Chapter Eighteen #2
Except the Drake she had come to know these past weeks wasn’t merely a businessman. He was passionate about Greythorne, fiercely protective of its tenants, unwilling to accept expedient solutions when better ones could be found through effort and ingenuity.
Had she misread him so completely? Had the connection she felt between them been entirely one-sided?
A soft knock at the door interrupted her thoughts.
“Come in,” she called, hastily folding Hilaria’s note and tucking it into her sleeve.
Mrs. Winters entered with a tea tray. “Your tea, my lady. Cook has included some of those small cakes you favour.”
“Thank you.” Katherine gestured toward the small table by the window. “You may leave it there.”
Instead of departing immediately, Mrs. Winters hesitated, her kind face creased with concern. “Forgive me for speaking out of turn, my lady, but are you quite well? You look rather pale.”
“I’m merely tired from the excursion,” Katherine replied, summoning a small smile that felt brittle even to herself. “A quiet evening is all I require.”
“Of course, my lady.” Mrs. Winters curtsied and withdrew, though her expression suggested she wasn’t entirely convinced.
When the door closed, Katherine moved to the window seat, leaving the tea untouched. The gardens below were bathed in the golden light of approaching sunset, the familiar view suddenly seeming alien and remote.
With mechanical movements, she began removing her gloves, staring numbly at the pale fabric as it slid from her fingers. Such a simple action, performed countless times without thought, now requiring her full concentration to complete.
Drake was to marry Lady Eleanor.
The western fields dispute would be resolved according to the widow’s practical proposal.
Greythorne’s heir would be secured, the entail’s conditions satisfied.
Everything settled, everything arranged—without regard for the unexpected feelings that had blossomed between its master and the dowager countess.
Had there truly been feelings on his side? Or had she imagined the current of attraction that seemed to flow beneath their argumentative exchanges, the flash of something more personal than professional respect in his grey eyes when he looked at her?
Perhaps it had always been one-sided. Perhaps Drake had only ever viewed her as a useful resource for understanding Greythorne, nothing more.
Yet she couldn’t reconcile that possibility with the man who had touched her wrist at Lady Fairchild’s reception, whose fingers had lingered against her pulse as though reluctant to break the connection.
Whose voice had dropped to that intimate register when he’d said, “You’re not like anyone I’ve ever known, Katherine. ”
A frustrated sound escaped her as she tossed her gloves aside. This circular thinking was pointless. Drake had made his choice. Whatever might have existed between them was now irrelevant.
She should be relieved, Katherine told herself.
Drake’s marriage would resolve the boundary dispute in her favour. The western fields would remain hers, legally and unequivocally. She would maintain her independence, free from the complications that any deeper involvement with Drake would have entailed.
This was what she wanted. What she had insisted upon from their first meeting.
So why did victory taste so bitter?
Katherine rose restlessly, moving to her writing desk.
The practical thing would be to write a note of congratulations.
Something polite and distant, acknowledging his engagement while maintaining the proper boundaries of their professional relationship.
After all, they would still need to interact regarding estate matters that affected both Greythorne and Willow Park.
She sat, drawing a sheet of paper toward her, and dipping her pen in the inkwell.
Lord Greythorne,
She paused, the formal address suddenly feeling wrong after weeks of calling him Drake in their private conversations. But what alternative was there? Their brief window of informality was surely closed now that he was to be married.
Please accept my congratulations on your forthcoming marriage. I trust this alliance will bring you both satisfaction and secure Greythorne’s future prosperity.
The words looked stiff and hollow on the page, nothing like the tumult of emotions churning within her. With a frustrated sound, Katherine crumpled the paper and reached for a fresh sheet.
Drake,
I’ve heard of your engagement and wish to offer my sincere—
No. That was no better. Katherine crushed this attempt as well, tossing it aside with growing frustration.
How did one congratulate a man on his practical, loveless marriage? How did one pretend that such news caused no personal pain, when in fact it felt like a dagger to the heart?
A third attempt proved no more successful than the first two. Katherine abandoned the pretence of composing a note, letting her pen fall to the desk as she pressed her fingers to her temples.
The truth was, there were no words that could adequately express what she felt. No proper, socially acceptable way to say: I’ve only just realized I’m in love with you, and now it’s too late.
In love. The thought stopped her cold.
Was that what this hollowness in her chest signified? This sense of profound loss at the news of Drake’s engagement?
“Ridiculous,” she whispered to the empty room. “Impossible.”
She had sworn never to risk her heart again after Edmund. Never to place herself in a position where a man could diminish or control her. Her independence was hard-won and precious.
Yet as she stared unseeing at the darkening garden, Katherine could no longer deny the truth.
Somehow, despite all her defences and determination, she had fallen in love with Drake Halston.
Not with his title or position, but with the man himself—his integrity, his intelligence, his unexpected gentleness toward those dependent on his care.
A man who valued her mind as much as he clearly appreciated her person. A man who challenged rather than dismissed her. A man as unlike Edmund as it was possible to be.
And now he was lost to her, committed to another woman for reasons of practicality and inheritance.
Had today’s events at Thornfield Park influenced his decision? Had he seen her with Lord Clifton and concluded that she was considering another suitor? The timing seemed too coincidental to ignore.
But no, how could Hilaria’s note have arrived mid-day?
And even if that were true, it only confirmed that whatever attraction Drake might have felt toward her, it had not been strong enough to overcome the practical advantages Lady Westmore offered.
Given the choice between a complicated entanglement with Katherine and a straightforward arrangement with the widow, he had chosen the latter.
She couldn’t even blame him.
The entail’s deadline loomed, Greythorne’s future hung in the balance, and Katherine herself had never given Drake any indication that she might consider remarriage. Indeed, she had stated the opposite on multiple occasions.
The first tear caught her by surprise, sliding silently down her cheek before she could prevent it.
Katherine brushed it away impatiently, only to find another following close behind.
And another. Until her vision blurred, and her shoulders shook with the effort of containing the sobs that threatened to break free.
All the carefully constructed walls of her composure, maintained through five years of Edmund’s coldness and cruelty, through the public performance of proper widowhood, through the daily navigation of a society that valued her only for her connections and decorum—they crumbled now, leaving her defenceless against the tide of grief that swept through her.
Not just grief for the loss of Drake, though that cut deepest. But grief for the years wasted with Edmund, for the courage she hadn’t found until it was too late, for the possibility of joy she had only glimpsed before it vanished beyond reach.
“I let him go,” she whispered, the admission torn from some deep place within her. “I let him go.”
The words hung in the silent room, both confession and accusation. She had maintained her independence, her control, her careful distance—and in doing so, had lost perhaps her only chance at genuine happiness.
As twilight deepened into darkness outside her window, Katherine remained motionless, tears flowing freely down her face. Tomorrow she would rebuild her composure, don the mask of the dignified dowager countess, and face the world with appropriate detachment.
But tonight, alone in her sitting room with only the shadows as witness, she allowed herself to mourn what might have been—if only she had recognized her own heart sooner.