“Your Grace, I am your physician. My name is Lavinia Bell. My father is Robert Bell. He sent me to take care of you. Do you understand?” she asked, taking one of the hands flying about and holding it. She squeezed the palm to try and get his attention.
Briefly, his eyes fluttered open, his gaze training on her long enough that Lavinia thought he was actually looking at her, not through her.
“Do you understand?” she repeated, squeezing his hand once again.
Closing his eyes again, the duke’s face formed into one of contemplation. His lips moved back and forth as though trying to form words, which came a moment later.
“You’re a woman.”
Lavinia couldn’t help the bark of laughter that escaped her mouth.
Clearly, he is not entirely without reason.
Lavinia schooled her face back into one of professional apathy. “Indeed, I am. Are you comfortable with my attending you? I can promise I am just as skilled as my father,” she stressed.
“More attractive than him, though,” he muttered, and again Lavinia laughed. Looking over, she found Stevens also struggling against mirth. It appeared that the duke was funny, or at least, his delusions were making him so.
“Thank you, Your Grace. Now, I am going to bleed you, and then administer a tonic that should have you feeling better. But before then, I need to examine you. Will you allow me to do so?” she asked.
The duke, who a moment ago had seemed entirely in the present, was now once again thrashing about. He ripped his hand out of Lavinia’s, his legs once again making a running motion. Moans began to slip from between his lips, and his face broke out in a sweat.
“Oh dear. Well, I suppose I’ll just have to go ahead,” she said, and beckoned for Stevens to walk toward her.
“Help me hold him down and I’ll put the leeches on,” she said, bending down toward her bag and taking a jar of the animals from her bag. She slipped one on each side of his forehead, then turned back toward her bag and began taking out the bottles that would, when their substances were combined, make a tonic that would hopefully draw the fever out of his body.
Three hours later, the duke was sleeping peacefully in his bed. The leeches and tonic had done their duty, ridding his body of its bad blood and fluids. Though she knew that neither remedy was particularly pleasant, the duke had slept through the majority of her ministrations. His temperature was now much improved. His skin no longer had the angry flush associated with febrile conditions, and his thrashing and delusions had stopped.
Lavinia was rather pleased with herself. Fevers, though simple in their nature, could be devilish things indeed. She’d once had to bleed a man four times, administer three emetic tonics, and dunk him in a cold bath before his temperature even approached something akin to normal. She was glad not to have had to make such a fuss for the duke, in part because she wasn’t sure whether she could maintain her professional mien in the presence of his naked body.
The very idea of what might lie beneath his bedclothes was enough to make her blush.
She had seen the glimpse of his long, lithe body as she tended to him, and more than once had found wicked thoughts infiltrating her concentration. Thoughts of that body on hers, touching hers. It was enough to make her blush, and was most certainly far from professional, but Lavinia found herself unable to stay focused around the duke. He was distractingly attractive.
If I am to keep treating him, I will have to build up some better defenses against his allure. Else the mere sight of his bare legs might be enough to make me completely ruin a tonic, or worse, attach a leech somewhere it oughtn’t be.
Shaking off this thought, Lavinia turned back to her cup of tea. She and Stevens were sitting by the hearth, taking a rest after a rather taxing afternoon. Or rather, something of a rest. She needed to learn more about the duke’s condition now that he was calmly sleeping, so she had asked the butler to retire with her to the two comfortable armchairs in the corner of the room. He had suggested they ring for tea, and Lavinia had not refused. She always liked a strong, bracing brew after she’d finished her work.
However, she still wanted to keep an eye on the duke, so her chair was positioned toward the duke’s bed, so she could monitor his condition. In her lap sat a pencil and scrap of parchment so she could take notes, and her tea cup was on the table between her chair and Stevens. He had requested some biscuits from the house cook, and Lavinia had already eaten three. They were marvellous, buttery things, but apparently the duke was refusing to eat them.
Fool. Who would refuse such delicacies?
