From Governess to Countess (Matches Made in Scandal #1)(27)

He laughed. ‘So you admit to thinking about me some of the time?’ His hand slid up her arm, coming to rest on her shoulder. His thumb began to stroke circles on the sensitive skin at the back of her neck, under her hair. She shivered. She reached up to trace the white line of the scar on his brow, relishing the way he responded to her touch.

‘Allison.’ He spoke her name as a caress. ‘I do believe we have unfinished business.’

‘Aleksei, I do believe you are right.’

He did not have to urge her to close the miniscule gap between them, she did that of her own accord. Their lips met, a tentative touch at first, as if they were worried that the three weeks would have dulled the attraction between them, but they need not have. Soft lips, rough stubble, and the tantalising touch of his tongue, and she melted swiftly into the heat of him. It was over too quickly. It left them both staring, breathing heavily.

‘Tonight, do you think?’ he asked.

‘Tonight,’ she agreed, without a second thought, allowing him to lead her towards the door of the garden room, momentarily forgetting what he was likely to find there.

*

A few moments later, Aleksei stopped short in front of the snaking line of servants queuing in the corridor outside the garden room. There seemed to be a full wardrobe of Derevenko livery represented, including an underfootman, a gardener, a scullery maid, two chambermaids and a stable hand, along with two individuals whose colours he did not recognise and a small, ragged urchin. All of them, including the strangers, flapped into a fluster of bows and curtsies, while the urchin simply gazed at him with wide-eyed wonder that made Aleksei want to laugh. ‘What the devil is going on here?’

With one accord, every face turned to Allison. Whose face had turned a bright, mortified red. ‘It is my fault.’

An inkling of understanding made him survey the gathering anew. Two bandages. One sling. Whatever was wrong with the others remained, probably most thankfully, obscured from view.

‘I can explain.’

‘I look forward to being enlightened.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Allison said, turning to her expectant patients, ‘but I am afraid I won’t be able to...’

‘No, wait here. Miss Galbraith will be with you shortly.’ Aleksei ushered her back into the garden room, folding his arms across his chest and leaning against the door. ‘I’m waiting.’

‘Aleksei, I want to assure you that I would never...’

‘Put anything before your obligations to me? I know that.’

‘I did not intend to keep my little dispensary from you. I would have told you later, if you had not insisted upon escorting me here—’ She broke off, grimacing. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘There truly is no need. I told you before I left that I trusted you, and I meant it. If you wish to utilise your skills for the benefit of Nikki’s servants—though I confess, there were some in the crowd who did not look as if they belonged to the palace?’

‘No.’ She looked ridiculously guilty. ‘They have no one else to turn to and if I did not treat them, they would simply go untreated. These people cannot afford to visit an apothecary, never mind consult a doctor, and in some cases they have been living with their ailments for so long, they have quite forgotten what it is like to be without pain. But I should have consulted you, at the very least.’

‘I wasn’t here to consult.’

‘No, but...’

‘Allison, I understand.’

‘You do?’

‘I suspect you can’t help yourself.’

‘You’re right,’ she said, eyeing him with surprise. ‘I had forgotten how much I enjoy treating patients.’

Which implied that she no longer did. When she was embarrassed, her cheeks flushed. When she was hiding something, colour stole up her throat, as it did now. He waited, giving her time to explain, but she so clearly didn’t want to. ‘Well then,’ Aleksei said, ‘tell me how this free service came about.’

‘It started with Natalya, Elizaveta’s maid,’ Allison said, looking relieved. ‘I thought she had been crying, her nose and eyes were so swollen, but it turns out she suffers dreadfully from hay fever, which is very easily treated with elderflower and marigold.’

‘I presume that Natalya sang your praises to the other servants?’

‘Only to your valet, who suffers from swelling of the joints in the fingers and toes. He recommended me to the housekeeper who is perpetually bilious. Then the chef came to me when he developed lockjaw from a cut from a meat knife—fortunately, you have wild garlic in the garden, since I have none in my herbal chest, and the chef himself procured the necessary mustard oil. Then, let me see, yes, Sergei...’

‘The head gardener who, I presume owed you a favour, hence your introduction to the Apothecary’s Garden?’

‘Yes,’ Allison admitted, with a sheepish smile. ‘He had fallen into a patch of stinging nettles, and his wife’s niece who works in the kitchen of the Vasiliev Palace came to me with a stomach complaint, and—well, it just snowballed from there. I come here at lunchtime when the children are with their nanny. There are not usually so many waiting, though some—the groom you saw—come every day for treatment. He suffers from stones, poor man, and my cure is likely to cause him some considerable pain when they pass. But you are not interested in—Aleksei, you truly are not angry?’