Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Seven Years Later

In Dorian's opinion, it ought to rain at funerals.

The fact that the sun was shining brightly in the sky over his head was offensive to him. The soft breeze, the scent of flowers carried on the wind—it did not match the somber energy of the group of mourning friends and family members all slowly shuffling into their carriages.

Today, they would visit the prepared burial site. The church mass preceding it had been long, but it was nice to have somebody to occupy his thoughts with for the time it lasted.

Anything other than dwell on all of the ways that his life had just been violently changed.

He was too young to be earl. It was not that Dorian did not wish to have the title or the responsibilities that came with it. No, he had been raised to step into the role from a young age. Rather, he had not intended to bury his father for a great many years.

The older man's health had been failing for a handful of years now, but perhaps it was simply foolish optimism that had had him hoping a benevolent twist of fate might miraculously ease his suffering and save him.

It would come and go, the lung fits where he could not breathe. Father had delegated most of his physical tasks to those on his employ and had been sending most of the paperwork by carrier to Dorian himself. In secret. Dorian had only been too happy to play dutiful heir and handle anything his father had asked of him.

He should have done more. Dorian had been selfish—a burden that he would have to carry alongside his broken heart for the rest of his life.

At least Father was no longer in pain.

Dorian moved through the motions of escorting his younger sister, Dolores, and his mother, Mary, into the carriage. He did not stop to express his gratitude for the turnout at the mass. He could not find it within himself to speak to anyone.

Mother's veil covered most of her face, keeping her obscured from view. It was better that way. He knew she would not want others to see that she could not seem to stop crying. Even his usually stoic sister had shed a tear.

Something he could not seem to do.

It was not duty or simple obligation that held his sorrow out of his reach. No, it was something that he could not place. Though, he did not know if he truly wished to.

The footman closed the door behind them and the carriage pulled them back in the direction of the cemetery. Soon, time would be up and they would have to return to the estate he knew he should run.

Things would have to change. Dorian could not fathom if either of the women in his life would approve of the changes that would have to happen. But all they needed to do for now was focus on their mourning. Dorian would handle everything else. If only his mind would stop spinning so rapidly.

Moving back to the estate at all would be an adjustment. If anything, the dread that formed in the pit of his stomach at the thought was enough to overcome nearly all other worries.

Dorian had kept as far away from the estate as possible for the last six years. He had not been back since.

His eyes drifted shut for a moment as he passed his mother his handkerchief. She accepted it silently until her nose honked as she struggled to clear it.

"When are your things due to arrive back at the estate, brother?" Dolores said. Her eyes were red-rimmed, but she was likely to face the situation more pragmatically than their mother.

"I do believe they should be unpacked while we are at the funeral. Do not worry, Mother, I have not removed you from the main rooms. I thought it improper," Dorian added gently.

His mother nodded gratefully, but another wave of tears started. It was only half an act of benevolence that he had not unseated her from those rooms. They were his now by rights, as he was the head of the household. But he simply did not want them.

There was a time when he longed to have the estate for himself, a distant time long since passed when he had envisioned a wholly other life for himself. Back in those days, he had been foolish enough to think that true love was a force capable of overcoming any obstacle.

He was not nearly so delusional any longer.

Dolores fidgeted in her seat. "I suppose this means you are going to start making changes?"

"I have no interest in disrupting your life, Dolores." Dorian sighed. Though, he knew she was well past the age that she ought to have found a husband for herself and moved into her own home. Dolores was a woman prone to fits of cruelty and stubborn as a mule. It went without saying that should she resume her old antics, he would have no issue finding a husband on her behalf and finally being rid of her.

"Well, I suppose that is some comfort then. Mother shall be pleased," Dolores said as she wrung her own handkerchief between her hands.

"Mother is more than capable of speaking for herself," Dorian admonished sharply.

Only a few moments had passed and he already regretted not taking a separate carriage back to the house. Perhaps he ought to have walked. It would have been better to face the experience of the estate again after so many years traveling on his own.

