Sophia James - A Proposition For The Comte

He was hot. She could see this in the bloom of his skin and the stretched closeness of bone, the pulse in his throat skittering and thready.

‘Let him live,’ she pleaded to no one in particular, though she supposed it was to God that she made this entreaty. It had been a long time since she had prayed with any sincerity.

He was pale and the dark bruising of tiredness lay beneath closed eyes. His nails were short and well trimmed, the ring he wore brought into full relief by the light in the room. It was crested and fashioned out of a heavy gold, a row of small diamonds caught under an engraved coronet.

He had lost the top of the third finger on his right hand, a clean healed cut that spoke of intent and expertise, but a relatively old wound for the scarring was opaque and faded. A man with life drawn upon him like a story and tonight with more chapters adding to the tale. The bed barely contained his height, his knees bent so that his feet did not overlap the base board. The boots placed beside the bed were of the finest leather, the buckles heavy, well fashioned and expensive, the same coronet of the ring engraved in silver.

With a sigh she stood and turned to the window, looking out across the city and the tableau of fading lights. London felt safe and busy. It felt peopled and close with the movement and the noise and the constant change of things to see. She had been here for twelve months now and had not once left the central district of the town. An ordered life with nothing surprising in it. Why had she then insisted that this dangerous golden-eyed stranger be brought home?

Taking up the book she had brought in with her, she sat again on the chair by the bed and began to read aloud. She’d heard somewhere that connections to the living world were advantageous to those knocking on the door of the next one, for it brought them back, guiding them.

Half an hour later when he spoke she almost jumped.

‘Where...am...I?’ His tongue wet the dryness of his lips, each word carefully enunciated.

‘In Chelsea at my town house. I am Violet, Lady Addington, sir, and we found you wounded on Brompton Place in the very early hours of this morning. When you were unable to give us your address we brought you here.’

‘We?’ The one word held a wealth of questions.

The quiet blush of blood ran across her cheeks. It was the curse of having such a fair skin and she gritted her teeth in fury. She had no need to explain any of her circumstances to him and she would not. Ignoring his query, she went on.

‘You have a substantial wound in the hairline above your right ear. It has bled profusely, though it has now been stitched. You also have a bullet hole in your left side which travelled through your arm to enter your ribcage. It has been removed, but the doctor who was summoned to tend to you is not certain of the effects it might engender. My housekeeper, however, insists she has seen others with your malady up and walking within a matter of days.’

In point of fact, Mrs Kennings had said a lot more than that about the patient, Violet thought, but was not about to repeat her servant’s fervent appreciation of the more favourable parts of his body.

‘Did anyone follow me here?’

The horror of such a question had her staring. ‘No. Did you expect them to?’

He turned his head away.

‘Where are my clothes?’

‘They were filthy, sir. We placed a nightgown upon you and tucked you into bed. There are garments you can wear in the drawer across the room when you recover. Your own clothes shall be returned to you on the morrow.’

‘And my weapons?’

‘Are being cleaned. I think you need to rest, for it was the opinion of my driver that you would feel dizzy if you moved too fast.’

‘He was right.’

He raised his hand against the light to shade his eyes. A headache, perhaps?

‘I do not think it was a robber who hurt you.’

‘No. I do not think that, either.’

His diction was aristocratic and old-fashioned. He spoke as if every word needed to be carefully said and thought about. She had the vague impression that perhaps English was not his first language and another worry surfaced as she remembered how he had sworn in French when first she had found him.

‘Who exactly are you, sir?’

This time Violet allowed more sharpness into her tone.

The woman peering at him was beautiful. He hadn’t seen such colouring on anyone before, with her green-grey eyes, stark white skin and hair that fell around a finely sculpted face in a blaze of red glory. She also looked uncertain, her full lips parted and the tip-tilt of her nose above giving her the appearance of an angel newly delivered from Heaven. A sun-kissed one at that, given her freckles.

Shaking his head hard, he imagined her as an illusion resulting from the blow to his temple and the shot in his side, but when he looked again all the parts of Violet Addington were still assembled in such a startling comeliness.

Violet. She suited her name. Delicate. Unadorned. Fragile. A hint of steel was there, too, as well as a baffling openness.

Lady Addington? Why would she be in a bedchamber with him across the depths of a frigid London night wearing a dark green high-necked ballgown with her hair down?

Nothing quite made sense.

‘Why are you here with me alone?’ He did not wish to give her his name for it meant some involvement in his life that she could not help but be hurt by. He was pleased when he saw her measure the truth of his reticence and look away. If he could have dragged himself off the bed and got to the door there and then, he would have, but nothing seemed to be working properly and he was so damnably tired.

‘You were reading me a story about the Spartans?’

She smiled. ‘I imagined you might enjoy it. You look a little like one of those ancient warriors yourself.’

‘In an embroidered nightshirt?’

‘Oh, it’s not your clothes I am speaking of, but your disposition. One would need to be more than dangerous to be allowed within their ranks. It’s a certain peril, an expectation, a darkness that does not allow in the light.’

‘Well, you’re right about that at least.’

Shadows crossed her face, a frown marking a line on her forehead. ‘I should probably leave you to sleep.’

He closed his eyes momentarily as he nodded and when he opened them again she was gone.

She barely slumbered that night, but lay tense and fidgety in her bed, listening for any sound of movement, but hearing none at all from his chamber at the end of the corridor. Was he asleep or did he lie there as she did, eyes wide open with expectation?

He had not wanted to give her his name which meant there were secrets he wished hidden. His weapons were back at his side now and she wondered if that was a safe thing to have done for the well-being of her household. But his query as to whether anyone had followed them also rang loud in her head.

Did he expect more trouble? Was he a man whom others could be hunting even at this moment along the wealthy streets of Chelsea and Knightsbridge? If peril were indeed to arrive at her door would he be able to protect them all? Or was he the peril?

The clock in her room beat out the hour of four and still she felt sleep far away. Once she had seldom slept at all through the night, day after day of restless slumber ending only when her husband’s factor had come up from the stables with a solemn face to pronounce Harland dead from an accident.

Nowadays she slept a little better, if not dreamlessly, the city enveloping her with its noise and its toil; the sort of rest that had taken the circles from beneath her eyes. The dragging lethargy was gone, but often she felt the self-blame of doubt.

Could she ever regain the girl she had once been before her marriage, the one who had thought the world open and good and fair? The one who was not so scared of life?