“Tell me.“ He commands.
“I-it was Lady Dinah, My Lord. She had her visit Geeva at the apothecary.”
“And then,” he asks as I beat my hands against his hard back.
“She gave herthetincture.”
Jasce stalks past the maid, down the long hallway, and to a study. He shoves the door open, and Lady Dinah stands at his sudden entrance.
“Don’t you ever drug my wife again,” he roars, his tone positively feral.
“J-Jasce…” she stammers, her voice small, feeble in the face of his anger.
Without another word, he leaves the room. I thrash in his arms as he strolls down the hallway and to his bedchamber. He pushes open the door and lowers me to my feet.
I sink to my bottom on the marble and sway my hands in front of my face. “It was a womb blessing,” I say in a sing-song voice.
A wobbly smile spreads across my mouth as I hum the words.
“Stop it!” he demands.
I hum even louder.
He crosses the room, pours water into a goblet, and brings it to me.
When I don’t take it from him, he kneels in front of me and forces some between my lips. I swallow and push it away.
“More.” Determination burns in his eyes as he raises it to my mouth again, and I dutifully take a few sips.
He brings it to my lips again and again until there is no water left.
Torchlight flares with the heat in his eyes as he rises to his feet and carries the goblet to the table. I remain frozen on the marble floor, my mind still hazy, yet alert enough to be mortified.
I hunch in half, remembering dancing in a room full of men.
Did I really tell them I was air?
“I don’t understand,” I say after a while, my stare locked on the veins in the marble.
Jasce sits on the sofa as I push to my feet and walk to the washing stand, where I quickly wet my heated skin.
“Dinah knows you haven’t shared my bed. She was trying to weaken your resistance by giving you that tincture.”
“How would she know?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe you told her.” I rub my index finger against my throbbing temple.
“It is none of her business,” he snaps.
“Maybe you even conspired with her,” I say unfairly, considering everything he did for me.
He doesn’t respond.
I take a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
“I know.”
