A hand stroked over her hair. “She’s safe. She’s sleeping.”
“My leg hurts.” Oh, but that was an understatement. Her leg burned, throbbed, and, when she shifted in a bid to find comfort, screamed. “Hurts.”
“I know. I’m sorry. Here, drink a little.” He slipped an arm under her neck and propped her up for a few sips of lukewarm tea. She tasted the sweet hint of honey, felt it coat and cool her raw throat. “A little more,” he urged. “The physician won’t allow laudanum until your lungs are clear. In the morning, I promise.”
Physician? “Is it very bad?”
“No, sweetheart.” He laid her down again, then bent over her and gently brushed a soft kiss on her brow and another on her temple. “No.” His lips moved to the sensitive skin of her eyelids. First one. “You’re all right.” Then the other. “Everything will be all right. Rest now.”
She sighed as his mouth moved leisurely over her face, trailing soft kisses across her skin. It was better than laudanum, sweeter and more soothing than honey. The darkness settled around her again, ready to pull her under. She didn’t fight it.
“Will you be here?” she whispered.
“I will.” He kissed her cheek. “I promise.” His lips hovered over hers and his breath whispered warm against her mouth. “Trust me, Lottie.”
She wanted to tell him that she did. In that moment, she would have trusted him with anything. But she fell asleep before the words could form.
* * *
The next time Lottie woke, she felt relatively lucid. She still hurt, everywhere, but the pain no longer carried the sharp urgency it had earlier, and the thick dregs of exhaustion and fear no longer dragged at her body and mind.
Turning her head, she found Owen standing at the windows, his back to her, awash in the warm glow of sunshine peeking out from half-open drapes.
“Owen?” She pushed herself up onto her elbows. “What time is it?”
Turning, he studied her. “Are you awake?”
Was she awake? What an odd question. She was speaking to him, wasn’t she? “Of course. Why would you ask?” Good Lord, had she spent a portion of the night speaking to him without being awake? Surely not. “I was awake before.”
He came to her bedside table and occupied himself with the various bottles, jars, spoons, and other accoutrements associated with a sickbed. “Which time?”
Apparently, she really had spent a portion of the night talking in her sleep. How mortifying. Because her arms were beginning to shake, she shifted back to lean against the headboard. “When you gave me something to drink.”
He poured a cup of tea and reached for one of the bottles. “Again, which time?”
When you kissed me, she thought, but she said nothing, afraid his reply would be the same. “Did I say anything untoward at any time?”
He glanced at her, offering a small, reassuring smile. “No.”
That was something, anyway. She frowned when he reached for a bottle she didn’t recognize and uncorked the top. “What is that?”
“Laudanum.”
“I don’t want it.” She’d had it once, when she’d twisted her ankle and it had swelled up to twice its natural size. The drug had done an admirable job of relieving the pain but had left her fighting nightmares and nausea.
Without a word, Owen poured a small dose of the drug into her cup and handed it to her.
“I said I don’t want it.”
“Didn’t ask what you wanted.”
“Owen, please—”
“You’re in pain,” he snapped.
She was. Her leg throbbed like the devil. But she didn’t see why he should be so angry about it. “It makes me ill. I would take it otherwise. But it makes me ill. I don’t want it. I just want…”
Relenting, he lowered his arm. “What?”
Her lips curved in an embarrassed smile. “A bath. I want a bath.”
The stench of smoke clung to her hair and skin—a thick, offensive perfume that billowed around her every time she moved. Even the linens smelled of it now.
“A bath, then,” Owen agreed. “To start.”
It required a level of coordination and dexterity that bordered on acrobatic to take a bath while keeping the entire bottom half of one leg dry, but Lottie managed it with the aid of two maids, a small wooden footstool, and what she could only assume were the limbering properties of utter desperation.
It was heaven to be rid of the smell and soot.
She was changed and comfortably settled back in a cleanly made bed when Owen returned with a small tray holding a bowl of stew and two thick slices of bread.
She waved the sight of it away. “Thank you, but I couldn’t possibly.”
“You need to eat.”
She couldn’t imagine why. She’d been roasted, not starved. “Hot stew sounds most unpleasant.”
“It’s cold.”
“Oh.” She wrinkled her nose. “That’s worse.”
“Mrs. Lewis thought you might prefer it chilled for your throat. She sent Samuel down to the icehouse.” He set the tray next to her on the bed. “He risked life and limb for this repast, Lottie. Will you snub his gallantry?”
“It is cold, day-old stew,” she said blandly and felt that was answer enough.
“Sop up the broth with the bread and we’ll consider your duty discharged.”
“Just the broth?” She waited for his nod before reaching for the tray. “Oh, very well.”
She still didn’t want it, but it had been thoughtful of Mrs. Lewis and rather sweet of Samuel. She wouldn’t go so far as gallant. Something a bit more palatable ought to come out of gallantry. The stew was not improved by age or altered temperature.
Still, it was pleasant to sit and eat while Owen kept her company. He explained Esther’s condition, which was rapidly improving, and made idle conversation that distracted her from the continued throb of her burn. Despite the pain, and cold stew, she felt a lovely warmth spread through her limbs. It felt wonderful, almost blissfully normal, to sit and speak of the weather and staff and family. Or it would, were she not reclining in her nightgown in her bedroom.
