Addicted (9 page)

Anais stood frozen, shocked, horrified. The implications of what she was witnessing spun with dizzying speed in her head. Her chest began to rise and fall too rapidly and she felt as though she were being choked by the blue ribbon around her throat. With shaking hands she tore the bonnet from her head. How could Lindsay have done this to her? How, after what they had shared with each other in the stable, could he so easily fall into the arms of another?

“Jesus, how long?” She wasn’t certain if Lindsay knew he said the words aloud.

“Long enough to see you with her and hear that you love her,” she whispered, choking back a sob. She looked away, sickened by the sight of him and saw, for the first time, the woman who was pressed against him.

“Why?” she asked in what was little more than a half-strangled whisper. But she could not finish the sentence. She could not look at Rebecca pressed against Lindsay, her breasts glistening from Lindsay’s mouth. She could not stand to see the woman who had been her trusted friend wearing her costume—the only thing she had ever owned that had not been designed or ordered by her mother. The only thing she had ever wanted Lindsay to see her wearing. Oh, God, what a stupid trusting fool she had been to think that Rebecca had picked up her muslin sack by mistake. It had not been by mistake, but by design—a cruel, ugly design.

“It was you I said those words to. I thought she was you, Anais,” he stammered. “Let me explain—”

“I don’t think the words are necessary, darling,” Rebecca purred, reminding Anais of the snake her friend truly was. “I think what Anais saw speaks for itself. We needn’t hide it anymore.”

“Don’t touch me,” Lindsay snapped, shaking off Rebecca’s hold on his arm. “Goddamn you, what have you done?”

“It’s what you have done, Lindsay,” Anais replied. “You have done this.”

“Let me explain,” he muttered, staggering closer. “I was with Wallingford. I was…slipped something…that is, I took something that made me confused. I thought Rebecca was you. I
believed,
Anais, that it was truly you.”

“How could you think such a thing? We look nothing alike.”

“Nor are we the same size.” Rebecca’s voice dripped with venom.

Lindsay shot Rebecca a murderous glare as he held on to the wall, supporting his wavering frame. “Anais, listen to me. It was a drug. I’m not drunk. I swear it. It was a mistake. I thought it was you. Believed it was you…believe me, Anais.”

“Lies,” Anais whispered brokenly as she fixed her blurry gaze on Lindsay. “Everything you said, everything you told me…it was nothing but lies. What we did, that was a lie, too. You were just amusing yourself with me—God, how you must have laughed at me, falling for your seductions so easily.”

“Don’t say that, Anais.”

“What, that you were bored silly that night so you thought you’d take me—plain, undesirable spinster that I am—out to the stables for a little amusement? You probably thought you
were doing me a favor by sleeping with me. You must have really felt sorry for me that night to put up with such an inexperienced wallflower like me—especially when you could have had…” Anais glanced at Rebecca and felt her throat squeeze shut. “When you could have had someone beautiful, someone as desirable as
her.
”

“I wanted you—I want
you,
” he corrected with a frown. “You know that. Just remember how it was, Anais.”

“I remember all too well. I remember a woman who is not beautiful, a woman with a round body that is too full in the belly and the hips, a woman who thought she was beautiful enough for someone like you. Obviously I was an evening of sport until you could move on to better and prettier things.” God, to think of the way she had blindly believed him. Never questioning his sincerity, actually believing that he had not proposed after making love to her because he wanted it to be special like he claimed. And she had fallen for it.

“No, this is a mistake. It’s not what it seems,” he began, taking a staggering step toward her while using his hand against the wall for support.

Anais felt her lips twist with disgust. He looked so very much like his father, stumbling toward her, fumbling with the fastenings of his trousers, his curling hair in disarray, his shirttails hanging outside his trousers. She could hardly look at him without wanting to vomit. This was not the Lindsay of her childhood. This was not the man she had lain with two nights ago. This was a stranger—a dissipated wastrel she had never seen before.

“No, please. Don’t look at me like that, Anais. Don’t look at me like you do him. I’m not like
him,
” he roared, staggering
toward her. “Listen to me and let me explain. I don’t want Rebecca. I don’t want anyone but you.”

