Chapter 23
Benedict had both crashed his head into a brick wall and swallowed a jar of sand. At least, that’s what the throbbing in his skull and dryness in his mouth would have him believe.
He pried open his heavy eyelids, the narrow stream of light peeking through the crack in the curtains searing his vision like he stared into the sun. Where in the hell was he? What had he done to make everything in his body hurt?
And why, amidst the misery, did he smell flowers? An airy perfume that was light and comforting. Familiar.
He struggled to right himself, but the effort of rising made his head swim and collapse back down onto the pillow. However, not before he caught a glimpse of golden curls fanned across the bottom of the bed.
“Violet?” he croaked, his thoughts swirling at a dizzying pace but blanketed by a thick layer of fog. He knew that hair. That scent. Yet Violet was in Wiltshire and, last he recalled, he was in London. Had he begun to experience delusions?
Something rustled and shoved into his feet, causing a momentary dip in the mattress and a flurry of color to burst before his eyes.
He tilted his head in the direction of the movement, ignoring the shot of pain in his temples and focusing on the figure that had scrambled from his bed.
Emerald green fabric, white lace, pink cheeks. That brilliant blonde hair.
“Violet,” he rasped again, because it was really her, it must be. However, she was backing away from his bedside like a stalked animal ready to bolt.
Reluctantly, she stilled at the garbled sound of her name, and after a moment’s hesitation—a moment where blue eyes bore down on him, and a few more scraps of his memory returned—she abandoned her retreat.
Instead, she busied herself with something at his bedside table, the loud clatters and clinks tolerable only because her body shaded him from the light, filling his view with swaths of green skirts.
The shadow lasted only a minute, though, before she shifted to grab his pillow, jostling him into a semi-seated position.
“Here.” She shoved a mug into his hand before he could even utter a groan of protest, and when his fingers curled reflexively around the warm surface, she helped guide it to his lips. “Drink this.”
His stomach roiled at the thought of consuming anything.
However, when the first splash of strong, sugarless coffee hit his throat, it went down with surprising ease, taking away a little of the dryness.
Giving him a tiny jolt of clarity, too. He was in a guest bedchamber at Rockliffe House, reclining beneath a brocade counterpane and surrounded by gilt-edged furniture.
Of course, how he’d ended up here with Violet at his side remained a mystery.
He accepted another mouthful of coffee, waiting for it to lift the haze from his brain.
Everything came at him in flashes, little bits of memory that wouldn’t form a whole.
Yet the longer he glanced around—at Violet’s pursed lips, at the cracked spectacles on the bedside table, at the bruise upon his knuckles—the more he could piece together.
Suddenly, his physical discomfort was secondary to the surge of shame coursing through his gut. What had he done? How had he allowed himself to so spectacularly, terribly lose control?
The coffee cup disappeared, replaced by a damp cloth pressed to his brow. He was perspiring, wasn’t he? His skin pricked, feeling both fevered and chilled, the not-so-gentle motions of the cloth doing little to ease the sensation.
Over the past weeks, he’d come to crave Violet’s caress, but this was only making things worse.
He wrinkled his nose, a pungent odor cutting through the pleasant mist of flowers.
Good God, was that him? When had he last bathed?
His linen shirt, which had once been crisp and white, contained mud stains, and it clung to his body from sweat.
He didn’t need to pull back the counterpane and observe his trousers to realize they fared no better.
“My clothing,” he muttered, shrugging away from her brusque ministrations. “You shouldn’t be near me. I smell distasteful.”
She arched a sardonic brow. “Your boots were covered in excrement the first time we met. Think nothing of it.”
The cloth came back toward his forehead, but he recoiled, clamping his arms tight across his chest as if he could squeeze himself into non-existence. He was in no state to be touched or looked at. He didn’t deserve her care, however snappishly given.
And perhaps she came to her senses and agreed, for she threw the cloth onto the bedside table, her face becoming stony. Her feet taking a clipped step away.
He closed his eyes, trying to wade through the monumental mess he’d created. Thanks to his own idiocy, time and circumstances had become a blur, leaving him with an onslaught of questions regarding what had happened during his drunken stupor.
