Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Benedict knew he would not sleep.
He could still feel the delicate resistance of the pearl buttons beneath his fingers. He could still see her reflected in the glass, loose-haired and flushed, watching him with an expression that had stripped every sensible thought from his head.
He had nearly kissed her.
The knowledge followed him down the corridor like an accusation.
Worse, she had not moved away. For one reckless instant, he had been certain she wanted him to do it.
Her lips had parted. Her breath had caught.
She had looked at him not with alarm, but with the same startled longing that had nearly conquered what remained of his restraint.
He descended the back staircase, crossed the darkened morning room, and let himself into the garden. The night air struck cool against his face.
Rivermere lay quiet beneath a pale moon. Gravel shone faintly along the paths, and the clipped hedges had become dark walls softened by shadow. The house behind him rose in dignified silence, its windows dark except for one or two faint squares of candlelight.
His feet carried him toward the old flower garden. He sat upon the low stone edge beside the bed Sophia had helped restore. The young plants were nearly invisible in the darkness, but he knew they were there.
Benedict stared at the dark earth. He had no idea how much time passed.
Five minutes, perhaps… or fifty-five. The garden did not require an answer.
It did not expect him to speak, decide, or prevent some impending disaster.
It merely existed around him, damp with night air and filled with the quiet labor of things growing where no one could see.
He rested his forearms upon his knees. The image of Sophia returned despite every effort to banish it. Benedict closed his eyes and right then, footsteps sounded upon the gravel.
He opened them and turned. Sophia was standing at the entrance to the path.
She was wearing a dark cloak over her nightdress, fastened closely at her throat.
Her hair remained loose, falling over her shoulders in soft waves that caught the moonlight.
The sight of it stirred an immediate and vivid memory of his fingers near the open back of her gown.
For one moment, neither of them spoke. Then she came nearer.
“You could not sleep either?”
Benedict shook his head. Speech seemed beyond him.
Sophia stopped beside the stone border. She looked toward the flower bed, then back at him. “May I sit?”
He nodded. She lowered herself beside him, leaving a careful space between them. The scent of lavender followed her, faint and familiar. Benedict was aware of every inch separating them and, more dangerously, of how little distance it truly was.
Silence settled. Sophia drew the cloak around her knees. Benedict looked toward the flower bed because looking directly at her seemed unwise.
“It is strange,” he said at last.
“What is?”
“To see something growing here.”
Sophia followed his gaze. “Mr. Wilkes is already planning how the colors will look together.”
“He has been planning that for years.”
“But now he believes he will see them.”
Benedict studied the faint shapes of the young plants.
“He did everything he knew to do,” he said. “He changed the soil. Altered the watering. Fed the roots. Yet nothing survived.”
“The problem was beneath it all.”
“Yes.” He rubbed one thumb over his palm. “The soil appeared sound. The plants were tended. Nothing was neglected. Still, the roots could not grow because something hidden prevented them.”
Sophia remained quiet. She had a way of doing that, letting silence become an invitation rather than an absence. Most people rushed to fill any pause he left. Sophia seemed to understand that some thoughts needed room before they could be spoken.
“When Amelia and Marjorie came to me,” Benedict continued, “I thought care meant preventing every possible harm.”
Sophia turned slightly toward him.
“I had no warning,” he confessed. “One day I was their uncle. I visited, brought them gifts, listened to Marjorie describe adventures which grew less plausible with every telling.”
A faint smile touched Sophia’s lips.
“And the next day?” she asked.
“The next day, I was responsible for everything.” His voice sounded too clear in the stillness of the garden.
“Their home. Their education. Their health. Whether they slept or ate or felt safe. Every decision their parents would have made became mine, and I had no notion how they would have made it.” He looked down at his hands.
“They had already lost so much. I could not allow them to lose anything else.”
“So you tried to hold everything in place.”
“I tried to remove every danger.”
“And every uncertainty.”
“Yes.” Benedict looked back toward the young plants.
“I thought if I watched closely enough, planned carefully enough, nothing further could reach them. If I knew where they were every moment, if I forbade every reckless impulse, then perhaps I could keep the world from taking anything else.” The words grew more difficult.
