Page 9 of The Governess’s Absolutely Impossible Wish (The Notorious Briarwoods #8)

H e hated the fact that she had caught him sad, but perhaps it was the best thing. Perhaps she had needed to see him exactly as he truly was. Not the way the world so often saw him, as laughing, joking, and making light of everything.

Perhaps she needed to see him truthfully, without any mirage about him at all.

He was so good at convincing the world that he was fine, that nothing was amiss. He was so good at making merry, so good at bantering with his brothers, so good at lifting others up. And yet he could not do the same for himself.

It was one of the most frustrating things that he had ever experienced, and it often caused him to sit up late into the night ruminating.

She’d caught him ruminating before the windows. He hated that he did this, but he couldn’t help himself. When he got this way, often all he could do was sit, staring out a window, wondering how he could make the sorrow inside him stop.

It chased him everywhere at this particular time of year, and it would likely chase him until the flowers pushed their way up through the earth and the sun came back.

It was a terrible thing for a person who lived in England.

Really, if he was wise, he should head for parts south. He should go to a better climate. But he loved his family. He could not bear to leave because they were all here. He stared at Miss Abbot. He had manipulated her terribly. She did not want to show him her music, but he had not wanted to show her his sadness.

So, surely this was perfect.

“All right then, have I convinced you? Are you going to play?” he asked.

She narrowed her gaze at him. “I am, but I have conditions.”

“Conditions?” he asked, curious, before he twirled his hand and gave her a deep, dramatic bow. “Whatever the lady commands,” he said.

“Good, I’m glad to hear it.” She gave a nod that was very reminiscent of a governess. “I’m going to do something with you that I used to do as a child when I felt sad.”

“Oh goodness,” he said, “you’re not about to give me some sort of sweet, are you? Or rock me on your knee?”

She laughed then. She was laughing more and more in his company, and he loved it. It warmed him… Warmed him as nothing else could.

“I cannot imagine you sitting upon my knee, Lord Zephyr. I don’t think I want to.”

He could imagine her sitting upon his knee though, and that was something he wanted. He managed to keep that thought to himself.

“I want you to go and lie underneath the harpsichord.”

“On the floor?” he asked, unable to hide his surprise.

“Is there another way to do it?” she queried.

He groaned. “Giselle,” he said. And her name, oh glorious heaven, her name hummed across his lips, and he wanted to say it again. And so he did. “Giselle, whatever are you making me do?”

“Making you, sir?” she scoffed playfully. “I’m making you do exactly what you wish. Hear my music. Now go and lay beneath the harpsichord.”

He stared at her for a long moment. Surely she wasn’t serious. But the way that she looked at him was that stern governess look she occasionally used with the children. And he liked it well, so he did exactly what she said.

He crossed to the harpsichord, got down on his hands and knees, turned back, gave her a quick look, and she nodded.

And then, feeling a bit like a fool, he turned on his back and stared up at the wooden paneling.

She crossed to the bench, her simple skirt swishing against her legs, her plain shoes beating a pattern across the floor. She pulled the bench out, sat down carefully, and he heard the rustle of paper as she placed her sheet of music on the harpsichord.

“Now,” she said, “this song is not meant to make you feel happy.”

“I shall take my chances,” he said.

“Isn’t that all we can ever do?”

“You are very wise,” he said.

“Thank you. I already knew that. If you would follow my wisdom, we wouldn’t be in this difficulty.”

“What? With me on the floor? Or me sad?” he asked.

“Oh, Zephyr,” she groaned, “what am I to do with you?”

“I can tell you what I’d like you to do with me.”

“Shush,” she replied.

“Yes, Miss Abbot,” he said, his lips already turning upward at her irritation. And yet the tone of her voice suggested she was enjoying this.

“You are incorrigible,” she said before she paused and added, “even when you are sad.”

“It is best to be incorrigible when one is sad,” he said. “Otherwise, one will never get out of it.”

“I’m not sure that’s true,” she said softly, as he saw her lift her hands and place them over the keys. “Sometimes I think you should just allow yourself to be sad and not try to fight it.”

Not try to fight it?

He would never stop trying to fight his sadness. For surely he was not supposed to feel this way, even if he did. He placed his hands over his middle and waited for her to begin.

There was a moment as if she was preparing for prayer. Or communion with some unseen spirit.

Then she pressed the keys softly, and then more firmly. Her hands danced up and down the keyboard, and the notes of her composition filled the air.

She was correct; it was not a song to make him feel happy.

