Chapter 11
“Theresa.”
Wilhelm stopped short at the edge of the corridor.
Laughter spilled through the open terrace doors at the far end of the hall, bright and unrestrained, carrying easily across the stone floors.
It was not the polite, contained sound he was accustomed to hearing from his daughter, not the careful cheer she offered in measured portions, but something fuller, freer, utterly careless of who might hear.
The realization struck him with unexpected force, because it had been far too long since he had heard that sound from her at all.
He stood there for a brief moment, listening, his brow furrowing as the laughter rose again, and then, without quite acknowledging the choice, he moved toward it, his steps quiet, his boots making no sound against the stone as though he did not wish to announce himself.
The terrace doors stood open to the winter air, and beyond them the grounds were alive in a way he did not at first recognize as his own estate.
Snow lay thick across the lawns, unbroken except where small boots had cut careless paths through it.
Tessa darted across the white expanse with her skirts gathered high.
Her cheeks were flushed pink with cold and exhilaration and her breath was visible in the sharp air as she laughed again and veered away.
Miss Watton stood a short distance away, half turned toward her, bent slightly as she shaped a snowball between gloved hands.
Her movements were quick and sure despite the cold.
Her laughter echoed warmly and openly when Tessa shrieked and jumped away, the effortless sound surprising Wilhelm.
As he watched them together, he felt a sudden tightness in his chest; the lively scene was so different from the careful order he kept at home that, for a moment, it seemed like he was witnessing something entirely apart from himself.
Wilhelm took in the scene before him, aware at once that this was not a lesson conducted under orderly supervision but something looser, louder, and far more alive, filled with movement and cold air and a reckless sort of delight that set every instinct shaped by years of responsibility on edge.
Snow was treacherous underfoot, hills invited falls, and children, however spirited, were easily hurt, and yet he did not step forward at once or raise his voice as he knew he should have done.
Instead, he watched the way Madeline encouraged Tessa without hovering, how her laughter met the child’s rather than overshadowing it, how Tessa kept glancing back at her not for instruction but as though seeking quiet permission to be wholly herself, and how naturally they moved together, unguarded and sure, as though such ease had always belonged between them.
Madeline’s presence seemed to soften the world around his daughter, making room for her to run and shout and exist without apology, and the sight of it stirred something in Wilhelm that unsettled him far more deeply than the cold or the snow ever could.
Tessa had not looked over her shoulder once since he had begun watching, and the realization struck him with a sharpness he had not anticipated, unsettling in its immediacy.
A sensation uncomfortably close to jealousy stirred in his chest, unwelcome and swiftly disciplined, and he told himself at once that it was concern, nothing more than a father asserting himself in the face of risk.
It was his responsibility to intervene when play edged toward danger and when his child forgot her own limits.
And yet, when he finally stepped out onto the terrace, the cold air cutting across his face and seeping through his coat, his heart was beating faster than the temperature alone could justify.
His shoulders hunched as though bracing for something.
He paused there for a moment, one gloved hand curling against his palm, his gaze fixed on his daughter, readying himself before crossing an unseen threshold.
“Theresa,” he called, his voice carrying across the snow, even as his jaw set and his posture straightened, authority settling over him like armor as he waited for her to turn.
Both turned.
Miss Watton stopped laughing immediately. Her posture straightened at once and she dropped the snowball she’d been hastily forming just a moment before. For a fleeting second, something like guilt crossed her face, as though she had been caught doing something improper.
Tessa, on the other hand, groaned.
“Papa,” she said, with all the drama of a child whose joy had been discovered, “you’re going to ruin it.”
Wilhelm paused mid-step, the cold biting through the soles of his boots as he surveyed the expanse of white beyond the terrace doors.
Snow lay thick across the grounds, unbroken except for a narrow path cut by the gardeners that morning, and beyond it the hill sloped away, smooth and inviting in a way that made his reflexes bristle.
“I am preventing injury,” he said flatly.
