Chapter 19
“Miss,” Wilhelm said, and there was steel beneath the calm in his tone, “you will look at my daughter’s face when you speak to her.”
Madeline’s hand tightened around the strap of her reticule as they stepped into the modiste’s shop, the bell above the door chiming too brightly for the way her nerves clenched.
The room was warm, scented with starch and lavender sachets, bolts of fabric stacked like orderly promises along the walls, mannequins dressed in silks that caught the light in soft waves.
It was quiet and for a brief moment Madeline was grateful because she had not wanted to thread herself through a crowd today.
The modiste—plump, powdered, and rigid with expectation at the sight of a Duke—had been smiling until her gaze fell to Tessa.
It was not the staring that was unforgivable.
Human eyes could be thoughtless and curious without malice. But there was something wrong with the length of it, the pause that stretched too far, the faint tightening at the woman’s mouth as though she were witnessing something unfortunate and wished to pretend otherwise.
Tessa’s shoulders drew inward almost immediately, her excitement faltering for a heartbeat as she shifted closer to Madeline’s side.
Madeline placed her hand lightly at Tessa’s back, a quiet brace.
Wilhelm had noticed and his body went still in the way it did when anger was restrained rather than released.
“My apologies, Your Grace,” the modiste said quickly, her eyes jerking upward, smile returning in a practiced snap. “I did not mean to stare. It is just… one does not often—”
“You will keep the shop closed until we have departed,” Wilhelm interrupted, voice even, the words carrying no room for argument. “For the next quarter hour, you will attend only to my daughter.”
The modiste blinked. “Your Grace—”
Wilhelm reached into his pocket and drew out a small leather purse, placing it on the counter with a motion that made the coins inside clink softly. “For your time,” he said, his gaze holding hers until the smile on her face became something more nervous than pleased.”
Madeline had not often seen him protective in this way, and something in her chest responded with a rush that was both warmth and ache. She did not want to look at him, because she was terrified her face would betray her.
The modiste swallowed, then nodded briskly. “Of course, Your Grace. Of course. I shall put up the sign.”
She moved quickly toward the door, flipping the lock and drawing the curtain, and the world outside vanished into muted light and shadow.
Tessa exhaled as though she had been holding her breath. “Now it’s only us.”
Wilhelm’s gaze softened by the smallest margin as he looked down at his daughter. “Just us,” he whispered. “We shall have the run of the place.”
Tessa’s excitement flared back to life with the speed of a match catching flame. “Can I try everything?”
“Within reason,” Wilhelm replied, though Madeline saw the faintest curve at the edge of his mouth, the indulgence he pretended not to possess.
The modiste returned at once, hands clasped tightly. Her manner was suddenly brisk and eager. “What colors does the young lady prefer?”
“Blue,” Tessa said instantly. “And green. And maybe pink, but not dusty pink.”
The modiste laughed too loudly. “Of course. Of course. We have the loveliest shades.”
She began pulling bolts of fabric from racks, displaying them with the flourish of someone presenting treasures, and Tessa’s chatter filled the room as she inspected lace and ribbon, her hands fluttering with excitement as she spoke.
“This one looks like a cloud,” she declared, lifting a pale scrap of cloth.
Madeline smiled, though her nerves still hummed under her skin. “It might swallow you whole.”
“That’s the point,” Tessa said seriously, then grinned, unable to maintain solemnity for more than a heartbeat. “Papa, do you like clouds?”
Wilhelm’s gaze flicked briefly toward Madeline before returning to Tessa. “I like that you are pleased.”
Madeline felt heat creep into her cheeks at that glance, however fleeting it had been, and she forced herself to focus on Tessa as the child disappeared behind the changing screen, only to emerge moments later in a dress with puffed sleeves that made her resemble a startled kitten.
“It’s too puffy,” Tessa announced, scowling at her reflection.
“It is… enthusiastic,” Madeline said carefully, and Tessa laughed.
They tried another. Then another. The modiste grew more frantic with each rejection, while Wilhelm remained immovable near the counter, arms folded, watching his daughter with a vigilance that was not sternness but pure attention.
Madeline tried to pretend she did not notice the way his gaze occasionally drifted to her, as though he were checking whether she was steady, whether she was coping, whether she was still the quiet anchor he seemed to have decided she was.
