14. CHAPTER 14
D alton heard them before he saw them.
Vivienne spoke in a low voice threaded with warmth. He knew it well. She had used it with him before, in what felt like another lifetime. Reserved for the dark, for their bed, for the moments after they shut out the world.
Now she reserved it for Harrison.
He slowed in the corridor outside the morning parlor, a tightness gathering in his chest.
A week. She had been beneath his roof for seven days, and in that time he had managed only one hour of uninterrupted time with her. One sustained conversation, the day they toured the castle, during which she had been polite but overwhelmed, and had asked about a locked door he could not explain.
Since then, nothing. Breakfasts where she paid more attention to her toast than she did to him.
Afternoons where he arrived in whatever room she occupied only to find Harrison already there, deep in some discussion that quieted at his entrance.
Evenings where Margaret kept up a stream of warm, impenetrable chatter that filled every silence before it could become an opening.
He was being managed. The doctor and the old woman had drawn a perimeter around Vivienne as neatly as any military cordon, and they were holding it with the ruthlessness of people who believed they were protecting her .
From him.
Her own husband.
The absurdity did not lessen the sting. He had been reduced to seeking opportunities to speak to his own wife as though he were a petitioner begging for an audience — timing his appearances, lingering in doorways like a man who had lost the right to walk through them.
And at night… Christ, the nights. She slept in the chamber adjoining his.
Every evening he stood in the dark, aware of the connecting door between them.
A taunt and a prohibition. Once, he would have crossed that threshold without knocking, and she would have received him eagerly.
The only question between them had ever been which bed — his or hers — and the answer had rarely mattered because they would both be in it regardless.
Now the door stayed shut.
She had not invited him. And after that awkward encounter the first morning, he would sooner cut off his own hand than risk knocking again and seeing fear in her eyes.
He pushed open the parlor door.
The three of them gathered around the writing desk near the window.
Vivienne seated, Harrison standing with a folded paper crushed in his fist, Margaret upright in the chair opposite.
They had been speaking in urgent, hushed tones.
A second paper lay open on the desk beside a teacup that had gone cold.
No one looked up when he entered.
"— worse than the rector's letter suggested," Harrison was saying, his voice tight. "This is a telegram. The scarlet fever has taken hold. There are new cases every hour. The families are frightened, and old Mrs. Le Page has no one to sit with her through the night."
Margaret had gone pale, but her voice did not waver. "I shall go with you. The fever will not take me, for I already had it as a girl. I can sit with the sick and relieve the younger women who have children to mind. "
Dalton's gaze settled on the crushed paper in Harrison's hand, then the letter on the desk. So there had been a first warning, sent by the rector, and then the wire. The island was in crisis.
"I could go as well — " Vivienne started.
"Absolutely not."
Three pairs of eyes snapped toward him. They had not heard him come in. The words had come out harder than he intended, and he saw Vivienne stiffen.
He did not take the words back. His wife, in the middle of an epidemic. Unthinkable. He would fight her on this. He would fight all three of them if he had to.
She turned to face him, chin lifting in a gesture he recognized from before. From the old Vivienne, who had never backed down from an argument in eight years of marriage. The gesture struck him somewhere between recognition and grief.
"If there is anything I can do to help," she said, "it is my duty to do so."
"You can help in other ways. But you will not set foot on that island while there is an epidemic raging."
Her eyes narrowed. "You cannot simply — "
"I can. And I am."
He watched her gather herself for the argument, saw the defiance in those hazel eyes, and braced himself.
The last thing he wanted was to antagonize her.
Their marriage was so fragile it barely existed.
But he would forbid it. Grovel afterward if necessary.
Whatever it cost him with her, he would keep her safe.
Harrison intervened before the thing could detonate.
"The duke is right, Grace." That borrowed name still grated, the one she had carried for seven years while he grieved a woman he believed was dead.
"You must not come. I am only permitting Margaret because she has already survived the fever once and is therefore less vulnerable.
But you have no such protection. As your physician, I cannot advise it. "
Vivienne looked at the doctor. Then, after a long moment, accepted his verdict with a nod .
Dalton noted it. She had yielded to Harrison's authority. Not his. The same prohibition, the same reasoning, and she had bristled at her husband and deferred to the doctor.
But this was not the time to quibble about that. Their opinions aligned, and that was enough.
"When do you leave?" she asked. Resigned.
"This afternoon, if I can secure passage. The packet steamer — "
"You shall not waste time with packet steamers," Dalton said.
They all turned toward him. He stepped further into the room, hands clasped behind his back. "My yacht can be ready within the hour. She is faster than anything in the harbor and will carry you to St. Peter Port directly."
The silence that followed was, he thought, almost insulting. Harrison blinked. Margaret's lips parted. Vivienne stared at him as though he had performed some trick rather than offered a boat.
Did they think him incapable of basic decency?
"Your Grace," Harrison began, "that is — "
"Necessary." He would not allow gratitude to cause awkwardness.
"And you shall not go empty-handed. Make me a list. Medicines, fresh linen, preserved foods, coal for the hospital — whatever you believe they will need.
My staff will gather what they can before you sail.
Anything we cannot source in time will follow on the next tide. "
He met the doctor's eyes. Whatever else lay between them — the suspicion, the jealousy, the unspoken contest over Vivienne's loyalty — it did not belong in this room.
