The Governess and Mr. Granville

“I hope and pray you’re wrong,” Serena said.

Something in her tone put him on the alert. It sounded personal. As if she, too, had loved and lost. He would have said twenty-one was too young to be seriously brokenhearted, but of course, he and Emily had been married three years by the time Emily was of age. He wondered who Serena...

He dismissed the thought. Likely she was moved by his own tale, not referring to a doomed romance of her own.

The silence grew awkward. Serena broke it.

“How will you determine if Mrs. Gordon is fit to be your children’s stepmother?” she asked.

“She’s a woman of good sense and few expectations,” he said. “I consider that an excellent start.”

Those cornflower eyes widened. “Oh, dear, she sounds rather uninspiring.”

He couldn’t help it; he groaned. “If by uninspiring you mean calm and reasonable...”

“That must be what I mean,” she said with that now-familiar mischievous twinkle.

“Her lineage is impeccable,” he said. “If not as elevated as your own.”

“I can’t help feeling Mrs. Gordon has attained the position of front-runner merely by coming from a good family and living close by,” Serena said. “Is your aim to make the nearest choice or the best choice?”

He refused to rise to that bait. “Since this will be a marriage of convenience, proximity seems a logical criterion.”

“What about whether she adores your children?”

Adores. What a word to use.

He straightened the storybook sitting on the chest of drawers next to the bed. “She will need to care about the children, of course. And to know how to nurse them and employ a governess and, when they’re older, introduce them to the world. She’s a mother already, so I’m sure she knows these things.”

“Hmm,” Serena said. It wasn’t a sound that expressed confidence in Dominic’s judgment. “What other qualities should the future Mrs. Granville possess?”

Like most of her questions, this one fell into the none-of-her-business category. But it was, he supposed, something he should be considering.

“Intelligence,” he said, “of course.”

“There’s no of course about that,” she said. “I hear many men don’t want an intelligent wife.”

“I’m not afraid of a woman with a brain, Miss Somerton.”

“Excellent,” she said warmly.

He shook off the pleasant feeling her approval induced. “For my wife to be attractive would be nice, but not essential.”

“A Christian woman,” Serena suggested.

“Naturally,” he said. “I believe most ladies of my acquaintance are Christians.”

“Someone...playful?” she proposed.

He frowned.

“You don’t object to play, do you?”

“Of course not,” he said. “It’s good for children to play. When it’s appropriate.”

Her quick grin said she considered him stuffy. To a twenty-one-year-old girl, he probably was. “I expect my wife to be mature,” he said. “Close to my own age.”

She nodded as if that made complete sense, which, perversely, left him feeling insulted. Who was to say he couldn’t find himself a younger wife if he wished?

Though a more mature woman was less likely to have romantic notions.

“The main thing is,” he said, putting an abrupt end to a conversation that had already become too personal, “the children should have someone to take the maternal role in their lives.”

“You mean, to love them.” Why did she have to twist everything, yet at the same time make it sound so uncomplicated?

“You really are very young, Serena.” Blast, he’d used her Christian name again.

“I suspect you mean I’m naive,” she said. “If believing in the power of love to transform lives is naive, then, yes, I am.”

“No doubt you’re right.” But Dominic would settle for a successful come-out for his daughters, and for a more comfortable existence for his sister.

Serena’s tsk suggested she knew he was fobbing her off. But she didn’t argue. “I think Louisa will sleep through now,” she said.

“Excellent.” He looked down at his sleeping daughter. Louisa had always been a small child, but huddled as she was, she seemed tiny. He had the urge to caress her in some way...but he didn’t know how. Awkward, he rubbed the bump in the blanket made by her foot. “I will do my best for my children in this matter of my remarriage, Miss Somerton, you may rely on that. I am more than conscious that they depend on me. Indeed, I would give my life for any of them.”

What on earth had possessed him to say something so dramatic? Blame it on the midnight madness.

Serena made a smothered sound. Dominic raised his eyebrows at her, daring her to comment.

She shook her head. “It’s time I returned to my chamber.” She bent over and kissed Louisa’s forehead. That was what he should have done, he realized, castigating himself. It seemed obvious now. The way Serena smoothed a lock of his daughter’s hair reminded him of Emily. For one moment, he found himself wanting that touch on his own hair, that tenderness directed at him. No.

Yet instinctively, he drew closer, and as Serena straightened, she bumped into him. Dominic grasped her arms to steady her. Immediately, he released her.

They stood staring at each other.

“Good night,” she blurted. And almost ran from the room.

Chapter Four

The next morning, Marianne’s complexion was redder than usual—one of those inexplicable days when her face started off the color of the crimson walls in the breakfast room and stayed that way. Small wonder that, having swallowed the last of her baked egg, she took to her room to lie down with damp cloths on her cheeks, with a plan to play some solitary chess later. A devotee of the game, she had a board set up in her private sitting room.

Outside, a spring storm had blown up, lashing the windows and bending trees at dangerous angles.

