Chapter 4 #2
“This will not take long,” he said, pulling over a stool and positioning himself just below my eye level. “I just need to assess you properly if you are going to be working with potentially toxic specimens.”
“It was just the cold,” I said. “I told you, I am—”
“Fine. Yes, so you have said.”
He reached for my hand, and instinctively, I tried to pull away—terrified he might realize my secret. His fingers closed gently around my wrist, stopping my retreat. Amusement lit in his eyes as they met mine.
“I assure you I do not bite, Miss Reed.”
I grinned despite myself, allowing him to take my hand with only the briefest hesitation.
His touch was clinical, entirely appropriate for an examination, and yet it made my pulse riot—which was deeply inconvenient considering his thumb rested at the exact point where the evidence of his effect on me was impossible to conceal.
I watched his mouth move silently with the numbers as he counted the frantic beats of my heart, transfixed, absurdly, by the fullness of his lips.
“Your pulse is elevated,” he said, a frown creasing his brow.
“You are making me nervous,” I replied, which was true, although not for the reasons he might assume.
“Am I?” The corner of his mouth twitched. “Try to relax.”
Relax.
It was a laughable suggestion when his fingers encircled my wrist, when his face was bent close enough that I could see the individual lashes framing his eyes, when the earthy scent of him filled the narrow space between us.
I breathed him in, and some dark part of me wondered if he would take root if buried deep enough.
I blinked to dispel the thought, trying to focus on anything that might distract from the awareness of him.
“Your housekeeper seems quite nice,” I said, grasping at the first neutral topic that came to mind.
He made a noncommittal sound of agreement while continuing his examination.
I tried again. “And Hawthorne. Well. Hawthorne is—”
“Strange,” he supplied, without hesitation.
“No,” I said briskly, then paused. “Well, yes, but…”
I sighed, struggling to find words that would not sound insulting. I was not entirely sure what was wrong with Hawthorne, but he deserved the same courtesy I would extend to any other person.
Dr. Ambrose's mouth quirked at my obvious predicament. “Yes, but what, Miss Reed? You find him disturbing?”
“Of course not,” I replied, though his assessment was not entirely inaccurate. “He is… different.”
“Different,” he repeated, tasting the word.
He turned my hands over, studying the pattern of discoloration spreading across my fingertips and palms. “Do your fingers often turn purple when you are cold, Miss Reed?”
“Pardon?” I asked, caught off guard by the abrupt shift. “Oh my fingers. No, not usually.”
He glanced up, one dark brow lifting in obvious skepticism.
“Occasionally,” I admitted with a sigh. There was no point attempting to lie to a doctor when the proof rested between his own hands.
He nodded, then pressed gently on one of my fingernails, studying the change beneath my skin.
I watched his face rather than my hands.
I had learned, somewhere in the past months, that it was easier to view the evidence of my deterioration through someone else’s expression—that looking at it directly produced a peculiar nausea that its reflection in another person somehow did not.
I was not certain what that said about me. I suspected nothing good.
“Does this hurt?” he asked, glancing up through dark lashes.
“No.”
“Here?” He pressed higher.
“A little tender, but nothing severe...” I trailed off, frowning at the realization that he had expertly changed the subject before the discussion was through.
“Dr. Ambrose, is there something wrong with Hawthorne?”
He went still. Whatever warmth had softened him closed at once, sealed behind a reserve so complete it might as well have been a locked door.
“I believe there are a great many things wrong with us all,” he mused, turning his attention to my hands and dismissing any further discussion on the topic.
It was obvious neither he nor Agnes intended to discuss Hawthorne, or whatever was wrong with the peculiar servant.
“Do you have any other symptoms?” he asked, putting a definitive end to my investigation. “Dizziness? Shortness of breath?”
I hesitated a beat too long. “No.”
His jaw tightened as he searched my face. “And have you seen a physician?”
“Yes, of course. I am perfectly fine, as I have said.” I forced brightness into my voice, though I was certain it convinced neither of us. “It is just poor circulation. There’s nothing to be concerned about.”
He inclined his head, clearly aware it was a lie. “You may get down now.”
I moved to slide off the table, but my legs were unsteady beneath me—from sitting too long, from the heat that had made me almost drowsy, or from the sustained proximity of a man to whom I had no reason to respond to so strongly.
I suspected the honest answer was all three.
I swayed, and his hands were there instantly, steadying me. “Careful.”
We stood close enough that I could see the flecks of gold caught in his amber eyes, close enough to feel the tension held in him just beneath the surface.
“I am fine,” I said, though my voice came out weaker than it should have.
“You keep saying that.”
He held me a moment longer than necessary. The heat of his skin penetrated the thin material of my dress, tempting me to split him open and crawl inside so that the ice filling my veins might finally thaw.
He released me without warning, turning away and focusing on the belladonna with an attention it almost certainly did not require.
“You can assist by cataloging those specimens,” he said gesturing to a table where various plant seedlings sat in labeled containers. “Record their condition and note any changes from my previous observations. The logbook is there beside them.”
I moved to the indicated table, grateful for the distance, and examined the dozens of seedlings before me.
Hemlock, foxglove, yew, oleander—and other, more exotic species I had encountered only in my father’s references or in the illustrations of botanical texts I had studied as a child.
I still recalled tracing each rendered leaf, trying to memorize the details with the dogged persistence of someone who understood, even then, that knowledge was the thing most worth keeping.
I flipped through the dense logbook, noting the attention given to each page.
“This will take most of the afternoon,” I said, already calculating the hours required to document everything properly.
“Then I suggest you get started.”
I glanced up to find Dr. Ambrose grinning as he leaned over his own work, thoroughly pleased with himself for assigning me what amounted to several hours of solitary and tedious labour.
The expression made him look almost boyish.
It made me want to smile back despite my irritation at being relegated to glorified clerical work.
I did not dare give him the satisfaction. I picked up my pen and got to work.