Courtesan's Kiss (21 page)

Mia picked up her guitar, but only plucked a few of the strings, notes that would be a song if she made the effort. But she did not have the strength at the moment.

“Miss Castellano?” Mr. Novins came into the room when she stopped playing. “Lord David said it would be all right if I came to speak with you.”

“Thank you, Mr. Novins.” She wanted to tell him that Lord David was neither her husband nor her lover and had no right to dictate who should talk to her, but she was so tired she could barely make her lips move.

“I wanted to reassure you. I believe that the coachman’s death was from a head injury and not from the illness that led to the quarantine. The other groom is most fully recovered from his distress, and once I receive word about the well-being of your maid I will be able to release you all from quarantine. That should happen any day now.”

It was a veritable speech for Mr. Novins and Mia nodded, raising a hand to her face to rub at her eyes and clear her vision. “Thank you, Mr. Novins. I appreciate the information.”

“Miss Castellano, now may not be the ideal moment …” Mr. Novins began, quite in earnest. Of course, Mia thought, now when she was so fatigued and her stomach hurt, he wanted to talk about Miss Horner, or at the very least express amazement at her good humor through the ordeal.

Mia did not want to hear one more person express surprise at her ability to be thoughtful, especially in the
face of her most recent failure. Maybe later. Right now all she wanted was her bed.

“Mr. Novins, please excuse me. I was up early and am very tired. I am going to my room for some prayer and some rest.”

Mia left the room and made it up the stairs and into her bedchamber before she accepted that she was about to be most unwell. She grabbed the chamber pot, and before she could take another step was thoroughly and completely sick.

In that way of sickness the few minutes afterward was free of nausea. She changed out of her dress, stays, and chemise, ruining the laces of the stays with her impatience, and put on a clean chemise. Mia knew there was no hiding her nausea in a house this small, even with no staff.

Oh, hell
, she thought, quite deliberately using the word,
I should have stayed dressed long enough to tell Mrs. Cantwell so she could tell Lord David
, to whom Mia was still never going to speak.

Mia went back into the dressing room and wrapped herself in a dressing gown the moment before the insidious pain began to build. She pulled open the door, intending to call for Mrs. Cantwell, but dizziness overwhelmed her and she careened into the passage and Lord David instead.

He took her by the shoulders—why was he always doing that?—and as she began to gag she tried to turn away from him.

“No,” he said. “Do it right here on the floor. It will be easier to clean up than if you trail it across the rug.”

She wanted to shout, “Do you think you can give permission for everything?” but she knew what would happen when she opened her mouth, so she bent over and let what was left of her stomach’s contents land on the hardwood floor, not feeling one whit of regret when some fell on his highly polished boots.

This time the retching left her weak and the dizziness added to her confusion. Lord David used a handkerchief to wipe his boots and left the bit of linen on the floor. He swooped her up in his arms and took her back into her room, putting her on the bed.

Mia was well enough in the moment to have the vague thought that this was the second time he had carried her in his arms and it was even less romantic than the first time, which she would have thought impossible.

She propped herself up in bed, feeling better in a sitting position. Lord David left the room without explanation and came back a moment later with a clean chamber pot, which he left on the table next to the bed.

He took the used pot with him and left the room still without saying a word. Mia closed her eyes and settled herself against the upraised pillow as the nausea began to build again. God help poor Janina if this was how she had felt.

Mia endured the torture of repeated bouts of nausea alone, and was grateful for it. It was too humiliating an experience to share with anyone.

She offered her suffering up for any sins the coachman
may have committed. It was a very Catholic way of thinking, but at the moment it was the only good she could see coming from this wretchedness. She was in such misery she would not even wish it on Lord David.

Periodically Mrs. Cantwell would come in and wipe her forehead with a damp cloth and bring a clean chamber pot. Where was Mr. Novins? Was she so far beyond hope that he was not even going to examine her?

Sleep, the only escape, was impossible, and she could feel her body growing weaker and weaker. Finally she fell into a state that was somewhere else. Not asleep, not awake; a preview of hell. Death did not seem so bad if it would mean an end to the constant cycle of nausea and vomiting.

Lord David came in once, at least she thought he did. Or could it have been a dream? No matter, it was a welcome break from the nightmare.

He was so gentle, carefully pushing each strand of hair from her face, smoothing the sheet, all while at eye level, as though he had knelt beside the bed.

“Listen to me.” His voice sounded different, too, as though he had a hard time speaking. Still, the command she knew so well echoed even in his whisper. “You are not going to die.” He took her hand and squeezed it, silent for a long, long time. “This will pass and you will recover.”

Gentle or not, he was still telling her what to do—as if he could choose life or death. But this one time she would try to do exactly what he wanted.

M
IA HEARD SOMEONE
open the door. It was the most wonderful sound in the world. The blessed click of the door handle was, for her, a celebration of life. For the first time in an eternity of hours she was aware of something outside of herself.

Mr. Novins came into the room. With Lord David behind him. The surgeon came over to the side of the bed nearest the window.

Neither spoke at first. Lord David walked over to the mantel and wound her clock, and then came to stand on the other side of the bed.

“You do not have smallpox,” Lord David announced.

“You are not God.” She was too weak to say anything else. With all the strength she had, she turned her head away from him and looked at Mr. Novins.

“Yes, I do realize that despite being able to command
most of this small world at Sandleton, I cannot decide what illness you have.”

