The Artist's Healer - Regina Scott Page 0,10
appeared to be in excellent health: color in her cheeks, a sparkle to her green eyes. She’d draped a short jacket of a similar shade of green about her shoulders. The color made the ginger of her hair and lips more noticeable.
“Did your mother put up your hair?” he asked. All too easy to focus on the warm color, estimate the thickness, imagine the feel of it. Ahem.
She raised her uninjured arm to touch a hand to the braid about her head. “Yes. Why do you ask?”
Linus collected himself. “Just making sure you’re following doctor’s orders.”
That brought the familiar light flaring into her eyes. “I don’t follow anyone’s orders, sir.”
“A slip of the tongue,” Linus assured her.
She leaned forward. “Then we are agreed I may rise from this bed?”
“We can consider it tomorrow,” he hedged. “Until then, continue the regime I prescribed.”
She made a face as she leaned back. “May I at least have something better than gruel? Mother tells me the Mermaid has a lovely beef stew tonight.”
“I cannot advise red meat,” he started, but he could see her stiffening, as if building up the energy to fight him. “However, if you concentrate on the vegetables instead, I will allow it.”
“How very generous of you.”
He had not been aware those words could be said so venomously.
“Until the morning, then,” he replied and went to collect his son.
Once more Ethan walked with him down High Street, head bowed as if he counted each stone they passed. The stillness at the spa had been restful. The silence now made Linus’s shoulders feel tight, as if his muscles had suddenly pulled themselves into a ball. Not so long ago, when Linus had come home from his practice at the end of the day, Ethan would have told him stories—castles he’d built with his blocks, mathematical problems he’d solved. Now he spoke only when necessary.
“How are you and Mrs. Archer getting along?” Linus asked as they turned onto the path toward the cottage.
“She’s very kind,” Ethan allowed, head still bowed. The sea breeze ruffled his hair.
“Oh?” Linus encouraged. “How so?”
“She lets me draw as much as I like, and she brings me treats from the bakery.”
Why was he suddenly jealous of a baker? “We could purchase treats as well. Nothing too sweet and not often enough to disrupt your diet, of course.”
“Yes, sir,” Ethan said dutifully. He climbed the steps to the cottage as cautiously as an old man.
Linus almost slammed the cottage door shut behind them. But no. He would not allow such a display. Ethan deserved better.
And Linus knew why the display was so tempting. He was frustrated, with himself and their situation. Catriona was to have been his partner, the mother to their son. Her charm, her beauty, had won his heart, but marrying her had been a mistake. She’d craved a life he could not give her, a life he still didn’t fully understand. In the end, she’d chosen that life over him and their son and left them behind. He still struggled to forgive her for her choices.
But he refused to let Ethan see any of that. His son deserved to live without the fears, the burdens.
If only Linus could find a prescription that would help the two of them find happiness again.
Chapter Four
Abigail took particular pleasure from the look on Doctor Bennett’s face when he came to bring Ethan and check on her the next morning. As his son went to the dining room where her mother had hot chocolate waiting, the physician stopped in the middle of the sitting room and narrowed his eyes at her.
“I distinctly recall saying we might consider you getting out of bed,” he said.
Abigail rose from the sofa, her burgundy-colored skirts falling about her feet. It had taken an hour of practice that had left her sweating, but she could stand without putting either hand on the seat to help her. “I did consider it, and then I attempted it, and you can see for yourself that I am fine.”
His gaze swept over her, as if he was examining every inch, and her cheeks heated.
“Your color is too high,” he said, bringing his gaze to meet hers. “You obviously overexerted yourself.”
Abigail shook her head. “Have you ever considered that my color has less to do with my health and more to do with your infuriating suggestions?”
He frowned. “I suppose that’s possible. And how am I to examine your arm now that you’re clothed?”
“Ha!” She twisted to show him the white satin