“I am certain,” said Daniels patiently, “she has broken some ribs. But broken ribs alone should not cause this sort of difficulty and pain. Not suddenly, after so many hours. But if she’s been going about physical activity since the initial wound, the broken bones may have caused her some bleeding, inside. Over the hours, the blood has been gathering inside her chest with no outlet. Now it’s pressing on her lungs and making it difficult for her to breathe. It’s called a hemo—”
“—thorax,” Susanna finished. Hemothorax. Yes, she thought grimly. She’d read about that. It made perfect sense.
“Ah,” said the doctor, in a tone of surprise. “So the patient is both lovely and clever.”
“She’s also mine,” Bram growled. “Don’t get any ideas. She’s mine.”
Susanna squeezed his hand. That sort of talk was so medieval and possessive. And she loved him for it.
“Yes, well.” Daniels cleared his throat and reached for his satchel. “The good news is, this is all too common on the battlefield.”
“How on earth is that good news?” Bram asked.
“Let me rephrase. The good news is, I’ve seen this many times, and there’s a simple cure. It’s a newer, controversial treatment. But I’ve used it in the field, with great success. All we need to do is drain the blood from her chest, and the condition will resolve.”
“No.” Wild with fear, she struggled to make the words. “Bram, no. Don’t . . . don’t let him bleed me.”
“You can’t bleed her,” he said. “She had too much of that in her youth, and it nearly did her in.” He turned her wrist scars-up for the surgeon’s view.
“So I see.”
And then Mr. Daniels did the truly astonishing. Something none of those doctors or surgeons in her youth had ever done. He crouched at her shoulder, where she could look him in the eye. And then he talked to her, not about her. As if she had a brain of her own, and full control over her own body.
“Miss Finch, if I can say it without risking a thumping from Bramwell here, you strike me as a very intelligent woman. I hope you will understand and believe me then, when I tell you this is no quack bloodletting. The pressure in your chest is unlikely to resolve on its own. If we do nothing, there is a good chance you’ll die. Of course, there’s always the risk of infection with such a procedure. But you’re young and strong. I like your chances against a fever better than I like your chances against this.” He thumped lightly on her distended chest, and it sounded strangely dull. “I won’t do anything without your agreement, however.”
Susanna regarded him with keen appraisal. He was young, it seemed. Scarcely older than she. His hair was unruly, but his eyes were calm and intelligent. Still, on this short acquaintance, she didn’t know that she could bring herself to trust any man who carried one of those horrific black satchels.
But there was someone else. Someone she could always trust to protect her.
She looked to Bram. “Do you . . . trust him . . . with my life?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then . . .” She pressed his hand and sucked another painful breath through a rapidly narrowing straw. “I trust you. Love you.” She needed to say that, once more.
Relief washed over his face. “Do it,” Bram told his friend.
She could bear this. So long as it was her choice, and Bram was beside her . . . she could bear anything.
Or so she thought, until she glimpsed the silver gleam of a blade, pressed against her pale skin. The sight made her recoil in horror. Her whole body flinched.
Daniels lifted the scalpel. “Where is that blacksmith? We may have to restrain her.”
No. Please God, no. All the nightmarish memories came rushing back. The footmen, pinning her to the bed. The sharp fire of the lancet against her wrist.
“No,” Bram said firmly. “No restraints. No one touches her but me.” He turned her head to face him. “Don’t look at what he’s doing. Only look at me.”
She obeyed, skimming her gaze over the handsome features of his face and letting herself sink into those familiar jade-green eyes.
He interlaced his fingers with hers. With the other hand, he stroked her hair. So tenderly.
“Now listen to me, Susanna. Do you remember that first night we met in the cove? I can refresh your memory, if need be. You were wearing that horrid bathing costume, and I was wearing a medieval torture device.”
She smiled. Only he could make her smile at a time like this.
“That night, you suggested we make some promises to each other. Well, we’re going to make them now. I’m going to promise not to leave. And you’re going to promise not to die. All right?”
She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out.
“I promise to stay at your side,” he said, “until this is all over. And for the lifetime after that. Now, make your promise to me.” His eyes glistened, and his voice was rough with emotion. “Promise me, Susanna. Tell me you won’t die. I can’t go on without you, love.”
She gritted her teeth, and managed a tiny nod.
Then the blade pierced her. And if there’d been any air left in her lungs, she would have screamed.
The pain was like fire. Burning and intense. But relief followed swiftly, like a quenching rain.
That first rush of air into her lungs . . . she was dizzied by it, turned upside-down. The world narrowed, and she felt as though she’d stumbled into a deep, dark well. As she fell down and down, she heard distant voices. Bram’s. The surgeon’s.“I believe she’s gone unconscious.”
“Perhaps that’s a mercy.”
Yes, she thought, swirling and tumbling into the darkness.
Yes, it was a mercy indeed.
Twenty-nine
She’ll recover soon enough. If she doesn’t take a fever.
Those had been Daniels’s words to him, after the procedure was complete. But it could not have been so easy. A few hours later—almost as soon as they’d seen her settled back at Summerfield—the fever had set in.
