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Scene #28
"Amelia, please. You don't look well. The physician said..."
"Damn the physician. He says much but does little." The high
lace collar she wore to hide the infernal wounds chafed. Amelia
wanted to rip it off, the hell with what anyone thought. It would
feel so good to let it open to the cool night air. Bandages had
done no good. The twin punctures no longer bled, but they refused
to heal as well. The only thing that seemed to ease their ache was
to leave them exposed to the air, and to the horrified curiosity of
strangers. Amelia shrugged off her brother's concerned grasp
with ferocious ease. Her gaze had been caught by that of a stranger
from across the room. In an instant, the distance and the heaving
mass of people between them had collapsed. The depth behind his
eyes was ancient and ageless at the same time. His eyes reminded
her of... No. It had merely been a trick of the light. An errant
reflection, not a wolfish shine. But the magnetism she felt was
too compelling. Even her weakness was no deterrent. If she could
just close with him, look into those dark wells... But he eluded
her easily, and she could not shake her overly solicitous brother.
"Edward, damn you. Let me be. I saw someone..." Edward's
grip was firmer and not so easily dislodged this time. "The
physician said you were not to tire yourself. That the night air
wasn't good for you. You'll catch your death." "Who's to say I
haven't already?" Amelia demanded, petulant. "Please release my
arm. I just want one more introduction, then I'll go with you,
docile and pliant, and let you turn down the bedclothes for me as
our mother would have done. Indulge me, Edward. Just one more."
Amelia tried standing on tiptoe to see past the bulk of Edward's
shoulders. The man she sought was nowhere in sight. "Michael
will kill us both," Edward grumbled under his breath, but he loosed
his grip on Amelia's arm, grasping her now below the elbow as the
need to restrain shifted to the need to support. Amelia was right;
nothing the physician advised had seemed to help her deathly
weakness and daily bouts of fatigue. She seemed to revive a little
in the evenings, a mixed blessing since she couldn't take her rest
at night. Every day dawned brightly anew while Amelia in contrast
seemed to slip further away. "Who are you looking for? I'll
fetch him for you if you promise to sit down and wait," Edward
offered. "That man with the raven hair and eyes. You can't have
missed him; he's easily the tallest man here." And the most
handsome, Amelia thought but didn't say. She certainly didn't need
to stoke her brother's possessiveness with jealousy yet. "The
tallest? There's no one here who stands out like that. Are you
certain you're not imagining things?" "Why when a man can't see
what's right under his nose, it's always the woman imagining
things?" Amelia retorted with more heat than she intended. "I
suppose I also imagined the thing that did this to me!" Her hand
flew to her collar and she nearly tore it off right there in front
of the startled curious eyes that had turned toward her outraged
cry. But before she could claw through the fine lace, rough and
clingy it seemed on her throat, a kid-gloved hand seized her own,
prisoning it easily within its massive clasp. "Please do not
trouble yourself, madame. I noticed you making your way towards me.
You seem... discomfited, so I thought to come to you instead. The
dreadful press of this crowd..." The lift of his upper lip
suggested he had encountered an unpleasant smell. The sudden
appearance in such contrast to the fluid smoothness of his voice
had caused Edward to jump slightly. Embarrassed, he tried to
interpose himself between his sister and this stranger who was so
suddenly, so solidly there. But the grip he had on Amelia's hand,
and that she had on him, Edward thought, was as if set in stone.
So fragile she looked, yet so fierce the grip... Like a drowning
woman, clutching at anything buoyant. "Easy, young man. I have
the best of intentions toward your sister." The man's tone was
conciliatory, but to Edward it sounded condescending. "Young
m... How exactly do you know she's my sister?" Edward demanded.
"Because I told him," Michael sounded out of breath, as is he'd
been forced to an uncomfortable pace following the stranger. "Your
physician, Amelia, introduced us. He thinks Lord Raduvan, here,
might be able to help."
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