It was unsettling, dangerous.
Tessa emerged in a darker blue dress with a simple bodice and a skirt that fell in clean lines rather than exploding outward, and Madeline felt something ease in her chest because it suited the child; it made her look like herself rather than a doll.
“Oh,” Madeline breathed without meaning to. “That is lovely.”
Tessa’s eyes widened. “You like it?”
“Yes,” Madeline said softly. “It’s elegant. And it doesn’t… hide you.”
Tessa turned, studying herself, then lifted her chin with sudden, fierce pride. “Papa?”
Wilhelm’s gaze moved over her, and Madeline saw the brief, complicated emotion that crossed his face before he controlled it.
“It is perfect,” he said.
Tessa beamed, then spun toward Madeline as though struck by a new idea. “Now you.”
Madeline blinked. “Me?”
“Yes,” Tessa insisted, already moving toward the racks again. “You must have a dress too. You can’t wear your plain ones.”
Madeline’s pulse jumped. “I am not the one attending as—”
“You are attending,” Tessa cut in, eyes bright, stubbornness flaring. “Papa said.”
Madeline’s throat tightened, and she glanced toward Wilhelm instinctively, but he was watching Tessa now, not intervening, as though he knew there was no stopping his daughter once she had decided.
“Tessa,” Madeline tried gently, “the ball is not for me.”
Tessa planted her hands on her hips, the pose so deliberate it nearly made Madeline smile. “Then it will be, because I say so.”
Madeline’s mouth parted, caught between laughter and protest, and before she could gather an argument that would not sound cruel, Tessa had already snatched a gown from a nearby mannequin and held it up triumphantly.
It was simple, a soft, pale color with a modest neckline and clean seams, the kind of gown that would not draw attention by frills or glitter, but by the quiet grace of its cut.
Madeline stared at it, her chest tightening. “Tessa, that is—”
“It’s perfect,” Tessa declared. “Try it.”
Madeline’s fingers curled around her reticule strap. “I cannot.”
“Why?” Tessa demanded, stepping closer, eyes narrowing. “Is it because you don’t want to look pretty?”
Madeline’s breath caught, because the question struck too close to wounds she kept buried.
“It is not that,” she said carefully, voice soft. “It is only… unnecessary.”
Tessa’s gaze sharpened with the strange, unchildlike perception that sometimes startled Madeline. “Are you scared?”
Madeline froze. Across the room, Wilhelm’s posture shifted slightly, as though he had heard more than he was meant to.
Madeline forced a smile that felt brittle. “Very well,” she said, because she could not bear to disappoint the child, because she could not bear to see her face fall. “If it will satisfy you.”
Tessa thrust the gown into her arms as though she had won a battle. “It will.”
Madeline retreated behind the changing screen, hands trembling faintly as she undressed.
The fabric was cool when she pulled it over her head, sliding along her skin with a softness she was not used to wearing, and as she fastened it, she stared at herself in the mirror with a tightness in her chest that was not vanity but disbelief.
She looked… different. Revealed, as though she had been hiding herself under plain cloth for so long she had forgotten what it was to be seen. She stepped out.
Tessa gasped, then clapped her hands. “Oh!”
Madeline’s cheeks burned instantly. “Tessa—”
“You look beautiful,” Tessa declared with utter certainty. “Like a princess, but not a silly one.”
Madeline swallowed hard, her heart pounding. She tried to laugh, tried to make it light. “It is lovely, but—”
Her words faltered because Wilhelm had gone very still.
He was staring at her with an intensity that made her skin prickle.
His mouth was slightly parted, as though he had forgotten for a moment how to compose himself, and Madeline felt a rush of heat sweep through her so sudden and humiliating she almost stepped back automatically.
“Your Grace?” she managed, voice quieter than she intended.
Wilhelm blinked once, as though the sound of her voice pulled him back from some dangerous distance. His expression rearranged itself into control, but his eyes remained fixed on her, dark and unreadable.
“It suits you,” he said, and the restraint in his tone only made the words more intimate.
Madeline’s throat went tight. She tried to focus on Tessa instead, because Tessa felt safe and Wilhelm did not. “It is too much,” she murmured.
The modiste, who had been hovering nervously, stepped forward with a critical squint.
“It is… pretty,” she said, and then her gaze dropped, lingering at Madeline’s waist with the same thoughtless scrutiny she had used on Tessa’s scars.
