Chapter 9
Payton departed the study, the baron’s reticent “thank you” at her back with Joy’s heartbreaking sobs pulling her down the hall and up the stairs to the girl’s closed door.
If anyone understood the pain the baron’s children experienced it was Payton.
She’d lost her mother at roughly the same age.
One day, Sasha Davenport, Payton’s mother, had been alive; and the next, she was gone, taking with her every ounce of security Payton had.
Unlike Damon with his children, Payton’s sister had stepped in and filled the void left by their mother’s death. She’d held Payton for hours until she slept, and when Payton awoke during the night, her sister lay in the bed next to her, her arms open and ready to offer comfort.
Lord Ashford wasn’t there to hold his children and make certain they knew he loved them.
Nor did he insist that things would get better.
He had the power to truly make their lives better, but he didn’t—or perhaps he couldn’t.
While Payton had never known the love of a father, she suspected what the baron gave his children was greatly lacking.
The entire family had suffered a massive loss.
How did Ashford continue on, seemingly unaware of the hurt that burrowed deep within his children?
It was clear he was not oblivious to their anguish, he merely chose to ignore it.
Anger bubbled inside Payton, but she tamped it down and saved it because she needed to see to Joy.
Later, there would be ample time to curse the baron and his hardened heart.
She could explore his reasoning for keeping his children at arm’s length and decide if it was a choice or something much more complicated.
She’d seen the pain that crossed his expression when Joy had cried out, but his impassive mask had returned within the blink of an eye. His offer to see to the child had been a hollow one.
Payton didn’t pause at Joy’s door; instead, she grasped the latch and pushed into the girl’s private chamber, the child’s weeping louder than in the hall.
There were so many things she longed to share with the baron’s children.
Despite her penchant for trouble, she and Joy had much in common.
Payton had lost her mother when she was young, and she too had woken many nights in a cold sweat as she attempted to fight her way out of a confined dark space.
Perhaps it was why the children had caused an irrational irritation within her.
They were, in essence, the same, except Payton had been left with siblings who lorded over her, while Joy had been stuck with an absentee father.
Empathy for the children’s plight filled Payton, though it may be a journey with no plausible resolution.
She’d been with Joy and Abram for weeks, and understanding of the situation had eluded her the entire time.
Payton lowered herself to the edge of the bed and gathered the girl into her arms.
Life would not always be what it was at this moment for Joy, Abram, or the baron.
The pain would never disappear, but one day, they would realize it was manageable.
Even further ahead, they would use their own past to make certain they achieved a future that pleased them.
Payton had been on her way to achieving that final accomplishment—or she had been until the duke took her at piquet.
The here and now was always changeable.
The realization of how much Payton had lost to the duke suddenly didn’t have the crushing weight of defeat it had before. Here, in Joy’s delicately decorated room, outside troubles seemed of a smaller magnitude.
As she did most nights, Payton murmured in the child’s ear, soothing her as she stroked her long, golden plaits and let the tears seep into the fabric of Payton’s dress.
Joy clung to her, and her sobs slowed to faint whimpers with time.
Her grip on Payton loosened until she fell back into slumber.
During the day, they kept a strict divide between them, but in the dark of night, Payton allowed herself to comfort the child, to act as if forming a connection with the baron’s children was not terrifying.
Mothering had been so natural to Marce after their mother died, but Payton wasn’t a mother and had no notion of where to begin, even if only to fill the role as a governess.
And so, Joy persisted in her vexing ways, and Payton continued in her role as the irritated governess.
Some days, she didn’t have to playact—much like the morning they’d doused her in blue dye. But other days, it was difficult.
That terrified Payton even more. What if she made a mistake? What if the children refused her kindness? What if they had no desire to care for a governess?
Payton rocked Joy’s tiny form back and forth long after the need was past. Soothing the girl’s pain was something Payton had never expected to excel at, yet she did, and that surprised her.
No doubt come morning light, Joy would return to her precocious, troublesome self, and Payton would once again take her place as the stern governess…these brief moments forgotten.
Their day would be filled with schoolwork, meals, lessons on decorum, and outings to the park with little time to dwell on the intimate nature of this moment.
If the time ever came to speak about these late-night bouts of terror, Payton would ask after what pulled Joy from sleep so violently.
What had the girl sobbing in the arms of a stranger?
And the question that nagged the most, what kept the baron from comforting his own children?
However, the time to ask those questions had not yet come, and Payton feared it never would. The cause of Joy’s nightmares was likely the same thing that burdened the baron. It should be discussed with the girl’s father, not the hired help.
Just as it should be the baron holding his daughter, not Payton.
Yet here she was with Joy while he remained detached in his study.
Joy nestled closer in her sleep, the whimpers now forming unmistakable words.
Mum. Father.
The girl called to them in her slumber. Payton was helpless to offer any further comfort. She would never be Joy’s mother and was unable to bring the baron to her. For now, Payton’s embrace would have to do. It was all she had to offer the grieving child.
Joy’s brow furrowed, and her eyes moved behind their closed lids as her nightmare returned.
With a jerk, Joy’s eyes sprang open again, and she searched the darkness as her cries started anew.
Payton’s chest seized as she gripped Joy tighter to keep her from tumbling from the bed.
Gradually, Joy eased back into her arms.
“Can I tell you a story, sweet girl?” Payton wasn’t sure what had made her speak, but when the girl burrowed closer, she continued.
“When I was a child, no older than you, I lost my mother, too. I was lost, aching inside, without the urge to leave my bed for days on end. I didn’t eat, just slept all day long.
Never would I allow the drapes to be parted and the bright sun to enter. ”
She wasn’t sure the child listened, but the tension eased from Joy’s small body.
“Everything I loved was taken from me when my mother passed away. You see, I hadn’t a father, only my mother…
and my siblings. I was so young and scared.
Who would care for me? Who would tuck me into bed, read me a story, and extinguish the candle at my bedside when I fell asleep?
I worried I would burn our home down because the candle would shrink until the flame found wood.
I fretted about who would make certain I woke for my lessons in the morning.
I cried over who would select the perfect ribbon to match my pinafore.
Such trivial things to fret over, I know.
” Payton couldn’t help her small laugh. How innocent and guileless she’d once been.
“However, as a child, those were the ways I knew my mother loved me, and without her, who was there to fill that place? My siblings teased me mercifully, as Abram does you, and I mistook their jests for dislike. But it was they—Marce, Sam, Jude, and Garrett—who came together and proved our family…our love…was not ruined with our mother gone. We were strong, we were resilient…we have thrived, just as our mother taught us to.”
The words left her in a rush, feelings she’d never shared with another soul, not even her siblings, but Joy needed to hear them, needed to know they were true for Payton and would be for her, as well.
Her mother’s words from that long-ago night had been seared into Payton’s every desire and need.
There wasn’t a day she didn’t remember her mother’s final musings, heard through the thin wooden walls at Craven House, and know that she would do exactly as her mother bid.
“Until the day you find your strength—which I know is within you—I will be here to blow out your candle at night, to read you a story before you find your slumber, and to select your ribbons come morning. That I can promise you.”
Even as the words left her, Payton feared it was a promise she wasn’t fated to keep without giving up a part of herself and the path she was forming for her future.
The deep, even rise and fall of Joy’s chest told Payton that the child was once again asleep and had likely not heard her governess’s promise.
It was a commitment Payton had no right to make, and one she could not be sure she could keep. If the baron ever discovered her deception, she’d be relieved of her post and would have no way to fulfill her promise to Joy.
But for this night, Payton was here. And come morning, Joy would find her pretty, pale pink gown laid out for her…with matching pink ribbons for her hair.