She gestured at her leg with a piece of bread. “I suppose I’ll not be able to join you for that tromp about the woods for a time.”
“Yes. Pity that.”
She tilted her head at him, then quickly righted it again when it wobbled. Must have strained her neck sometime in the stable, she mused. “Would you truly have taken me?”
“Did you want to go?”
“Not an answer,” she mumbled and smacked her lips experimentally. They felt oddly thick. Or maybe it was her tongue. She seemed not to have its full cooperation. And the warmth had grown into a foggy sensation all of a sudden. Scowling, she looked at her bowl. “I think the stew’s gone off.”
Oh, wouldn’t that top things off splendidly? She’d survived a fire only to be done in by bad broth.
How dreadful, she thought. And giggled. Which wasn’t right at all. Death by stew wasn’t the least bit funny.
“’S definitely gone off.”
“It couldn’t have.” He reached out, dipped the tip of his pinkie finger in the broth, and had a taste. “Ah. Mrs. Lewis added a little something extra, I think.”
“Something that made it go off.”
“It isn’t off, darling. Let me have the bowl.”
She barely felt him slip the bowl from her fingers. “I feel most pecoo…” She smacked her lips again. “Pe-cu-li-ar.” She enunciated each syllable slowly and carefully, and she still wasn’t sure she’d gotten it right. “Tricky word, that.”
Her head lolled and snapped back up.
The broth, she thought drunkenly. There was laudanum in the broth. Outrage bloomed and vanished just as quickly. She couldn’t hold on to it. She couldn’t hold on to a single thought.
She pulled herself together long enough to glare at him. Or hims, rather, as he was currently multiplying exponentially before her eyes. First two, then four, then eight…
It was fascinating, really.
“So many of you.”
She was delighted to see he found this as amusing as she. Wasn’t it lovely, to share a spot of laughter with someone for whom you cared?
“Close your eyes, Lottie.”
She would rather watch the Owens. They were moving now, slipping arms around her back, settling her down on the pillows. And didn’t that feel delicious? Absolutely delicious.
“You’re better ’n stew.”
She wasn’t sure he heard her. There were too many of him, making her dizzy.
She closed her eyes and slipped back into the waiting darkness.
Fourteen
“You put laudanum in the stew.”
Lottie delivered this accusation—one she’d been waiting to hurl for the last half hour—the moment Owen walked in the door carrying a tray with a small teapot and cup.
If he thought she would take so much as a whiff of what was in that pot, he was mistaken.
“Good morning, Lottie.”
“Is it morning?” she snapped. How was she to know? She’d woken disoriented, alone, and in the foulest of tempers, which was, she now recalled, another unpleasant side effect she’d experienced after taking laudanum for her ankle. The clock on the mantel said it was a quarter past six, but she couldn’t tell if the light peeking in through the drapes was morning or evening light.
“Early yet,” Owen returned. “But yes. Most of the house is up. How do you feel?”
“As if someone put laudanum in my stew,” she bit off. And like she’d spent a full day sleeping off the effects.
“That someone was Mrs. Lewis. I had nothing to do with it.”
“Oh.” Feeling thwarted, she folded her arms across her chest and hunched her shoulders. “Then I apologize for the accusation.”
“Yes,” he replied dryly, “you sound remorseful. She was trying to help, you know. She was worried about you. Now she’s worried she’ll lose her position.”
“Mrs. Lewis isn’t going to lose her position.” She was, however, going to get a tremendous earful.
“Do you feel ill?” he asked, setting the tray down. “The food should have helped, but Mrs. Lewis brewed up a pot of something soothing if you need it.”
“Something soothing,” she repeated, suspicious. “Like laudanum?”
“No, I tried it myself first. It has chamomile and…” He waved his hand about at the pot. “I don’t know what. Soothing sorts of ingredients. Who knows where housekeepers acquire their recipes. Do you want some or not?”
“It won’t be necessary.” She felt sluggish, but not ill, and she hadn’t had any nightmares that she recalled.
“Are you feeling better? You look and sound as if you’re feeling better.”
“I am.” Crabbiness notwithstanding, she felt markedly improved.
Moving closer, he studied her face. “Certain?”
“Yes.”
“Your throat? Your leg?”
They pained her, particularly the latter, but not enough to risk another dose of laudanum. “Both better.”
He bent over her and subjected her to a long, narrow-eyed examination that made her distinctly uneasy. Apparently satisfied with his own assessment, he leaned down even farther, planted his hands on either side of her pillow, and ground out, “Then you can tell me… What in the name of God were you thinking?”
She pressed farther into the pillows. Later, that would sting the pride, but she couldn’t help it. He was furious. The muscles of his arms were bunched, and green eyes snapped in a face otherwise hard and unyielding as stone.
Carefully, slowly, she chose her words. “Owen…”
Too careful, too slow. He barreled on without her explanation.
“You ran into a burning building, Lottie. Into fire. What sort of madness—?”
