Courtney Milan (20 page)

She pressed her lips together and looked away. “It wouldn’t be polite to say.”

“The one thing we have never been to one another is polite. But never mind, Miss Charingford, I shall fill in the bad and the good. Either I am an unspeakably rude fellow, the kind who vents his ire and spleen on perfectly innocent young ladies, or…” His gaze slid to her profile. She was still looking across the room, refusing to meet his eyes. “Or,” he said softly, “I am madly in love with you. And I have been for this last year.”

His heart seemed to stop in his chest as he spoke. The seconds that should have ticked by froze into an agony of waiting, watching to see if her eyes would widen. If she would turn to him and see the truth writ large on his features. If she would even care.

But she didn’t look at him. He couldn’t read what he saw in her expression—a tightening of her jaw, a tensing of her hand before she pressed it flat against the table.

“Well,” she finally said, “you’re doing it wrong. You are supposed to pick two possibilities—one dreadful and one lovely.” She turned then, deliberately meeting his eyes. There was a spark of merriment in them. “Confess, Doctor Grantham. That’s
two
dreadful ones.”

It was such a curious sensation, that constricting feeling that settled about him. He felt as his heart were made of green bottle-glass—cold and wavy, distorting the light that passed through it until even the brightest emotion was stripped of all illumination. He pushed the corners of his lips up into a smile.

“Ah, Miss Charingford. You slay me.”

Maybe some hint of the truth leaked out, because the light faded from her eyes, and she peered up at him. “I didn’t hurt your feelings, did I? I meant it—”

“In all good fun,” he said brusquely. “Yes.”

Fastenings,
he could imagine his father saying.
I wooed your mother with fastenings.
Jonas tried to imagine Miss Charingford’s face if he presented her with a horse-shoe nail retrieved from some mucky boulevard. She would probably look at him…approximately as she looked now, as if he’d offered her a bouquet ripe with horse-droppings.

He’d done it to himself. He had a dreadful sense of humor, a too-blunt tongue, and he’d never seen the point in holding either back. But she’d never take him seriously now. He had told her outright that he loved her, and she hadn’t seen it as anything but another volley, another ill-considered jest. The entirety of his feelings had become a joke. She didn’t even see him as a friend, let alone a suitor.

If he were another person entirely, he might burst into flowery speech. If he did, she’d probably laugh at him. Besides, he didn’t believe in pretending to be anyone other than who he was. Even if she swooned at whatever poetic nonsense he managed to spout, she would only be disappointed once they grew comfortable with each other and he went back to making jokes about death and gonorrhea.

“Don’t worry, my dear,” he said, a little more brusquely than he’d intended. “I’m a doctor. We’re not allowed to have feelings; they interfere with our professional judgment. I’m here to make you a proposition.”

“Oh?” Her jaw squared. “On a scale of boring to improper, where does it fall?”

“Mildly scandalous.” He tapped the table. “I have a wager for you, if you’ve the stomach for it.”

Up went her chin again. “There’s no point to a wager,” she said. “There is nothing you have that I could want.”

He ignored this. “I wager,” he said, “that I could show you a situation before Christmas that would be beyond even your capacity for good cheer.”

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I see the worst of Leicester. In five minutes, I’ll leave for my next appointment. You smile and you wish and you see an entire world set forth in the most optimistic terms. I wager that I can find you a situation that lacks a bright side.”

He didn’t have fastenings, but he did have his version of it—house calls.

She mulled this over for a few moments. “What do you get if you win?”

“We’ll get to that in a moment, if you please. The more salient question is, what would you wish if you win? You could ask me for any favor. You could make me stand on my head in the market square for twenty minutes, if you wanted. Think, Miss Charingford, of all the ways you might humiliate me. Surely that would be worth
something
to you.”

She frowned and tapped her fingers against her lips. She didn’t look at him as she thought; she just tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. Finally, she gave a nod. “What if I said I wanted you never to talk to me again?”

His lungs stopped working. “That’s…that’s what you’d want?”

“No sarcastic comments. No biting wit. No reminders of my past mistakes.” Her voice dropped. “Yes, Doctor Grantham. That would tempt me. That would tempt me greatly.”

He swallowed. Every word she spoke hurt. She didn’t just dislike him. She hated him. But if that was the way of things… Best that he discover it now.

“What if you changed your mind later? Would I be barred from speaking?”

She considered this a moment. “I suppose that if I should lose my head so far as to want to hear the grating tones of your voice once more, I should be allowed the opportunity to reverse the wager. It needn’t be a permanent condition.” She tilted her head at him. “It will be, of course.”

“Unless I win.”

She waved off that possibility. “And what humiliation will you heap on me if you should prevail?” Miss Charingford asked.

“I want a kiss.”

Her head turned to his. Her eyes widened. She looked into his gaze. He wanted to reach out and touch the tips of his fingers to her cheek, to graze his hand down the line of her jaw until her lips softened.

“A kiss,” she repeated. “You want a kiss. From
me.”

“Your ears appear to function with tolerable accuracy.” His own words seemed harsh and clipped. “If you fail, I get a kiss from you. An honest kiss, mind—not some shabby peck on the cheek.”

As he spoke, her eyebrows raised. Her lips thinned. “Do you think me loose, Doctor Grantham?”

“I think you as loose as a citadel. Why else would I have stooped to making elaborate wagers with you in exchange for the smallest token of your affections?”

She didn’t seem to hear that. Instead, her brow furrowed and she looked up. Finally, she nodded to herself as if she’d solved a difficult problem. “I see what you’re about, Grantham. You think to teach me a lesson. You want to show me that the world is more frightening—and more dark—than I believe.”