As a matter of fact, it was as melancholic as his innards. And for a moment, he was tempted to ask her to stop. He did not need to be pushed further into darkness. He was already struggling with it. It had given him pause—the realization that love would not save him from the melancholy that came at this time of year. But surely, once she understood she was coming to love him too, that she would be his wife… Then the melancholy would dim.

He had been hoping so entirely at Christmas, when he had met her and realized she was the woman for him, that he would not have to face the darkness that came to claim him. But it had claimed him, nonetheless.

But it wasn’t over yet. There was still time to win her, and that would change everything.

And now? Now at least he was not alone.

She was with him, standing in the yawning maw of his dark melancholy, unwilling to let him face it by himself. And now her song was surrounding him too, wrapping him up in its sorrowful chords.

And he felt her pain. He felt it through his entire body, mixing and mingling with his own, doing some strange sort of ritual. As if her pain united with his could cleanse them both of their melancholy, or at least make it into something new.

He sucked in a shuddering breath and, for a horrifying moment, tears stung his eyes. He wasn’t going to cry. He knew it was all right to cry. His mother had told him many, many times over the years that it was perfectly all right to cry. Briarwood men cried, at least a little bit more than the usual Englishman these days. He knew his father had cried.

It was perfectly normal. And years ago, when a gentleman cried, they were often praised for it. But something had happened in the last few years, and now gentlemen were not supposed to cry.

He’d felt it, the prison of it, the way he was supposed to keep certain emotions from being seen. He knew his family did not feel that way, and yet he’d felt the need to protect them from himself.

Was Miss Abbot right? Was it absurd? After all, they all accepted Leander exactly for who he was. Why was Zephyr trying to hide this from them? To save them because he didn’t want anyone else to feel the pain he felt?

That was why.

Surely, none of them could understand this bizarre grief that came for him unbidden.

But she did. Bloody hell, she did. She played and played, her hands sweeping over the keys, her body moving, her passion filling the room.

Not only that, the power of lying just beneath the harpsichord was astonishing, for he could feel the strings vibrating and causing his body to hum, as if he was at one with not just the instrument but the music.

He could feel the air about him change, sweeping with the power and energy and emotion that had not been here just before. And a tear did slip down his cheek, and then another, and another. And he was able to find some release that he had never felt before.

The pain did not feel quite so brittle, so hard inside him. It felt more as if it was suddenly slipping through him, seeking a way out, rather than burrowing deeper inside. And then her hands came to rest. And he lifted his own to dash his tears away.

But before he could, she was down on her knees beside him, staring at him.

“Scoot over,” she instructed.

“I beg your pardon?” he gasped.

She waved her hands at him. “Over.” And he did as he was told because she was very good at telling people what to do. She really did belong in his family.

She laid down beside him, not looking at him, but staring up at the wood paneling. And somehow that made him feel safe. And she found his hand, entwining her fingers with his. “You’re making me do things that I swore I would not do,” she said.

“I cannot do that,” he replied softly.

“No, you are right,” she sighed. “I am choosing it, which is very frightening. But I’m glad, if I could but help you for a moment with your pain. I wish someone had been able to help me with mine.”

“I still could if you’d let me,” he said softly.

Their hands wound together felt like heaven. For a moment, it felt as if they were not two people, but just one. Two souls, two hearts that ached, helping each other, warming each other. Another tear slipped down his cheek. And she rolled onto her side. He tried to dash it away, but she reached up with her other hand and took it. “No. No,” she said, “I like it.”

“You like to see me cry?” he said, teasing, despite the fact that he could not stop his emotions now.

“I like to know that you are not perfect,” she corrected.

“Perfect?” he asked. “No one could ever be perfect.”

“Not even me?” she teased.

“Not even you.” And he felt the danger of that. He felt her feel the danger of that. For if she was not perfect, perhaps she did not have to keep her vow or her promise. Perhaps she could be more than something so limiting and cold.

Her eyes flared.

Then she leaned forward ever so slightly, and he knew what she wanted.

She wanted his kiss. And so he gave it to her. She gasped as they embraced. Their lips teased and touched and shared whole worlds that both had kept hidden away. His tongue teased the line of her mouth and she opened to him, and then passion rushed in as they clung to each other.

There had been that moment they had felt as if their pain had become one. Well, now his sorrow and her pain began something else entirely. It was beautiful, and deep, and strong, and all-encompassing.

There were no lies, and there were no pretenses.

There was just the two of them. A young woman who had lost her mother when she was little, who had been shoved away from the world that she had known into one where she’d felt she had to be perfect.

And he, who was supposed to be perfect, who came from a perfect world, but did not feel perfect at all.

And in that moment, he knew that she loved him back, just as he loved her. He did not know if that would be enough, but he prayed it would.