Louise sighed. He clearly wasn’t ready to make peace with her though why, she wasn’t sure. It troubled her and dimmed her mood even further. “Please forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” he said, applying an impassive tone she despised. “Quarrels happen. I’m sure we’ll both survive it.”
“You’re still angry with me, though.”
“I was never angry with you,” he clipped with sudden irritation. He huffed a breath, paused a moment, then said, “I’m not angry with you, my lady. How do your compresses feel?”
“Fine,” she grumbled.
“No itchiness?”
“No.”
“That’s good.” He moved around the room. It sounded as though he picked something up. “Mrs. Winterly says she’ll be up soon to sit with you for a bit. Would you like me to read for you until she arrives?”
“Only if you wish to.” She’d no desire for him to stay out of obligation. The possibility that he might, that he always had, that she’d somehow invented an intimate bond between them when there was none, prompted tears to gather against the corners of her eyes.
With nowhere to go, they dampened her compresses and her bandage, though Mr. Berkly seemed not to notice. For which Louise could only give her sincerest thanks.
Marcus glared at the unexpected letter he received the next day, forwarded to him by Redding. It was from Mr. Von Gräfe, a renowned physician at the University of Berlin. And it was written in German. No matter how much he wished it or how hard he tried, he could not decipher its contents. Which meant he would have to seek help from Lady Louise. He sighed. Their recent quarrel had been welcome, if only for the purpose of adding some much needed distance between them. And yet, he felt like an ass.
It wasn’t her fault he wanted her so badly the rising need within him made him irritable. Coupled with the knowledge that he wasn’t good enough for her, he would have welcomed the chance to engage in a brawl if only to spend the forceful energy bursting through him. Because bedding her, which was what his body craved, was out of the question.
Still, he regretted destroying what had in truth become the closest friendship he’d ever enjoyed. He’d shared things with her – parts of himself he’d never revealed to anyone else. Like his goal to learn German. He took another look at the letter and cursed, then made his way to Lady Louise’s room and prepared to knock.
A howl from the opposite side of the door accompanied by a series of expletives fit for a St. Giles scoundrel, and all semblance of propriety flew from Marcus’s head as panic took over. Without thinking twice, he pushed the door open, entered the room. And froze.
She wasn’t supposed to be out of bed yet. Certainly not without aid.
Irritation snapped at his nerves. He prepared to chastise her for putting her eyesight at risk, but the words caught in his throat as she spun to face him.
He blinked, then swiftly shut the door to protect her from prying eyes as he finally registered what she was wearing. A very translucent and highly indecent chemise clung to her curves, allowing an unhindered view of her shapely legs, not to mention a semi-clear view of everything else.
Heaven have mercy, he was a surgeon who ought not be swayed by the sight of a half-naked woman. But he was a man first, and the woman he now had the pleasure of seeing in all her gorgeous beauty happened to be the very same one that turned his brain inside out.
“Mr. Berkly?”
Marcus snapped to attention, recalled her outburst, and did his best to ignore the outline of her full breasts and the flare of her hips. He also thanked the Lord she was blindfolded and wouldn’t see his body’s response. “Yes, my lady. It is I. Please forgive my intrusion but I heard you scream. Are you all right?”
“I stubbed my toe. It hurts like…” She clamped her mouth shut.
“Like bloody hell?” he supplied. She flushed a deep shade of red, and his treacherous mind immediately wondered if the shade covered all of her body. Willing himself to be proper, if by nothing more than his actions, he drew closer and put one arm around her.
His intention had been to guide her back to her bed. Instead, she turned more fully toward him until he was nearly embracing her with far too much proximity for either one to pretend propriety. Every muscle within him drew tight. Arousal pulsed through his veins and yet, by some incredible restraint, he remained utterly still.
“You should not see me like this,” she murmured.
No. He shouldn’t. Nothing could be more wrong. Or right. “And you should not be up and about. Why did you leave the bed and why…” He swallowed. Forced a ragged breath into his lungs, then pushed it out. “Why aren’t you wearing a proper nightgown?”
She tilted her head back in the way she would have if she’d been able to meet his gaze. Her lips parted and Marcus’s fingers fanned out across her back, their tips digging into her muslin-clad flesh. When she spoke again, her voice was hoarse. “I spilled my glass of water when I tried to drink unaided. The nightgown got wet so I took it off and tried to locate a dry one.”
“You should have called for your maid.”
“I asked her to go and purchase the jasmine.”
“Then you should have called for one of the other servants to assist you.” Fearing he might soon lose his resolve if they stayed like this for even a second longer, he spun away from her and searched the space. The chair her maid must have used when she was last here stood between the bed and the chest of drawers. In all likelihood, Lady Louise had run into it in her search for the blasted nightgown. He moved it out of the way and looked through the drawers until he found what he sought.
“This should do.” Cut from a thicker cotton, the nightgown would conceal what his mind would forever remember – a woman whose body he longed to worship with every fiber of his being. He snatched up the garment and quickly helped her into it.
