Chapter Fifteen #4
“He has come on behalf of Trenton,” he said. “He does not want me to interfere in Trenton and Lysabel’s affair.”
Alixandrea watched her husband as he went over to the wine she’d brought and started drinking from the pitcher.
He didn’t even take a cup. She knew how torn he was about this; she, too, was torn, but she also understood a woman’s heart.
She understood that Lysabel was in love for the first time in her life and she was desperate and miserable without Trenton.
“Matt,” she said quietly. “I am your wife, but I am also the one who knows you best in this world. And I can be completely honest with you without being judgmental.”
He looked at her. “Well? Let’s hear your honesty, then.”
She put her soft hand on his arm. “Your daughter is in love,” she murmured.
“I have tried to tell you this, but you have not been listening to me. She is in love with a man who has treated her better in just a few days than Benoit treated her in twelve years. She is not going to forget about Trenton so easily. You have mentioned betrothing her to Ranse, but even if she marries him, it will be with Trenton on her mind and in her heart, and that is not fair to her or to Ranse.”
Matthew gazed into those hazel eyes he loved so well. “And you think I am wrong in this?”
Alixandrea lifted her shoulders, turning away from him. She couldn’t honestly look him in the eye and tell him he was wrong.
“Nay,” she said. “I know you are looking at the moral aspect of it. You are looking at Lysabel’s future and the future of her girls. But you are not looking at the condition of her heart. The heart wants what the heart wants, and you cannot break that bond if it has been formed.”
Matthew pondered her words. “Then what should I do?”
Alixandrea looked at him, then. “I know you do not want to do this, but you must trust your daughter to make her own decision. Trust her to make the right one. She has her father’s wisdom, after all. You must give her the chance to choose her own destiny this time.”
It was difficult for Matthew to accept that, but his wife was wiser than him in all things. He had to trust that she was correct. Gaston had tried to tell him the same thing, but coming from Alixandrea… now he had the two people he loved best in this world telling him the very same thing.
He didn’t like losing control like this.
“Then I shall go and speak with her,” he said, resignation in his voice. “I do not want my daughter to end up hating me, but she must understand that I am only thinking of her future.”
Alixandrea stopped him as he tried to walk away. “Not now.”
“Why not?”
“Because Trenton is here.”
Matthew’s eyebrows flew up. “Trenton is…?”
Alixandrea nodded, pulling him over to the chairs in front of the now-blazing hearth. “I saw him come in through the postern gate when I was in the kitchens procuring your refreshments,” she said. “He must have ridden in with Gaston. Did he tell you?”
Matthew’s expression tightened with displeasure. “He did not.”
Alixandrea gently pushed her husband into a chair. “It is possible that he did not know,” she said. “Trenton could have followed him from Deverill.”
“And it is equally possible that he knew and did not want to tell me.”
Alixandrea sat down next to him, holding his hand. “Mayhap he was planning to tell you,” she said. “Do not think Gaston was being subversive. You know him better than that.”
Matthew did, but Trenton’s presence at Wellesbourne still didn’t sit well. “Where did Trenton go?”
Alixandrea turned away, her gaze moving to the lancet windows of the solar as if she could see the activity beyond them.
“Lysabel is in the garden with the girls,” she said. “I suspect that is where Trenton is going. Matt… stay here with me. Trust that your daughter will do the right thing, whatever that may be. Have faith that everything will work out as it should.”
Matthew wasn’t so certain, but he didn’t argue.
He kept thinking about his daughter, so vulnerable he thought, and Trenton, who wanted something very badly.
Then he thought of Gaston, closer than a brother, and knew the man was hurting, too.
His estranged son had come to him for help, and Matthew had shut him down.
Perhaps, Gaston had some fear of losing Trenton for good over this.
It seemed that both Matthew and Gaston had fears for their children.
Lifting his wife’s hand, he kissed it.
“I think I shall go to Gaston,” he said. “It would seem that we have some waiting to do. You will understand when I say that I should like to wait with him, with your permission.”
Alixandrea smiled at her husband. “Go to him.”
Matthew kissed her hand again before letting it go, making his way from the solar and up to the chamber on the second floor, the smaller one that overlooked the bailey, where Gaston usually stayed when he visited.
Matthew knocked on the old oak door, waiting in silence until it was opened and Gaston stood in the doorway. But no words were spoken between them.
No words were necessary.
They threw their arms around each other and hugged. And then, they sat and waited.