Chapter 17 #2
Until now. Until I found myself desperate to see that lost look disappear from her eyes.
“A nursery?” Sybil looked around with obvious curiosity as they stepped through the gate. “What are we doing here?”
“Building a garden,” he said simply.
“What sort of garden?”
“The sort you’ve been reading about in those medical texts.” He watched her face carefully, noting the moment understanding dawned. “A proper herb garden. With all the plants you mentioned in your notes.”
Your notes. The margins you filled with careful observations about which herbs might help with various ailments.
She turned to stare at him, her blue eyes wide with surprise. “You read my notes?”
I read everything you touched, trying to understand what made you so passionate about healing.
“They’re written in my books,” he said with careful, casual arrogance. “In my library. Of course, I noticed them.”
“But I thought—that is, I assumed you wouldn’t approve of me writing in your books.”
“Why wouldn’t I approve of improvements?” He arched an eyebrow at her. “Your observations are considerably more useful than the original text in most cases.”
More useful. More insightful. More evidence of the brilliant mind you hide behind all that practical competence.
The flush that crept up her neck was charming. “They’re just notes. Nothing important.”
“Oh really.” He repeated with gentle mockery. “Yes, I can see how detailed pharmaceutical knowledge would be completely useless.”
She opened her mouth to argue then seemed to think better of it. Instead, she turned toward the nearest glasshouse, her expression shifting from embarrassment to wonder as she took in the vast array of plants within.
“Oh my,” she breathed.
Hugo followed her inside, watching as she moved from table to table with growing excitement. Here was chamomile in neat rows, there lavender in various stages of growth. Mint and rosemary, thyme and sage, dozens of medicinal plants he recognized from her careful marginalia.
“Look at them all,” she said, her voice full of delight. “The variety, the quality—I never imagined such a selection would be available outside London.”
There it is. The spark I was hoping to see.
She moved through the space with newfound energy, examining leaves, checking root systems, and asking the proprietor detailed questions about growing conditions and harvest times.
The lost, hollow look had vanished from her eyes, replaced by the focused intensity he’d glimpsed when she’d treated Rosalie’s injuries.
This is who you really are when you’re not trying to be what you think I want.
“The echinacea looks particularly healthy,” she was saying to the owner, a weathered man who seemed delighted to have found someone who appreciated his work. “And the quality of your feverfew is exceptional.”
“Ah, you know your plants, Your Grace,” the man beamed. “Most ladies who come through here are only interested in the roses and such.”
“Most ladies haven’t spent years learning which herbs can save lives,” Sybil replied with a smile that made Hugo’s chest tighten unexpectedly.
He found himself watching her hands as she examined the plants, noting how she kept her gloves on despite the delicate work of checking leaves and stems.
It struck him as odd—surely she’d want to feel the texture of the plants properly, and gloves could only hinder such detailed inspection.
Perhaps she’s more careful about appearances than I thought.
But even as the explanation occurred to him, it didn’t quite fit. Sybil had never been particularly concerned with maintaining a pristine appearance, especially when engaged in work she cared about.
“Hugo, look at this!” She turned toward him with enthusiasm, holding a small pot containing what appeared to be a rather unremarkable green plant. “It’s comfrey—I’ve been wanting to try making a proper poultice with fresh leaves instead of dried ones.”
“Fascinating,” he said dryly though he found her excitement oddly compelling.
“It is, actually. The fresh leaves contain compounds that dried ones lose, and if my theories are correct, a poultice made from fresh comfrey should be significantly more effective for treating bruises and sprains.”
Your theories. Based on careful observation and practical experience.
“In that case, we’d better take several plants,” he said.
Her face lit up. “Really? You don’t mind me conducting experiments in your garden?”
Your garden. You still don’t understand, do you? It’s not my garden I’m planning—it’s yours.
“I think I can survive the scandal of having a wife interested in useful knowledge,” he replied.
The proprietor spent the next hour helping them select plants—lavender for its calming properties, mint for digestive issues, calendula for wound healing, and a dozen others that Sybil chose with the careful consideration of someone who understood exactly how each would be used.
“The cart’s loaded, Your Grace,” the man said finally. “That’s quite a collection you’ve chosen. Planning something ambitious, are we?”
“Something like that,” Hugo murmured, watching Sybil practically vibrate with excitement as she surveyed their purchases.
Back at Vestiaire Castle, Sybil stood in what had once been a corner of the gardens, gesturing animatedly as she explained her vision for the empty space.
“The tall herbs should go along the back—the comfrey and echinacea need more room to spread,” she was saying, her cheeks flushed with enthusiasm. “And we could create a proper drying shed just there, where the morning sun would hit it but the afternoon heat wouldn’t be too intense.”
Hugo found himself nodding along though he understood perhaps half of what she was explaining. What mattered wasn’t the specific details of her plan but the way her whole being seemed to come alive when she talked about something she was passionate about.
This is what was missing. This sense of purpose, of building something meaningful.
