She could not, of course, accuse him of anything within her mother’s hearing. Instead, she said, “I hardly think I need such a fuss made.”
James cupped her cheek and turned to look at Lady Worthington, who had made her way to Violet’s bedside and was looking at Violet’s rather tousled hair with an expression of vague distaste. “This is what I meant,” he said to her mother. “My Violet. My flower. So courageous in the face of grievous illness.”
Lady Worthington sniffed. “Audley, please don’t become maudlin, or I may find myself in need of a physician as well.” She looked at Violet, frowning. “You look flushed. Are you feverish?”
“I wish,” Violet said honestly. “That might indicate that this was naught but a horrible nightmare.”
“She must be feverish,” Lady Worthington said to James.
“She clearly requires constant attention,” James said earnestly. “I have been, naturally, as attentive as I can manage, but I thought a feminine presence . . .” He trailed off.
“Indeed,” Lady Worthington said curtly, with the air of someone resolving herself to tackle an unpleasant task. “A sickbed is no place for a man, Audley. Leave it to me.”
“Of course.” James leaned forward to press a kiss to Violet’s brow. “I will leave you in your mother’s loving care.”
I will murder you in your sleep for this, Violet attempted to say with her eyes as he gave her a limpid, loving, thoroughly sickening look. His lovesick smile slipped for a second, replaced momentarily by an entirely self-satisfied grin, and in that instant she knew two things beyond a doubt.
One, her eyes’ message had been received.
Two, he undoubtedly knew that she wasn’t ill.
Eight
It had, James reflected over a late luncheon the next afternoon, been a remarkably enjoyable day. The day before, he’d had to work very hard on several occasions to stifle his laughter at the expressions on Violet’s face—which had ranged from incredulous to murderous—but on the whole, he’d put on a rather impressive performance. When he finally left his wife in her mother’s care the previous afternoon, she’d been propped up by enough pillows to support an entire family, under a layer of bedclothes thick enough to ward off a Russian winter. Her mother had been patting her gingerly on the shoulder with an air of long-suffering weariness that implied that she expected to shortly be sainted for this effort. He wondered how long it had taken for Violet to convince her mother to leave—he had seen no sign of the countess at the dinner or breakfast tables, and an inquiry of Wooton confirmed that the countess had not occupied the room James had ordered prepared for her.
On his way out of the room he’d caught Price on the stairs with a stack of books in her hand, so he’d guessed that Violet was running some sort of elaborate scheme to continue her library cataloguing project from the confines of her bedchamber—it must have driven her mad to have her mother’s visit interrupt her progress. In some ways, this was an improvement—at least now he could enter the library at any hour of the day without worrying about finding her there, filling the room with her scent, biting her lip in concentration as she scribbled away at her catalogue, her face as beautiful as it always was when she was deep in thought.
He’d been half expecting to find her up at dawn, or at least by the time he left for an early meeting with his man of business about a pending sale of a stallion. He shut himself away in his study for several hours with a neglected pile of correspondence, both stables related and personal, and when he grew peckish and rang for a footman to ask for a tray to be sent in, he learned that Violet still had not made an appearance outside of her bedchamber.
He allowed himself a brief moment of surprise as he accepted the tray placed before him on his desk, wondering at her lingering in bed, but promptly decided that she must have calculated that she could not reemerge, bright-eyed and in the full flush of health, without rousing his suspicions. He told himself that this was all the better—his trick had worked so well that she had now taken to punishing herself—but he could not deny the small voice within him that noted that tormenting Violet was considerably more entertaining when he was actually in her company.
He took a bite of bread—upon which he promptly choked, when Violet entered the room.
“Good afternoon, darling,” she said sunnily, sinking into the chair facing his desk. She was dressed in a riding habit of midnight blue, her dark hair pulled neatly back from her face into some sort of elaborate braided concoction at her nape. She looked beautiful—and perfectly healthy.
His eyes narrowed.
Violet seemed not to notice. “Did you sleep well?” She reached forward and, without so much as a by-your-leave, poured a cup of tea, which she nudged toward him.
James, being rather occupied with the task of forcing air back into his lungs, took a moment to reply.
“Very,” he finally managed, taking a healthy gulp of tea and watching as she prepared a cup for herself. He was amused to note that her inability to pour tea without at least a splash or two winding up in the saucer remained unchanged. “What are you—”
“Oh, I’m feeling much improved this afternoon,” she said cheerfully, stirring sugar into her tea. The sound of the spoon against china was loud in the otherwise silent room. “My mother’s visit really worked wonders—you were entirely correct in that regard. I can scarcely believe what a miraculous recovery I have made. But then, this is how Briggs said it might be, you see.”
“Did he?”
“Oh, yes.” She beamed at him, and he averted his eyes. Her face was radiant when she smiled, and he sternly reminded himself not to be distracted by a pair of sparkling eyes and uneven dimples—he had made that mistake five years earlier, and all he had gotten in exchange was a brief window of happiness, followed by a long period of regret. “One day bedridden, the next up and about as though nothing were at all the matter.”
Despite the knowledge that she was lying to his face, James was nevertheless amused. She seemed to be taking an awful gamble that he knew nothing at all about the symptoms of consumption—which, admittedly, he didn’t, but he’d never heard anything about the wild fluctuation in health associated with the disease.
“Interesting.” He drew the word out slowly. “You know, darling, I can’t help but think this isn’t at all consistent with what I’ve read of consumption in the past.” Which was nothing. But she didn’t need to know that.
“Oh, James.” She waved an airy hand as though he were being entirely foolish—was he imagining it, or did she seem more alert than normal? “I’m certain Dr. Briggs knows more about it than you do—or would you like to summon your own physician for a second opinion?”
She blinked at him innocently.
His eyes narrowed. What the bloody hell was going on? Did she know that he knew? But how could she possibly?—he’d only learned the truth for certain the previous day, and she’d not seen anyone but him and her mother in the interim.
Belatedly realizing that she was still awaiting his reply, he said slowly, “Yes, perhaps we shall. I’m certain Dr. Worth would like to make a thorough examination of you.” And why, oh why, did discussion of a physician visiting Violet have to send such utterly lewd images into his mind? Never had the word examination sounded so . . . obscene. Clearly he was going slightly mad from lack of female contact.