Danice Allen Page 6

  She quickly snapped open the watch locket pinned to her bodice and leaned toward the dim glow of the fire to ascertain the time. It was three o’clock in the morning!

  “You had too much faith in me, doctor,” she muttered under her breath as she rose to her feet. “You said I couldn’t do anything wrong. Well, I’ve just ignored my patient for three hours, and heaven knows what condition he’s in!”

  Amanda quickly crossed the cold floor to the stranger’s bed. She could hear him moving about and hurriedly lighted another candle and set it on the bedside table. She was shocked at her first clear view of him; he’d changed from looking as pale and still as a marble effigy atop someone’s tomb to looking flushed and restless.

  His black hair was damp and wildly tumbled on the pillow from turning his head from side to side. His lips looked parched, and the front of his shirt was soaked through with sweat. He mumbled unintelligibly and shouted exclamations that plainly revealed that he was delirious and reliving horrific experiences of some battle.

  Riddled with guilt and the fear that she may have neglected her duty just long enough to guarantee the stranger’s death, Amanda set to work with a vengeance. She threw back the bedclothes, determined to follow the doctor’s instructions down to the letter even if it made her blush crimson. He’d clearly said that if the stranger developed a fever, she was to strip him down to nothing.

  Amanda bit her lip as the man’s long, muscled legs were revealed below the hem of his long shirt, the tail of which barely covered his private parts. She knew now that the gentleman did not embrace the practice of wearing drawers. But soon it wouldn’t matter, anyway. She had to take his shirt off, and then he’d be as naked as a babe … but with the developed body of a mature man.

  Swallowing nervously, trying to be as objective as a nurse might be in the same situation, she unbuttoned his shirt with trembling fingers. There were a great many small slippery buttons, and she had to lean close to his body to see what she was doing.

  With his shirt half open and a glimpse of his chest impairing her concentration, his right arm suddenly lifted and curved around her shoulders, flattening her upper body against him. With her nose buried in crisp curling hair, and a hard nipple pushing into her cheek, Amanda braced her hands against the man’s chest and tried to straighten up.

  “No, Laura,” said the man in a thick voice. “Don’t go, love. I need you….”

  Then, just as suddenly as he’d grabbed her, he let her go. Amanda straightened immediately and worked faster on the buttons, worried that he might take another notion to pin her down to that hard, broad chest.

  Chastising herself for being so unforgivably carnal as to admire his physique when she needed all her concentration to save his life, Amanda pulled off the shirt without stopping to think or look or register any sort of emotion. The shirt turned out to be much easier to take off than his jacket, particularly since he was constantly moving and lifting his arms instead of lying still.

  The shirt was off and on the floor, and Amanda walked to a little chest of drawers where she had a basin of vinegar water and a cloth ready and waiting. She dropped the cloth in the water, carried the basin to the bedside table, then set it down.

  She hesitated for a few seconds as she tried to convince herself that she could sponge the gentleman off without allowing her eyes to stray to “that part” of his anatomy. She wondered if perhaps singing a hymn would help her thoughts remain chaste while she worked to get his fever, as well as her own alarmingly warm thoughts, under control.

  She wrung out the cloth and began by pressing it to the stranger’s hot forehead. He immediately responded with a sort of grateful gasp. And when she began to sing in a breathless, barely audible voice, she sensed a general calm wash over him.

  Could it be possible? she wondered, amazed and flattered. Could she really be a comforting influence to this strange man? Thinking that perhaps the words of the song were what comforted him, she sang a little louder. She decided that perhaps he was a respectable, religious man after all if he could be soothed by a hymn.

  She slid the cloth over his face, along his jaw—scratchy with the beginnings of a black beard—over his dry lips and down his neck. It was a strong, tightly corded neck that curved into broad, brown shoulders. She dipped her cloth again and bathed his shoulders and chest, circling self-consciously around his small wine-colored nipples.

  At this point, she had to stop singing for a moment to swallow hard. Then she resumed her song in a stronger, more determined voice. This time she was singing entirely for herself … trying to bolster her own wavering courage as she approached that part of his body she’d been trying to pretend didn’t exist.

  But it did exist, and with a freshly dipped cloth making its way down his taut, flat abdomen, she was forced at last to face reality.

  Amanda’s song caught in her throat. Naturally she’d never seen a naked male body before, but once, when she was looking in her father’s expansive library for a medical book that would explain some of Prissy’s arthritic symptoms, she had run across a volume that diagrammed both male and female forms. So, while she was not entirely unprepared for what she saw, seeing it in the flesh, so to speak, was rather stunning. She looked … fascinated and not the least bit properly repelled.

  “Gretta?”

  Amanda jerked guiltily when the stranger spoke.

  “Why are you stopping, Gretta?” he asked in a weak, plaintive voice. “I like it when you bathe me, sweetheart.”