“Maybe I’m simply looking for an excuse to spend time in your company.” Maybe he wanted her to see him outside the social settings where he performed so poorly. He wanted a chance for her to see
him,
a chance to break through the impossible wall of her dislike. “Maybe,” he said, “I’m thinking that the days are dark and long, that midwinter is approaching. Maybe, Miss Charingford, all I really want is a kiss.”

If she reached the end of their time together and felt any affection for him at all, she’d never enforce that ridiculous forfeit that she’d asked for. If he won, he’d get to kiss her. And if she didn’t like him after spending time in his company…

Yes, it was definitely preferable to realize it now.

“The more I think on it,” he said, “the more I realize that it is impossible for me to lose.”

“We have more than two weeks until Christmas, and I refuse to shadow you the entire time. Will three visits suffice, do you think?”

Three visits. They’d walk to the calls and back. That might amount to a handful of hours in her company. If he couldn’t convince her to consider him in that time, it was never going to happen.

“Three visits will do.” He paused. “If you’re accompanying me on house calls at Christmas time, you might consider…”

“I’ll make a basket,” Miss Charingford said. “Of course I will.”

“Tomorrow, then, we’ll be going to see a woman who has eight children and one more on the way.” He looked over at her. “Bring something appropriate.”

Chapter Four

T
HERE WAS A TRADITION THAT HAD BEGUN SIX YEARS AGO,
one that was always important to Lydia. These days, she never felt as if Christmas were coming until she’d decorated her father’s office.

Another man might have frowned and ordered her out of the room as he bent over the account books. But then, Lydia had always been aware that her father was rather out of the ordinary.

He sat at his desk as she wound red ribbon about the base of the oil lamp that stood on a side table. He didn’t look up at her. He didn’t say a word. Still, when she cut the fabric and began to add holly, he leaned over and, almost absentmindedly, squeezed her hand.

“Can I get you anything?” she asked. “Tea? A glass of wine?”

“Mmm,” he replied. “A one. I’m missing a one.”

She peered over his shoulder. “You left it on the last page,” she said after a moment’s study. “When you carried the amount over.”

He looked up at her, peering over the rims of his glasses. “Did I, then?”

She ran her finger down the facing page and pointed.

He frowned—not a real frown, that; she knew his moods well enough to know when he was unhappy. And right now, he wasn’t. “So I did,” he said. “So I did.”

But instead of returning to his books, he looked at her—at the heavy gown of dark rose she’d donned, so unsuited for an afternoon at home.

“You’re going out,” he said mildly.

She shrugged, feeling suddenly awkward. Lydia knew for a fact that she could tell her father anything. She’d told him about that dreadful ordeal with Tom Paggett, after all. Her father knew the absolute worst about her, and he loved her anyway. She didn’t understand why.

And she didn’t want to tell him about her wager with Doctor Grantham. He trusted her, and even though she knew why she’d agreed—for no reason other than to rid herself of him—she was aware that the situation might have appeared somewhat improper if she were to reveal the stakes.

A kiss? From Grantham? The very idea made her shiver. No, it had made perfect sense to make sure that Grantham never talked to her again. She’d never have to feel that nervous anticipation creeping up her spine. All she had to do was endure him for a few afternoons, and she’d be free of him.

“I am going out,” she said awkwardly.

He glanced down, caught a glimpse of her half boots. “Going out walking. With a man?”

Lydia made a face. “Not a man,” she muttered. “At least—not like that.”

Even though there was nothing exceptional in walking with a gentleman, another father—knowing what he did of Lydia—would have restricted her movements, refusing to let her do what the other young ladies did. He might have told her she was no longer trustworthy.

Mr. Charingford was not those other fathers. When Lydia had told her father she was pregnant, he’d held her close for many long minutes, not saying a word. He’d called her mother in, leaving Lydia in her comforting embrace. Then he’d left the house. She had no idea what he’d said or done, but Tom Paggett had left town two days later. Her father didn’t speak much, but she’d never doubted him.

One of Lydia’s first memories was playing on the floor of her father’s study. Her nurse had darted in, grabbing her up with a flood of apologies and a scold for Lydia.

“Can’t you see your father’s busy?” she’d remonstrated.

But her father had simply shrugged. “If you take her away every time I’m busy,” he’d said placidly, “I’ll never see her. She can stay.”

He’d not been too busy to take her to Cornwall when she was pregnant, hiding her condition from those who would have disparaged her. And on Christmas morning, when she’d not been sure if she would live, he’d come into her room with ribbons and holly. He hadn’t said a word; he’d only set them around the room, fussing with ribbons he scarcely knew how to tie because he’d wanted to do something.

Sometimes, when she thought of her father, she felt as if there were something vast and impossibly large inside his slight frame, something too big for words. It certainly felt too big for
her.

And so now, she put ribbons in his study as Christmas approached. It was the only way she could return those too-large emotions.

“You’re not walking out with a man?” His tone was congenially suspicious. He looked pointedly at her.

So it was her favorite walking dress, the one she saved for special occasions. He’d seen her altering the trim last night, replacing the light blue cuffs with two inches of white linen that she’d embroidered herself.

Lydia felt herself flush. “I like looking well, no matter who I’m with.” She wasn’t even sure why she’d dressed with such particular care. Maybe she just didn’t want to give Grantham another opportunity to poke fun at her.

“Mr. Charingford. Miss Charingford.” A maid ducked her head in the doorway, interrupting the conversation.

Behind her stood the tall figure of Jonas Grantham. His coat was slung over one arm; he held a large black bag in the other.

“You see?” Lydia sad. “Not a man. A doctor.”

Grantham looked to one side, biting his lip, and her father raised an eyebrow at her.

“That’s not what I meant,” Lydia muttered.