The Duke with the Dragon Tattoo (Victorian Rebels, #6)(7)

Dr. Holcomb entered with sure, confident strides. “I say, old boy, do you think you can sit up again?”

He’d answered Dr. Holcomb before. Verbally. When they were alone. But he’d never before had to form words with “my lady’s” bosoms grazing his forearm.

He must have nodded, because Holcomb’s strong arms slid between his shoulders and the pillow. It took the three of them, but they wrestled him into a sitting position once more.

The darkness spun, and the world tilted.

She didn’t let go. Her hold on his hand anchored him to the world. And eventually, the dizziness abated and the ringing in his ears, vibrating like a plucked wire, dimmed and died.

“Are you ready?” Holcomb asked.

He swallowed and nodded.

The snick of the scissors echoed inside his head rather than against it. He held his breath as the pressure of the wrap released, and the grip of her hands intensified. He didn’t know which of them trembled. Maybe they both did.

The cotton patches unraveled from beneath his nose, then lifted from his eyes, which he immediately peeled open.

Sapphires danced in a blur of gold.

“Can you see me?” she whispered breathlessly.

He should answer her. He really should. But nothing seemed to obey him. No words could escape past the thickness in his throat.

“Close, if you please,” Dr. Holcomb clipped.

He impatiently submitted his closed lids and tender nose to a warm wash with a cloth, then blinked them open the moment he could. His gaze starving for her.

“You can see me!” she exclaimed.

See her? He absorbed her. Devoured her. Committed every detail to his empty memory with inhuman precision. In fact, he could see nothing else. And never wanted to.

The downy curve of her beaming cheeks, dimpled with a delighted smile. The fullness of her expressive lips. The riot of untamed curls spilling like dark honey down her plain peach gown.

He was no poet, this he knew, because every word that came to mind was both crass and insufficient.

He had no frame of reference with which to compare her. No metaphors to pronounce. But he remembered that in the graveyard, he’d dragged himself beneath the statue of an angel. Soft-cheeked and solemn, with the striations of gray stone curls tumbling down to her hands pressed in prayer. Her head tilted to the side, as she gazed in grace, guarding the dearly departed.

The thought of that angel—of someone like her—missing him, loving him, assuming he was gone, fueled his ability to crawl, broken and burning, through the storm to the roadside.

But during these weeks in the dark, when he could think through the pain, he’d realized a few things. No one had come for him, though the old earl had sent word far and wide.

He’d awoken in a pauper’s grave, one saved for the unloved and the unwanted.

Or worse. The condemned.

He had an enemy. One who’d beaten him to death. Or at least assumed they’d succeeded.

And now … he had an angel. One come to life. More beautifully rendered than any artist could compose. Hers was a face molded by a loving celestial hand.

She was young. Quite young.

Was he? He didn’t think so. He felt as old as time.

Though they’d drawn the drapes and lit a single candle for the unveiling, the room may as well have been illuminated by the noonday sun. She glowed with some inner luminescence, a light both otherworldly and pure. Her wide lapis eyes glinted like jewels against fresh, gilded skin. She was too soft to be real, surely. Too divine to be mortal. Too golden to be made of the same clay as himself.

And he …

Oh, buggar me blind! he thought. What do I look like?

He needed … something. Something that wasn’t on the dark wardrobe on the far wall, nor the bedside table, but—

There. Above the ivory washbasin to his right.

A mirror.

“It’s … best you don’t look just now.” An impish nose wrinkled with worry as the rest of her features battled with composure when she correctly guessed the reason for his distress.

His shoulders gave out, curling in upon themselves. He wanted to pluck his own eyes out. He wanted her to look away. To let him go. His heart shriveled like a piece of wet rubbish thrown on the fire.

Because she’d confirmed his worst fears.

“I’m a monster,” he groaned.

Was that his voice? As raspy and graveled as the pit he’d pulled himself from.

Fuck, how could those be the first words he spoke to her?

“Oh no!” She clasped his hand even tighter. “You mustn’t think that! You’re a miracle. An absolute miracle.”

Her eyes shone so earnestly, he couldn’t bear to look at them.

“You don’t have to lie.” As he glanced up at Dr. Holcomb’s impressive muttonchops, his stomach clenched around emptiness at the grim expression tightening the man’s sharp features.

“Your nose didn’t heal as straight as I’d hoped and there’s more swelling than I like. But your more … superficial wounds shouldn’t take too much longer to heal. Your ankle will take the longest, and you should stay off it until I relieve you of the plaster cast in a few weeks’ time.” The doctor bent to pick up the candle and hold it in front of both eyes, tracking their movements.

He wanted to shrink away from the man. The impulse powerful enough that he couldn’t suppress a wince. His skin crawled and his blood sang with ferocity and … fear.