All About Seduction(48)

Had her illness repulsed Mr. Whitton as much as that? The idea of starting anew with another of the guests was like a draught of bitter poison. She’d thought if she couldn’t entice Jack, perhaps she could persuade Mr. Whitton to make the attempt again. He at least seemed willing before she botched it. She pressed the heel of her hand against her head. She was trying, but it seemed a hopeless cause. What else could possibly go wrong?

The butler strode through the hall and opened the front door as several footmen exited, carrying luggage to a carriage waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

The library door opened and Mr. Whitton emerged. Mr. Broadhurst stood behind him, making Mr. Whitton look almost juvenile. Or was it just that her husband’s stooped shoulders, bushy gray eyebrows, and loose skin marked his age? Her thoughts flitted back to Tremont’s accusation that her husband was ill and didn’t have long for this world.

Mr. Broadhurst turned his cold gaze on her as he was about to shut the door. His hands fisted and he stepped out into the hall. “Caroline!” She winced at his thundering anger. “Why aren’t you at the mill?”

Robert moved protectively closer to her.

She fought the urge to turn tail and run. Taking a step forward, she extended her hand to Mr. Whitton. Her ears burned as her humiliation from last night was complete. “I’m sorry to hear you’re leaving us. You will be missed.”

“Ah well, duty calls.” Mr. Whitton didn’t even bat an eyelid at his polite fiction. Duty hadn’t had a chance to call. He grasped her hand limply and stepped back quickly, his mouth tilted in a smirk. “I’ve already taken my leave of your husband.”

Dear Lord, what had he said to Mr. Broadhurst?

The door to the gentleman’s saloon opened and smoke wafted out. Her stomach roiled and bile rose in her throat, but she refused to get sick again. The gentlemen all watched her like pigeons waiting for crumbs.

Now would be the time that Amelia or Sarah would throw their hands against their foreheads and say they felt faint, or when they might gracefully swoon into Robert’s arms, but she was not the swooning type.

“Mr. Broadhurst,” she said, “a word with you in your study, if you please.” She wanted to tell everyone to leave her alone, but she would have to deal with all of it. “Robert, check on Lord Langley and ascertain if he needs any assistance before he leaves.”

Robert’s jaw dropped.

Mr. Broadhurst folded his arms and glowered at her.

“Now,” she added. Of course it wasn’t her place to order the head of her family around, but she’d had more than she could take on the best of days—and this most certainly wasn’t the best of days.

The doctor chose that moment to appear in the open doorway, his arm through a pair of wooden crutches and a paper sack in his hand. Why not? Surely another dozen witnesses to her anguish were about to appear, and she would have no time to compose herself.

“Ah, good, Dr. Hein, I will be with you shortly, and I have a favor to ask of you.” First she had to deal with her husband.

With as much dignity as she could muster, she walked past a dumbstruck Mr. Whitton and her furious husband, through the library door, and into the inner sanctum of her husband’s study.

She waited until Mr. Broadhurst joined her.

“You cannot order me about,” he said. “I won’t have it.”

She simply shut the door behind him and with her dignity straining sat down in one of the chairs. “If you expect me to continue on the course I set, then you will allow the doctor to assure me that you will be around to welcome a child into this world.”

“Did you—”

She swatted away his question like a pesky gnat. It didn’t bear mentioning that the man she’d arranged to have a liaison with was now gone. “The doctor is here now. And I do not know that some illness or perception of illness on your part brought on this desire to insist upon children now.”

“You turned nine and twenty on your last birth anniversary. Before you know it, you’ll be too old to conceive.”

Her age, not his. How like him to make this about her age, rather than his failings. She struggled to remain upright with her shoulders back. The demons of hell pulled on her and pressed on her and pounded the insides of her skull with instruments of torture. “And your health, sir?”

“My health is fine.”

“No it isn’t. You don’t always walk to the mill anymore. And I do not want to give birth with a husband on his deathbed. You must be around to protect my good name and reputation and that of the child.” For at least a year or two.