What else could she do? Heart dropping—she hadn’t returned since that dark time—she smiled nonetheless. “Very well.”
Relief flashed in Quincy’s eyes. Before she could wonder at it, however, Yargood entered.
“His Grace’s room is ready.”
“Splendid. Thank you, Yargood.” Lenora, smiling, looked at Quincy. “If you’re done with your tea, I’ll show you the way.”
“Nonsense,” Aunt Olivia said. “You’re needed here. Clara will bring him.”
Barring any further discussion, she deftly wielded her cane, and before Clara knew what had happened she found herself with Quincy out in the hall.
He gave her a bemused smile. “Well, that was impressively done.”
“She has her talents,” Clara replied with a grin that quickly faded as they made their way through the house. She glanced up at Quincy, noting the new lines of strain about his eyes, and her heart ached for him. “I’m certain Miss Brandon couldn’t have been his mistress,” she murmured low.
He shot her a rueful look. “And here I thought I had hidden my disquiet.”
She flushed. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve no need to apologize. Besides, whatever the truth, it doesn’t change who my father was to me. And so it doesn’t matter who Miss Brandon was.”
Clara bit her lip. No matter his words, there was an undercurrent of strain in his voice that told her it did matter. Quite a bit.
“If you’ve a wish to know who she was,” she ventured quietly, “I’m certain there’s someone on the Isle who can answer that for you. There must have been someone working at the house while she was there.”
There was a moment of tense silence. She feared she’d overstepped.
When he spoke, his voice was low and threaded through with emotion. “I’ll consider it. Thank you.”
They reached his room then. But when she might have brought him inside, she stopped cold. Or rather, hot, for at the sight of the large four-poster bed that dominated the space she couldn’t help but think of him amid the sheets. Which led to her body warming as she imagined herself amid those sheets with him…
Drawing upon every ounce of willpower she possessed—similar to when he’d arrived and she’d wanted to throw herself into his arms—she smiled brightly. “Here you are then. We’ll be sure to have a maid show you the way to the dining room when dinner is ready.”
“Thank you, Clara.”
She nodded and turned, making her way down the hall. And she did not let down her guard until she had turned the corner and was well out of sight. As she leaned heavily against the wall, exhausted, she wondered how she would be able to get through the next weeks without falling in love with him.
***
Clara had not visited Swallowhill in nearly fifteen years, not since those days of heartbreak and pain, when all hope had seemed gone. The property had returned a modicum of that hope to her, showing her that, even in ruin, something could still hold grace and beauty. That though something might be cast aside, it still had worth.
She had not imagined how altered the house would be.
The gray stone exterior was chalky from the salt air, pockmarks dotting its surface. Ivy grew wild up its façade, lacing over windows, latching onto downspouts and tearing them from their moorings. Several windowpanes were cracked or broken, the paint peeling from their casements to show the bleached gray wood beneath.
The gardens, however, had received the brunt of time’s heavy hand. The plants grew wild and unkempt, seeming to have swallowed everything in their path. Clara shivered. If the state of the front garden was this grim, what must the back gardens look like? Images of the paths she had walked and found so much solace in rose up in her mind, the overgrown rosebushes and hedges only the more beautiful for their determination to thrive with no one to care for them. Her heart ached at the thought of it all going to ruin.
She should have perhaps visited before now. This place had given her just what she’d needed when she’d been at her lowest, and a horrible guilt filled her that she’d allowed it to be reduced to this.
No, she reminded herself firmly. Swallowhill was not hers to care for.
“Goodness,” Margery said, peering up at the façade. “It’s in worse shape than I expected. Though after it was abandoned for so long, this shouldn’t come as a surprise.”
Phoebe came up beside Clara, linking arms with her. The simple act grounded Clara, and she drew in a shaky breath.
“Is it as you remember, Clara?” her sister asked.
“A bit,” she said vaguely. “Though it’s been some time since I’ve been here.”