by Diana Quincy
His interest piqued. “Then to what do you attribute it?”
“It is entirely possible battlefield trauma causes lasting changes to the brain.”
“If that is so,” he said, keeping his tone purposely neutral, “is this change to the brain irreversible?”
“Ah, that is the big question, is it not? Whether these men are permanently marked or whether their affliction can be reversed over time.”
“How would one reverse it, do you suppose?”
“By social healing. Exercise helps manage some symptoms. As does keeping oneself occupied.” He regarded Rand with a thoughtful air. “You seem most interested in the affliction, my lord.”
“Some of my men were so affected.” He forced an easy tone despite the tightness in his chest. “Naturally I am interested in seeing to their welfare.”
The doctor paused and Rand could see his mind working. “If you should ever have need of my services, you have only to ask.”
“For my men?”
“For your men, of course,” Drummond said. “Men who are so afflicted often find sharing their difficulties with a medical expert can provide some relief.”
They reached the breakfast room, where several guests were already seated. “I shall take that under advisement.”
Drummond followed Rand in and they headed to the sideboard where breakfast was laid out. “Perhaps you might care to call upon me when you return to Town to further discuss the matter.”
“We shall see.” Rand’s cravat felt tight around his neck, impeding his flow of breath. “Eggs, doctor?”
…
“I think we should move up the wedding,” Laurie said between bites of kidney pie.
Kat nibbled on her toast and pretended not to notice when Rand seated himself at the long breakfast table, choosing an available chair across the table as far away as possible from her. His mistress hadn’t appeared. She was no doubt sleeping late after a long night.
“Kat?”
She swung her attention to Laurie. “Hmmm?”
“What do you think about us marrying earlier than we planned?”
“I think it is an excellent idea.” The sooner they married, the further behind she could put the catastrophe she’d almost made of her life. She slid another glance at Rand, who appeared to be concentrating on his breakfast. Yet his plate remained full. “I can’t wait to be your wife.”
“Excellent. I’ll speak with your father as soon as we return to Town.”
Cradling her chin in her hand, she gave Laurie her full attention. He seemed on edge. His handsome face was drawn and deep lines creased the areas around his eyes and mouth. “Did you not sleep well?”
He darted a look at her. “Why do you ask?”
“You seem out of sorts.”
He exhaled. “I’m anxious to marry you so we can put all of this behind us.”
She held her breath. Did Laurie suspect something was amiss? “All of what?”
He stilled. “The anticipation, of course. This endless waiting can drive the sanest man to bedlam.”
“Is that all?” She smiled with relief. “What shall we do today?”
“The rain has let up,” Laurie said, recovering some of his usual easy manner. “Perhaps we can arrange an excursion into the village. Mrs. Hobart mentioned it is market day.”
After breakfast, a small group—including Lexie, Bea, and Peter Lawson—went along with them to the village. They started out together checking out the wares, and Kat couldn’t help noting a subtle tension between the two men. Eventually, she and Laurie drifted away from the others. “What is going on between you and Peter?”
Laurie paid for two sweetmeats and handed her one. “What do you mean?”
She took his arm as they resumed walking amid the stalls and vendors who’d laid their wares out on blankets on the ground. “You’ve been very short with him today. I thought the two of you were friends.”
“It’s nothing.”
“It must be something,” she insisted. “I’ve never known the two of you to be at odds.”
He finished chewing his sweetmeat before answering. “I discovered him insulting a lady.”
“Peter? Truly? Perhaps you were mistaken. He has always been a perfect gentleman.”
“It was no mistake.”
“Who did he insult?”
“It doesn’t matter.” He pulled her behind the church, where they were out of sight, and pushed her up against the wall.
“What are you doing?” she asked, knowing perfectly well he intended to steal a kiss.
His eyes blazed as he looked into her face. “I have a fierce hunger for you, Kat.” His lips pressed against hers in a demanding kiss.
She opened to him and kissed him back, fully participating with concentrated eagerness, desperate to experience the same urgent need with Laurie that she had with Rand. Once Laurie bedded her, she’d forget all about Rand. She just knew it. “Why don’t we anticipate our wedding night?” she murmured against his lips.
He pulled back, his shock apparent. “You can’t mean that.”
She planted another kiss on his lips. “I do mean it. We both want to and we are going to marry anyway. Where’s the harm in it?”
Warring emotions flashed in his face. He kissed her again, pulling her body tight against his. “Are you certain, Kat? Once we do it, there will be no turning back.”
“I don’t want to turn back. I want to belong to you fully. You are the most decent person I know, Laurie. So good and honorable.”
He paled. “I want to do right by you, Kat.” He pulled back from her and released a shuddering breath. “It would be wrong to anticipate our wedding night. But I will speak to your father about moving the wedding up the moment we return to Town. I want this done as much as you do.”
Walking back among the vendors on Laurie’s arm, a lingering uneasiness followed her. Laurie had always been anxious to marry her, yet something had changed. Not only did he seem distracted and on edge, but there’d been a note of grim desperation in the way he’d kissed her. She shoved the concerns out of her mind. Marriage would cure whatever was wrong with Laurie. As it would for her. It had to.
