The air in Beaumont Manor crackled with a subtle tension – a current Eleanor could almost taste. It wasn't the overt, suffocating kind she remembered from her previous life, the kind that came with whispered barbs and pointed silences. This was… different. It was the anticipation of a storm yet to break, the breathless pause before the orchestra's first chord.

Julian was due home from London.

Eleanor stood by the window in the drawing room, ostensibly admiring the manicured lawns stretching towards the distant woods, but in reality, her gaze was fixed on the winding drive. Her heart hammered a frantic rhythm against her ribs, a stark contrast to the carefully cultivated stillness she projected. She smoothed the silk of her gown, a pale lavender that reflected the twilight hues filtering through the glass.

She had spent the entire day steeling herself. Reminding herself of the purpose of this second chance: detachment. Survival. Avoidance of the soul-crushing pain that had defined her first marriage. She wouldn't be a supplicant, a beggar for affection. She would be a shadow, a quiet presence until Julian inevitably tired of the arrangement and sought an annulment or, more likely, a divorce. Then, she would disappear.