Chapter 28
Upon their return to Fernworth, Lady Westmere instructed a groom to take George's horse to the stables to be washed, brushed, fed, and rested, insisting that he stay, at least, for some refreshments while they all decompressed from the morning's events.
And George was more than happy to accept the offer with only one thing left on his mind: finding a quiet moment alone to tell Cecelia the truth.
The moment they entered the house, George could barely remove his coat before Mary and Catherine came hurtling down the stairs, demanding to know what all the commotion had been about.
He and Cecelia looked at each other, smiling as they silently decided whether to draw it out, just as they might have done when they were children.
Seeing the mischievous glint in her eye, George shook his head and said, “Oh, it was really nothing at all.”
Mary looked disappointed, yet Catherine was so positively churlish as she demanded, “I do not believe you. Tell us what happened!”
She crossed her arms over her chest, scowling her most famous, frustrated scowl, and George couldn't help his laughter.
Somehow, it was as if walking through that door had flung him right back into the past, returning him to the carefree days of play and teasing he had shared with the Flannery sisters.
“I don't know, Cecelia,” George said, looking from the sisters to her, “what do you think to our telling them?”
Cecelia, having already removed her gloves, pulled off her hat and coat and handed them to a waiting maid, offering her gratitude before she turned to say, “I am not certain they deserve to know.
They were quite terrible after Catherine's incident. They simply would not listen to my instructions at all.”
George, feigning horror, gaped at the sisters and demanded, “Is this true? How dare you not listen to your kind, caring elder sister?”
Then, he lifted his hand to cover his mouth from Cecelia's view as he leant in and whispered, “I wouldn't have either.”
The girls chuckled and blushed as he offered them a wink.
His heart swelled to hear their laughter, and a small weight was lifted from his shoulders.
“Enough teasing, you two,” Lady Westmere scolded, as she too began to remove her outer garments. “If they must know, then they must join us in the drawing room for tea.”
The two younger girls’ expressions fell as if they knew entirely what that meant. Tea meant best behaviour, and neither of them seemed willing to act like proper young ladies as they both turned and practically fought each other to be the first to the drawing room.
George chuckled as Cecelia stepped across to join him, rolling her eyes at her sisters.
“You must forgive them,” she said, “it doesn't matter how old they get, they never mature. I am almost certain Mary does it just to get under Mother's skin.”
George glanced over his shoulder at the dowager and said, “It appears to be working.”
Her expression was barely readable, but what he could read was quite annoyed.
He suspected that after the morning's drama, she was in no mood for a proper scolding.
“Besides,” he added, offering her his arm in a silent gesture to escort her into the drawing room after her sisters. He was surprised when she took it, and he had to hide it from his voice as he added, “I have missed their playful nature. It makes me wish my parents had had more children.”
Cecelia squeezed his arm and said gently, “You always had us.”
George's heart skipped a beat as he fought the urge to ask whether that remained true now. He wished for the moment to be entirely right.
So many things had gone wrong so far, so many moments had been stolen or interrupted or never come to pass at all because of his cowardice, and then there was the constant reminder in the back of his mind; his father's voice given life inside his head for all these years, reminding him that whatever he did, it was never quite good enough.
But he was determined for this to be, and with that determination, he found his free hand checking his pocket for the pendant he had kept there ever since she had thrown it at his feet at the theatre.
Just the knowledge that it was still there, even after his altercation with Fitzwilliam, allowed him to breathe a little easier.
When they entered the drawing room, they found Mary and Catherine sitting in the armchairs beside the roaring fireplace, the excitement on their faces making George smile.
“So, you really wish to hear the tale?” George asked as he escorted Cecelia to a couch, careful not to sit too close beside her.
“Yes! Of course we do!” Catherine insisted.
“If it please you, Your Grace,” Mary added, reaching over to tap Catherine to remind her of her manners.
“George, please,” he insisted, and he looked to Cecelia for permission.
“Go ahead,” she said, “you always were better at storytelling.”
