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She shook her head, knocking an inky curl loose. He had the odd impulse to twine it about his finger.

“N-no, not today. I was going to visit the old assembly hall to see how the women are faring. It is…very cold in the winter. It was n-never fully repaired you see.” A V began to form between her eyebrows as she spoke, as though the subject brought her great sorrow. Yet James had no earthly idea what could be the cause of that sorrow.

“Then I shall go with you there as well. And we can both stop and have the mutton,” he announced, brooking no argument.

Mariah glanced at her father, who was watching her with his brows furrowed in the same manner as his daughter, then she turned back to James with a forced smile.

“Of course, my lord.”

She rose and kissed her father on the cheek. “Goodbye, Papa.”

“Goodbye Mariah-love.”

Such casual family affection was another punch to the chest. He had had that once. With Harry. With Lionel and his parents. But illness and war had stolen it all away.

He thought again of that painting of Bedford Grange.

I deserve to have that back, he told himself, clenching his jaw as he exited the Counting House with his wife.

Yet as the carriage began to roll the hum of the looms seemed to ask him, At what cost?

3

“The mutton truly is quite good,” James said with his mouth full.

Although he had been known to carouse and make unwise wagers, he was a gentleman and did typically eat like one. In truth, he merely wished to provoke a reaction from his wife, who had been subdued since their visit to the assembly hall. Upon her direction, a footman had extracted an assortment of woolen blankets and heavy coats from a trunk she had evidently prepared earlier in the week. When they stepped within the soot-stained assembly hall, James finally understood the necessity of such provisions. Although a few structural repairs had evidently been started, Mariah explained that the endeavors were abruptly abandoned due to the need for housing the displaced families currently streaming in from Lancashire. Precarious weathered canvas now draped across the remains of the roof to shield the interior from the biting northern elements.

Unfortunately, this meant the assembly hall was freezing in November in Barnsley. The women were all decently skilled workers and their work kept their hands warm, as did a coal stove that Mariah had supplied. Yet when his wife was not preoccupied with the women who used the hall for their work, she appeared rather sad at the state of the hall. Whenever James caught her staring at the makeshift covers with a frown on her face, she would force a smile and move him along rather expertly.

His wife gave a noncommittal hum in response to his statement, picking at the cottage pie before her. “Shepherd’s pie not to your liking?”

“No, all the food here is quite good. I’ve rather lost m-my appetite.”

He paused with his fork mid-air. “You’ve been here before then?”

She nodded carefully, her expression wary.

“You’ve been here with Harrison.” That feeling rather like jealousy flooded him again, and suddenly his mutton appeared quite unappetizing before him as he set the fork down with a clink.

“There was nothing untoward. He had been…rather adrift, and I merely suggested he h-help with building the housing for the workers flooding in from Lancashire.”

James exhaled through his nose, willing his pulse to slow. This sensation he was hesitant to label jealousy was relatively new, and he recognized it would not get him closer to his goal. If anything it would push Mariah further away and she was already suspicious of his motives. “The women we met today, the ones sewing in the assembly hall… will they benefit from this new housing?”

Mariah’s face brightened as she nodded and James had to blink at the transformation before him from someone rather timid and withdrawn to…glowing. Radiating purpose. It was the look she wore when he entered the previous day. The look before she realized it was him…

With that thought, his heart sank.

“Indeed, there will be significantly more space and sanitation. They are currently living on top of each other in housing from a cotton m-mill that closed years ago. Barnsley has mostly been a linen town in my lifetime.”

“Have you been back?” he asked, the question never occurring to him before. “To your father’s homeland?”

“T-to Ireland?” The way she said Ireland in the back of her throat caused an erotic chill down his spine.

Well, I’ve always been attracted to her. That was never in doubt.

True. But you’ve never really seen her beyond that attraction.

And now he was seeing her. Just when he needed something from her that went against everything she stood for.