“Your Grace, shall we have the gardeners begin preparing the beds?” Peters approached with deferential caution, clearly uncertain about the protocol for this unusual project.
“No.” The word came out more sharply than Hugo had intended. When both Peters and Sybil turned to look at him in surprise, he felt heat creep up his neck. “That is, I think we can manage the initial planting ourselves.”
We. As if I have any idea what I’m doing with herbs and soil.
Sybil raised an eyebrow. “You want to help plant them? In those clothes?“
“They’re just clothes,” he said, already shrugging out of his coat. “And you’ll need someone to carry the heavier plants.”
You’ll need someone to watch over you and make sure you don’t overexert yourself trying to prove you can do everything alone.
For a moment, she simply stared at him, as though trying to understand this departure from his usual ducal dignity. Then her face broke into a smile that made his breath catch.
“Very well,” she said, pulling off her own gloves with decision. “But don’t blame me when your valet despairs over the state of your shirt.”
My valet can manage. When did you last look this happy?
The next two hours passed in a blur of soil and sweat and surprisingly companionable conversation.
Hugo found himself hauling bags of compost and digging holes under Sybil’s careful direction, while she kneeled in the dirt, arranging plants with the precision of someone who understood exactly how each would grow and spread.
“A little more to the left,” she instructed as he positioned a large lavender bush. “They need room to breathe but close enough that the scents will blend properly.”
“Like this?” he adjusted the plant’s position, noting how she’d somehow managed to get soil streaked across her cheek despite her careful movements.
“Perfect.” She sat back on her heels, surveying their work with satisfaction. “By next summer, this whole section will be blooming. We’ll have enough lavender to make sachets for the entire household, and the chamomile should provide plenty for teas and tinctures.”
We. Our. You’re already thinking of this as permanent.
“You’re still wearing gloves,” he observed, noting how she’d somehow managed to plant an entire garden without once removing the leather from her hands.
She glanced down, as though surprised by the observation. “Oh. Yes, well. They’re an old pair anyway.”
An old pair. That explains precisely nothing.
But before he could press the issue, she was on her feet again, moving toward the next section of the garden with renewed energy.
“The mint needs to be contained, or it will take over everything,” she was saying, her voice warm with the kind of professional knowledge that came from years of practical experience. “And we should plant the calendula near the kitchen garden—it’s useful for so many preparations.”
Hugo listened with half his attention, the other half focused on the way she moved through the space they were creating together. She was in her element here, confident and capable in a way that had nothing to do with social graces or ducal expectations.
This is who you are when you stop trying to be what you think others want.
By the time they finished, both of them were thoroughly disheveled.
Hugo’s shirt was stained with soil, his usually immaculate hair falling across his forehead in damp strands.
Sybil looked even worse—her dress was torn at the hem, her hair had come loose from its pins, and there was a particularly large smudge of dirt across her left cheek.
She’s never looked more beautiful.
The thought hit him with surprising force as he watched her survey their work with obvious pride.
“It’s going to be wonderful,” she said softly. “I can already imagine how it will look when everything’s established. The colors, the scents, the way the morning light will hit the lavender…”
“You have dirt on your face,” he said, the words emerging without conscious thought.
She raised a gloved hand toward her cheek, missing the smudge entirely. “Where?”
There. Right there; making you look like a woman who isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty for something she believes in.
“Hold still,” he said, reaching toward her face.
This is a mistake. You’re crossing a line you agreed not to cross.
But his thumb was already brushing across her cheekbone, wiping away the streak of soil with gentle precision. Her skin was warm beneath his touch, softer than he’d expected, and the way her breath caught made something tighten low in his chest.
For a moment, they simply stood there in their ruined clothes, surrounded by the garden they’d built together, staring at each other with an intensity that had nothing to do with herbs or soil or any of the practical reasons they’d given for this project.
Then, Sybil did something that surprised him completely.
She giggled.
Not a polite laugh or a nervous titter but a genuine, delighted giggle that transformed her entire face and made her look years younger.
“What?” he asked, his thumb still resting against her cheek.
“You,” she said, her eyes sparkling with mirth. “The Duke of Vestiaire covered in dirt and looking completely satisfied about it. If your daughters could see you now.”
If my daughters could see us now. If anyone could see us now.
“They’d probably think I’d taken leave of my senses,” he admitted.
“Have you?”
The question was asked lightly, teasingly, but something in her tone suggested she genuinely wanted to know the answer.
Have I? Have I lost my mind over a woman who was supposed to be nothing more than a convenient solution to my problems?
“Probably,” he said quietly, his gaze dropping to her mouth.
Definitely.
Her giggle had faded, replaced by something warmer, more complex. The air between them seemed to thicken, charged with possibilities neither of them had quite acknowledged yet.
Step back. This wasn’t part of the arrangement.
But his feet remained planted in the soil they’d worked together, his thumb still tracing the curve of her cheek, his entire world narrowed to the woman in front of him and the growing certainty that their carefully practical marriage was becoming something else entirely.
Something that felt dangerously like the beginning of everything he’d never known he wanted.