Anais was suddenly aware of a strong presence beside her. Without looking, she knew that it was Lord Broughton. His arm around her waist was strong and comforting and she sagged against his side.

“Broughton! Thank God…tell her—tell her about the drug…” Lindsay pleaded, lurching toward them. “Broughton knows…he was with me—”

“For as long as I live I shall remember you this way,” Anais gasped through trembling lips as she tried to stem her sob of pain. “Never have you resembled
him
more than you do now. You’ve broken my heart.” She covered her mouth once more, praying she would be able to leave before she completely broke down. “I wish I had never let you touch me.”

“No, Anais,” he said, his voice pleading.
“Christ, no, don’t say that!”

But she turned from him, and Garrett, who was just as shocked by Rebecca’s betrayal, reached for her and took her into his arms.

“I’m sorry,” Lindsay cried. “Christ, don’t leave!”

Anais closed her eyes, blocking out the sound, hating the words she had heard him say so many times before. Such meaningless, empty words. Such a meaningless act. What a fool she had been. A hopeless, romantic fool.

“I will not lose you!” Lindsay roared as she turned and walked away, still holding fiercely onto Garrett’s arm. “You cannot run from me, Anais. I will find you.
Anais!
” Her name, ripped from the depths of Lindsay’s tortured soul, echoed throughout the hall and Anais shivered, still hearing him calling her name even after the carriage wheels had set into motion.

4

Ten months later

“Anais, you must come downstairs, at least for a cup of tea. It is Christmas Eve, you cannot possibly spend it up here in your room,
oh—
” Ann’s voice broke off when she came waltzing into the room and spotted Anais lying in bed with Robert Middleton’s ear to her breast.

“I’m sorry,” Ann mumbled, clearly horrified that she had walked in on her sister in such an intimate position.

“Don’t be silly, Ann. Dr. Middleton was just finishing with me, were you not, sir?”

“Indeed I was, Lady Anais.” He straightened away from her. “I shall check in with you tomorrow to see how you are faring.”

“Surely you do not need to call on me tomorrow? ’Tis Christmas morn, and you have a wife and child that you will not wish to leave.”

He reached for her hand, clasping it tightly in his warm one. “I shall see you tomorrow, Lady Anais. Sleep well and remember you are not to exert yourself.” He snapped shut the wooden cylinder he had used to listen to her chest. “It’s utterly amazing.
Your heart sounds much stronger than it did two days ago. If you keep this up, you shall be wandering about the woods in no time.”

“Thank you, Dr. Middleton.”

“Just Robert,” he murmured as he placed his hat over his dark blond hair. “We have, after all, known each other since we were in swaddling clothes.”

“Thank you, Robert,” Anais replied, knowing he would not be happy until she did so. And truth be told, she did feel silly acting so formal around him. She had known him all her life. He was Garrett’s younger brother after all.

“Send word to The Lodge if you need me. And remember, you are not to be near drafts or the cold air. The cold makes it harder for the heart to pump the blood. Your heart doesn’t need the strain. I’m afraid you shall have to miss out on the church service this evening. Your condition is delicate, you must not take any risks.”

“Mother says that she believes you are much too young to attend me,” Anais said, laughing at him and his boyish pout.

“No doubt she puts more stock in that old physician of hers, the one whose medical books were written in the time of the Bible.”

“She’s threatened to send him to me.”

“Whatever you do, don’t let him bleed you, Anais.”

“I won’t, Robert.”

“Well, then, if that is all, I shall be on my way. The weather, it appears, has taken a turn for the worst.”

“Never know what winter will bring in Worcestershire.”

He nodded and reached for his brown pigskin bag. “It’s much
the same in Edinburgh. Well, then, good night, Anais, and happy Christmas to you.”

“To you, too. Wish Margaret the same and give your daughter a kiss for me.”

“I shall,” he said, beaming a wide smile at the mention of his child. “I certainly shall. Happy Christmas, Lady Ann,” he said, inclining his head as he passed her sister.

Ann came over to the bed and sat down beside her after Dr. Middleton had closed the door. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize he was still here. He was up here for a very long time.”