Madeline stood a few paces behind Tessa, her cheeks already flushed from the cold, her eyes bright with a kind of quiet excitement Wilhelm had come to recognize over the past days.
He now understood Miss Watton more thoroughly and saw that her eagerness had nothing to do with recklessness and everything to do with joy.
She had wrapped herself in a wool cloak that softened her lines without hiding them.
The fabric moved gently as the air stirred around her curves.
“We mean to go sledding next,” she said, tone mild but unyielding. “Not prepare for battle.”
Tessa skipped lightly from one foot to the other. “Miss Watton says the snow is perfect today. She says if we don’t go now, it will melt and we’ll miss it.”
Wilhelm’s jaw tightened. “Miss Watton,” he said, casting a long look at the governess, “does not bear responsibility for broken limbs.”
Madeline met his gaze without flinching. There it was again, that calm steadiness that unsettled him more than defiance ever could. “I would not suggest it if I believed it unsafe,” she said. “And I will be right beside her.”
Tessa looked between them, then smiled with the quick intelligence of a child who knew when to strike. “Papa can come too,” she said. “To supervise.”
Wilhelm let out a slow breath. Supervising, at least, he could justify. “Very well,” he said. “I will join you. Do try not to charge ahead.”
Madeline’s lips curved, just slightly, as they stepped out into the cold together.
The air was sharp and clean, snow crunching beneath their boots.
Tessa ran ahead, despite his warning, and laughter spilling freely as she dragged the small wooden sled toward the hill.
Wilhelm followed more slowly, his gaze drawn, against his will, to Madeline as she moved.
She walked with purpose, lifting her skirts just enough to keep them dry.
She was surefooted and her laughter was quieter than Tessa’s but no less real.
There was warmth in her that had nothing to do with hearths or blankets, something that seemed to radiate outward, drawing people in without asking.
“This is quite steep,” Wilhelm said, stopping at the base of the hill.
“That is the point,” Tessa replied.
Madeline glanced at him. “We can begin halfway down,” she offered. “If that would ease your mind, Your Grace.”
He should have agreed. It was sensible. Instead, something stubborn rose in him, something that had nothing to do with safety and everything to do with the way she watched him, waiting to see what he would choose.
“No,” he said. “If we are doing this, we will do it properly.”
Tessa squealed in delight. Madeline’s brows lifted, surprised, and something in her expression softened further, as though she had not expected him to yield so fully.
They trudged the rest of the way up the slope.
Then Wilhelm helped Tessa onto the sled, lowering himself to one knee so he could steady the narrow wooden frame as she climbed into place.
His gloved hands rested firmly at the sides while she shifted and settled.
Little Tessa’s skirts bunched beneath her in a way that would have earned a reprimand indoors but seemed perfectly harmless out here.
Snow worked its way into the seams of his gloves almost at once as he continued supporting his daughter.
The cold seeped through the leather and bit at his skin, yet he found he did not mind it.
His attention was fixed instead on the way his daughter glanced back at him with bright, expectant eyes, trusting him to keep her upright and safe.
When he gave the sled a measured push, she shot forward with a delighted cry.
The runners hissed softly against the packed snow as she gathered speed, and he remained standing at the crest of the hill, watching until she reached the bottom without mishap.
Her laughter floated back up toward them as she turned and waved enthusiastically, already clamoring for another turn.
Madeline turned to him then, her cheeks flushed from the cold, eyes bright with a warmth that had nothing to do with exertion. “Your turn,” she said, the words light but assured, as though the matter had already been settled.
“I am not sledding,” Wilhelm replied at once, his tone instinctively firm, though it rang hollow even to his own ears.
“Of course you are,” she answered calmly, a faint smile touching her mouth as she met his gaze without hesitation. “You cannot supervise properly if you do not understand the mechanics.”
He stared at her incredulously. “The mechanics?”
She nodded with exaggerated solemnity, as though delivering a principle beyond dispute. “It is only right that you give it a go.”