My Lord Wicked (Historical Regency Romance) (7 page)

If only she would recognize him. He craved any semblance of her former self.

Stacks had to admire Edgekirth's professionalism. He came every morning and evening to check on Freddie. Even if it was at Marshbanks Abbey. Though the two men were bitter enemies, they forged a bond over the helpless orphan girl.

One afternoon as Stacks was cross pollinating two flowers, he heard a squeaky meow and turned to see a thin orange kitten with white markings. He called to the cat in a softened voice, but it shied away. Immediately, he thought how alike the kitten and Freddie were. Too proud to be pitied, to proud to accept favors.

The next day, the kitten returned. Stacks spoke softly to it, and it came closer, then skittered away.

On the following day, the kitten came close enough for Stacks to grab it and hold the little fur ball in his big hands. He remembered Freddie telling him about her dog, Champs. She had even called out the dog's name during one of her delirious nights.

If only this little kitten could replace her long-revered dog.

That evening when he entered Freddie's chamber, Stacks took the kitten with him. His voice soft, he approached her bed and said, "I've brought you a present."

Her lids slowly lifted.

He placed the fluffy kitten on her pillow and watched as a smile came to Freddie's pale, dry lips. To his surprise, the cat did not run away.

Freddie's thin hand came up to stroke the kitten's white neck. She looked up and met Stack's beaming gaze. "For my very own?"

He nodded, moisture coming to his eyes.

"I shall call him Marmalade," she said in a hoarse whisper, petting the kitten's soft coat.

"Your clothes have arrived," Stacks informed her, trying to sound cheerful.

She began to cough. When the coughing subsided, she sighed. "I fear I have no strength to put them on."

"You will get stronger," he said convincingly. And he believed it.

***

The following morning Freddie was strong enough to sit up in bed and drink broth Maggie offered. Marmalade lay beside her, curled up in a snug ball, purring softly. The sun shone through the room's gothic windows, and a fire blazed at her hearth. No longer suffocating with fever, she felt a comforting warmth, especially over the revelation that her guardian himself had tended her during her illness.

Bent on conversation, Maggie prattled on incessantly. "Whoever would have thought--what with the abbey full of servants--his lordship himself would see fit to sit by your bedside all them nights. I don't believe for a minute those wicked things they say about him."

Freddie stroked her kitten, her brows lowering, worry pounding in her breast. "What wicked things?"

"I ---uh, I really couldn't say, miss."

Just then the door swung open, and a strange man entered her bedchamber.

"How very good it is to see you up, Miss Lambeth," he proclaimed, crossing paths with Maggie, who left the room.

She shot a quizzing glance at him, bringing her blanket up to cover her breasts which showed under the thin linen of her shift. "And you are?" A deep, wracking cough sapped her strength.

"Dr. Edgekirth," he said, strolling confidently to her bedside.

"You have been very sick," he told Freddie.

"For how long?" She watched as his hand came to rest on her forehead. It felt strong, yet gentle. Like she sensed he was.

"Nearly two weeks."

"You bled me?"

"I did."

She nodded. "And you came every day?"

"Twice each day."

"You gave me lungwort?" she asked, her voice hoarse.

"I did."

"And aqua cordials?"

He nodded.

"Then you must be a good doctor."

"And on what do you base that determination?"

"On the fact that I've spent my entire life administering to the infirm. My father was a surgeon."

"Where?"

"In Sussex. A village known as Chelseymeade."

"He attended Oxford?"

She nodded. "Until he fell in love with my mother and cut short his studies. He had hoped to be a physician."

"When did he attend Oxford?"

"At the same time as Lord Stacks. They were the greatest of friends."

He nodded firmly and moved to lift her cover.

She pulled it tightly over her chest. "As you can see, Dr. Edgemont, that is totally unnecessary. I am quite on the road to recovery."

"Edgekirth," he said with a grin. "Tell me, how would your father have acted had a female patient treated him as you are treating me?"

She thought for a moment. "He would have lectured her sternly until the poor woman felt like an utter baboon."

"Lecturing is not my method."

She met his mischievous gaze. "You charm your patients into compliance."

