Fear for her health battled his impatience.Recognize me.He waved a hand over her face. Her pupils didn’t move, not until he was inches from her face. “How do you feel?”
She swatted his fingers. “Who are you?”
His mouth became dry, drier than a desert. “Wycliff, dearest.”
“Lord Wycliff is full of jokes, Ruth. I’m here. Are you much hurt?”
Grasping her sister’s arm, she sat up an inch before flopping back down. “A headache. A bad one, but I’m fine. I’m fine. Did they move things around again? The lamplight—it’s wrong, the glow is in the wrong place. I hate when they move my things.”
“What?” Mrs. Bexeley smoothed Ruth’s palm. “We’re not at home. We’re at that Blaren House. You went to see Wilkinson, your Adam’s father.”
“Oh.” She rubbed at her neck. “For a moment, I thought Mama or Mrs. Fitterwall moved my things again.”
She put both hands to her temples. “Never mind. What happened? Did I panic?”
Ruth hadn’t looked his way. She hadn’t looked about the room. Something was very wrong. And why did she come for his father, especially since the good man was only here in spirit? “It’s irritating, dear, to have your things shifted,” he said. “I know it to be irksome, like having something stolen.”
“Hush you.” Mrs. Bexeley helped Ruth lean against the settee back. “Can you stand?”
His poor Ruth looked so pale, so fragile.
She’d had a bad fall, but would that alone confuse her?
He tried to push away the memories of the blow she’d taken to her head. During their attack, the trunk where he’d hidden the other copied ledger had smashed against her skull.
Wycliff shook himself. He was never this timid. “Ma’am, you lost your balance. The uproar at Blaren House did that. Sorry, my dear.”
He gripped his sjambok, his favorite whip made of the toughest leather of rhinoceros skin. Curling the end of the long shaft about his palm, he readied to snap it. Then he thought better of it. The noise of it might upset Ruth. “Why did you ladies come tonight? As you can see, I have just taken control of this place. I’m not ready for guests.”
Ruth took her sister’s arm and stood. “Take me to Wycliff.”
Her sister led her as if she were a blind woman.
Wobbling, she approached and stood in front of him.
This was the moment.
He dropped his sjambok and opened his arms.
She raised her hand to his face.
The sweetness of this reunion flooded through him, like a dam breaking. He dipped his head to kiss her fingers, but she reared her hand back.
Smack.
She’d slapped him, hard. “You frightened me nearly to death, Lord Wycliff. That wasn’t right.”
Still feisty.
He rubbed his stinging face. The gold band on her finger surely left a mark upon his cheek.
Gold.
The one he’d given Ruth had been silver.
He stepped back a safer distance and stood against his desk. “I suppose I deserve that, but I have a one-hit rule.”
Ruth broke free of the sister and stepped closer. “That was for calling me a bed wench. And this is for tossing me over your shoulder.” She reared back again.
