Chapter Twelve #2
"I asked him once. He said…" She paused, remembering.
"He said that loving someone doesn't mean you stop existing when they're gone.
It means you carry them with you in everything you do.
You honour them by living, not by dying.
You prove that the love was worth something by becoming someone they would be proud of. "
Alistair was silent, staring at their joined hands. When he looked up, his eyes were bright with unshed tears.
"I think I would have liked your father."
"He would have liked you too." She smiled. "He had a weakness for stubborn men who took too long to admit their feelings."
A surprised laugh escaped him; rough, startled and genuine. "Is that what I am? Stubborn?"
"Impossibly so. It's one of your more endearing qualities."
"I have endearing qualities?"
"Several, actually." She became suddenly aware that she was still holding his hand—that they were sitting close together by the fire, speaking of love and loss and feelings that neither of them had dared to name.
Heat crept into her cheeks. "Though I'm not sure this is the moment to enumerate them. "
"Why not?"
Because if she started listing all the things she found endearing about him, she might not be able to stop. Because the way he was looking at her right now, soft and wondering and achingly vulnerable, made her want to close the distance between them and do something very foolish indeed.
"Because Henry will be wondering where I am," she said instead, gently withdrawing her hand. "And you have estate business to attend to."
"Indeed." He cleared his throat, visibly collecting himself. "Yes, of course."
She rose, still clutching his mother's book. At the door, she paused.
"Thank you," she said. "For trusting me with this. With her."
"Thank you," he replied quietly, "for making it possible to talk about her again."
She left the library with her heart pounding and her thoughts in chaos, and she didn't see the way he watched her go. He didn't see the expression on his face, the way his hand rose unconsciously to touch his chest, as if trying to hold something in that was threatening to break free.
***
The book, Catherine's book, became Eliza's most treasured possession.
She read it every night, studying the pressed flowers, tracing the handwritten annotations, trying to piece together a picture of the woman who had created this small masterpiece.
Catherine had been witty, judging by her notes.
"Found this specimen near the old oak—considerably prettier than Lord Pufferton's waistcoat.
" And she had been romantic: "Pressed this rose from the south garden on the anniversary of my wedding—ten years, and I still feel the same flutter when he walks into a room. "
Ten years, and she still felt the flutter.
Eliza thought about that often, lying in bed at night with the book open on her pillow. Would she still feel this way in ten years? Would the sight of Alistair still make her heart race, her breath catch, and her body ache with wanting?
She thought she might. She thought this feeling, whatever it was, had the kind of roots that didn't fade with time.
But she still wasn't ready to call it love. Not yet. Not until she was certain that what she felt was more than attraction, more than admiration, more than the natural sympathy between two lonely people who had found an unexpected connection.
***
The second gift arrived a week later.
Eliza found it on her nightstand, as usual, though she still didn't know how he managed to leave things without being noticed. A small wooden box, polished to a gleam, with a delicate brass clasp.
Inside, nested on a bed of velvet, was a hair comb.
It was beautiful: silver, set with small green stones that caught the morning light and scattered it in emerald sparks across the walls. The craftsmanship was exquisite, clearly expensive, far beyond anything a governess should accept from her employer.
But it wasn't the expense that made her breath catch.
It was the note tucked beneath it, written in Alistair's precise hand:
This was my mother's. She wore it on her wedding day, and every anniversary thereafter. She used to say that green was the color of growing things—of hope and renewal and all the possibilities that come with spring.
I thought of you when I found it in her things. I thought of how your eyes hold that same green, that same promise of new beginnings.
Wear it, if you like. Or keep it safe, if you prefer. Either way, I wanted you to have something of hers that wasn't just words on a page.
—A.
Eliza sat on the edge of her bed, the comb cradled in her hands, and felt tears slip down her cheeks.
His mother's wedding comb. A piece of jewellery that must hold a thousand memories, a thousand moments of love, loss and longing. He was giving her something irreplaceable, something precious, something that said far more than any words could express.
He was giving her his past. Opening the locked rooms of his heart and inviting her inside.
And she had no idea what to do with that invitation.
She wore the comb to dinner that evening.