Now Bram hadn’t left her side in days.
He kept an unceasing vigil at her bedside. He passed the hours tending her in small ways. Coaxing her to take spoonfuls of willow bark tea, or sponging the fevered sweat from her brow. Sometimes he talked to her. Read aloud to her from the newspaper, or told her stories of his childhood and his years on campaign. Anything that crossed his mind. Other times, he shamelessly pleaded with her, begging her to just wake up and be well.
He ate, when coaxed. The indefinite postponement of the village festivities had left Spindle Cove with a surfeit of Fosbury’s cakes. There always seemed to be a tray of the pastel-iced things close at hand. Bram found himself developing a taste for them, in a wistful sort of way.
He slept, infrequently and fitfully. He prayed, with a regularity and intensity that would do a Benedictine proud.
Others came and went from the sickroom. Daniels. The housemaids. Sir Lewis Finch. Even Colin and Thorne came by. They all urged Bram to take a break now and then. Go downstairs for a proper meal, they said. Have a rest in the bedchamber they’d made up down the corridor.
He refused all their well-meant suggestions. Every last one. He’d made a promise not to leave her. To stay at her side, until this was done. And he’d be damned if he’d give Susanna any excuse to drop her end of the bargain.
So long as he stayed right here, she could not die.
Sir Lewis sat with him one afternoon, occupying the chair on the other side of the bed. The old man rubbed the back of his neck. “She looks better today, I think.”
Bram nodded. “She is better. We think.”
That morning, as he’d been adjusting the pillows beneath her head, his forearm had brushed against her cheek. Instead of scalding with fever, her skin had felt cool to his touch. He’d called in Daniels to confirm it, not trusting himself after so many hours of vain hoping.
But it seemed to be true. The fever had broken. Now it only remained to be seen if she would wake from it with no ill effects. The vigil was easier now, and yet unbearable in its suspense.
“Sir Lewis, there’s something you should know.” Bram took Susanna’s hand in his. It lay wonderfully cool and limp across his palm. “I plan to marry her.”
“Oh. You plan to marry her?” The old man fixed him with a watery blue stare. “That’s how you ask a gentleman for his only daughter’s hand? Bramwell, I would think your father had raised you better than that.”
“Your blessing would be welcome,” he said evenly. “But no, I’m not asking you for her hand. Susanna’s wise enough to make her own decisions.”
That was as close as he could bring himself to requesting Sir Lewis’s approval. He damned well wouldn’t ask the man’s permission. As far as Bram was concerned, the moment Sir Lewis had lit that cannon fuse, he’d surrendered all responsibility for Susanna’s welfare. The old man had endangered his daughter’s work, her friends, her very life—and all in the name of glory.
Bram would protect her now. As her husband, if she’d have him.
“My only daughter, getting married. She is all grown now, isn’t she?” With a trembling hand, Sir Lewis touched his sleeping daughter’s hair. “Seems just yesterday she was a babe in arms.”
“That wasn’t yesterday,” Bram said, unable to restrain himself. “Yesterday, she lay in this bed, burning with fever and hovering near death.”
“I know. I know. And you blame me. You think me a self-serving monster.” He paused, as if waiting for Bram to argue otherwise.
Bram didn’t.
“One day,” Sir Lewis said, pointing to himself, “this self-serving monster’s greatest invention will be perfected, and it will see battle. That cannon will shorten the duration of sieges. Allow troops to attack from a safer distance. It will save the lives and limbs of many English soldiers.”
“Perhaps.”
“I love my daughter.” The old man’s voice went hoarse. “You’ll never know the sacrifices I’ve made for her. You have no idea.”
“Perhaps not, but I know the sacrifices she’s made for you. And you have no idea what a remarkable person she’s become. You’re so absorbed in your own work, your own accomplishments. I’ve no doubt you do love Susanna, Sir Lewis. But you’re bollocks bad at it.”
Sir Lewis paled. “How dare you speak to me that way?”
“I believe I can speak to you any way I wish. I’m the Earl of Rycliff, remember?”
“I should have never secured you that title.”
“It’s not in your power to take it back. I’m the lord now.” Bram drew a slow, deep breath, trying to calm his rage. He was furious with Sir Lewis for putting Susanna and Finn and all the others in danger. But with any good fortune, this man would soon be his father-in-law. For Susanna’s sake, they would need to make peace.
“My father held you in the highest regard,” Bram said. “So do I, on professional merits. You’re a brilliant inventor, without question. Your creations have helped the British army prevail on many a battlefield, and as many times as I’ve lifted my Finch pistol in defense, I probably owe you my life. But your daughter, Sir Lewis . . .”
Bram turned his gaze to the sleeping Susanna and squeezed her hand. “Your daughter puts people back together. Young ladies, no less—who defy all rational formula. And she still finds time for the occasional washed-up, wounded officer. I may not owe her my life, but I owe her my heart.”
His eyes burned at the corners. He blinked hard. “If you think that rifled cannon will be your greatest invention, you’re a fool. Your greatest invention is right here, sleeping in this bed. Susanna is your legacy. And in your pride, you almost lost her.”