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She tried not to think about him much, despite how closely her nephew was clearly going to resemble the man.

Perhaps, having met the dowager, who had the same crystal-blue eyes and sandy-blond hair, Millie could come to associate those features with Oliver’s grandmother instead of with Freddy.

It would be a relief, she thought, to look at the dear boy and be reminded of a stately grandmother instead of a ruinous father.

It wasn’t Oliver’s fault, after all. Just like Claire and Millie couldn’t control their own mother’s antics, Oliver had no purchase over his father’s.

One day , Millie thought with a shake of her head as she was shown into her bedroom, he and I may just bond over that.

Once relieved of her overdress, half stays, and hairpins, Millie collapsed into the goosedown sleigh bed in the center of the room, face-first and sighing, with her eyes already closed, and for a good, long moment, there was nothing in her life but stillness and the sound of a slowly flowing river outside her window.

The manor was situated just outside of Bourton-on-the-Water, a quaint little village full of cobbled paths and thatched roofs on the other side of the meadow.

The county seat here had been built into the source of its original wealth: an old quarry built into a bountiful vein of limestone that jutted from the landscape like an announcement of grandeur, interrupting the idyll of rolling hills and flowing water simply because it could.

When Millie had asked Claire if the house had a name, Claire had smirked and said that while the house was called something rather grand and official, the locals called it Crooked Nook, and that was the only thing she could ever remember without digging up the papers and scanning them.

Crooked Nook.

Millie liked it.

It made her think of something wild and hidden, something that couldn’t be cultivated and combed into submission like her mother’s rose garden.

As her mind grew heavy and swam toward the stretchy, light-smeared landscape between the waking world and sleep, she thought of the corner near the gate of her lifelong home in London, where the weeds could climb through the iron fence and reach toward those precious, pampered rose bushes.

The dandelions were just there, fuzzy and white and delicate as enchanted snow.

When the wind blew their seeds up and sent them dancing around the rich, indigo blue of the morning glory trumpet blossoms springing proudly from their vines, Millie could feel a true wonder spark in her heart just as it had when she was a child.

What sort of girl loves weeds? her mother had asked.

Lacey Yardley had let Millie plant a cutting once, many years ago. The idea was to teach the least biddable of her children how plants can duplicate themselves in fertile soil, how beauty and grace might expand, if honored.

Millie had done it, of course. She’d dug into the dirt, plucked away the worms, and rooted a thick, thorny cutting of roses into the very planet by its stringy feet.

It hadn’t taken.

Instead, the plot had exploded in creeping ivy and daisies, each wild thing strangling the life out of that cutting. She’d been young then, only ten or so, and she’d stood over the carnage with an odd feeling in her chest that was, for certain, not disapproval.

The rap of knuckles on the door snapped her from her reverie, forcing her to lift her head full of wild, unpinned chestnut curls from the bed and blink bleary-eyed at the wall with a frown.

Her fingers were stretched outward, as though to touch the flowers she had been conjuring in the half-mire of her mind.

She sighed as another rap sounded on the wood and rolled herself from the bed to trudge reluctantly across the room. She hadn’t even a dressing gown to grab and wrap about herself for modesty, so she opened the door only a crack, sticking her nose through the sliver of air in askance.

It was the dowager countess, who tilted her head in amusement at this greeting.

“I think this is yours,” she said softly, holding up a narrow, leather-bound volume in her manicured hand. “My stablehand found it in the coach.”

“Oh.” Millie took a step back, rubbing the heel of her hand over the grog in her eyes. “Oh, yes, thank you, my lady. It is mine.”

Rather than holding it out so that Millie could take the book, the dowager stood in place, still peering through the crack in the door with a quizzical little smile, and transferred the journal from one hand to the other. “Actually, might I come in for a moment? I wanted to ask you something.”

“Oh. Erm, of course.” Millie thought she couldn’t rightly refuse, despite being in nothing but her chemise and surrounded by a nest of unpinned hair in need of a wash. ”By all means.”

The dowager gave a little titter and saw herself into the room, nudging the door shut behind her.

She was still fully dressed, of course, finely turned out in delicate, sky-blue lace.

It was the type of frock Millie would reserve for only the finest of events, but for this woman it was simple wear for a day about the house.

“My, but you’re a well-made woman,” the dowager said, her pale eyes gone wide at the skimpy state of Millie’s dress.

Millie scoffed, her cheeks heating as she crossed her arms over her chest. Her generous figure was far from fashionable, of course, and had long been a thorn in her mother’s side.

The dowager’s tone did not sound mocking, but it was hard to imagine any admiration from a woman like this in any sincerity.

“I would have remained dressed if I had known you were coming, of course.”

“I did not mean to embarrass you, dear,” the dowager said. “I think it is simply difficult to not envy your youth.”

If you say so , Millie thought, while murmuring assurances that no offense was taken.

Well-made, was it? Tell that to the modiste. Every one she’d ever seen had shared the same opinions, frowns, and tutting noises of disapproval.

“Oh, your journal.” The dowager held the book out until Millie wrapped her fingers around the opposite end.

She gave her another one of her cryptic smiles.

“I have to confess, Miss Yardley, I flipped through it. At first, because I needed to figure out what it was, and then because I found myself very entertained. You have a very sharp mind and a wicked way with words.”

“You … read …?” Millie stammered, her throat going a bit dry. Suddenly, she couldn’t remember anything at all that she’d written in this particular volume, nor just how embarrassed she ought to be. How long had she been dozing in that bed?

“Not all of it, but yes, several excerpts,” the dowager said, without any sense of abashment.

“One thing that stood out to me was your descriptions of London. You see the city in a way I never have. You’ve explored streets I have never even dreamed of strolling down.

And you … well, you are allowed to do so without accompaniment, aren’t you? Isn’t that something!”

“Not as a matter of habit,” Millie protested, thinking immediately of how her mother would blanch at this revelation. “And really only after I passed a certain age where my prospects were rather unlikely, you see …”

“Oh, nonsense. You haven’t passed that age,” the dowager cut in with a dismissive wave of her hand, “nor is it my concern. You see, I have had an interest in returning to the city of late, once the new countess arrived to take over management of the Nook. I haven’t enjoyed a Season in London since Frederick, that is my Frederick, was alive, and …

well, I have a yearning to do it again, on my own terms.”

“I see,” said Millie politely, though she was entirely at sea in this conversation.

The dowager gave her a little grin, as though she were more than aware of how much sense she wasn’t making.

“The truth of the matter is that I have never done such a thing on my own, nor would I know how to even begin. My plan has been to find and hire a lady’s companion to assist me, and after reading this …

I wondered. Might you be interested in the role, Miss Yardley? ”

There was a beat of silence. Millie blinked, unsure she’d heard the woman correctly. “You wish for me to accompany you through a London Season?” she repeated, a little dumbly. “I am not a debutante. I know nothing of High Society.”

“Oh, that part I need no assistance with,” the dowager said with a dismissive lift of her shoulder.

“I wish for you to stay here through the remainder of the winter first, of course, so that we might become accustomed to one another. After that, yes, I would like to return to London and have the Season I have always dreamed of, free of rules, husband, and chaperone, with a canny guide to London as my companion to make many witty observations in my ear. I promise it will be more fun than returning to your mother’s rose gardens. What do you say?”

For a good while, Millie could only stare. But eventually, she managed a semblance of a nod.

And perhaps, after a time, she did get herself to say the word yes . The journal entry about it never did specify if she managed that feat. It only mentioned the prospect of fun and how alien such a thing sounded opposite the towering appetite of the London Season.

All the same, when the Yardley family carriage returned to London two weeks later, Millie was not inside it.