It turned out that Stevens was even more helpful than the maid in bestowing useful information upon Lavinia. He knew so much about the duke’s condition, having been attending to him from the moment he returned home from the war.
“I don’t mind telling you that the last few physicians we’ve had enter this house have been absolutely without use. The duke’s betrothed keeps sending for them in the hopes that they’ll find a cure, and he will be restored to his former self. But it is a lost cause. He is so much altered form how he was before the war.”
“And how exactly is he altered?” Lavinia asked, her pencil poised above the parchment.
“His mood is entirely different. He used to be such a kind, calm gentleman. Slow to anger, affable, committed to his duties. But when he came back, none of this was true any more. He gets agitated at the slightest provocation, rarely smiles, takes no interest in his holdings, his investments. He is refusing to go to parliament when the session begins in November. He eats little, laughs none, and does not even seem to enjoy time with his betrothed.”
Lavinia found the duke’s lack of laughter particularly sad, though not for medical reasons. Rather, she imagined he looked particularly handsome with a smile on his face. She did not, however, relay this suspicion to Stevens.
Instead, she ducked her head down and dutifully scribbled all the information Stevens had relayed to her, turning her mind to the words Cheyne had said in his book. “And his injuries? I understand that only one leg was shot, but both are unable to be moved.”
At this, Stevens took a deep breath and hastened a glance toward the duke. Then, lowering his voice, he leaned in close to Lavinia and whispered, “I do not think he is still injured. The last physician told him that the injury was self-inflicted, that he had shot himself on purpose. Of course, such a suggestion is preposterous but I cannot help thinking the physician was right in thinking that whatever ailment keeps the duke’s legs form moving is his own doing. He does not think himself worthy of his title, his reputation, now that he has been shot and discharged from the Army. And so he has given up on life, and his legs.”
Lavinia had to hold back a smile. She was not rejoicing in the duke’s suffering, but rather in his butler’s intelligence.
“Do you know, I think you are exactly correct,” she said.
Stevens’s face broke out into a small grin, a crooked, slightly awkward smile that made her think the man was unused to the expression as of late. It was clear that this household had not seen happiness in quite some time.
But I will change that. As soon as the duke wakes up, my work will truly begin.
Chapter Four
Peter awoke having his senses assaulted. When he opened his eyes, it was to find his chambers filled with sunlight. Looking down, he found himself covered in different bedclothes and dressed in a white cotton shirt.
He lifted the shirt to his nose and inhaled. It smelled clean and fresh, as did his skin.
He not only smelled clean, he realized, but felt clean, like everything, from his skin to his soul, had been scrubbed. Running his hands through his hair, he found that it too had been washed, and was braided and tied back in a small queue at his neck.
He was beginning to wonder how all these had happened when the door to his room was opened and in walked Stevens.
“Good morning, Your Grace. I am relieved to see you looking so much improved,” he said with a smile.
Stevens smiling? When was the last time he had seen his butler happy?
Not since you’ve been back. You made sure that no one in the entire house had cause to smile.
While Peter did feel rather like a new gentleman now that he was freshly clothed and washed, he knew that this alone could not be the cause of his butler’s grin. Something else had happened, and he needed to know exactly what.
“Why are you looking so jubilant this morning, Stevens? What has happened while I’ve been asleep?”
Stevens opened his mouth, but his words were cut off by the entrance into the room of perhaps the most beautiful woman that Peter had ever seen. She was, however, wearing the most hideous gown his eyes had ever had the misfortune to lay their gaze upon.
Still, the gown did nothing to detract from the intelligent twinkle in her eyes, which were the color of honey taken straight from the beehive. She had skin that resembled young strawberries, white with the faintest hint of blush pink beneath. Even from his position in bed, Peter could see that freckles dotted the whole of her face.