  In his delirium, he seemed to bounce from the battlefield to the bedchamber in the blink of an eye. Amanda wondered what had happened to Laura, whom he had mentioned only moments before, and decided that perhaps she’d been precipitate in bestowing him with a religious nature. Theo’s conjecture, that he was a rogue, was probably much closer to the mark.

  Amanda ran the cool cloth down both long legs. She discovered a thick, ugly scar on his right knee that made her wince. She could imagine how serious the wound had been when it was fresh. She thoroughly dampened down every inch of his body, then started at the top again and repeated the exercise several times. After an hour of these intimate ministrations, she noticed that his skin felt cooler and had returned to a more natural color. Glancing in a mirror near the bed, however, she observed that her own complexion was exceedingly rosy.

  But how could it be otherwise? She had just attained a thorough knowledge of the physique of the male sex and a detailed familiarity with one very masculine body in particular. Every significant mole, every angle of bone and curve of lean muscle was etched on her memory forever. As long as she lived, she’d never be able to erase from her mind the image of this stranger stretched out naked on the bed.

  Like a guilty pleasure, the sight of him was stirring and disturbing at the same time. She knew she had no choice but to look at him … but she enjoyed looking.

  It was a long night for Amanda. Once she got his fever down, however, she was grateful to be able to cover him up again. He continued to be restless and to talk in his sleep, naming several more females. In connection with these names, there was sometimes a fleeting smile on his lips, a bawdy suggestion, or a soft-spoken endearment. Amanda could no longer ignore the obvious; whether he was married or not, the stranger was definitely a lady’s man.

  Near dawn, the stranger seemed to fall into a more natural sleep. Instead of lying flat on his back in a funereal pose, he actually shifted onto his side, drew his knees up, and tucked his hands against his chest. Feeling much more at ease about his condition but still worried that he might have a relapse, Amanda drew the rocking chair near the bed and sat down.

  She had been sitting only a very few minutes when she realized how cold the room was. She got up and threw kindling and a large log on the fire and stoked the embers. When she returned to the rocking chair, she drew her feet up under her skirt and wrapped herself in the quilt but she was still cold.

  It occurred to her that now that the stranger’s fever had abated, he might b
e cold also but was too soundly asleep to realize it. At the moment, he was covered only by a sheet and a thin blanket. She wasn’t about to neglect her duties as nurse again, so she unfolded another quilt that was hanging over the footboard of the bed and drew it up and over the stranger’s shoulders.

  Tucking the blanket under his bewhiskered chin, resting her hands on his shoulders, and leaning close enough to admire the way his thick lashes feathered over his tan cheek, she couldn’t help but linger and look. But she lingered too long. Out from under the covers came his left arm, reaching around her shoulders as he’d done before and drawing her to his chest.

  “Lie with me, sweetheart,” he murmured huskily.

  “Indeed, I cannot,” Amanda said breathlessly, trying to pull away.

  “Don’t play the tease with me, Angela,” he said, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “I know you want to. And I’m so cold….”

  Amanda thought that for an unconscious man his strength was quite amazing. Every time she wriggled in an attempt to free herself, his hold on her tightened.

  At this point, after hours of tending and worrying over the fellow, Amanda was bone weary. Caught in the stranger’s embrace, she was experiencing some new and pleasant sensations as well. Amanda had never in her entire life been held in such a manner. And even though he thought she was “Angela,” the circle of his arms warmed and comforted her.

  Presently, tired of struggling and desperate for some sleep, she eased herself onto the bed, reached behind her for the extra quilt, snuggled her head into the hollow of the stranger’s neck, and went to sleep.

  Jack was dreaming. He was in church, and an angel in a diaphanous white dress was floating overhead, singing a single hymn over and over again to the accompaniment of a gilded harp. The angel’s face was hidden behind a veil, but her voice had an ethereal quality that calmed and soothed him.

  Then, suddenly, she was not an angel, but a bride … a bride marching up the aisle, her train sweeping behind her like an anemic witch’s cape, her head bobbing up and down in time to a militant tune.

  He stood by the altar and waited … and sweated … the insides of his stomach sloshing like cream in a churn. He stuck his finger inside his tight collar and tried to breathe. But he couldn’t. He’d never breathe again because, in less time than it took to pull the legs off a spider, he’d be married. Married. Married!

  He fought hard to rise through the black, downy layers of unconsciousness. He needed to wake up before it was too late … before he was well and surely caught in the parson’s mousetrap.

  The black turned to gray mist; then spots of light broke through, but his eyes were still closed and seemed determined to stay that way. His lids felt heavy and gritty, his mouth felt as dry as a bale of winter hay, and a dull ache pounded his temples with the mournful regularity of a drumbeat in a funeral march.

  He must have been drinking last night, he reasoned … chirping merry till the crack of dawn, no doubt. And now he was paying for it. Would he ever learn?

  With much effort, he opened his eyes. He blinked against the glare of sun spilling through a small, square window covered with a flimsy curtain. He had no trouble recognizing that he was in a rented room at a public inn.

