Page 29 of Every Rogue Has His Charm

“I’ve been ill—”

“Yes. At times, violently.”

Heat rushed into her cheeks, and the burn led her to discover the previously unknown injury there. She lifted her fingertips to prod its edges, then studied her scraped palms. “I…fainted. But how did I—?” She glanced around her room.

“I carried you back to your bed,” he said. She squeezed shut her eyes, not sure whether she was trying to call up the memory of being wrapped in his arms, or push it away. “Mrs. Drummond’s manservant found some quack named Trefrey who said it must have been caused by something you ate and prescribed a purgative. Your footman, Geoffrey, was taken ill too, though not as severely.”

“Oh.” Weakly, she slid back down among the pillows. She remembered none of it. “And so you…sat with me. All night?”

“And all morning, and most of yesterday too. Yes.” He made it sound as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world.

Oh, she did not doubt there were husbands who kept vigil at their wives’ sickbeds. But her husband? When he had spent six years demonstrating how very little he cared? Why? she wanted to demand.

“You said you had important business,” she reminded him instead.

“London has waited this long. It can wait a little longer. But speaking of urgent matters…” He pushed to stand, stretched the stiffness from his back. “If Mrs. Horn isn’t camped outside your bedchamber door, I’ll be shocked, and I’ve heard Mrs. Drummond’s voice below at least twice, calling to check on you. These new-built houses aren’t much for privacy, are they?” he remarked with a glance toward the window. Here, the elevation spared them the prying eyes of passersby, but the dining room was something of a fishbowl.

It was, she supposed, a not-so-roundabout way of faulting her choice, of criticizing her for taking this place when he had deserted her in a perfectly good house in town.

“I wanted something that had only ever been mine,” she said, her voice weaker than she would’ve liked.

To her shock, he nodded. “I never had much desire to visit one of these seaside towns. But after sitting here all these hours, watching the water, I begin to understand the appeal.”

There was a sort of longing in his words. In her mind, he’d been like the sea: powerful, remorseless. If he wanted to remake his world, he could do so—had done so—with little more than a snap of his fingers.

But perhaps truly erasing the past was not quite as easy as it seemed.

Even for him.

“I should go,” he said, tossing the book onto the seat of the chair and striding toward the door.

Go? she wanted to call after him. How far? Your bedchamber, London, the other side of the globe? And for how long? A few hours’ rest? A lifetime?

She said nothing, though, her sudden bewilderment only amplified by her weakness. Of course she wanted him gone, wanted her peace—meager though it might sometimes be—restored to her. And yet, she watched his broad shoulders disappear through the doorway with the same strange wistfulness with which he had regarded the waters of the English Channel.

Before she could begin to sort through the tangle of her emotions, Mrs. Horn came bustling in. “Ah, there you are! Isn’t it grand to see Your Grace sitting up—or very near it, at least? How are you feeling?”

“I—I’m not certain,” Caro answered honestly.

“And it’s no wonder, poorly as you’ve been. I’ve sent down to the kitchen for some beef tea and hot water. You’ll be all the better for a wash and fresh nightgown.…” Here, she disappeared into the dressing room, and her voice grew muffled, so that Caro could only make out occasional words, something about “strength” and “stale air” and Geoffrey, the poor footman.

“Did the duke really sit up with me all night?” she asked when Mrs. Horn reappeared with an armful of fresh linen.

“Oh, aye. Right fierce about it too. Nearly drove Mrs. Drummond to distraction—oh, and here I am forgetting that she left a note for you.” She reached into the slit pocket of her dark gray worsted and pulled out a folded slip of hot-pressed paper, from Caro’s own writing desk, it appeared. “I couldn’t like it—nursing’s not a job for a man—but he insisted. Wouldn’t let me do more than bring him a tray and close the drapes,” she said, tsking at the discovery that they had since been opened, and drawing them nearly shut again. Caro blinked at the sudden dimness, relieved by it and yet still craning to glimpse the sliver of water just visible in the gap she had left. “To look at him, you wouldn’t know he had it in him to be so gentle—beggin’ your pardon, Your Grace.”

Caro shook her head, brushing off the apology and appearing to agree with the housekeeper’s assessment, though that would be a lie. She had seen his gentle side, once.

To distract herself from unwelcome memories, she flicked open Fanny’s note. Before she could read a word, however, two housemaids came in, one with a tray and the other lugging a canister of the promised hot water, and Caro had to submit herself to being bathed and dressed and very nearly fed. It required almost all her strength to persuade Mrs. Horn she was capable of wielding her own spoon.

Muttering a protest under her breath all the while, the housekeeper busied herself with picking up around the room: she smoothed one of the duke’s discarded coats over her arm, gathered up damp towels from the washstand and an empty glass from the bedside table. Proof, if Caro had needed it, that her husband had indeed spent hours by her side.

The last item Mrs. Horn collected was the book he had tossed onto the chair. She turned the spine toward her, made a scoffing noise in her throat, and shook her head in open disbelief.

“What is it?” Caro ventured, dabbing at the beef tea dribbling down her chin.

“The last part of some tall tale about a highwayman, by that fellow…what’s his name? Oh, yes. Robin Ratliff. When His Grace asked for it, particular-like, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I offered to send round to Donaldson’s for something better, but he said he wanted that book, and no other. Felt certain you would have it somewhere, and sure enough, Tilly found it in a crate in the attic. And when I gave it to him, he chuckled real strange-like and said, ‘Well, at least she didn’t use it to kindle a fire.’” Again she shook her head, tucking the book into the crook of the arm that held the coat.

“It was a gift,” Caro explained. “A thoughtful one, at the time. But I’ve since lost my taste for gothic romances.”