Dorinda and the Doctor
Page 2
“You really must take the time,” she chided him. “A doctor with a cluttered office will be eyed askance by any female patient who comes here.”
He smiled. “Female patients don’t come here; I go to them. Besides, you’re not eyeing me askance.”
“I’m not your patient, thank God.”
His smile vanished. “Why ‘thank God’? I’ll have you know that—”
“Forgive me, I didn’t mean it that way. I just . . . have been at the mercy of doctors too many times to wish to be anyone’s patient.”
He was about to ask for an explanation, but she hurried to take the book from him and instantly changed the subject. “Good Lord, have you no tea tray?”
“I’ve had no need of one until now. I live here alone, remember?” Though he hoped to change that state of affairs shortly.
He watched as she set the book on the table and poured the tea. She glanced at him with one pretty eyebrow raised. “No sugar? Or milk?”
“No. Sorry. I drink it without.”
With a roll of her eyes, she sipped some tea, then set down her cup. “We shall definitely have to arrange for you to hire a maid of all work. Or a cook or someone who can keep your pantry stocked.”
“And buy me a tea tray,” he added cheerily, encouraged by her use of the word we.
“Trust me, I’m already making a list of necessary purchases.” Reminded once again of how competent she was in running a household, he watched as she critically surveyed the table’s jumbled contents. “I suggest you organize these by function. We can put the astringents—elixir of vitriol, alum, and Peruvian bark—together, then the purges, then the emollients and so on. Don’t you think?”
Astringents? She knew what those were? “Clearly you really have spent a great deal of time in doctors’ offices. But I thought your husband was in perfect health until he met his untimely death. How do you know the function of what’s in those jars? Were you once sickly? You certainly don’t look it now.”
She paled. “I had a great many ill relations,” she mumbled, then turned deliberately toward the cupboard. “Now, about these shelves . . .”
Percy watched her retreat with a narrowed gaze. How very odd. He could swear that she had no ill relations—the duke’s family was small. So why hide the reason for her medical knowledge? Might that be why she behaved so strangely with him, one moment friendly and open and the next wary and closed?
Well, whatever it was, he meant to get to the bottom of it. Because the first step in gaining her affections was clearly going to be gaining her trust.
2
DORINDA OPENED A box and tried to look interested in its contents, but her blood was still in a wild riot over what she’d nearly revealed. And how quickly he’d pounced on it, turning very physician-like.
She shuddered. She liked him much better when he was teasing her. Or carrying that ridiculous excuse for a tea tray. Or wearing the banyan that revealed more than it concealed of his surprisingly firm and well-sculpted body.
There’s no reason you can’t just have an affair with him, you know. You’re a widow. It’s practically expected of you to take a lover.
Percy reached past her to remove an instrument from the box she was staring blindly into, and just the feel of him so close set her senses reeling. Oh Lord. Clearly it had been far too long since she’d shared a man’s bed.
“I suppose we should decide what we’re going to argue about,” he murmured beside her.
“Wh-what?” she asked, still caught up in wicked thoughts of him in her bed.
He smiled down at her. “For tonight. For when we argue at dinner.”
Oh, that. “Certainly! Of course.”
He turned the instrument around, as if checking for damage. “You’ll have to be the one to figure it out, since I’ve never been married or even engaged,” he said conversationally. “What sort of things did you and your husband fight over?”
Trying to still the clamoring in her blood at having him so close, she pulled more medical implements from the box. “Oh, the usual. Which of our families to spend Christmas with. How the dining room should be renovated. Where we should go for a holiday.”
Why she wasn’t willing to drink mare’s milk just because Edgar had heard that it would help her produce the requisite son. She grimaced.
“None of those will work, since they only pertain to already married couples,” Percy pointed out. “What did you argue about during your courtship?”
“I don’t remember us arguing then,” she said truthfully.
He gaped at her. “Never?”
She shrugged. “We didn’t court long enough to argue. I was Edgar’s second wife, you see, so he was in something of a hurry to marry, and I was happy to oblige him.” Little had she known that he was in a hurry because he needed the heir that his previous wife hadn’t lived long enough to bear him.
“I see,” Percy clipped out. “So you were very much in love.”
“At the beginning, I suppose.” She’d thought it was love at the time, in any case. But now she wondered if she’d just been in love with the idea of being lady of the manor and thus escaping her stultifying life of balls and parties. She was not a terribly social person.
“But not later?” he probed.
She’d said too much. “Come to think of it, there was something we argued about during our courtship: which season was better, spring or summer.”
“You’re joking,” he said. “That’s the silliest thing I ever heard.”
A smile crossed her face. “Isn’t it, though? I made the mistake of telling him one night that I preferred summer because my eyes continually water in spring, and he told me that I was being absurd. He said I ought to prefer spring because summer was too hot. He argued the point until I conceded it just to get him to stop plaguing me about it.”
Percy shook his head. “Arguing over one’s preference for a season is ludicrous. Might as well argue over the best color. If we choose to fight about that, Her Grace will laugh us right out of the dining room.”
