Chapter Seventeen #2
Once they were married, it would be different.
She would "assist" and "advise" and "help," always one step removed from actual authority, always dependent on his willingness to listen.
Her ideas would become his ideas, just as they had at that dinner gathering.
Her voice would be heard only when he chose to amplify it.
She thought of Daniel, impossible, infuriating, terrified Daniel, who had argued with her as though her opinions were worthy of combat. Who had never once suggested that her role was to assist him. Who had looked at her with something like awe and called her remarkable.
Remarkable. Not useful. Not capable. Remarkable.
"Lillian?" Edward's voice broke through her thoughts. "You have not answered. Will you…..That is, may I hope..."
"I cannot give you an answer now." The words emerged steadier than she felt. "This is too important a decision to make hastily."
His expression flickered; surprise, perhaps, or the first hint of displeasure.
"I had thought…. I believed my intentions were clear. I did not expect you to require additional time."
"Nevertheless, I require it." Lillian withdrew her hands from his grip. "You have paid me a great compliment, Edward. But marriage is not a decision I can make in a rose garden on a sunny afternoon. I must think carefully before I commit my future to anyone."
"Of course. I did not mean to rush you." But there was something in his tone now, a slight edge, a hint of wounded pride, that had not been there before. "Take whatever time you need. I will await your answer with patience."
They walked back to the main gathering in silence, and Lillian felt the weight of his expectation pressing down upon her like a physical burden.
She had time. But she did not know how much or whether it would be enough to understand what she truly wanted.
***
That night, Lillian could not sleep.
She lay in the darkness, listening to Rosanne's steady breathing from the other bed, and tried to make sense of the chaos in her heart.
Edward was offering her everything she had once thought she wanted; security, stability, a comfortable life with a man who seemed to value her intelligence. It was more than most women in her position could hope for. It was, by any reasonable measure, a good match.
But within appropriate bounds echoed in her mind, and she could not silence it.
She thought about what marriage to Edward would mean.
She would have a role, an important role even, but it would always be secondary.
She would advise, but not decide. Suggest, but not act.
Her capabilities would be useful, but they would never be hers.
They would be tools in service of his ambitions, filtered through his judgment, subject to his approval.
And then she thought about Daniel.
She had spent days trying not to think about him. Trying to convince herself that his rejection was final, that there was no point in hoping, that she must move forward with her life regardless of the wound he had left in her heart.
But lying in the darkness, with Edward's proposal hanging over her like a sword, she could not pretend any longer.
She still loved him. Despite everything, despite the coldness, the retreat, the morning room where he had looked at her as though she were nothing, she still loved him.
Not because he was easy. He was the opposite of easy. He was complicated and wounded and infuriating and afraid.
But he had never, not once, suggested that her role was to assist him. He had never claimed her ideas as his own or dismissed her opinions as unfeminine. He had argued with her, challenged her, pushed back against her conclusions with the fervor of someone who took her seriously.
He had seen her as an equal. Even when he was running from her, even when he was building walls to keep her out, he had seen her as an equal.
Edward saw her as an asset.
The realization was clarifying, even as it was painful. She could not marry Edward Potter. Whatever security he offered, whatever comfort his fortune might provide, she could not spend her life being assisted rather than heard.
But that left her with nothing. No prospects, no suitor, no path forward except a return to Hartfield and the quiet life of a spinster daughter caring for aging parents.
Unless...
She cut the thought off before it could fully form. Daniel had made his choice. He had chosen his fear over his love, and she could not force him to change.
But still, in the darkness, she could not quite extinguish the ember of hope that refused to die.
***
Morning brought unexpected news.
Rosanne was still abed when Lillian rose, but there was a letter on the writing desk—sealed with the Wyntham crest, addressed in Rosanne's hand.
Lillian recognized it as the letter Rosanne had been composing that morning, filled with details of the house gathering that she was sending to her brother.
She had seen her writing again the day before and she had assumed that she had sent more than one letters to him.
But beside it was another letter; one that must have arrived during the night, delivered by express messenger. This one was addressed to Rosanne, and it bore the same Wyntham seal.