“But perhaps I was only pressing the earth more firmly around their roots.”
Sophia’s expression softened.
“You love them,” she smiled.
“That does not mean I love them well.”
“You were grieving, too.”
Benedict’s mouth tightened. “They required more from me than grief.”
“They required you to remain.”
“I remained because there was no one else.”
“Perhaps at first.” He turned toward her. Sophia held his gaze. “But you do not sit beside their beds because no one else can. You do not remember which story frightens Amelia or which lie Marjorie tells when she has hurt herself because duty demands it.”
“She lies often enough that the pattern is easy to learn.”
Sophia smiled, but the tenderness in her face remained.
“You know them,” she said.
“Not as their parents did,” he told her.
“No. You know them differently.”
Benedict looked away again. “Their father knew how to make everything into an adventure. Their mother understood what each silence meant. I know rules, accounts and consequences.”
“You know that Amelia apologizes when she is frightened,” Sophia replied. “You know Marjorie talks more loudly when she is hurt. You know which doors they leave open at night and which dreams send them searching for light.”
“That is not enough.”
“It is not everything,” she said gently. “But nothing ever is.”
A faint breeze moved through the leaves.
“Plants do not grow because someone protects them from every drop of rain,” Sophia continued. “They grow because someone notices what they need. Sometimes that is shelter. Sometimes it is space. Sometimes it is having the hard ground beneath them broken open.”
“And if I choose wrongly?”
“You will.”
Benedict frowned. Sophia’s mouth curved faintly. “So shall I. So did their parents, I am certain.”
“You seem unusually cheerful about our inevitable failure,” he pointed out.
“I find it comforting.”
“How?”
“Because loving someone does not make one infallible. It only gives one a reason to notice when one has been wrong.”
Benedict considered her words.
“I am still afraid,” he admitted. The confession escaped so quietly that he might have pretended not to say it. Sophia did not permit him the pretense.
“Of failing them?”
“Of failing to see what they need until it is too late.” His throat tightened.
“Of Marjorie’s courage carrying her somewhere I cannot follow.
Of Amelia becoming so quiet that I mistake her silence for peace.
Of making one decision, just one careless, ordinary decision and discovering it was the one which mattered. ”
Sophia’s hand shifted upon the stone between them, though she did not touch him. “You cannot protect them from every sorrow.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
He glanced at her. She spoke without reproach. That made the question harder.
“I am learning,” he said.
“You are trying.”
“It may not be enough.”
“It will be as long as you love each other.”
The words settled painfully beneath his ribs. He looked toward the house, where the twins slept beneath the same roof that had once contained their parents, their whole family, and a happiness Benedict had not known how to preserve.
“I understand fear more than you suppose,” Sophia whispered.
He turned back to her. She stared at the moonlit path.
“I have never felt entirely settled anywhere. At home, I was the daughter who did not shine in company. I was not accomplished enough to be admired or troublesome enough to command attention. I simply existed at the edge of things.”
Benedict’s expression tightened. “You were always interesting.”
Sophia gave him a sad little smile. “You did not know me then.”
“I know you now.” The words came with more force than he intended.
Her eyes lifted briefly to his before falling again.
“In society,” she continued, “I was too quiet to be remembered and too uncertain to become interesting. People rarely disliked me. They simply forgot I was present.”
“I would not have forgotten you.” The certainty in his voice surprised them both. Sophia looked at him. Benedict had no explanation to offer. He only knew it was true.
“When I came to Rivermere,” she said after a moment, “everyone already belonged here. You, the twins, the servants who have watched the family grow for years. Even Mr. Wilkes belongs more securely to the roses than I did to the house.”
“You are the Duchess of Rivermere.”
“That is a title.”
“It is more than that.”
“Is it?” The question was very quiet. Sophia clasped her hands in her lap.
“I love the girls,” she confessed. “More than I expected to. And I have begun to love the house, too.” Her smile faded. “But sometimes I fear I am only visiting another family’s life, that I have been placed inside a home which existed perfectly well before me.”
“It did not.”