The dowager gasped a breath, shuddered, and then retreated for a moment back into the carriage before poking her head in front of the window again, her look searching Talen’s face. “Conner? Little Conner? No. Impossible. It cannot be.” Her dark brown eyes looked haunted.
Talen stared at her, his jaw solidly in place. Silent.
Everything in Ness clenched, and she couldn’t look away from Talen, trying to discern what he was thinking.
The silence stretched onward, the dowager and Ness staring at Talen. Talen sitting stoically atop his horse, not moving, not acknowledging the dowager’s words.
Ness gave a tiny cough. “It is him. Conner. I recognized him and brought him here. It is him, but he doesn’t remember that time.”
“Doesn’t remember that time?” The dowager finally swung her look to Ness and her nose flipped up as she scrutinized Ness from head to toe. A vacant smile pasted the edges of her lips to her cheeks. “You, Mrs. Docherty, you are…forgive me, but my memory fades me…you’ve been here before?” Her head shook with a long blink, her turban hitting the upper part of the window. “Are youBaron Gundall’sgirl? I thought she married into the Whetland family?”
“I did. I am Nessia. But I am a widow now.”
“Nessia—ahh—you are? Did you marry the eldest or the youngest grandson of Lord Whetland?”
“The youngest. Gilroy.”
“I am sorry to hear that, dear.” Her finger flicked out to point at Ness’s left arm resting in her lap. “Your arm looks to be in pain.”
Ness looked down with a shrug. “It is mostly healed now, it doesn’t pain at all.”
“Good, good, good,” the dowager whispered slowly, mostly to herself in what looked like an attempt to purchase a modicum of time to gain her equilibrium.
She exhaled a long breath, her look swiveling to Talen. “Forgive me for my bluntness on this matter, but you, lad…you don’t remember? You don’t remember who you are? How can that be?”
Talen lifted his shoulders. “I am attempting to piece together that answer for myself as well. Mrs. Docherty has been kind enough to show me this place in attempt to spur some memories forth.”
The dowager nodded. “Of course, of course. Such a kindness. But you, you both must come up to the main house and sit with me. This isn’t proper, a conversation like this out in the open in the drive.”
Talen shook his head. “We didn’t intend to interrupt your plans, as you were clearly on your way out.”
She flicked her hand in the air. “Nonsense. I was about to do a round of calls, but that can wait. We weren’t going to get far anyway, if the mud on your horses is any indication of the roads. This is far more important. You will follow me up to the house.” Her head turned toward the front of the carriage. “Turn us around, Mr. Leopold. Straight to the house.”
“Yes, mi’lady.”
The driver nodded toward Talen and Ness before sending the horses down to the base of the drive where he could turn the carriage about in a wide swath of gravel. Within minutes, the carriage passed them on the way back up to the main house.
Ness glanced to Talen. “Are you ready for this?”
He looked at her, a steely glint in his pale blue eyes. “Why do I think my answer should be no?”
Her lips pulled back in a smile that didn’t quite make it into a smile. The whirlwind whipping around in her belly reflected the exact thing in his eyes.
She wasn’t sure either of them was ready for this. But there was no turning back now. “I am here with you, no matter what.”
He gave her the slightest nod.
She inclined her head toward the manor house, nudging her horse into motion.
Onward.
{ Chapter 23 }
Talen stared at the teacup in Ness’s hand.
She’d taken it to be polite, of course, but her hand had hung there, in the air, halfway to her mouth for the last ten minutes as the dowager countess bustled about the drawing room doing what, he couldn’t quite place.
Closing doors. Rifling through drawers. Pulling out papers. Disappearing into an adjacent room for a moment, then returning with what looked to be a frame under a white cloth that she leaned against the wall beside the side door of the room. Scurrying out into the main hallway, her steps echoing down the corridor only to return minutes later, a flush spotting her wrinkled neck.