"The island saved my wife's life," he said. "It sheltered her for seven years. I am in its debt."
Harrison's expression changed, the guarded wariness giving way to reluctant gratitude. Perhaps even a smidgen of respect.
"They will be grateful, sir. More than I can say."
"And if you require more help once you have assessed the situation, you need only send word and I will see to it. "
Margaret reached for his hand and squeezed it with surprising strength. Her eyes were bright.
"God bless you, Your Grace."
He inclined his head. He was not comfortable with blessings he had not earned. But the old woman was not thanking him only for the yacht. She was revising her estimation of him, and if that influenced Vivienne's opinion, he was not too proud to let her.
Vivienne was watching him. The wary assessment he had grown accustomed to was gone. In its place… not trust, not yet, but something similar. Approval, perhaps.
"Thank you," she said.
"I should see to the preparations," he said, uncomfortable with her gratitude. "Harrison, your list. Within the half hour, if you please."
He turned and left the room before the feeling could reach his face.
In his study, he rang for Prowse and began giving orders about the yacht.
The departure consumed the next two hours. Supplies requisitioned, the crew summoned, provisions loaded under Mrs. Trevena's supervision. Margaret packed with the brisk economy of a woman who knows how to handle herself in a crisis. Harrison compiled his medical list with grim efficiency.
Dalton read it, doubled the quantities of carbolic acid and quinine, and added a crate of fresh linens without being asked.
By half past three, the yacht was ready.
They gathered in the entrance hall. Vivienne stood near the bottom of the staircase, her fingers twisting in the fabric of her skirt.
Harrison appeared with his medical bag and a single valise. He looked drawn. The urgency that had carried him through the morning had settled into resolve.
It was Margaret who came last. The old woman descended the staircase in her traveling cape and sensible bonnet, her spine straight, her pace unhurried. Vivienne turned to meet her, and her face crumpled.
"Now then," Margaret said, taking Vivienne's hands in both of hers. "None of that. I shall return before you know it. "
"Promise me you will be careful."
"I have survived a great deal worse than scarlet fever, my dear. I survived raising three sons and burying two husbands. A little island epidemic is hardly going to finish me off."
A watery laugh escaped Vivienne, and Margaret drew her closer. For seven years, she had been the nearest thing to a mother Vivienne possessed. This kind old lady had taken in a woman with no name and no history and given her a home, a purpose, and the plain, steady fact of being wanted.
"You are braver than you know," Margaret said. She cupped Vivienne's face. "You always were. Even when you could not remember being brave, you were. You do not need me here to tell you."
She glanced at Dalton over Vivienne's shoulder, and the look she gave him was a command. Take care of her. Or answer to me.
He held her gaze and nodded once.
Margaret patted Vivienne's cheek, adjusted her bonnet, and bustled toward the door.
Dalton watched her go. Harrison's farewell was harder to witness.
The doctor approached Vivienne with the easy intimacy that had been under Dalton's skin for eight days.
He took her hands and held them as though he had every right.
In a sense, he did. He had been her protector, her physician, the man she had once agreed to marry.
The fact that the marriage was void did not erase the intention behind it.
"You will take care of yourself?" The worry in her voice made Dalton look away, examining the stonework as though the grouting required his professional opinion.
"I shall try," Harrison said with a small smile.
He bent and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.
Dalton absorbed the familiarity, the tenderness, the ease with which she permitted it. An ease she did not yet feel around him. His hands stayed at his sides, and his face betrayed nothing. He had spent twenty years in the intelligence service. He could endure a kiss on the knuckles.
Then Harrison drew her into an embrace. Brief. Decent. No sane husband could take offense .
The burn behind his sternum suggested sanity was not the governing factor.
He still said nothing. Watched Harrison release her, step back, incline his head.
"I will send word when we arrive."
"Please do." The catch in her voice was a small, precise wound.
Harrison turned to him last. The two men regarded each other across the entrance hall. For a moment, the old antagonism held. Then Harrison extended his hand.
"Your Grace. Thank you."
Dalton took it. The handshake was firm and brief and contained more honesty than any conversation they had managed in eight days.
"Bring them through it," Dalton said. "And bring yourself back in one piece. She will worry until you do."
Those words cost him more than the yacht full of supplies.
Harrison stared at him for a moment. Then he nodded, collected his bag, and followed Margaret out into the afternoon.
The great door closed behind them.
Vivienne remained at the foot of the stairs, one hand on the newel post, her face turned toward the door. Her eyes were bright, and the sight of them nearly cracked him open.
He ought to say something. Offer comfort. Reassure her. Suggest tea. Anything that might bridge the distance without shattering the fragile truce they had built.
Instead, he said nothing. Because the first thought he could hold was that his rival had left, and he was glad Harrison was gone.
He was glad. God help him.
The shame came next, and he did not fight it. He deserved it. He would have preferred different circumstances, of course. But he would not pretend he was sorry to have his wife to himself. He had long since learned that lying to himself was a luxury he could not afford.
He would help the island. He had already set it in motion: money, supplies, physicians — whatever it took. Because it was the right thing. Because the people who had been Vivienne's friends and only protectors for years were ill.
But the man who had occupied her hours, her confidence, and her affection, who had stood between Dalton and his own wife with the tenacity of a sentry, was gone from his home.
And if Dalton had his way, the doctor would soon be gone from her thoughts as well.