Serena visited the nursery and found the children fidgety, snapping at each other. Louisa was feeling much better, but her mood was subdued.

“What we need is a nice game,” Serena announced.

“Can we slide down the banister again?” William begged.

“No, dearest.” Even though it was exactly that kind of day, and Serena felt so peculiarly unsettled that she’d have relished the chance to climb onto the banister herself. Not that she ever would, of course. “We’ll play dominoes.”

The children pounced on the suggestion, and the twins soon had the game set up. Luckily, it didn’t require much concentration, because Serena’s mind was busy elsewhere. Wondering at Dominic’s unguarded, late-night declaration of love for his children.

Not that he’d said anything as simple as “I love them.” Instead, he’d said, “I would give my life for any of them.”

She doubted he’d been thinking of the verse from John’s gospel: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” But she had thought of it, and had recognized a declaration of ardent love.

He would probably be horrified by her interpretation. What a pity that he should feel so much for his children, yet not show it in his words or deeds! During her eight months at Woodbridge Hall Serena had observed him as a cool, distant father. A provider and protector, but not a loving papa. When he embraced his children, she saw only duty on both sides.

Until last night, she’d assumed his behavior was a reflection of his thoughts.

She’d been wrong.

Yet she doubted even Dominic knew how much he loved his children. Given his attitude to love in a new marriage, he might not even want to know.

For his own sake, and that of his children, he needed to admit to his deeper feelings. And if this was another example of Serena deciding what was best for others...she didn’t care.

The game of dominoes came to an end, with William the winner.

“What shall we play now?” Charlotte asked, as the older children packed away the dominoes.

“Time for spillikins, I think,” Serena said. “Louisa, perhaps you could ask your father to join us?”

Louisa was hard to resist on any day. Today, when she was still pale from her sleepless night, even the hardest-hearted brute would succumb. Dominic was certainly not that.

“Ask Papa to play a game?” Thomas said, astounded. “In the middle of the day?” It wasn’t clear which idea he found more outrageous: that Dominic might play or that they might see their father outside the prescribed times.

“Why not?” Serena said. “He’s probably as bored as we are.”

Thomas’s expression said she had lost her mind, but of course, he didn’t contradict her. The Granville children were all, with the occasional exception of Charlotte, well-behaved, as they should be.

Serena escorted Louisa downstairs to the library, where Dominic usually spent the morning on his correspondence and accounts. She knocked on the paneled oak door.

“Come in,” said a mildly irritated voice.

He’d been deprived of sleep, Serena reminded herself. She opened the door and gave Louisa a little push.

“Hello there.” Dominic’s voice softened immediately. Serena could hear him smiling. “How are your ears this morning?”

Still holding the door handle, Serena pressed her own ear to the opening in an attempt to hear the conversation—only to stumble a moment later when the door was wrenched open.

She gave a little squawk of dismay, and straightened up.

“Eavesdropping, Miss Somerton?” Dominic asked.

So, in the cold light of day they were back to “Miss Somerton.” If not for the flicker in his hazel eyes of a recognition that went more than skin-deep, she’d have said their midnight conversation had never happened. And perhaps his eyes were just a little too fixed on her own, as if he wouldn’t allow them to stray. Last night, she was almost certain he’d been looking at her mouth.

“I apologize,” she said, slightly breathless. “I wanted to hear how well Louisa framed her request.”

“You could have come in with her.”

“True,” she agreed. “But then I couldn’t have observed you without your knowing.”

He gave a startled laugh. “That honesty of yours.”

“There’s no point pretending otherwise, when you caught me red-handed,” Serena said.

“A fair point,” he conceded. “And at least this time your ruthless honesty isn’t directed at my private life.” He propped one shoulder against the doorjamb. The casual power of the pose suggested he had the world at his feet, his to command or ignore. When he looked like this, the task of reforming a man so distant into a loving, playful father seemed an impossible fantasy. Then he surprised her by saying in a tone that wasn’t distant, “So...spillikins, hmm?”

Serena nodded. She tried not to sound too eager. “Marianne is resting in her room, so I thought I’d spend some time with the children. With such beastly weather outdoors, we’re looking for entertainments.”

“Please play with us, Papa,” Louisa asked, with plaintive sweetness.

Dominic swung her into his arms, a tenderness in his eyes that made Serena’s heart jump. This was more like it.

“If you insist.” His agreement told Serena just how worried he’d been last night. “But I warn you—” he set Louisa back on the floor and ruffled her hair “—I shall win.”

“Not with those big hands you won’t,” Serena said. Gracious! What was she thinking of, commenting on his hands? Besides, strong though they looked, the tapering of his fingers suggested he might not be entirely graceless.

Not at all.

“Miss Somerton, are you too warm?” he quizzed her.

Serena pressed her palms to her cheeks. Heat. Pull yourself together, my girl. “I’m quite comfortable,” she said.

The children were surprised but delighted when their father entered the nursery.

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