“True.” Sifting back through old memories, she carried the box of implements to the cupboard shelves and began to lay them out. “We did used to fight over whether ladies should use rouge.”
“They shouldn’t, of course,” he said firmly.
She bristled. “And why not? Sometimes a lady needs a bit of color in her cheeks in the dead of winter.”
“I’ve no objection to that, but most rouges contain lead.” Frowning, he walked up to take the empty box from her. “You might brighten your cheeks, but only until you kill yourself.”
That took the wind right out of her sails. “There’s lead in rouge?”
“Some of it. The men who make such potions don’t tell you when those pretty pots of rouge contain poison along with their unguents,” he said with fierce conviction. Then he shot her a long glance. “So why did your husband disapprove of rouge if not because of the lead in it?”
“He thought it was the mark of a whore.”
“Ah. Seems a bit harsh.”
“Exactly! But he was a man of strong opinions.”
“Forgive my frankness, madam, but he sounds like an arse.”
She blinked, then burst into laughter. No one had ever put it quite that way before. “He was, actually. Sometimes.”
He fixed her with a dark gaze. “All the same, I’m glad he stopped you from using rouge, no matter what his reasons. I would rather have you here with me, looking a bit pale, than in the grave with color on your cheeks.”
What a lovely thing to say. And there was such intensity in his eyes that it quite stole the breath from her.
Dangerous. Very, very dangerous.
She jerked her gaze from his. “Well, we can’t argue over rouge then either, now that I know about the poison. That would make me look ridiculous.”
A profound pleasure coursed through her that made her chide herself for being so susceptible to his flatteries. They were merely flatteries, weren’t they? “But we still have nothing to argue over.”
He stared at her another long moment, then said tightly, “We could argue over my coarse ways.”
She snorted. “What coarse ways? You’re always a perfect gentleman.”
“With no tea tray and no sugar to offer a lady,” he pointed out.
“That hardly signifies,” she said. “Bachelors are all that way, gentlemen or no.”
That provoked another heart-stopping smile from him. “Especially doctors. It’s hard to care about the mundane when you deal with life and death every day.”
“I would imagine so.” She stared at him. “What made you become a doctor?”
“My mother had consumption when I was a boy.” His eyes clouded over. “I had no sisters, so it fell to me to take care of her. When she died a lingering death, I swore that one day I’d find a cure for it.” He forced a smile. “So far, no luck, but I keep trying.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, her heart aching for him.
“Don’t be. I miss her, but her death led me on a path I might not have chosen on my own, and I cannot regret that.” He took in a deep breath. “Now, we still must decide what to argue over.”
She allowed him to change the subject, sensing that he would not welcome pity. “That gets harder by the moment since we seem to agree on everything.” She thought a moment. “I suppose we could argue about what exercise is best: walking or riding.”
Percy shrugged. “Either one keeps the constitution in good order. What is there to argue about?”
“Trust me, Edgar found plenty. He used to insist that a brisk walk was far superior to a long ride.” Especially since he always fretted that riding might keep her from conceiving.
“That’s absurd.”
“I quite agree,” she said, secretly pleased that Percy saw things as she did. “Besides, people must choose whatever activity comes naturally to them. And I’m a natural at riding. I love it more than anything.”
“So do I.” Percy opened another box. “Though I suppose I could pretend not to. One of us must, if we’re to argue over it.”
“Then I should be the one to pretend I like walking. I heard Edgar extol the virtues of a brisk walk often enough that I know exactly what to say.”
“Good, because I have no trouble waxing rhapsodic about riding. There’s something about racing along in the wind that reminds me of being at sea, hurtling through the waves in pursuit of some new land.”
The wistfulness in his voice clutched at her heart. “Do you miss it? Being at sea, I mean.”
“Sometimes.” He gazed off at the lone window. “I miss how brilliantly the stars shone, unobscured by the smoke and fog of London. I miss the rocking of the ocean.” He winked at her. “Though I don’t miss being thrown out of my bunk whenever seas were rough.”
“Oh my, that must have been jarring.”
“And occasionally downright hazardous, since I sat on my bunk to shave.”
“Good Lord! You never cut yourself, did you?”
His eyes warmed. “Thank you for the concern, but no. Though it didn’t take me long to realize why so many seamen grow beards.”
She gazed up at his clean-shaven chin. “I can hardly imagine you in a beard. I’ll bet it made you feel very piratical.”
“Oh, very,” he said with a grin. “I considered adding a skull-and-crossbones hat and a gold hoop in my ear, but I was afraid a drunk sailor might accidentally shoot me in the passageway one night, so I settled for saying ‘Arr’ and ‘Ahoy, matey’ from time to time.”
“But no parrot on your shoulder?” she teased.
“Absolutely not. Parrots chatter too much. I like my sleep.”
“It doesn’t sound as if you got any,” she said lightly, “what with being tossed out of your bunk and staring at the stars and encountering drunk sailors in passageways.”