"I see you are quite perceptive, Miss Lambeth," he said, smiling.

"And I see you know what you are doing," Freddie countered, still clutching the blanket to her bosom.

He grinned and turned toward the door. "I'll report to your guardian now." He turned back and met her eyes. "I'll look in on you again in the morning."

***

Stacks no longer anxiously paced the cloister like he had done for nearly two weeks. Now he stood watering a clump of herbs growing in the quadrangle, coatless on this sunny morning. He needed to be with the sprouting, blooming, glorious evidence of life. To celebrate life. For now he knew Freddie would live.

He looked up as Edgekirth moved toward him. "My ward grows stronger," he said flatly. "It seems I am greatly indebted to you, Edgekirth. How can I ever repay you?"

"By sending her back," Edgekirth said through compressed lips.

Stacks threw down his pail. "But you and I both know she's far too weak to travel."

"She will regain her strength," the doctor said. "Even robust strength, I fear, would be no defense against your cruelty. Let her go before you destroy her, too."

"You have once again overstepped your bounds," Stacks said, dismissal in his voice as he turned back to his herbs.

Edgekirth stalked up to the baron. "I will not allow you to kill her as you killed Elizabeth!"

Stacks spun around. "You dare to call Lady Stacks Elizabeth!"

Edgekirth's posture slackened. "Never to her face."

"But you thought of her as Elizabeth. You coveted her, did you not?" His flashing black eyes held Edgekirth's.

The physician swallowed. "She was the most beautiful, vibrant woman I have ever seen. And you destroyed her, damn you, Stacks."

Stacks turned back to his herbs, fighting the overwhelming urge to run his fist through the insolent doctor's face. "My man has been instructed to present you with a bag of coins for your excellent services." Edgekirth
had
been diligent and competent.

"Take your damned money and go to hell!"

Chapter 6

Stacks closed the library door and settled back in his red leather chair, opening the thick packet newly arrived from his solicitor. He thumbed through the letters of application for the position of companion to his ward and counted fourteen. The first, from an orphaned girl fresh from the schoolroom, he dismissed. Freddie would need someone with town bronze to groom her, an older lady who had been through a few seasons. Another was from a matron near Bath. She would not do at all. He sought a woman who knew London ways. Tossing aside undesirable applicants, his attention was drawn to a letter from a Marie Dewhurst. He read on. The woman was the daughter of Sir Manley Moreland and the recent widow of Captain Michael Dewhurst, who had distinguished himself in the Peninsula. She had been presented the year after Elizabeth. Stacks' attention perked. Though her letter seemed more concerned with titled persons of whom she was acquainted than of herself, Stacks thought the widow would serve his purposes well.

He began to see that a widow would be an excellent choice. Just as he was about to dash off a letter to his solicitor to instruct him to hire Mrs. Dewhurst, he came to a sudden stop, the tip of his pen poised over his paper.

Though a widow would suit his needs, something told him that Mrs. Dewhurst was not the right widow. Why have a woman who had been on the fringe of the
ton
when he might have one who had been at its very core? His thoughts flitted to that long ago Season when he had found a bride, despite his reluctance to do so. The fair and lovely Elizabeth Binghampton had burst on the scene with her beauty and flirtatious ways, leaving an army of admirers in her wake.

And everywhere Elizabeth went, her mousy companion, Julia Smith, had followed. Even after Elizabeth became Lady Stacks, Julia continued to accompany her, making her home at Marshbanks Abbey.

Julia had stayed on after Elizabeth died, and only on Stacks' firmest insistence did she leave.

It was not until much later that Julia Smith finally married a much older man who made her a widow only two years after marrying her. It was said she was bitterly disappointed in the expectations of her husband's estate.

Stacks leaned back in his chair, rolling the pen between his palms. He pictured Julia Smith as she had looked as a maiden some ten years earlier. She had dark hair and shrewd eyes that were nearly black. Though she was not fat, her fleshy chin and neck had given her the appearance of being overweight, which coupled with her hawk-like nose, dismally reduced her marital prospects. Stacks had often wondered why she chose to align herself to one as beautiful as Elizabeth.