“But it is too tight through the bodice. You have… filled it out.”
Madeline felt the remark land like a slap. Heat rushed to her face, sharp and immediate. Her hands flew instinctively toward her skirt as if she could smooth away humiliation, and she forced herself to smile even as her chest constricted.
“I will change,” she said quickly.
She stepped back behind the screen before anyone could see the sting in her eyes, before the shame could settle too deeply.
But Wilhelm’s voice cut through the air a moment later, low and deadly calm. “You will not speak to her that way.”
Silence. Madeline held her breath, fingers frozen on the buttons at her back.
The modiste stammered. “Your Grace, I did not mean—”
“You did,” Wilhelm said. “You meant to criticize her body as though it were your right.”
“It was only a remark,” the modiste pleaded.
“It was an insult,” Wilhelm replied, each word placed carefully, like a weight dropped onto a scale. “And no one has the right to insult a member of my household.”
Madeline’s pulse thundered, as the words wrapped around her with warmth and fear at once.
The modiste’s voice softened, suddenly sincere. “I apologize. Truly. I did not think.”
“You will think,” Wilhelm said, and the finality in it left no room for argument. “Or you will not be paid at all.”
Madeline swallowed hard. Her fingers trembled as she changed back into her plain dress, her cheeks still burning, her mind spinning with the knowledge that he had defended her without hesitation, without concern for how it might look.
She emerged a few minutes later to find the modiste standing rigidly near the counter, eyes lowered, while Tessa hovered beside Madeline with a fierce, protective expression that made Madeline’s chest ache.
“I’m sorry,” the modiste said immediately, voice strained but genuine. “I was rude.”
Madeline forced herself to nod, though her throat was tight. “Thank you,” she managed.
Wilhelm stood beside the counter, one hand resting on the leather purse. His expression was composed again, cold authority reassembled, but his gaze flicked to Madeline with something that made her stomach dip.
He pushed the gown’s folded bundle toward the modiste. “We will take it,” he said.
Madeline blinked. “Your Grace—”
Wilhelm did not look at her. “It is purchased.”
Tessa beamed. “I told you!”
Madeline’s breath caught. “You did not need to—”
Wilhelm finally turned toward her, and the look in his eyes was so firm it stole her voice. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I did.”
Madeline kept her head lowered as they left the shop, as though if she looked up she might see ghosts of judgment lingering in the street beyond the modiste’s curtains, and she did not breathe properly until the carriage door shut behind them and the world outside became distant again.
Tessa chattered excitedly beside her, already describing how she would dance, how she would choose her partner, how she would eat little cakes without anyone scolding her.
Wilhelm sat opposite them, shoulders broad in the cramped space, one knee angled slightly as the carriage jolted forward, his gaze fixed on nothing outside the window.
Madeline’s hands clenched in her lap. “Your Grace,” she said carefully, because she could not keep it inside, “you needn’t have bought that gown.”
His gaze shifted to her, slow and intent. “You will be present at the ball.”
“That does not mean I require a new dress,” she said, though her voice trembled despite her effort. “I could remain in the background. I could—”
“You will be beside Tessa,” Wilhelm interrupted, calm but unyielding.
. “You defended me,” Madeline whispered, and she hated how vulnerable it sounded.
Wilhelm’s jaw flexed once. “No one has the right to insult anyone in my household.”
The word made her pulse jump, but Madeline shook her head faintly. “I am only the governess.”
Wilhelm’s gaze held hers, dark and steady, and for a moment the carriage felt too small, the air too close. “You are the woman who has made my daughter laugh again,” he said quietly. “And you will not be made to feel ashamed in my presence.”
Madeline’s breath caught, heat unfurling low in her belly in spite of herself, because his voice did that to her, because his control was not coldness but restraint, and she felt the edge of what lay beneath it.
She looked away quickly, terrified of what her face might reveal, terrified of the hope trying to rise inside her despite every warning she had given herself.
This was duty, she reminded herself again, clinging to the thought as the carriage carried them back toward Kirkford House, toward a ball that would test her composure more cruelly than any lesson ever could.
And yet her body remembered the way he had looked at her in that gown, as though he had forgotten how to breathe, and no amount of duty could erase the truth of what that glance had done to her.