Dolores had better be intelligent enough to keep her commentary about the past to herself.

"You did not have to return home at all, you know," Dolores added unhelpfully.

"Do not start this again. I am not in the mood." Dorian pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Well, it is true. We have not needed your company for the last six years and I do not think father's death is nearly a sufficient reason for you to have returned home. I think it would be far better that you made your appearance, set affairs back on the track they have already been on, and then disappear again. That is what you do best, after all, is it not?"

"Enough," he warned.

"Have I struck a nerve, brother? Something bothering you? I am only stating facts," Dolores continued smugly.

"And you would have looked after you and Mother? Who would have chaperoned you or handled Father's affairs? Certainly you do not expect that you shall be left to oversee the books by yourself!" Dorian laughed bitterly.

Dolores started to answer. He could see the angry words right there on the tip of her tongue, but she wisely swallowed them back. Her teeth shut with a snap so loud that it might have echoed in the small space.

They both knew very well of Dolores' ambitions. She believed she had been helping father run the estate for years. She had no idea how little she had actually been involved in.

"I managed just fine. Besides, who do you think cared for Father during his times of need?" Dolores sat forward stubbornly. "I do not recall seeing you at his bedside!"

"Do not fight. Please," their mother interrupted gently.

Dorian eased back into his seat. Mother was right, this was neither the time nor the place for such things. He knew the truth. It was out of the residual scraps of respect and affection that he still held for his sister that he did not say anything else. If Dolores had had her way, she would have become mistress and official spinster of the estate. She would have haunted the walls of the estate with father's fortune at her personal disposal until she died.

"You cannot be all right with this, Mother. Please tell me that you understand your son is far too soft to be what we need him to be! If we are to leave our fates in his weak hands, we are certain to be doomed!" Desperation edged into her voice.

Dorian had to bite his tongue to keep from fighting with his sister. There was no reasoning with her when she was like this, and everyone in the carriage knew it. The pair of them had hardly spoken in the last few years, aside from the obligatory letter.

While she had apparently stayed the same, he had not. He did not expect her to take his word for it—she would see in time. The lofty, idealistic, and lovestruck young man that she had known before was no longer. His time apart had changed him. It was the reason he had left.

Many times over the years, he had debated if he could handle coming back, if he would endure being back here without her. The vibrant young woman had been his whole reason to live—she was all he had thought he needed for his happiness.

He wondered where the years had taken her, the sweet, adventurous, and wild woman who had stolen his heart all those years ago. The woman he had let slip through his fingers. He had fumbled, and he had lost her. He had no one to blame but himself.

Silence fell over the carriage as he continued to look out the window. The landscape had not changed since his last visit. All the same markers. The large arching trees, the same shrubs and bushes had all been perfectly maintained. Just as beautiful as ever. Life had gone on. It was only him who still felt stuck in the past.

The farther the carriage pulled him through the outskirts of London to the cemetery, the more the memories assaulted him. The pond that the carriage pulled past reminded him of Claire with her skirts hiked up around her knees, legs caked in mud and her hair flopping on her head as she tried—and often succeeded in—plucking a fish from the pond with her bare hands. It was the only time she could stand still.

The rolling landscape that surrounded them as they left the city reminded him of her love of art and playing in the woods around his family's estate. She could always talk for hours about her passions, and Claire was passionate about absolutely everything. How she lived every day with such bright vibrancy had always stunned him—that she had allowed him to exist in her orbit, a further shock and privilege.

He had thought time and distance would be enough to soothe the aching, festering wound in his heart, but he knew now that it had done nothing to help him fall out of love with her. Her voice was still in the back of his mind. It was still her face that haunted his dreams.

His reason to breathe and wake each morning had been to share time with her. Even now, he was just as much in love with that brilliant woman. Still, for the sake of all involved, he hoped to never see her again.

It was better that way.