The lock clicked again. Lottie whipped around, already prepared to unleash every cutting remark in her arsenal, but Jasper had not returned empty-handed.
He stepped through the door, his expression far too pleased with himself, and holding a small, polished wooden box.
Chapter 26
It may be necessary, before we proceed, dear reader, to offer a word of caution. If you are morally delicate, requiring virtue or historical accuracy, or indeed still clinging to the belief that a Tolliver sister left alone with a handsome man will make sensible choices, you may wish to close the book immediately. Honestly, one wonders how you made it this far, for the author has warned you repeatedly. Proceed at your own peril.
“Still furious?” Jasper had the gall to ask.
“Raging,” Lottie said tightly, though her eyes were already fixed upon the box in his hands.
“Splendid. That shall make this all the more effective.”
“What,” she asked warily, “is in that box?”
“Your forfeit,” he replied, strolling past her as though he were not the most infuriating man in London. “I have made my decision.”
She eyed the box like it might bite her. “That is not a letter-opener, is it?”
“Not unless you wish to open yourself,” he said cheerfully.
“Jasper! What on earth can you mean?”
“I jest,” he added, setting the box down on the desk and flicking the latch. “It is a therapeutic device. Very modern, and most scientifically.”
She folded her arms. “And you, of course, are the appointed physician?”
“Yes.” He smiled. “I will be administering your treatment.”
“Treatment?”
“For a most troubling feminine condition. Common in women of your temperament… volatile, restless, ungovernable.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Hysteria.”
“Precisely,” he said brightly, as though she’d just solved a riddle.
He lifted the lid with a flourish. Inside was a curious little contraption—brass, leather-strapped, with a delicate crank on one side. Jasper turned the gear lightly between two fingers and it began to whir, soft and steady, with a faint purring vibration beneath the sound.
Lottie’s eyes went wide. “Is that—” she choked.
“It has been used in certain medical circles,” he said lightly. “One simply applies it in the appropriate location and—voilà! Peace, calm, and renewed feminine grace.”
Her cheeks flamed. “That cannot possibly be real.”
“It is quite real,” he said. “Hysteria is a well-documented disorder, Charlotte. Symptoms include excessive emotion, defiance of social expectations, impetuous midnight visits to gentlemen’s homes—”
“You are deranged.”
He smiled wider. “Doctors have used vibrating chairs for nervous conditions as early as the last century. Though I confess this model is somewhat newer. Modified by a curious inventor in Bloomsbury. Entirely above board.”
She looked from the device to him and back again. “And you intend to use it on me?”
“Well,” he said, giving the crank another playful turn and sending a deeper hum through the air. “I would hardly trust you to operate it yourself. That would not be responsible of me. Now. If you’d like to proceed with your forfeit…”
Jasper turned the crank slowly, the soft whir of the mechanism filling the room with an entirely new kind of tension.
“You shall need to lie back,” he said, his voice low and absurdly calm, as if he were discussing the weather or a case of mild nerves. “It is most effective in a reclining position. Shall we?”