…
“Come on, girl, we’ll slip out the library doors.” Vera jumped a happy circle around Rand as they made their way through the darkness, moving quietly so as not to wake the sleeping guests. He walked along the corridor to the library with Vera following. Pushing the door open, he saw the fire still blazed, and its flickering light cast dim dancing shadows about the room. It was most unusual for a fire to be burning in the middle of the night.
He made for the doors that led to the gardens, but the dog veered away from him toward the hearth. “Come, Vera. Let’s go for a walk.”
The animal yelped a short, happy bark, nuzzling into a high leather chair that faced the fireplace. He gave a low whistle to call the dog back to him.
Wagging her tail vigorously, Vera gave the chair her full attention. Frowning, Rand stepped toward the dog. Someone must have left food on the chair. As he neared, he caught sight of delicate pale feet first, folded under feminine legs and dangling a bit off the chair. The scent of violets reached him next, leaving little doubt as to who occupied the chair. His heart pounded.
“I see I haven’t completely won Vera over from her mistress,” he said, forcing an even tone.
She leaned forward in the chair to look around it and back at him, color high on her cheeks, the firelight dancing in her short curls, making them glisten like specks of gold around the glittering sapphire of her eyes. “Now she comes to me,” she said in a wry voice, her eyes following him as he stepped in front of the hearth. “When I would prefer to stay concealed.”
His chest contracted at the thought of Kat hiding from him. Regret slammed into him anew for having hurt her, even though he had done it to ensure her future happiness. “She is a stubborn-minded female. I’ve learned Vera does as she pleases.”
She ran her hands over the dog�
��s head and wiggling body, allowing Vera to lick her chin with great enthusiasm. “Hello girl. I’ve missed you, yes I have.”
He wondered why she’d cut her hair. He’d loved those long silken tresses. Even now, he could almost smell the delicate floral scent her bathing soap left in the gleaming mass of strands, which he’d buried his face in not so long ago. “Why did you cut your hair?”
She paused for a moment, her eyes fixed on the motions of her hands moving up and down the dog’s soft fur. “I needed a change.”
Surprisingly, he found he did not regret the loss of her hair. Even though he’d always thought the gleaming strands contributed to her considerable beauty. Now Rand saw they’d actually distracted from her delicate allure. These short curls framed her face in a way that showcased her fine-drawn features, highlighting enormous blue eyes in a fragile, heart-shaped face; the adorable upturned point of her slender nose, and the slight upper lip resting atop a lush lower one. “It suits you.”
This time she did look at him, her eyes rounding and flickering with obvious surprise. He realized then that she’d done it because of him, as if chopping off her hair would shed their shared past, cutting him out of her life or her heart. If only it could be that easily accomplished.
He suppressed the wild urge to tell her she was even more beautiful to him now, a mix of sensual earth goddess and ethereal nymph. For him to have believed, even for a moment, that this radiant creature could ever be his, was laughable. “I’m sorry to have disturbed you. We were just going for a walk.”
Holding Vera’s jowls gently in her slim, tapered fingers, Kat regarded the animal with mock reproach. “Have you awakened the earl in the middle of the night to tend to your needs?”
That she referred to him as the earl was not lost on Rand. No longer was he her Edward. The reference to his title emphasized the new chasm between them. He pushed away the crushing regret, reminding himself that he had intended for things to fall this way. His planning here, as on the battlefield, had been to perfection.
He did not correct Kat’s mistaken assumption that Vera’s needs had pulled him out of bed to wander in the night shadows. No need for her to know this sleeplessness occurred often, or how glad he was to have the animal’s companionship when it did. “Has sleep eluded you as well?”
Sitting back in the chair, she looked into the fire, the flames flickering in the vibrant shade of her eyes. “So it would seem.”
“Would you care to walk with me?” The invitation breached the uneasy lull between them before he’d even realized his mind had formed it.
She blinked away from the fire to look up at him, inquiry evident in her gaze.
“I comprehend I’ve proven something of a disappointment to you,” he said in gentle answer to her unspoken question. “I understand if you wish to decline.”
She pushed up from the chair. “There is no harm in taking Vera for a walk.”
A spurt of gladness flowered in him at the thought of spending a little more time with her, even though the thinking part of him knew it to be a grave mistake. But he pushed it out of his head. Soon she would be Sinclair’s and quite safe from him. He tamped down the howling protest deep in him at the thought of another man taking possession of her. Stepping aside, he allowed her to pass by him toward the library doors.
She wore a dressing gown over her night rail, the white of which peeked out at her smooth throat. Walking behind her, he noted how the belted dressing gown emphasized her tiny waist and the soft curve of her hips in a way that her formal gowns—which fell loose over her midriff—did not.
She stopped in front of the doors to allow him to pull them open, which he did, coming close enough to catch the beguiling whiff of violets again. The night air rushed in to greet them, doing little to cool the heat gathering under his skin.
Vera slipped past them both, bounding out onto the terrace and out of view as Rand stepped out after Kat, closing the door behind them with a soft click. They stepped down off the terrace in silence and set to walking at a pace slightly faster than a mere stroll, the full moon providing the only light over the Hobart’s rolling, well-kept lawns.