“Not to mention playing cards into the wee hours, which we did whenever the ship was becalmed. It was either that or go mad from boredom.” His gaze turned serious again. “Still, at least at sea a man need never be alone. Even here in London, with all its people, I sometimes feel very lonely. That’s when I wish I could just walk down a passageway to find a friend striking up a fiddle or playing a game of loo.”
Lonely. How well she knew the feeling. Lisette and the duke were wonderful people, but sometimes they saw only each other, and she was left wishing for what could never be.
“You could go to a club,” she said. “That’s what my husband did nearly every night.” Then Edgar would stumble in during the wee hours of the morning stinking of brandy and wanting to bed her.
“Did he?” His voice lowered to a ragged rasp. “I can’t imagine why. What possible entertainment could a club provide that would compare to an evening spent with you?”
The words hung in the air between them. And when his gaze locked on her mouth, she had to fight the sudden leap of desire in her veins. “I never guessed you were such a flatterer, Dr. Worth,” she managed to whisper.
“Percy, remember?” He reached up to cup her chin in his warm hand. “And it’s not flattery, sweetheart. It’s the truth.”
Sweetheart. Even Edgar had never called her that. Or touched her with such feeling.
Anticipation shivered deliciously down her spine when Percy’s eyes darkened and he bent his head toward hers. In that moment she knew that if she just kept standing there like a dolt, he would kiss her.
She wanted him to. Oh, how she wanted it! But she couldn’t let him. Not if she were to keep her sanity.
Stepping back from him, she turned toward the table and said, “I suppose we really should tackle this jumble here.”
A muttered curse escaped him, and she wondered if he would press his advantage and take her in his arms anyway, like some bold buccaneer. If he did, she didn’t know how she would resist him.
Though she must. He might be an attractive, fascinating fellow tempting her into madness, but he was also a doctor used to healing people. He wouldn’t simply accept that she was barren. And she would never again put up with some pompous physician admonishing her to “just relax” or “take cold baths” or even “do whatever your husband wishes.” Never again.
As the silence spun out behind her, she stared down at the jars and picked out the purges, the elixir of vitriol, the alum, and the Peruvian bark—all supposed “cures” for barrenness that made her violently ill.
Remembering that gave her the strength to resist him. She squared her shoulders and forced a brightness into her tone that she didn’t feel. “So tell me, Doctor, what was it like to travel the world? Did you visit any interesting places?”
There, that was a safe subject.
At first he didn’t answer. One moment passed, then two as she held her breath and prayed. At last he said, in a cool voice, “Morocco. And the West Indies. Not to mention . . .”
When he launched into a recitation of the many places he’d visited, it was all she could do not to sag against the table in relief. Because the last thing she needed was a man like Percy courting her. He was too perceptive, too intriguing . . . too irresistibly dangerous, like the bright and pretty rouge that hid poison. If he swept her into his orbit, she would never have the power to leave it.
And she hated feeling trapped. Men had certain expectations of women that she could never fulfill. So she would be better off not taking up with Percy.
Still, as the day went on, she wished she could. Because no other man had ever shared so many of her opinions and views of the world. She’d never met a man who could laugh at himself and make her do the same.
A man who tempted her to consider
the unthinkable.
It was all she thought about while they organized his office. Especially with him so clearly pursuing her. It wasn’t just the provocative things he said. It was his many probing questions about her past. And his sly touches—a brush of his hand here, a bump of his shoulder there.
It was the way he watched her, like a sleek cormorant ready to pluck her up and devour her whole if she was fool enough to come up for air.
She should swim away, just put an end to this farce and leave. That would be the sensible thing. A pity that she wasn’t feeling very sensible today. Besides, they were almost done. In an hour she would have to leave to dress for dinner.
The thought depressed her.
Determinedly she opened a box, then shuddered to find it filled with daunting instruments, including a nasty-looking saw. “Shall we put all these in a drawer?” She held up the saw. “So the sight of them doesn’t alarm your patients?”
“Might as well. I had more use for an amputation saw at sea than I ever do on land.” He cast her a quick smile. “Not too many lords and ladies get their limbs crushed while navigating slippery decks in a storm.”
“I should hope not.” She loaded the instruments into a cupboard drawer, then turned to watch as he pushed furniture around now that all the boxes were out of the way. Sweat beaded his wide brow, and he stopped to wipe it on his sleeve. At her insistence, he’d removed his coat earlier to keep from soiling it, and the sight of him in shirtsleeves made her heart catch in her throat.
“That’s the last box,” she said inanely.
He stared hard at her. “I see that.”
She should leave. But she didn’t want to. Despite spending the day in a doctor’s office, this had been more fun than she’d had in a very long while. Wouldn’t it be lovely if Percy proved not to care about her barrenness? If she could . . . perhaps . . . spend more wonderful days like this with him?
Glancing around, desperate for any excuse to stay longer, she pointed to the skeleton. “We still have to figure out where to put that.”
“That,” he said decisively, “belongs precisely where it is.”