Rosanne stirred as Lillian examined the envelope.
"What is it?" Her voice was thick with sleep.
"A letter for you. From Wyntham, by the look of it."
Rosanne sat up abruptly, fully awake now. "From Wyntham? Give it here."
She broke the seal and scanned the contents, her face going through a rapid series of expressions; confusion, alarm, and something that looked almost like hope.
"What does it say?" Lillian asked, her heart suddenly pounding.
"It is from Mrs. Gerald, the housekeeper.
" Rosanne looked up, her eyes wide. "Daniel left Wynthorpe yesterday evening.
Rode out without warning, gave no indication of where he was going.
She thought I should know, in case..." She stopped, her gaze sharpening on Lillian's face. "In case he was coming here."
Lillian felt the blood drain from her cheeks. "Here? Why would he..."
"Because I wrote to him." Rosanne's voice was small, guilty. "Three days ago. I told him about Edward, about his attentions to you. I told him that if he did not act, he would lose you forever."
"Rosanne." Lillian's voice emerged as barely more than a whisper. "What have you done?"
"What someone needed to do." Rosanne lifted her chin, a gesture of defiance that did not quite mask her uncertainty.
"He loves you, Lillian. Whatever walls he has built, whatever fears he harbours, he loves you.
And you love him. I could not simply stand by and watch you both make a terrible mistake. "
"You had no right..."
"I had every right. He is my brother, and you are my dearest friend, and I cannot bear to see either of you suffer when the solution is so obvious.
" Rosanne's voice cracked. "If I was wrong, if he does not come, then I will accept the consequences of my interference.
But I could not sit and do nothing. I could not watch you accept Edward's proposal and spend the rest of your life wondering what might have been. "
Lillian wanted to be angry. She wanted to rage at Rosanne for her presumption, for inserting herself into a situation that was none of her concern.
But beneath the anger was something else, something that felt terrifyingly like hope.
Daniel was coming. Or he might be coming. He had left the house without explanation, riding out into the evening like a man possessed.
He might be coming for her.
"When did Mrs. Gerald say he left?" she asked, her voice steadier now.
"Yesterday evening, around seven o'clock. If he rode through the night..."
"He could arrive today."
"Yes." Rosanne reached out and took her hand. "Lillian, whatever happens, whatever he says when he arrives, know that I did this because I love you both. Because I believe, truly believe, that you belong together."
Lillian squeezed her hand but did not respond. She did not know what to believe anymore.
She only knew that the next few hours would change everything.
***
The morning passed in a blur of anxiety.
Lillian went through the motions of the house gathering, attending breakfast, making conversation with the other guests, avoiding Edward's increasingly pointed glances, but her mind was elsewhere.
Every sound of hoofbeats on the drive made her heart leap; every opening door made her catch her breath.
By early afternoon, she could bear it no longer. She excused herself from the ladies gathered in the drawing room and slipped out to the garden, desperate for solitude and fresh air.
The rose garden was empty at this hour, most guests having retreated indoors for the warmth of the fires. Lillian found a bench tucked into an alcove, hidden from casual observation, and sat down to wait.
She did not know what she was waiting for. Perhaps nothing. Perhaps Daniel had ridden somewhere else entirely; to London, to visit friends, to escape for reasons that had nothing to do with her.
Perhaps Rosanne's letter had meant nothing to him at all.
She was still sitting there, lost in thought, when footsteps on the gravel path made her look up.
And there he was.
Daniel stood at the entrance to the alcove, looking as though he had ridden through the night and most of the day.
His clothes were rumpled, his hair disordered, his face pale with exhaustion.
There were dark circles under his eyes and mud on his boots and a wild, desperate expression on his features that she had never seen before.
He looked, Lillian thought distantly, like a man who had ridden to the edge of a cliff and did not know whether to jump or turn back.
"Lillian." Her name emerged from his lips like a prayer or perhaps like a plea. "I need to speak with you."
She rose slowly, her heart hammering against her ribs. "Your Grace. This is…...Unexpected."