Even though he did not look at her, his body felt her presence beside him keenly. His senses were alert to her every movement, to each soft inhale and exhale. He closed his eyes and swallowed, determined to drive the intense awareness between them away. “I understand you and Sinclair are moving up the wedding.”
“Yes. We see no reason to delay.”
He fixed his gaze ahead into the darkness, watching the blurry bouncing mass he knew to be Vera. “Indeed.”
“What was wrong with Toby?”
He stiffened. “What do you mean?”
Impatience edged her response. “I’m not a complete fool. His sister, Bea, says the war has…affected him.”
“He’ll be fine. I imagine it will take time.”
“He seemed to be seeing things, as though he was dreaming yet he wasn’t sleeping.”
“It is like a waking nightmare that keeps reoccurring,” he said.
She stilled, her eyes on him. “And yet it does not happen to everyone. Like you, for instance, you don’t suffer so, do you?”
He drew a sharp breath. “When one witnesses horrors most civilized beings cannot even begin to imagine, it is bound to have an impact.”
“I always hated the war and everything about it. I blamed it for taking you from me. But now I know that wasn’t the truth of it at all.”
Actually it was the complete and total truth, but she could never know it. She must always assume him to be a philandering rakehell with no hope of reform. “Some men are not meant to be faithful,” he said.
“Where is the fair Maid of Malagon this evening?”
“Sleeping in her bed, I presume. We are not in each other’s pockets.”
“I do expect faithfulness from Lord Sinclair, you know. He is very devoted to me.”
Pain lanced his chest at the thought of her in Sinclair’s bed. “The viscount’s devotion to you is clear for all to see.” She didn’t speak, but he heard her breath hitch and feared she was near tears. “You could never be happy with me, Kitty. I wish it were otherwise, but it is not.”
She stared straight ahead as they walked, refusing to look at him. “I know that now. It is well and good that I discovered it before it was too late.” Her words were punctuated by a distant bark followed by a splash. She groaned. “Talavera, you bad dog.”
He froze. “What did you call her?”
She walked ahead, shielding her face from his view. “We must retrieve her.”
He caught her arm, feeling the soft warmth of her flesh through the thin dressing gown fabric. “You called her Talavera. Is that her full name?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you name her that?”
She still looked out ahead, refusing to meet his eyes, the blue-green light of the moon slanting over her soft features. “You know why.”
“Tell me.”
She finally looked at him, a hard glint in her glistening eyes. “Must you complete my humiliation by forcing me to say it aloud?”
Talavera. He’d been badly injured and left on the battlefield for days while the killing raged around him. Both sides had claimed victory and the outside world saw Talavera as a great military triumph for Wellington, winning him a viscountcy and, eventually, a dukedom. As the great commander’s chief strategist, the acclaim had extended to Rand. Many saw Talavera as the battle that won Rand an earldom.
For Kat to pay him tribute by naming her beloved dog after his greatest wartime achievement both stunned and humbled him. He’d had no idea she’d followed his military career. “I’m honored,” he said in a soft voice. “Truly.”
She snatched her arm away from him. “Don’t be,” she said sharply, gesturing toward the sound of Vera’s yapping amidst splashing sounds. “Keep her. She’s yours now.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, you adore Vera. As she does you.”
&nb
sp; “I don’t want anything that reminds me of you.” She spun around and left him, striding back toward the house, the hem of her dressing gown flapping indignantly about her ankles, making her look almost like an apparition in the blue night light. His emotions in chaos, he watched her disappear into the shadows of the house, just as she would soon vanish from his life for good.
Chapter Nine
“It is good of you to come, my lady. Your visits seem to help tremendously.” Mr. Milbank, the hospital administrator, escorted Kat to her carriage after she’d spent the afternoon visiting residents at the soldiers’ home.
“It is the least I can do.” She flushed with pleasure at having done something useful. The more time she spent visiting the soldiers, the more superfluous her social pursuits became. “I understood Mr. Ledworth is to leave soon.”
“It is so,” Mr. Milbank said as they stepped into the afternoon heat. “His episodes occur less frequently than when he first came to us.”
“Episodes?” Something tickled down Kat’s spine. “I have heard some soldiers are afflicted. Is it very common?”
Mr. Milbank’s expression shuttered. “This is hardly appropriate conversation for a lady’s ears.”
She halted in front of her father’s carriage. “Please be frank, sir,” she said in a firm voice. “If I am to be of any assistance at all to these men, surely it is best I know something of what ails them.”
Mr. Milbank swallowed hard. She knew it would be difficult for him to deny a lady’s command, even though she’d cloaked it in a polite request. “You will have heard of nostalgia.”
“Yes.” She hadn’t known what afflicted Toby had a name. “Go on.”
“It is characterized by a certain moroseness, as well as a loss of strength, sleep, and appetite.”
“And the waking nightmares.” Like Toby experienced.
He shot her a startled look. “I’m surprised you know of such things.”
She waived aside the comment. “How do you treat it?”
“We do not allow them more rest than is necessary. We attempt to keep them busy and to vary their occupations. Keeping regular hours and taking gymnastic recreation seems to help.”