know.”
***
The days leading up to the Cranes’ arrival passed in a blur of preparation.
Nathaniel threw himself into the work with a focus that bordered on obsession, overseeing every detail of the household’s readiness.
He met with Mrs McConnor to review the state of the guest chambers.
He consulted Morrison about the menu for the welcoming dinner.
He walked through every room Elspeth might conceivably enter, noting anything that could invite criticism and ordering it amended.
The staff, sensing the gravity of the occasion, responded with admirable efficiency. Floors were polished until they gleamed. Windows were scrubbed until they sparkled. Every piece of silver in the house was brought out and burnished until it shone like glass.
And through it all, Nathaniel maintained a scrupulous distance from Serena.
It was torture. Absolute, exquisite torture.
He saw her every day—at meals, in the corridors, occasionally in the schoolroom when he checked on the children’s progress.
But every interaction was carefully restrained, every exchange bounded by professional courtesy.
He called her Miss Collard. She called him my lord.
The warmth that had characterised their recent exchanges was entirely absent, replaced by a formal politeness that felt like a mockery of everything they had shared.
He knew it was necessary. He knew it was right. But that did not make it hurt any less.
At night, alone in his chambers, Nathaniel allowed himself what he denied himself by day.
The longing for her presence, for her voice, for the quiet certainty of her nearness.
The fear of what the Cranes’ visit might yet bring.
The terrible doubt of whether he was strong enough to shield his family from what threatened them.
And beneath it all lay the constant, unrelenting awareness that the woman he loved was somewhere in this house—thinking of him as he thought of her—separated by nothing more than propriety and fear.
He wondered if she slept. Wondered if she lay awake as he did, staring into the darkness, replaying every word they had spoken, mourning what they had been forced to set aside.
He hoped she was not suffering as he was.
He suspected she was.
Three days before the Cranes were due to arrive, Nathaniel found himself in the library late at night, sleep eluding him entirely.
He had come there without quite deciding to—drawn by memory more than intention.
By the image of Serena seated by the window, a book in her hands, the firelight catching in her hair.
She was not there now, of course. She was in her room, observing the distance they had agreed upon. Yet her presence lingered—in the books she had been reading, in the faint trace of lavender that still clung to the air.
He crossed to the chair she favoured and lowered himself into it, feeling faintly ridiculous, like a man paying homage to an empty shrine.
This was absurd. He was a marquess, a man of two-and-thirty, reduced to brooding over a chair because the woman he loved had once occupied it.
But the chair was comfortable. It smelled faintly of her. And for a moment—just a moment—he allowed himself the illusion that she was there with him. That they sat together in companionable silence. That the future held something other than scandal, vigilance, and impossible restraint.
He closed his eyes and imagined it.