She wondered why he was humoring her unless she was about to die. “Where have you been?”

“Here, at least five times. The question is, where have you been?”

She shook her head. Talking took too much energy.

“Yes, you are better, but exhaustion can still take a toll.”

Mr. Novins looked at Lord David, who gave a curt nod. What secret did they have?

“Mia,” David began, “Mr. Novins has a posset that he and the apothecary devised for Miss Horner’s mother.”

Mr. Novins picked up the story. “She grows so weak sometimes that Mary is afraid she will slip away.”

Mia drew a breath. She could understand that. Even breathing seemed like work.

“The posset will help you regain strength, but it may well dredge up unpleasant memories. It’s as if the body is trying to dispel anything that weakens it. Would you try it and see if it will help you?”

They both waited, as though afraid of her answer. Well, she was not a fool. Of course she wanted to be better as soon as possible. She could withstand a few more bad dreams. She gave Mr. Novins the slightest nod and closed her eyes.

“Stay awake a moment more, Mia.” She felt David sit on the edge of the bed and gather her close. “Open your mouth and let Novins dose you.”

She did as he wished and felt the cold tasteless syrup
slide down her throat. Mia felt it trickle all the way down to her stomach and thread its way to her extremities in a most peculiar way.

“Don’t leave me,” she whispered, forcing her eyes open to look at Lord David, unable to see his expression through her watering eyes.

Mr. Novins cleared his throat. She had already forgotten he was there. “Miss Castellano, I will explain what happened when you are feeling better.”

Mia felt Lord David nod to the surgeon and heard the door click shut.

“Tell me what I can do to make you more comfortable.”

“Just hold me.”

He could have argued. He could have refused. He could have patted her hand and assumed she was delirious. Instead David Pennistan let go of her only long enough to tug off his boots, pull off his coat, loosen his cravat, and then set himself on the bed, on top of the covers, lifting Mia into his arms again.

Lying against his chest was the most comfortable place in the world. If death was going to take her, this would be the perfect place from which to leave this world.

“You will tell me if you are going to be sick again? I think it’s over. Mr. Novins said four hours.”

“Forever,” she whispered.

“Yes, I know it feels like an eternity since it started. You must talk to Gabriel about how time is distorted by pain.”

His voice, the way it sounded so everyday and normal, was as comforting as his arms.

“Contagious?” she asked.

“No.” He was quiet a minute and as if sensing that she loathed his one-word sentences added, “Rest now and let me explain later.”

Let me
. Had he asked her permission? How very unique. She must be on her deathbed. But if she was, then there would be no “later.”

“Heaven.” It was all she could manage, but thought that he should know the joy of conversing with someone who used one-word sentences.

“Shh.” He smoothed her hair, which she was sure was tangled and damp from her fever. “Rest now, Mia.”

“Talk.” She was almost asleep but was afraid that she would not wake up if she closed her eyes.

“All right. I’ll talk about anything you want if you will rest and try to sleep.”

“Mexico.”

She was asleep. He could tell by the even breathing and the lack of tension in her body. David lifted his other leg onto the bed since it appeared he was going to be with her a while. He might as well be comfortable. Mrs. Cantwell was napping and, frankly, he was sure he did not care, and did not think Mia would, if the housekeeper came to the room and found them together. There was no doubt in his mind that Mrs. Cantwell had seen far more shocking sights in this house.

Mia Castellano was not going to die. He tried to believe
it, and for the first time in hours he felt his fear ease, the tension leach from his neck and shoulders.

Not from smallpox, at any rate, or any other disease. Novins had been sure from the beginning that this was food poisoning. Despite his suspicions earlier, when faced with the evidence, David could hardly credit that someone had tried to harm them, kill them, to make sure that whatever contagion was among them was not spread. Fear made monsters of some people and weaklings of others.

He’d all but cried, hadn’t he, when he had come to the room with Novins to find her so weakened that her head lolled back when Novins shifted her away from the soiled sheets. She’d looked more dead than alive. The fear that gripped his heart had stunned him.

Her breathing changed, coming now in an odd gasping sound, but she slept on. He hoped that this would be the worst of Novins’s predicted “unsettling memories,” and that when she awakened she would be on the mend.

It was hard to believe that he missed the way she moved, jumped up from a chair, hurried from one side of the room to another. Mia Castellano did nothing slowly and yet managed to be as graceful as any lady he knew. He told himself he would have another chance to watch her fish, that she was going to be healthy again. He pictured the elegance with which she cast the line and played the fish that tested it.

He would love to watch her do any number of things, he thought, and wondered if she would make love with the same energy with which she did everything else. He
imagined that bed would be one place where
no
was not her favorite word.

Her breathing grew more restless and she began to mumble words that were unintelligible at first.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled, and he tried to think of what she felt the need to apologize for.

“It’s all right, Mia.” He felt her tears on his shirt.

“Papa! Papa! Please.”

That was when he realized it was a dream. He continued to hold her, at times quite firmly, as she struggled against the nightmare memory, giving him no more clue to its content than her father’s name.

At times her “Papa” was accompanied by short rapid breaths as if she were doing some kind of physical work. He tried to shift her a little so that she could breathe more easily but she grabbed his shirt and pulled herself up farther into his lap. “Help me, help me.”

He had never heard her beg before this and wished he could help her. Novins had not told him how difficult this would be for him to listen to, powerless to help or even give comfort.