Anais shrugged and picked at the loose thread of the woolen blanket that covered her. She couldn’t help but notice how pale her fingers still looked and how her veins, so blue and cold, could be seen through her skin, as if her flesh was nothing but transparent tissue that was used for papier-mâché.

“You are improving?” Ann captured her gaze. “You must be, for you look much better than you did a month ago when you returned from France. Lud, you looked on death’s door when Lord Broughton carried you in. I vow, it was providence indeed that you met up with him in Paris, for Aunt Millie would have been in hysterics had she to deal with you alone, and in a foreign city.”

“It was very fortunate that I met up with his lordship,” she muttered, not wanting to talk about Garrett and the events that had taken place.

“Has Dr. Middleton told you what your delicate condition is? He’s mentioned it several times to Mama and Papa, but he is rather vague to its cause.”

Anais let her sister see her impatience. “I have told you, Ann, that it is nothing more than a bit of fever and malaise.”

Ann arched an intelligent, blond brow, clearly not believing what she was hearing, but letting the rebuke slide. “Mother told Father that it is most likely your womanly organs rotting away in spinsterhood that is causing your heart to fail. But father believes that you’ve caught some sort of virulent brain fever from the French.”

Anais smiled and reached for Ann’s hand. “I vow, Ann, my womanly organs are just fine. And I am not allowing that quack, Dr. Thurston, to talk Mother into believing that my condition is nothing more than hysteria caused by my woman’s parts.”

Ann chuckled. “When you say it, Anais, it sounds like such flummery. How can a woman’s organs make one hysterical?”

“They can’t. Dr. Thurston just despises women, that is all.”

“Louisa has come to me.” Ann sobered. “I thought you would want to know that your maid is concerned that your last flux lasted nearly two weeks. It was rather…er…according to Louisa, it was rather heavy.”

“For heaven’s sake,” Anais groaned, blushing all the way to her scalp. “Is nothing sacred in this house?”

“Of course not,” Ann said with a grin. “In a house filled with women, how can a subject like monthlies be kept quiet? Still, Louisa fears that it may indeed be your womanly organs that are making you ill after all.”

“The humiliation!” Anais said with mock horror. “What? Do all the maids line up in a row while they gather our monthly padding and discuss our courses? Does the entire house know when one is early, or one is late?”

“I should think the late bit would be most talked about,” Ann said, sticking out her tongue in a cheeky manner. “Imagine the
gossip if one of us were to miss our monthlies. Mother would interrogate us for hours if she ever found out.”

“Mama cares only about Mama. I doubt she’d care a tuppence about something as mundane as monthlies.”

“True,” Ann agreed. “But still, I thought you would like to know. And
I
want to know that you are on the mend. The bleeding has stopped, hasn’t it?” Ann asked, concern once again creeping into her eyes.

“It has.”

“Father said there was nothing wrong with you that rest won’t cure. He always takes up your side, you know.”

“You are right about Father having a soft spot for me. And thank heavens for that, because if it were up to Mama, I would be in the care of Dr. Thurston, being bled every day and confined to bed with my womanly organs while he contrives to find a way to keep them from making me mad.”

“Yes,” Ann said, laughing. “Papa adores you as I know very well that you adore him. Every man you have ever met is held up to him, aren’t they? He is the pinnacle that your suitors must strive for.”

Anais felt herself blush. It was true, no matter how silly the notion sounded. Her father was a good, kind, honest man. Was it so wrong for her to desire that the man she choose to marry and commit her life to, be nothing short of the sort her father was?

“And then there is Mama,” Ann said with a groan. “She is forever making me fuss over my appearance. She is only interested in me when I am looking pretty and am dressed in frilly gowns with layers of flounces and bows. She never bothers to read my poems, and furthermore, I don’t believe she listens to
me when I sing, unless of course I’m surrounded by potential beaux. Then she uses it to her advantage to inform everyone, most embarrassingly, I might add, what a wonderful wife I shall make. I vow, Mama never has a substantial thought in her head. She never thinks of anything other than fashion and her toilette. How could father have married such a shallow person?”

“Love is blind, I suppose.” Anais thought of how she had been blinded by love. Love had stopped her from seeing what Lindsay was truly like. Naiveté had prevented her from realizing that Rebecca was not truly her dearest friend. She had been so blind to many things this past year.