Freckles, to most gentlemen and ladies of the English upper classes, were unbecoming. Peter knew that Magdalene had tried to remove hers with an awful-smelling combination of sodium borate and camphor. But he had always liked freckles. They made him think their owners whimsical.
He had, in fact, tried on more than one occasion to get Magdalene to stop with her skin treatments and had even gone so far as to suggest she walk outside without a hat. He loved her freckles—they were one of his favorite things about her. However, her response had told him that such suggestions would not be welcome again.
“Keep my freckles! Peter, you must be mad! My freckles are what kept me from getting proposed to until my fourth season! My mother threatened to make me wash my face four times a day with acid and lavender if I did not find a husband by this winter. It’s a lucky thing I found you, or the skin of my face might have fallen off by now,” she’d scolded him.
This woman, however, did not look as though she minded her freckles one bit.
Peter wondered, rather wickedly, whether her freckles extended beyond those visible parts of skin available to him. Were there freckles on her breasts, whose shape he sadly could not assess due to that terrible frock? Would the legs he assumed, from her height, must be long and lean also be so dotted with the things? He wished he could find out.
But a woman like this would not be easily wooed, he knew. Her confident stance, legs apart, shoulders thrown back, chin up, told him she was in complete control of herself. He also guessed, from the relaxed way she carried herself, that she was perfectly happy with herself exactly the way she was. Which was something to be admired.
She obviously cared nothing for fashion or style. The dress, combined with her hair, which was pulled back in a bun at the nape of her neck, made her seem severe, but the hint of a smile at her lips and the intelligence in her eyes suggested the exact opposite.
Those eyes, which were a beautiful golden brown, were staring at him with an assessing stare, like a maid might do to a cut of meat at the market. It was not a feeling Peter liked overmuch. It did strange things to his stomach and skin, making one jump and the other tingle.
Real gentlemen do not tingle. They…shiver? No, they…tremor?
Rolling his eyes inwardly, Peter gave up the fight to replace the word “tingle.” After all, he wasn’t a real gentleman anymore. Why shouldn’t he tingle?
Such frivolous wonderings were thankfully interrupted when his attention was diverted a moment later by the mystery woman walking further into his room. In fact, she walked all the way to his bed.
The tingling grew even more pronounced with each step she took in his direction, and extended down his body, coming to rest in the region between his thighs, which recently had not had much reason to be excited. One minute in the presence of this woman, however, and Peter found himself stiff as a board. It was an odd, but not altogether unwelcome situation, especially since he had his bedclothes to cover his indecorousness.
“Good morning, Your Grace. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Lavinia Bell, daughter of Dr. Robert Bell. My father was unable to attend you last night while you were sick with fever, and he sent me to tend to you. I bled you and administered medicines to help flush the fever from your body. I then had your servants change your bedclothes, wash you, and then dress you in loose, clean clothes, in order to ensure you are no longer surrounded by the remnants of your illness. Now that I have returned, I would like to conduct an examination, to ensure you are in fact cured of your febrile disease.”
“Examination? But…but you’re a woman!” Peter said, feeling thoroughly confused. He had no recollection whatsoever of meeting this woman before. And he would certainly remember making the acquaintance of such a beautiful creature. Of course, the last day was rather blurry in his mind. He remembered sitting with Magdalene in the garden, looking at her smiling eyes and full lips, and then…nothing. Well, not nothing, precisely.
There were glimpses of the battle, of Brock and his men around the cannon. But he knew that was just his usual dream. This Lavinia Bell, however, featured in none of those remembrances.
“I am indeed female, Your Grace, but I think you will find me just as capable as my father in the art of practicing the medical sciences. My father has taught me everything he knows, and were it not for the laws governing medical training in England, I am sure I would make a fine physician.”
“That may be true, but the fact of the matter is that you are not currently a physician. You are a woman, standing in my chambers, which I think you will agree is rather untoward. Leave, and send for your father. I will wait for him to conduct the examination.”
Peter rather liked the idea of examining Miss Bell, but he was not nearly so fond of her returning the favor in kind.
