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It dawned on me then that this could be to my advantage.
“Let us not fuss,” I said to her. “It is merely a dress, Bernice. I should not take much more of Dr. Darrington’s time, as he has other patients. If you could please get someone to clear this and have a new dress brought out for me as I speak to him, then we may go change.”
“Of course, my lady.” She curtsied and rushed back into the house, allowing us a few moments alone.
“I thought you had forgotten me, Theodore,” I found the courage to say as I turned to him.
He seemed taken aback. “Did you spill the ink on purpose?”
“My brother says I can be a bit calculating, but this was just an accident I seek to take advantage of.”
“Take advantage?” he asked, still at a distance from me, making me frown.
“How do you plan to examine me from so far away?”
“It is best I do not touch you while you are unaccompanied…I do not wish to be tempted any further.”
I did not like how formal he was being. We did not have much time to speak freely. “I cannot bear the short times we have to speak. So tell me plainly: If you care for me and I for you, what is to be done?”
“That is the problem, there is nothing we can do—”
“I do not believe that. Why do you?”
He frowned and then proceeded to look to the wound upon my head. “How is your head? Do you have any other pain?”
“My head is fine. I barely even noticed the stitches. Thank you for hiding them so well. I am a bit sore but nothing altogether too unpleasant.” I answered each of his questions, before again asking, “Why are you so certain there is no way?”
“Because I myself am a product of two people who believed they could defy society.”
“What?”
“How else are bastards born if not by two people who should not have been together daring to hope they could anyway?”
I opened my mouth but heard Bernice speaking with someone from inside. Once again our time was coming to a close far too quickly. It would take me years to know him truly at this rate. “I will find a way we can speak more privately to each other.”
He stared at me but said not a word as Bernice returned.
“Is everything all right, my lady?” she questioned.
“Yes, Dr. Darrington was waiting for you before he tended to me further. You wished to see my head, correct?”
He nodded. “Yes, my lady.”
I was unsure what he was thinking, but I desperately wished to know, so I thought to see if I could create another distraction or cause another mess to force Bernice to leave us once more. We needed to speak…to freely speak for longer than a few minutes.
But the question was how?
Theodore
I was sure she did not know what she had asked for. A woman or man only asked to see each other privately so they could do private things to each other. She was far too naïve to know, yet the thought of it came to my mind and excited me nevertheless. The things I would do to her if I could, and if she knew, she would brand me a scoundrel several times over. I planned to push it from my mind altogether, but once more she had managed to distract her maid with some other task and whispered to me.
“Is my request possible?”
“It is not.” I finally found my voice to speak.
“Why?”
Verity and her bloody whys. Why? Because she was who she was, and I was who I was. Why? Because I lacked the self-control to remain within my bounds. Why? Because I loved her. Did she not realize how hard the truth was to speak?
“Do you not wish to see me?” she infuriatingly asked instead.
“Of course I do,” I muttered, unable to stop myself.
“Then do so.”
What hellish temptation this was. I could bear it no longer.
“You know not what you speak, for if you did, you would realize you open yourself to ruin. Should anyone find out—”
“Let no one find out.” She did not avert her gaze as I attended to the wound on her head. “You are one of the very few people I truly enjoy being with, Theodore.”
She was too close, whispering exactly what I wished to hear.
Oh, how…how desperately I wished to kiss her, to listen to her whisper a thousand questions in my ear, to hold her. How desperately I wanted to fulfill her request. But even if I wished to, it was impossible.
Exhaling, I leaned away, trying to prevent the blood in my veins from rushing to places it ought not to in a lady’s presence.
“Verity, London allows for no such privacy,” I replied, and as if to prove my point, the marchioness herself met us outside.