It wasn't a fancy dinner; just the three of them in the small dining room, as had become their custom. Henry chattered about his day, Eliza responded with appropriate enthusiasm, and Alistair…
Alistair stared at her hair.
She had swept it up differently than usual, creating a style that showcased the comb to its best advantage. The silver gleamed against the copper of her hair, the green stones winking in the candlelight like tiny captive stars.
"You're wearing it," he said, when there was a lull in Henry's monologue.
"I am."
"It suits you." His voice was rough, his eyes tracing the line of the comb against her hair. "Better than I imagined."
"You imagined it?"
"I…" He stopped, color rising in his cheeks. "I may have considered how it would look. When I found it in her things. I thought…"
"What did you think?"
He met her eyes across the table.
"I thought it was meant for you," he said quietly. "I don't know how to explain it. I found it in a drawer I hadn't opened for years, and the moment I saw it, I thought of your hair. Your eyes. The way you…" He stopped again, visibly struggling. "Forgive me. This is inappropriate."
"Nothing about this is appropriate." Eliza was surprised by the steadiness of her own voice, given the chaos inside her. "An employer shouldn't give his governess jewellery, leave books on her nightstand and look at her the way you're looking at me right now."
"I know." His jaw tightened. "I should stop."
"Should you?"
The question hung between them—weighted, dangerous. Henry, oblivious, was arranging his peas into constellations on his plate.
"I don't think I can," Alistair admitted, his voice barely above a whisper.
"I've tried. Heaven knows I've tried. But every time I tell myself to keep my distance, I find another book to leave you.
Every time I swear I won't look, my eyes find you anyway.
I don't…" He pressed his hand against his temple.
"I don't know what to do with this. I've never felt anything like it. "
"Neither have I."
Their eyes held across the candlelit table, and Eliza felt the world narrow to just the two of them; the air between them charged with everything they weren't saying.
"Miss Harrow!" Henry's voice broke the spell. "Look, I made Orion! See his belt?"
Eliza dragged her gaze away from Alistair, feeling slightly dazed. "That's wonderful, darling. Very accurate."
"Can we go stargazing tonight? You said we could when the sky was clear, and Thomas says there won't be clouds until tomorrow."
"I think that's a lovely idea. If His Grace approves."
She looked at Alistair, who was still watching her with that devastating intensity. He seemed to shake himself slightly, collecting the scattered pieces of his composure.
"Stargazing sounds acceptable," he said. "Perhaps I might join you."
And so, an hour later, the three of them found themselves bundled in blankets on the terrace, lying on their backs to watch the winter stars wheel overhead.
The night was cold but clear, the kind of crystalline winter evening that made the stars look close enough to touch.
Eliza had arranged blankets in layers, one beneath them on the stone terrace, two more wrapped around each of them, and had ensured Henry was thoroughly bundled before allowing him to lie down.
"Can you see them?" Henry asked, pointing at the hazy band of light that stretched across the darkness.
"I can. It's particularly bright tonight."
"Miss Harrow says it's made of millions and millions of stars, all so far away they just look like a cloud. Is that true, Alistair?"
"So I'm told." Alistair's voice was warm in the darkness. "Though I confess astronomy was never my strongest subject. I was more interested in practical things—agriculture, engineering, the management of estates."
"That sounds boring."
"Henry," Eliza chided gently.
"It's alright," Alistair said, and she could hear the smile in his voice. "He's not wrong. Estate management is boring. Necessary, but boring. I used to envy my friends who could spend their time on poetry and philosophy while I was learning about crop rotation and tenant agreements."
"Why couldn't you do both?"
"Because I was the heir. My father believed that a duke's first duty was to his land and his people. Everything else: art, music, literature, was secondary." A pause. "He wasn't wrong, exactly. But sometimes I wonder what I might have become if I'd had more freedom to choose my own path."
"What would you have chosen?" Eliza asked. "If you could have been anything?"
The question seemed to surprise him. He was silent for a long moment, considering.
"I don't know," he admitted finally. "I've never let myself think about it. It seemed pointless because I was born to be a duke, and a duke I will be until I die. Imagining alternatives felt like betraying my duty somehow."
"That's very sad."
"Is it?"