“I’d not have done it but for Esther.” She shook her head, determined that he should hear her out, that he should believe her. “I swear it. I’d not have left the house at all. But I saw Esther. She went after Mr. Nips. Someone put him inside. They put him in the fourth stall. It won’t open from the outside.”
“You would have died for a pony.”
“No,” she insisted, and though she knew it was the right thing to say, would have been the smart thing to do, she felt the pain of shame at the admission. “I’d not have gone in, even for him. I went in for Esther.”
“You should have called for me.”
“I did.” Hadn’t she? The moments before she rushed to the stable seemed a blur to her now. “I thought I did. It all happened so fast. There was so little time.”
“You didn’t,” he snapped and pushed away from the bed. “There was time. A body can run and yell simultaneously.”
“I thought I did. I know I meant to call for you. I remember that I…” She remembered opening her mouth to shout for him. Then she’d seen Esther fly across the lawn. “Oh.”
“Oh?” he repeated incredulously.
“I did mean to call for you.” She licked lips gone dry. “Then I forgot.”
“You forgot.”
“Well, people do,” she returned impatiently. She had intended to call for him. The thought ought to count for something. “I was a trifle distracted.”
“Distracted.”
“Repetition of what I say is not a conversation. It is an echo.”
“You don’t want to hear my own thoughts just now.”
“Then you may listen to mine. Esther is my sister. I have cared for her since her infancy because, Lord knows, our mother was not fit for the task.” The woman had been perpetually absent, preferring the company of her lovers to her own children. “Forgive me if I did not instinctively abandon a lifelong responsibility to a man who has been here less than a week.”
Something flashed across his face. Anger, maybe. But something else as well. “You’ve known me longer than a week.”
“I have,” she said, happy to find at least one point on which they could agree. “Which is why I intended to call for you. Certainly, I should have called for help from someone. But when I saw Esther, I simply acted. I did what came naturally. That may not have been the wisest course of action, but it was the best I could do. I will not apologize for it.”
He opened his mouth, then snapped it shut and dragged a hand down his face. “You owe me no apology, Lottie.”
She was happy to have that point on which to agree as well. “No, but I do owe you a great debt of gratitude.”
“You’re not in my damned debt.”
She gritted her teeth with impatience as he swore, shook his head at her, then took up pacing at the foot of her bed. “Do I wish to know your thoughts now?” She ventured after a time. He didn’t look a great deal less angry than he had a few moments ago, but he’d gone from stomping to merely striding, which she took as a promising sign.
“I am thinking of how best to go about not killing Esther.”
“Owen, don’t. It was my decision to go after her. She tried to make me leave.”
“Not hard enough,” he ground out.
“She was trying to save Mr. Nips.”
“A damned pony,” he snarled with an angry gesture. “Over her own life, over the life of her sister.”
“He’s not any pony. He is so much more to her than that. He was a gift from our father. He…” How to explain it? She busied her hands with the counterpane while she searched for the right words. “Father had a tendency to forget Esther. I was his firstborn. Peter, when he came, was his only son. He loved Esther, of course. He loved all of us. But…”
“But what?”
She bit her lip and glanced at the open d
oor. “Will you close that?”
He grumbled, stalked to the door, slammed it shut, and stalked back. “But what, Lottie?”
“Esther is likely not his natural daughter.”
He considered that with a furrowed brow. “Did William know?”
“I believe so. He was so often distant with her. I think, perhaps, he wasn’t sure what to make of her. So he set her aside, in a way. Ignored her, or… Esther loves to sketch, and she’s wonderfully talented. She made dozens of drawings for Father over the years. But he only ever bothered to frame one of them. Just one. And he would forget her birthday sometimes.” She sighed and, annoyed with her nervous fidgeting, pushed the counterpane away. “He forgot most of her birthdays, to be honest. But he remembered her fifteenth. He brought her Mr. Nips. Esther has a great affinity for animals, and for Father to remember that, and her birthday…” She shrugged and wondered if Owen could understand what a gift like that, on a day like that, would have meant to a girl accustomed to being shunted off to the side by a father she adored.
“I assume Esther doesn’t know. How do you?” he asked when she shook her head.
“The journals. He wrote about our mother whilst she stayed with us and made a note of each time she left. It isn’t a clear picture, but the pieces are there, if one cares to put them together. Our mother returned from one of her travels, as she called them, approximately seven months before Esther was born.” It was fortunate that Esther had never been one for puzzles. “I know Mr. Nips is just an old pony to you, but—”
He held up a hand. “I would have gone after him for you. For Esther. You should have called for me.”
And back to this, Lottie thought. “Good God, you are so immovable in your positions. Completely intractable.”
“I beg your pardon?”
She cocked her head, studying him. “I don’t know how I failed to notice before now. You’ve called me stubborn, but it is you who wins arguments through sheer obstinacy.”
“This isn’t about winning.”
Every argument was about winning, or else it would be a conversation. But that was a separate argument. “You might concede a point or two or change your tactics a little, but your position never really alters. You simply refuse to budge until you have your way. Obstinate.”
A Talent for Trickery Page 18
