Despite his parents’ dismay, Aunt Wilcox had supported his medical ambitions, and she made no secret she intended him to be her heir. She was a formidable woman, whom he respected. They had an austere and enduring affection for each other.
Daniel returned downstairs, peering into the drawing room, the consulting rooms, and the library, where he stopped.
She wasn’t attending a case.
Nora filled Horace’s favorite chair, dozing with a book in her lap, her work smock still tied over her dress and a pencil skewered through the listing knot of her hair.
She was not a woman who put much store in flattery or useless compliments, but her smooth cheek against the wing of the chair was pink with sleep, and the wayward curl catching her eyelashes…
“Nora?” he whispered gently and knelt down, suddenly tempted to press his lips on hers in a way he hadn’t for days.
“Hmm?” She stirred.
“I forgot to remind you this morning. Dinner tonight. At Whitewood.” It was easier naming the house than his family. “It’s already quarter past four.”
Her face spasmed into a frown, and she muttered something indecipherable in Italian as her eyes shot open. “Sorry. I remembered. I just lost track of time. It’ll be all right, though, so long as we hurry.”
The book thudded to the floor as she stood and plucked at the ties of her smock with bleary eyes and clumsy hands.
“Let me,” he offered, using the excuse to bend close to her neck, grazing her hair with his forehead. Tiny static shocks ran over his scalp.
As soon as he freed her from the apron, she hurried for the stairs, unaware of his longing. “My dress is laid out already, and if I don’t wash my hair…” Nervously, she reached for the loose knot. Daniel could almost see her rapid assessment, weighing the lingering smell of pungent medications with the hours it would take to soap and dry her thick tresses. Last month she’d actually suggested cutting it, but he’d averted that tragedy, bombarding her with so many lines of archaic poetry that she’d collapsed with laughter and sworn to give up the idea.
“I’ll brush it with that rose-scented powder,” Daniel offered. Cracking a smile, he requoted one of his earlier arguments in favor of keeping her hair long:
“Hir hair displayit as the goldin wyre,
Aboif hir heid with bemys radient…”
Nora snorted. “I’m glad you think so.” But the smile she sent over her shoulder betrayed her pleasure.
Now if he could just keep her grinning until the end of the evening.
***
His mother’s dining room was at its best that evening, attired as elegantly as the guests gathered around the table. None of them controversial, to Daniel’s relief: a neighboring member of Parliament of the Whig persuasion—which was perhaps why he appeared so glum, as they’d had little success with Peel in power—and a country doctor from Berkshire and his wife.
Candles and silver and crystal shone, and it was evident his mother had taken some trouble in selecting the menu, including the salmon Daniel had predicted, wrapped within an exquisitely crafted pastry case and decorated to look like it had scales and fins. Even more remarkable was the degree of congeniality shown to Nora, who was seated in the place of honor between Aunt Wilcox and his father. A smile lurked in the corners of her mouth, and the only time her brow puckered was between bites when she glanced at her dull knife—adequate for cutting the venison on her plate, but a much clumsier tool than the scalpel she was used to. Daniel took an amused sip of wine and returned his attention to his mother.
“I’m glad to see Aunt Wilcox tonight,” Daniel murmured. As usual, she appeared entirely ageless—chin firm despite the deep creases around her mouth, silver hair as thick and becoming as it had been when he was a child. To him, Aunt Wilcox had never been young and would never grow old.
When his parents had balked at Daniel’s proposal to marry Nora, it had been Aunt Wilcox who frowned imperiously and insisted they all calm down. “She might not be from a fine family, but she is the sole heir to the most famous physician in England. That counts for something.” Daniel’s cheek flickered as he fought back a smile from the memory.
“She’s missed you,” his mother said, swirling her wine. “You know she still has hopes you’ll take up the role of a private physician—”
“Does she still intend to visit Germany?” Daniel interjected.
“Not this year,” his mother said, lace cuffs swaying as she replaced her glass. “Your aunt is very caught up in the concernsof that society of hers. Next year, when she is no longer the vice president…”
Mother had a habit, recently acquired, of not finishing her sentences. Perhaps it was meant to be fashionable, but Daniel’s smile stiffened. His aunt was involved with any number ofsocieties, and he didn’t feel magnanimous enough to give his mother the pleasure of asking which one.
“And Joan?”
“I may have to take her myself.” Mother would be pleased to see Joan form an attachment to an eligible gentleman met at a foreign spa town. Happier still if she returned home engaged to be married. Daniel was warier of the idea, but—“We must make sure she is in good company,” his mother finished.
There would be no doubt of that.
Daniel glanced along the table, his mouth hitching upward as he caught Nora’s eye.
