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“Marina is not well. I am taking her to her chambers,” Anthony replied. “You should run along to Mrs. Havers and have her fetch the physician and see if the cook can make some soup.”
The boy nodded effusively. “I’ll do it right away.”
He ran out ahead of the couple, with all the determination of a true knight that had been set a vital quest.
Meanwhile, Anthony carried his wife out of her private library at a slower pace, not wanting to knock her or make her sickness worse. What ailed her, he did not know, but he did not like the word ‘arrhythmia’. There was something threatening about it.
“There really is no need,” she said quietly, her arms looped loosely about his neck, her fingertips accidentally brushing the back of his neck.
A pleasant tingle shivered down his spine, but he could not let himself think about that.
“Nonsense,” he replied. “You are my wife and you are not feeling well. It is my duty to keep you safe. Even if I cannot make you a medicine to heal you, I can at least put you to bed.”
She made no further protest as he took her upstairs to her bedchamber, where he pulled back the covers and lay her down. His throat tightened as he felt her hold onto him for a moment longer than necessary, his mind in turmoil as she finally released him and settled back into the soft mattress.
Feeling rather too warm himself, he eased the coverlets over her and retreated to the safety of the windowsill where he could wait, at a polite distance, for the physician and the soup to arrive.
What is the matter with me? He clawed a hand through his hair and discreetly touched his palm to his heart, wondering if he had an arrhythmia of his own. One that ambushed him whenever he was close to his wife.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
What Marina had assumed was mere bashfulness at the sight of her husband’s bare, muscled stomach and the ensuing closeness of him, feeling the touch of his hand on the sensitive nape of her neck and across her brow, had turned out to a rather inconvenient bout of sickness.
She did not know if it was a belated spread of William’s illness, or if it was just one of those random afflictions, but for two weeks she had not left her room. She had not even had the strength to mix her own medicines, relying on the housekeeper to fetch what she needed from her stores.
The physician had brought medicine too, but she did not trust it as much as she trusted her own.
“How are you feeling today?” Anthony asked, walking into the room without so much as a knock.
He, too, had barely left her bedchamber. When she woke from a feverish slumber, he had been right there at her writing desk, working as he watched over her. When she stirred in the dead of night due to a throbbing headache, his shape on her chaise-longue had comforted her. As she languished through fever and sniffles and aches, he had never been far from her side.
“You will make yourself ill if you stay close to me,” she had protested a few times.
“As long as it is once you are better, so I might have the benefit of your medicine, that is fine with me,” he had replied, before helping her to sip some chamomile tea.
“You should at least sleep in your own rooms,” she had continued to argue, despite rather liking the security of having him nearby.
“I barely sleep anyway. The chaise is comfortable enough,” he had told her, in a tone that had suggested he would brook no further complaint.
Sitting up in bed, the morning sunlight no longer hurting her eyes, Marina was almost sorry to confess the truth. “I think I am entirely recovered. Weakened, perhaps, but that will remedy itself with some walking and some fresh air.”
“Are you certain?” he asked, as he came to sit on the edge of the bed. “Shall I send for the physician again?”
Marina pulled a face. “He was a quack. Never call for him again, for anyone.” She shook her head. “I only trust Doctor Stanforth.”
To her surprise, Anthony chuckled. “I shall bear that in mind, though London is just too far away for me to summon him here.”
“Then, it is fortunate that you will soon return to the city,” another voice interrupted, as a familiar figure bustled in.
If the delirium had not gone away a week ago, Marina might have thought she was seeing things.
“Your Grace?” she croaked. “When did you arrive?”
She looked to Anthony for answers, but he seemed just as surprised as she was by the arrival of his grandmother.
Harriet sank down onto the chaise-longue where her grandson had slept for a fortnight. “A few minutes ago,” she replied. “Mrs. Havers informed me of your unfortunate illness, Marina. In truth, I had hoped that you might be… you know… but the housekeeper insisted it was just a fever.”
“I might be what?” Marina replied, shaking her head in confusion.
