Dukes Prefer Blondes (The Dressmakers 4)

“No, my lady.” He bent toward her. His eye was discolored, beyond a doubt. No trick of the light. He brought his arm behind her shoulders, lifted her head, and smoothly slid a pillow behind her, then another.

“I may not be as observant as you, but even I can see your eye is injured,” she said.

“Yes,” he said. “It collided with your fist.”

She stared at the bruised eye, while her sluggish mind worked to no useful end. “I hit you? You must have deserved it.”

“No, I was minding my own business—­or, rather, your ladyship’s business. I was trying to keep you from hurling yourself onto the floor or out of the window in your determination to get to Arabia or Portsmouth.”

She looked about the room, trying to remember. The room did not enlighten her.

“You were delirious,” he said.

“Oh.” She’d rather not imagine what else she might have done or said. He occupied her thoughts excessively—­the ones she could remember—­and the odds were good she’d been indiscreet. “I dreamed I smelled raw beefsteak. Not a dream, then.”

After a silence, during which she grew increasingly uncomfortable, he said, “Where did you learn fisticuffs?”

“Harry. Who else? It amused him. But that was ages ago, when I was little. I can’t believe I did that. I’m sick! I can’t sit up without help.”

“I didn’t get it at Gentleman Jack’s Boxing Saloon, I promise you,” he said. “You did it from a reclining position, when I thought you’d calmed, you deceitful creature. It was definitely you, so don’t try to wriggle out of it. I’ve witnesses to attest to my not having left this house since the day I arrived. Furthermore, the footman guarding the door will testify to my eye being in perfect order when I arrived in your room last evening, and my not leaving said room until I went to the door to request raw beefsteak. No jury in the land would find you not guilty—­unless, that is, you batted your big blue eyes at them.”

Clara put her chin up. “If I did hit you, I’m sure you had it coming.”

“I was trying to keep you from hurting yourself, you ungrateful female.”

“Stop whining,” she said. “Come closer, and I’ll kiss it and make it better.”

His eyes widened, but so briefly she’d never have noticed had she not been watching him so intently.

He wasn’t the only one who was startled. Maybe she was still delirious? Her face felt hot, and not for a minute did she believe fever was to blame.

In a heartbeat he recovered his usual cool manner, and took a step back from the bed. “I thought you were done being delirious,” he said.

“It must be the laudanum,” she said.

“You haven’t had any on my watch.”

“Then I must be in my senses. Come closer.”

“No kissing,” he said.

Right. Why would he want to be kissed by a diseased female whose breath would probably stop a charging rhinoceros in its tracks?

“Very well,” she said with a theatrical sigh. “I only wanted to admire my handiwork.”

After a time of studying the bedpost, he said, “It isn’t that I object to being kissed. Even by you. I am a man, as I’ve pointed out before.”

“I noticed that about you,” she said. The strong neck and powerful shoulders and broad chest . . . the way his torso tapered to his waist. Since he wore no coat she had a clearer than usual view of that region . . . and of his narrow hips . . . and long, long legs.

She must be getting better. Or very much worse. Maybe her illness had damaged her brain.

“However.” A pause, before his gaze returned to her. “You’re still ill and not entirely in your right mind,” he said. “My manners might be ramshackle, but even I do not take advantage of helpless females.”

“I’m not helpless,” she said. “I gave you a stinker.”

His mouth twitched. “I take the blow as a sign of improving health.”

“Maybe it was for the best,” she said. “I’ve been wanting to hit you for quite some time. Now I’ve got it out of my system.”

“From what others have told me, the condition is not so easily cured,” he said.

“How many other women have hit you?” she said. A hot feeling went through her, which she knew was jealousy, not fever.

“A slap here and there,” he said. “Mainly, they throw things at me.”

She did not want anybody but Lady Clara Fairfax throwing things at him.

“That’s a good idea,” she said. “That way, I’m less likely to hurt my hand.”

He moved closer again. “Does your hand hurt?”

It did, actually, a bit. She hadn’t paid attention specifically there, pain being a general constant lately. She slid it her hand under the bedclothes. “Certainly not. I only meant that next time, I would be well when I did it, and would hit harder. But no, you’re right. Missiles would be wiser.”

“Let me see your hand,” he said.

She didn’t move.

“Do not make me behave in a masterful manner,” he said.

If she had been less ill and less self-­conscious about what she looked and smelled like, she would have happily let him be masterful.

As it was, she withdrew her hand from its hiding place and presented it.

He took it and examined it, finger by finger. “Does this hurt?”

“No.” What she felt was the opposite of hurting. She was piercingly aware of his touch.

“This?”

He went on examining and she went on melting inside. He checked every bone and muscle. He examined her palm, her wrist, and so on. His hand was so warm and strong. She could smell him, too. He didn’t smell sick. He smelled like himself, like a man, and a recently bathed man, too.

She needed every iota of her ladyship training as well as her vanity not to pull him down and make him touch her everywhere the way he touched her hand.

“Your knuckles are slightly bruised,” he said as he put her hand down on the coverlet, so gently, as though it were a small Ming vase. “I’ll order some ice. I should have ordered it with the beefsteak last night.”

“I didn’t notice it last night,” she said. “Probably in the way your bruises didn’t show at once.”

“You didn’t seem injured,” he said. “You went straight to sleep, so peacefully.”

“And you didn’t want to disturb me, and risk getting punched in the other eye.”

“I shouldn’t have risked your waking up with throbbing fingers. You’ve enough to cope with.” He paused. “As to that . . .”

The way he trailed off made her anxious.

“I’m better,” she said. “I know I’m better. I feel more like myself. Not completely, I admit. Still—­”

“Spots,”

he said.

“What?” She touched her face. “I’ve come out in spots?” It only wanted that.

“Not there,” he said. He gestured at his chest and below. “They usually appear on the torso. Red. Small. ” He held his thumb and forefinger barely apart.

Oh, prettier and prettier. Red spots. Foul breath. She hoped Davis had bathed her in the last twenty-­four hours. Clara had a grisly idea what her hair must look like. Thank goodness for the nightcap.

“I’ll ask Davis to check,” he said. “They usually go away in a few days, but you’d be wise not to scratch them and risk infection.”

“Ice,” she said. “You were going to send for ice. For my knuckles.” Maybe she could put it on her spots as well, and freeze them away.

She’d always believed she wasn’t a vain woman. Clearly, she’d been wrong. At this moment, she’d give a treasured possession—­even her cabriolet—­to be well again and properly dressed.

“Ice, yes,” he said, and seemed to come back from a great distance. “And you seem well enough to try some broth or gruel.”

“I’d rather try something more substantial,” she said. “What did you do with the beefsteak?”

The spots appeared on Wednesday. Nonetheless, Lady Clara’s appetite continued improving slowly but steadily. Likewise her spirits.

On Friday, the colleague Dr. Marler had promised to send turned up at last. He pronounced her ladyship on the mend and scoffed at the idea of typhus. Had that been her trouble, he said, she would never be doing so well at this point. He left written instructions for her convalescent care. Radford threw them on the fire.

By Saturday, the spots had disappeared.

She was getting better.

By Tuesday it would be three weeks since she’d fallen ill, and she was recovering as speedily as Radford could wish. Already she was spending a part of the day out of bed, in a chair. Her strength was returning. She needed less and less help, with anything.