“Where’s Alex?” he managed to say, opening his eyes before visions of pamphlets littering the doorstep could add to his malaise. But where once there’d been an irate, panicked sense of doom, he experienced only a dull ache.
“I don’t know.” Violet looked at him blandly, her voice ringing hollow. “Your mother was downstairs when I arrived. I’ll request that she come up so you can ask her.”
She whirled away, feet marching one methodical step after another toward the door.
In seconds, she’d be gone. And while he didn’t know how she’d gotten here, he knew, with a certainty that made his stomach plummet, that once she left, she wouldn’t come back.
There’d be no more coffee, no more cloth against his throbbing brow.
Not just today, but for every long, miserable year to come.
This was the moment he’d look back on as the one that had shattered their marriage beyond repair.
And no, he didn’t deserve any of what she had to give, not even a little. However, he also wasn’t noble enough to watch her walk away. Not if it meant forever.
“Violet,” he said, grit returning to his throat, making his voice dry and broken.
She kept walking, his pathetic call getting swallowed up by the determined rustle of her skirts.
“Violet.” He drew air into his aching lungs and forced her name to reemerge with more power. Forced his body to scramble upright, fighting against the sudden blast of dizziness that made the room spin.
She turned, the tap of her slippers against the carpet momentarily halting.
Her face was clouded, the soft lines of her features melding into one another.
Nonetheless, he knew she was watching him expectantly.
Knew her eyes were blue and cool, and he had only a speck of time before they grew impatient and didn’t look his way again.
He grappled the bedpost, squeezing with all his strength in an effort not to crumple to the floor. “Violet I …” His body was shaking, jaw clattering, but he had to make himself speak. Had to compel her to stay.
“I don’t know what I’ve done,” he choked out, the words coming from some deep, secluded place inside him. “I don’t know who I am anymore.”
His chest was being ripped in two, his legs on the verge of collapse.
Yet he couldn’t stop, not until every jagged piece came free. “I’m so afraid. So ashamed.” His eyes burned, and a raw, desperate sound tore from his throat. “So bloody sorry.”
He couldn’t stand any longer, could scarcely even breathe.
But suddenly, he didn’t need to stand, for gentle arms encircled him, guiding him back to the bed.
Without letting go, Violet helped him get his head on the pillow and lie on his side amidst the tangle of sheets.
And then, she lay down next to him, tucking her chest against his back like a comforting blanket.
She stayed there as uncontrollable shudders racked his chest and his inhales fell more like sobs. She stayed with him—one hand splayed across his abdomen, the other rubbing circles against his shoulders—as years of bottled-up emotions poured to the surface, leaving him stripped and undone.
Not once did she try prompting him to speak. She remained there simply as a silent foundation of support, giving while taking nothing in return. However, as seconds stretched into minutes, and he slowly recalled how to breathe without trembling, he knew he couldn’t leave it this way.
He may have garnered her sympathy enough that she wouldn’t prod him, but he couldn’t spend the rest of his life holding her at a distance, keeping his family skeletons tucked in a closet. If he was to atone for his actions, he had to let her in.
He gingerly rolled to face her, finding that his head didn’t throb nearly so much as it had before. Nor did her features swim before his eyes. Everything had become clear: pink lips, flushed cheeks, milky skin. Blue eyes that shone like the Wiltshire sky, serene and bright and lovely.
“I need to share some things with you,” he said, driving the words from his tongue before they could retreat. “About Alex. About … about my father, too.”
She reached for his hand, her fingers curling tightly around his. Her body drawing a little closer. “I want to understand. I desire so much for you to be open with me.”
It occurred to him, in the back of his mind, that he sorely needed to change his shirt. To brush his teeth. That perhaps he should be standing up for this, rigid and solemn, keeping a careful distance.
Yet the moment had arrived now, on this bed, with Violet embracing him regardless of his dishevelment. He couldn’t risk losing his resolve and letting it pass them by. Besides … something about lying next to her felt right. Like maybe it would make what he had to reveal just a fraction easier.
He took a breath, using the warmth of her hand to ground him. “I assume you know the scandal of Lord Samuel Prescott eschewing his family, and society as a whole, so he could marry a woman they disapproved of and start a new life as a working man—a poet.”
She kept looking at him, her expression measured. “Yes.”