Chapter 16 #3
“Well, it is a great pleasure to meet you both again. I trust the staff has made you comfortable. If you should find yourselves in need of anything at all during your stay, you must not hesitate to ask.”
He then turned his attention down to the small stool near the sofa. His expression softened. “Continue with your reading, girls. But do not let your aunts convince you to hide under any rugs.”
Cordelia and Georgianna giggled, nodding quickly. With that, Nathaniel turned and walked out of the room, the doors clicking firmly shut behind him.
A short silence fell over the drawing room the moment he departed.
Seraphina waited a beat, ensuring his footsteps had fully faded down the corridor, before she crossed the carpet to Euphemia’s side. She leaned in close, her voice dropping to a whisper.
“He did not look at you once,” Seraphina murmured, her eyes fixed on her Euphemia’s face. “Not a single time.”
Euphemia turned her head to look back at her, her brow furrowing as a cold knot formed in her stomach. “What do you mean?”
“He did not acknowledge you at all, Effie,” Seraphina said, her whisper frantic and filled with concern. “He acknowledged me, he acknowledged Leonora, he even joked with his little girls as he was leaving. But he never once glanced at you. He acted as though you were entirely invisible.”
Euphemia grew completely quiet, her throat tightening. She stared at the closed door, unable to find a single word to utter in reply.
Seraphina stared at her, her eyes wide. “Is everything all right? Euphemia, are you entirely sure that everything is fine?”
She stepped closer, glancing briefly over her shoulder toward Leonora before looking back at Euphemia. “This is precisely why we decided to visit you, to see how you were truly doing. We wanted to see ourselves.”
Euphemia forced a small, tight smile to her lips, though it felt incredibly fragile. She adjusted her posture, smoothing down the front of her gown to give her hands something to do. “Everything is fine, Seraphina. I am doing well.”
Seraphina sighed, her shoulders dropping as she studied Euphemia’s face. It was entirely clear that she did not quite believe it. “If there are problems, Effie, you know you can tell us. You know you can come back home if you must.”
“It is all right,” Euphemia insisted quietly. “Truly, everything is fine. This is my home.”
Knowing she could not afford to fall apart in front of them, Euphemia smoothly transferred the conversation back to her sisters, asking a light question about their journey to keep the attention away from herself.
As Leonora and Seraphina began to talk, adjusting their positions to sit back down near the children, Euphemia sank slowly into her own chair.
She stared into the middle distance, a hollow ache settling deep in her chest.
In truth, she had noticed that Nathaniel had not acknowledged her.
She had noticed the exact second his eyes swept over the room, intentionally cutting her out of his gaze.
But she wasn’t surprised. For the past week, everything between them had been exactly like this.
She didn’t even have the proper words to explain it to her sisters. They were simply not in a good place.
They were too formal with each other, too rigidly polite, too guarded. Everything about their interactions felt as though they were complete strangers again, erasing every bit of warmth they had shared before that fateful incident in his bedchamber.
It was breaking her heart.
As much as his coldness hurt her, the fact that he was keeping such a deliberate distance from her was proving a dangerous point.
It proved that she had crossed a line she never should have touched.
More than that, it revealed a terrifying truth to her, that she was starting to care far too much about what he thought of her, what he felt, and how he treated her.
She did not need a soothsayer to tell her how grave this situation was.
She didn’t need anyone to explain the symptoms of the ache in her chest, because she could already tell from everything people dreamed about, from every poem and story of love, that what she was feeling at that exact moment was actually something similar to it.
She was starting to have genuine feelings for him.
That was why it was hurting her so terribly that he did not seem to remember their kiss, and that he was starting to keep his distance from her.
She resolved then to give him the distance he so clearly demanded. She had simply come on too strongly, encroaching upon his private world far too quickly and disregarding the strict boundaries he had established for their interaction long before their marriage vows were ever spoken.
If she stepped back, perhaps they could find their way to the safe, predictable ground they had occupied before the lines had blurred.
It would be a bitter, agonizing trial to withhold her words when she so desperately wished to speak to him, but she would master herself, she would tuck her feelings away, and pour every ounce of her remaining energy strictly into her duties and the care of his daughters.