Brooke didn’t answer. She wasn’t about to give away Alfreda’s secrets. She shouldn’t even have made the offer. He would probably survive for a few more days.
But her silence prompted him to say, “I’m aware there are self-trained healers with knowledge that has been passed down from one generation to the next who still treat the sick in areas where doctors are not available. This far north, we are lucky to have even one doctor who lives nearby. But why would your maid have a rule against helping the nobility?”
She’d revealed too much! This closeness to him must be rattling her thoughts. She blanched when he added, “Is she a witch?”
“Don’t be absurd! There are no such things.”
“Of course there are. It was a witch who cursed my family.”
Hebelievedhe was cursed? She was incredulous. He was an educated man, wasn’t he? He should know better than to succumb to superstition. But then it dawned on her that he was going to use that supposed curse as another means to get her to flee. He must think that if he professed to believe in it, then she would, too. Ha! She wasn’t falling for that ploy.
He didn’t say anything more about his family curse. He closed his eyes instead. Apparently, he’d taxed what little strength he had. They shouldn’t have met yet. He should have waited until his fever was gone and he was not in pain.
“You should rest if you hope to survive until your doctor returns,” she suggested matter-of-factly, and turned toward the door.
“You can ask your maid,” he said, opening his eyes. “But why do you even want to help me?”
Not expecting the concession, she glanced back at him. “Because you are going to be my husband.”
He growled at that answer. She raised a brow, silently questioning if he was going to be the one to fail to comply with the Regent’s demand.
“So you think you can make me love you by healing me?”
“Not a’tall. I’m confident that you will find many other reasons to love me.”
He didn’t seem to like that answer and scowled darkly. “You are mistaken, Brooke Whitworth. I am not pleased to allow you into my home, nor should you feel welcome here, because you are not.”
Her back stiffened. She had been nothing but cordial, even helpful to him. “Then tell me to go.”
He didn’t. No, of course he wouldn’t. He’d already made it clear he wantedherto do the fleeing on her own.
“Just as I thought,” she added bitterly. “You are as stuck with me as I am with you, no matter how much we both hate it.”
Chapter Thirteen
BROOKE WAS TOO UPSETto notice that Alfreda was in the group of people waiting outside the viscount’s door. She turned away from them and ran down the narrower corridor to that tower Gabriel had led her to earlier. She peeked into the dark stairwell and saw only a faint light emanating from above, but she mounted the stairs anyway. She wanted to see for herself exactly where the wolf had wanted to put her. When she reached the top of the stairs, she blanched. Nothing was in that circular tower room except cobwebs.
The windows were small and narrow, letting in only a few narrow sunbeams. This wasn’t a bedroom, it was a dismal cell.
“Well,” Alfreda huffed, coming to look over Brooke’s shoulder at the empty room. “Now we know.”
“And have Gabriel to thank for not making me sleep on the floor in here tonight.”
“Don’tyouthank him. I will find some way to—if he ever stops annoying me.”
Brooke turned about and hugged Alfreda because she needed a hug just then. She didn’t want to stay in this house. She didn’t want to argue with Dominic Wolfe again. Even as sick and wounded as he was, he’d quickly lost his temper. God help her when he regained his full strength. If that happened. Maybe she shouldn’t ask Alfreda to intervene, should just let nature and one incompetent doctor take their course.
Rubbing Brooke’s back soothingly, Alfreda said, “If he’s not really a wolf, it will be all right.”
Since neither of them believed he was a real wolf, Brooke knew the remark was meant to lighten her mood. She appreciated Alfreda’s effort, but it didn’t work. She’d clung to a slim hope on the way to Viscount Rothdale’s estate that he and she might get along eventually—if he didn’t simply refuse to marry her. That hope was gone now that she knew how deep his antipathy ran for her whole family.
Such a dismal thought and such a shame. Had she met Dominic Wolfe under different circumstances, she could have been quite attracted to him. He was young and handsome, after all. A very different outcome might have been possible, even a courtship if her family had approved—no, that was only what should have happened, not what could have happened, not when he was only a viscount. Her father would have aimed higher, not for her, but for himself. Not that it mattered when Dominic despised her and was determined to make her despise him as well. He had made that abundantly clear.
Brooke turned toward the stairs, wanting to leave this horrid room, confessing, “The wolf hates me. He wants me to flee.”
“We anticipated this outcome.”
“I know. It was illogical to hope that he might like me andnotimmediately hate me because I’m Robert’s sister.”
