Page 66 of The Wayward Duke
“Too soon to tell.” Julian sucked in a raw breath, grappling for some semblance of control before his fury shattered him. “But if she dies. I’ll paint the city with that bastard’s guts. Understand me?”
Wentworth scrubbed a hand over his face. Began wearing out the rug again beneath his boots. “I’ll find him, duke. Her Majesty has every resource looking. We’ll scour London brick by brick if we must.”
“See that you do. In the meantime, I’m returning to my wife’s side. Send word immediately if you have news.”
“Of course. I hope your wife pulls through, Hastings.”
Back upstairs, Julian braced himself before entering the bedchamber. He focused on the figure in the bed, still motionless amid the pillows, her blonde hair spilling across the linen. Still balanced on the knife’s edge.
Crossing to the bed, Julian sank into the chair beside her. Gently took her hand between both of his. He clung to the solidity, the anchor keeping his fraying thoughts from slipping their moorings.
“Linnie.” Her name scraped raw and jagged from his throat. He traced the delicate blue veins beneath her translucent skin, felt her faint pulse. “I love you.”
Julian lifted Caroline’s hand and pressed his lips to her knuckles. Inhaled the scent of her. This hand he’d held countless times, from barefoot in sunny meadows to gilded ballrooms. These beautiful fingers that drew him. That touched him.
He wanted her to wake up and touch him again.
Please. One more breath. And then another.
“Come on, sweetheart,” he whispered into her palm. “Just open your eyes.”
Julian traced the sharp angle of her cheekbone, then the graceful bow of her lower lip. Soft. Still warm. Lips he ached to kiss again.
Wake up.
But she remained motionless amid the pillows. The only sound was her shallow breaths, growing fainter.
27
Julian had lost track of the hours and days, keeping grim vigil at Caroline’s bedside.
She burned. The fever ravaged her body, leaving her wrung out and restless beneath the linens. Her skin was dry beneath his hand as he bathed her flushed cheeks with cool water.
When the dreams tormented her, Julian administered a few drops of laudanum, hoping to ease her torment. But the tonic only pulled her deeper into delirium, her lips moving as she whispered to ghosts.
Even in the throes of fever, he refused to relinquish her hand, his thumbs tracing the veins and delicate knuckles. Imprinting the precious topography to memory.
How often had he traced that elegant sweep of brow and cheekbone? His fingertips knew her features better than his own. Every nuance was inked into his bones, imprinted on his soul.
When they were young, he’d spent hours studying her as she sketched his nude form. Always more brazen with charcoal in hand, her tongue caught between her teeth in endearing concentration. Blushing the entire time. And later, after they married, he had mapped her in return – each freckle and contour – with hands and lips.
Those days were stained by the years of bitter silence that followed. But they had rediscovered tenderness amid the wreckage left by grief and loss.
Until Kellerman’s bullet had torn through her flesh, ripping that progress to shreds.
And now Julian watched her fight for each shallow breath. His days had distilled to the routine of wiping her brow, administering drops of tonic, begging her to hold on.
The hours crawled by as the mantelpiece clock marked their sluggish passage. One chime. Two. Five.
As dusk swallowed the sickroom, a faint whimper fractured the silence. Julian dragged his bleary focus from his ledgers. Setting aside the pen, he grasped Caroline’s questing hand.
“Shhh. I’m here.” His rasp of a voice still startled him. How long since he had uttered more than a few hoarse words?
Tonics hadn’t eased her distress. Her slender frame thrashed and convulsed as the fever took fresh hold. Julian filled a cup from the pitcher and gently lifted Caroline’s shoulders.
“Drink this,” he coaxed. “Come on, my duchess.”
After a few unsuccessful attempts, he managed to work some water down her parched throat.