And so, George began to tell the story. With every new piece of information they learned, the girls gasped and exclaimed, and showed great interest, and for a while George lost himself as he so often had in the past.
It was only when his story was drawing to an end, as if she had specifically allowed him the time to tell it, that Lady Westmere finally entered the room, quickly followed by a maid.
“Cecelia, honestly!” she snapped as soon as she entered, “take yourself upstairs and get out of those wet skirts!”
Cecelia glanced at George, and they shared a playful look before she dipped her head to him and hurried from the room.
He remained where he was, feeling disappointed at the loss of her beside him. The emptiness there was quickly filled by Lady Westmere.
“I must thank you, Your Grace,” she said with the sincerest tone George had ever heard. “I fear what might have become of us had you not stepped in.”
As George might have his own mother, he tentatively reached out to tap her gently on the back of her hand as he said, “I could never have sat idly by and allowed that man to do anything to this family.”
Lady Westmere's unreadable expression became one of quiet happiness, though there was a small glimmer of sadness in her eye as she said, “I remember how often your mother had called it our family during those long summers in the country. They seem so long ago now.”
At the mention of his mother, George flinched. He smiled, and in an effort to change the subject from his mother, he corrected, “I would never allow anything to hurt our family.”
He was even more surprised when Lady Westmere reached up and placed her hand against his cheek.
Her eyes flashed with indecision as if she were unsure about whether he would take the touch as disrespectful.
Then, she strengthened the pressure on his cheek as she assured him, “Your mother would be terribly proud if she could see you now.”
George leaned into her hand, wishing that his own mother were there to tell him such things, wishing she were the kind of woman who might do so.
“I thank you for saying so, My Lady, but I fear it may not be entirely accurate,” George said, removing her hand from his face to squeeze her slender fingers. “She would likely scold me for having waited so long to ask you if I might have a moment alone with your daughter, Lady Cecelia?”
At that, the dowager raised a brow. Her lips pursed, and for one moment, he feared she would reject his request.
Yet, at that moment, Cecelia returned, and quicker than he had ever seen her move, Lady Westmere ordered, “Mary, Catherine, help me in the hallway!”
“But Mama—” Catherine started, but Mary grabbed her sister by the elbow as if she too knew what it meant.
Catherine, dragged past the table, grabbed a couple of biscuits from the table before they all disappeared from the room.
Lady Westmere only slipped her head back in to assure them, “We shall be just on the other side of this door!”
With that, she closed it, and Cecelia turned to look at him in confusion. “What on earth was all of that about?”
George, feeling suddenly more nervous than he ever had before, rose from his seat and offered her his hand.
“Come here, will you?” he asked, when Cecelia only looked at him with mild curiosity.
She pursed her lips, and George feared she might be difficult.
Then, she started to smile, crossing the distance between them to lay her hand in his.
“What are you up to, Your Grace?” she asked, her tone playful, though there was an anxious kind of anticipation in her gaze that only made George’s insides clench up harder.
“Sit with me?” he suggested, guiding her gently down onto the couch where he had been sitting alone only moments before. “I asked your mother if I might have a moment alone with you.”
Cecelia glanced around the room before she pointed out, “We are alone.”
Though he already knew it well, her words made a shiver pass down the length of his spine.
They had not shared a single moment entirely alone since they were children playing in the meadows. The memory of it made him smile as he imagined the radiance of her bounding through the wildflowers, carefree and innocent.
“I must confess something to you, Cecelia,” he said, his heart hammering so hard that he was almost certain she would be able to hear it, “something that I have denied to myself for so long that I can no longer contain it.”
Cecelia’s eyes darkened suspiciously.
“If you wish to tell me that you were right and I was wrong, then you do not need to utter the words,” she said, scowling, urging her hand from his, though her fingertips remained ever so lightly upon his palm.
George returned her scowl, shaking his head. “You do not like to make things easy for me, do you, Cece?”
At her old nickname, she started to blush.
“What would be the fun in that?” she asked, though her tone was a little uncertain.