Miss Bell raised one of her eyebrows, which Peter now realized were quite dark, especially in comparison to her fair hair. Somehow, this lent her expression a rather regal air, like she was a queen and he a mere manservant. Peter almost found himself feeling cowed in front of her, especially since he was laying in bed, and she was standing over him, her height suddenly making her seem giant.
But that feeling of almost-weakness made him agitated. Peter had been feeling weak for months, but prior to now, he had only been able to do so in front of his staff and Lady Magdalene. No one had challenged him, tried to emasculate him. If anything, they had tried to lift up his spirits.
However, the woman in front of him was doing the exact opposite. Her formidable nature was reminding Peter of just how unintimidating he was in his current condition.
How weak I must look.
And so, using the skills he had honed after weeks of shouting at maids, refusing meals and generally making sure that everyone around him was as miserable as himself, Peter looked up at the woman and said, in his lowest, most menacing growl, “Get. Out.”
My legs might be lame, but my voice is just as ferocious as ever. He was grateful for that, at least.
“I beg your pardon, Your Grace, but I really do need to examine you in order to—” Miss Bell began, but Peter interrupted her, raising his voice as he again shouted, “Get. Out!”
This time, he paired the shout with a thrust of his chest that had Miss Bell jumping back with what looked like fright.
“My goodness,” she said, her hand over her heart, her breaths coming out fast and shallow: a sure sign that Peter was winning. He purposefully ignored the delicious sight of her bosom heaving, finally giving him some sense of her proportions in that area.
Get her out of your room, and then you can think about her bosoms.
Peter didn’t want to scare her. He just wanted her gone. He needed her gone, from his chambers, and from his house.
Turning to Stevens, Peter gestured at the woman and said, “Stevens, will you kindly remove this bluestocking, uppity chit from this house? And please see to it that she does not return. I will have only qualified physic
ians in this house,” he said.
He was gratified to see the look of shock on Miss Bell’s face as she backed away from him. With her gone, he was free to go back to the delicious imaginings of earlier, back when Miss Bell was not a physician looking to examine him, but simply an attractive stranger who had ignited in him desires he had long forgotten he possessed.
Indeed, he was rather satisfied with how well he had managed the situation, or at least, he was until he saw the look on Stevens’s face. It was one of disappointment, and one of loss of faith.
This served to immediately quell his satisfaction, replacing it with the familiar melancholy that seemed to color so many of his days.
Stevens’s look reminded him that the good Duke of Kingwood, a kind gentleman, a friend to all, was gone, and that his butler was mourning him.
He’s not the only one.
Peter was glad when Stevens left a moment later. Once again, he was alone. Fantasizing did not commence. Instead, he engaged in self-pity, contemplating how truly wretched he had become, that he would yell at a woman and banish the only man, perhaps the only person, who truly knew and cared for him.
“What do you mean, he ordered you from the room?” Lavinia’s father asked that evening. He was finally home from Mrs. Huan’s birth. The baby was born breech, and it was thought for most of the night that the mother would not survive. However, due to the combined efforts of her father and the midwife, both Mrs. Huan and her baby, named Robert, after Lavinia’s father, had survived.
Lavinia had smiled upon hearing the baby’s name. Robert Huan was not the first baby to be named after her father, and Lavinia expected he would not be the last, not so long as her father continued to excel at his profession.
Now, however, that smile was gone, for she was recounting her morning with the insufferable Peter Cadden, The Duke of Kingwood.
“He said he would not be seen by a woman, and then he asked his butler to escort me out,” Lavinia huffed, crossing her arms and leaning back in her chair. They were seated in the library, a stack of books between them and the day’s newspaper laid out on the table in front of them. They had split the paper equally, and ought to have been enjoying the day’s news in silence, except that Lavinia’s father had idly asked how the duke was, resulting in an emotional tirade she knew was annoying them both.
The Duke she Desires Page 4