He tried to recall her married name. Something like Weaver or Taylor or something that reminded him of the guilds.

Where was she now? She would be the ideal companion for poor Freddie. She had travelled within the upper echelons of society, yet pecuniary circumstances kept her from being too proud to be a paid companion.

And the woman had enjoyed living at Marshbanks Abbey. He recalled that she had not wanted to leave.

If only he could remember her name. He began to fumble in his desk. She had written him a couple of years ago to tell him of her widowhood and to commiserate with him about grief over losing life's mate.

Thankfully, his desk was cluttered with many papers which should have been discarded long ago. Among them was a letter from Mrs. Julia Taylor.

He drafted a letter to Mrs. Taylor, imploring her to come make her home once more at Marshbanks Abbey.

With the letter dispatched, his thoughts turned to Freddie. She was much too weak to travel but too pure to stay at Marshbanks Abbey without proper chaperonage. The girl grew stronger daily. She was now out of bed for hours at a time, reading before the fire, little Marmalade curled on her lap. Her cough was less wracking, and the hoarseness in her voice grew less pronounced each new day. He did, indeed, owe much to Edgekirth.

Though the two men despised each other, Edgekirth came daily to check his patient's progress. Stacks accepted--even welcomed--Edgekirth's presence. It was good that Freddie have the society of a learned gentleman since he himself could not taint her with his presence. Not until Mrs. Taylor arrived.

***

Edgekirth tucked the blanket around Freddie in her invalid's chair. Maggie had helped her into a new sprigged muslin morning dress, and she did not at all think she needed the blanket, but the doctor had insisted. He pushed her chair across the red carpet that now held elongated patches of sunlight the exact shape of her gothic windows. The two of them settled before the fire in her chamber, and Marmalade contentedly hopped on Freddie's lap.

Freddie studied Edgekirth's tanned face. "I am wondering how the complaints of your patients differ from those we had in Chelseymeade."

The doctor ran his hand through his golden hair and smiled at her. "I believe illnesses are the same the world over."

"But your climate here is so much damper," Freddie said, coughing. Her coughs no longer seemed to raise the phlegm from her very toes. "Surely that predisposes one to chills and lung fever."

"It is my belief that the body regulates itself to its environment. Those raised in a moist climate are better able to endure it, not like you--who was unused to it--and took a fever your first week here while Lord Stacks remained perfectly healthy."

She noted that he only addressed her guardian as Lord Stacks when talking about him, but never to his face. "There is merit in what you say. It has been my observation that those who are daily exposed to poison ivy suffer no complaint whereas if you or I would come into contact with it, we would scratch with uncommon vigor."

He nodded. "It is unfortunate for the profession that you are a woman, Miss Lambeth, for you would have made an excellent physician."

She sipped her tea. "Tell me, is there an apothecary in Morton?"

"No. It is too small and too remote."

"Then where do you procure your remedies, pray tell?" she asked.

"From a shop in London."

"In Spitafields?"

"Why, yes," he said, puzzled.

She took a bite of biscuit. "I know it well."

He reached for a biscuit himself, admiration in his gaze.

"Do you not find elixirs made of fresh plants and herbs to be far more satisfactory than those potions procured from London?"

"How could I know when no one here grows such plants?"

"But if it can grow anywhere in England, it grows in my guardian's garden. He is a noted botanist."

Edgekirth frowned. "Your guardian is hardly willing to share his bounty with me."

How wrong he was about her guardian! Why the generous Lord Stacks would likely go to any lengths to help the less fortunate, including Dr. Edgekirth's patients. She sat down her cup and gazed up at the doctor. "You and Lord Stacks do not get on, do you?"

He laughed. "How observant you are, Miss Lambeth."

She wondered how a man such as her guardian could have an enemy. He was so very kind. Then she remembered Maggie's words.
People said wicked things about Lord Stacks.
"Why do you dislike Lord Stacks?" She watched him as his crooked grin vanished, the features of his agreeable face hardening.

He did not answer for a moment. "That is a matter between your guardian and myself," he said firmly. "It does not concern you."