But her life was exceedingly more complicated than he was capable of imagining. And she barely had the time or strength anymore to lament that she wasn’t the artist she’d hoped to be.
“Well, you’ve succeeded in astonishing me, Lord Anstruther, but surely it is not appropriate for me to accept such a gift.”
“Bah.” He made the same face he did when swallowing his bitter tinctures from the apothecary. “When you’re my age and rank, my dear, just about any eccentricity is permitted.”
That produced another laugh, though this one shaded with regret.
“I’d compensate you for your time, of course.” He cleared his throat, again uncomfortable at the mention of funds.
So much gratitude for his kindness welled within her heart, her chest literally ached with it. “It’s not that at all, my lord, only—”
Dr. Longhurst burst into the earl’s private room without so much as a knock, startling him into a fit of coughs. “Nurse Pritchard! It’s Trenwyth. He’s awake.” Without processing the information, Imogen went to Anstruther, but the old man waved her off.
“Go,” he wheezed. “I told you … He’d listen … to Sarah.” Again the earl pointed to the ceiling.
It was almost enough to make a believer out of her as she followed Dr. Longhurst into the hall.
The door to Trenwyth’s room stood open, and light spilled from it along with a cacophony of voices. Dr. Fowler was in there, she could tell from his jowly voice as he ordered other staff around the room. William entered before her with a tray of tea and broth.
All noise was smothered by her blood pounding between her ears as Imogen’s dread surged as powerfully as her euphoria. What if Trenwyth remembered her? He’d recognized her voice as Ginny’s in his feverish delirium. He’d called to her, dreamt of her, clung to her like she was his salvation, and that very admission evoked trills of foreign and ridiculous hope.
But … what if in consciousness, she was nothing more to him than a whore? What if he revealed her secrets to a room full of her employers? Of men. She’d lose everything.
Just as quickly as the fear presented itself, she excised it. How could she consider herself at a time like this, when a man she’d fought to save had miraculously pulled through?
Because it was not only herself she had to consider. She had her mother to support, and her sister to protect. They had no one else. They relied on her absolutely.
Dr. Fowler had sent for Trenwyth’s sister, Lady Russell, but she was traveling with her husband on the Continent, and they’d not heard a word from her.
Which meant … Cole had no one either.
Not true, Imogen decided. He had her, and there was no chance she’d let him go through his dreadful recovery alone. She’d nurse him back to health. She’d be a source of strength, knowledge, and of encouragement. No part of her would be denied to him. Her assistance, her body, her hands, her heart if he wanted it.
Imogen knew he’d owned a part of it since that night they’d spent together. It would take little more than a kind word and that devastating smile to coax the rest of it into his strong hands.
Hand. He only had the one. She’d help him get used to that as well. She’d fetch and carry what he could not. She would—
All sentient thoughts scattered like a flock of startled birds when she rounded the frame of his door.
Had Imogen passed him on the street, she would not have recognized him. Certainly, there was the jaw she’d shaved smooth only this morning. Aristocratic angles and masculine stubbornness clenched against a sip of tea William held to lips that remained pressed together. His hair wanted a cut, though she’d washed and shaped it after a fashion. It fell across eyes that bore no resemblance to the molten fire she remembered. They were now more feral than fierce, but dull too. Dull and empty. As if everything that had once made him Collin Talmage, Duke of Trenwyth, had been taken, leaving only this coarse and rather lupine creature in his stead.
Shadows seemed to gather around him that had nothing to do with the fact that Molly drew the curtains closed against the spring afternoon.
“Your Grace,” Longhurst said, leading Imogen into the room. “Might Nurse Pritchard persuade you to take your tea, or broth if you prefer?”
Unable to breathe, Imogen stared in slack-jawed stupefaction.
Trenwyth’s eyes flicked over her and fixed back onto Longhurst. He’d considered her only for the time it took a grain of sand to pass through an hourglass, but it was enough to set Imogen’s limbs to trembling. Not for the reasons she predicted either. Those eyes, once so full of assessing wit, predatory confidence, and not a little pain, were now only strident wells of immeasurable nothingness.
“Why would she?” His dry voice resembled a growl, but lacked an iota of inflection.
“Why, indeed?” Fowler muttered from where he stood over the duke, his arms crossed in what Imogen translated to be a rather defensive stance.
She winced, but stood her ground, unable to tear her eyes away from the dear sight of him. Alive. Awake. His left arm, still heavily bandaged, was secured to his chest with a sling draped from his wide shoulder. He had regained some color beneath his chapped and weather-beaten skin.
He was battered, bruised, and still every bit as beautiful as she remembered.
“Nurse Pritchard is the reason you’re alive,” Longhurst informed him.
“Hardly!” Fowler unfolded his arms, his hands falling to clench at his sides.