“Naturally, I’m going to fuss over you. You’re my wife.” He examined her bandages. “What did the villain use? A lancet?”

“A scarificator.”

Jasper made a soft sound of disgust as he took her left arm. It was bandaged even more heavily than her right. He glanced up at her in question.

“It wouldn’t stop bleeding,” she said.

He clenched his jaw, so angry on her behalf he could scarcely get the words out without snarling them. “Where were your parents?”

“They’d gone to their rooms by then. It was only Mary and me. And Dr. Cordingley.”

Jasper couldn’t understand how her mother and father could have allowed her to be subjected to such an outrage. “You must have been very ill for them to summon the man.”

“I wasn’t ill,” Julia said quietly. It was the same thing she’d said in her bedroom at Belgrave Square.

He gave her a sharp look. “What?”

“I wasn’t ill. I only needed some time alone, by myself, with my books. The only way I’m permitted any privacy is if I’m in poor health. So . . . I said that I was. That’s why Dr. Cordingley was summoned.”

Understanding sank in. Jasper didn’t know if he should be amused or appalled. “You’ve done this before.”

“Sometimes.” Her color heightened. “Often,” she amended. “It isn’t as bad as it sounds.”

“You let him bleed you so you could stay in bed reading a novel?”

“You make it sound quite unreasonable.”

“Julia—” He broke off. “My God.”

She tugged her hand from his grasp. “And I don’t let Dr. Cordingley do anything. I never ask for him to come. My parents are the ones who summon him. It’s the price I must pay to be left alone. In the past, it’s seemed to be worth it.”

“Not today, obviously.”

“No. Not today.”

Jasper was poised to say more on the subject, but Julia was in no state to hear it. Her face, in the firelight, was as bloodless and pale as it had been when he’d called on her in Belgrave Square.

He came to an instant decision.

Sweeping her up in his arms, he carried her to the bed. She opened her mouth to object, but he silenced her with a look as he set her down on the edge of the mattress. “I should have known this would be too fatiguing for you. Had I been thinking clearly when we arrived, I’d have ordered you straight to bed.”

“Ordered me,” she scoffed. “Really, Jasper.”

He gave her a dark glance as he crouched down to untie her boots.

“My dear,” she said, correcting herself.

“That’s better.” He removed her boots, and then, reaching up beneath her skirts, he found the satin ribbon garter tied above her right knee.

Julia sucked in a scandalized breath. “What are you doing?”

“I’m removing your stockings.”

“You mustn’t.” She pushed against his shoulders. “I mean it. I can do that part myself.”

His fingers curved around the back of her silk-clad knee. “Let me,” he said. “Please.”