  As his eyes adjusted, his other senses kicked in. He could smell freshly laundered linen, and something sweeter and more fragrant. Something like … a woman.

  His eyes suddenly focused, and literally right under his nose was the source of the teasing scent. Hair … pale blond, gloriously shiny hair just inches away.

  Using his powers of deduction—which weren’t completely obliterated by the effects of alcohol—he knew that below the hair there had to be a face, and below the face a body … both of which he hoped were fetching.

  His brows furrowed. He liked to think he had consistently good taste in females, but for some reason, he couldn’t remember. He shrugged, knowing his full faculties and capabilities would return in time. This certainly wasn’t the first morning he’d awakened feeling decidedly cup-shot.

  One ability of which he was rather fond seemed to need no recuperative time period. Below the blanket he was nude … and aroused.

  That the lady he held in his arms was dressed and above the blankets seemed odd, but he was willing to wait for an explanation. For now he’d rather do again what they’d obviously done already and he’d forgotten.

  He bent and kissed the top of the blond head, the slight angling of his neck bringing a surprising twinge of sharp pain. He winced. “Damn every potent potable on the face of the earth,” he muttered thickly.

  In time the pain abated, but he decided to move his hands for a while instead of his head. He began to explore the curves of the female in his arms, starting at the swell of her womanly hips, moving to the dip of her slim waist, then up to the firm roundness of her breasts. They were good breasts, healthy and resilient, not too big nor too small but just right….

  She gave a soft little moan and shifted in his arms, her face now tilted so that he could look at her. She was lovely. And she wasn’t wearing a trace of cosmetics, which was highly unusual for a lightskirt of the sort that serviced public inns. He felt himself getting tighter, harder, and he decided that it was time to wake up Sleeping Beauty with the proverbial kiss.

  But as he lowered his face to hers, her eyes suddenly opened. They were as blue as a robin’s egg, lined all round with spiky brown lashes. And they were filled with terror.

  “Merciful heavens!” she screeched, pushing frantically at his chest, rolling off the bed, and springing to her feet, her long, tangled hair flying in the air. “Whatever do you think you’re doing?”

  Confused and irritated, Jack sat up, his blanket falling to his waist … and his head exploding!

  The sudden onslaught of excruciating pain struck him like a bolt of lightning. He squeezed his eyes shut and fought the encroaching darkness that threatened to consume him again. At all costs, he had to avoid the darkness … and the dream.

  His head fell to the pillow, and he reached instinctively toward the pain, bursts of blinding white playing against the dark curtain of his throbbing eyelids.

  Just as his hand came into contact with a strip of padded cloth covering his forehead, he felt the woman’s small cool fingers circle his wrists, restraining him. “Don’t disturb the wound!” she beseeched. “Please, sir, you might start to bleed again!”

  Jack’s eyes flew open. “What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded to know.

  Her eyes widened. “Don’t you remember the accident?”

  It was an effort to talk. Jack was nearly overcome by waves of nausea, and his tongue seemed stuck to the roof of his mouth.

  “I need something to drink,” he croaked, then clamped his jaw shut and ground his teeth together till they squeaked. He refused to throw up. He hated throwing up.

  “Here, take some of this,” said the woman in an urgent tone, placing the rim of a mug against his lips and gently tipping it.

  As the liquid drenched his mouth and seared down his parched throat, Jack was aware at first only of the blessed quenching of his thirst. Then he tasted the stuff, and his stomach did another turn. He started choking and pushed the mug away.

  “What the hell is that stuff?” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Water from the trough?”

  The woman puckered her lips disapprovingly and stood with her fists on her hips. “I am not accustomed to gentlemen cursing in my presence, sir, and I’d thank you very much if you’d refrain from doing so while we are forced to keep company! For your information, the liquid you just imbibed is a nourishing beverage the doctor recommended last night. He said I was to give it to you as soon as you would take it.”

  “Well, I won’t take it. I’d rather have—”

  “I know what you’d rather have,” the woman said tartly. “But you had far too much of that last night. Perhaps if you hadn’t been foxed, you’d have avoided the accident and neither of us would be i
n this predicament.”

  By now Jack had figured out that the woman was not a doxy. No doxy he’d ever consorted with dressed in simple, severe black. Nor had he ever met a doxy who talked like she did, spewing out prim indignation like a regular jaw-me-dead.

  So, she didn’t like his cursing, and she seemed miffed with him about something … something that had to do with the accident that had left him with this blasted head injury. His mind was a muddle, and he had a million questions. He knew that if he wanted the woman to cooperate and answer his questions nicely, he’d have to ask them nicely.

  With his head on the pillow and his eyes closed, the pain returned to a level he could tolerate. He was about to open his eyes again and make another go at requesting some tea—this time doing it like a gentleman would—when he felt the heavenly pressure of a cool, wet cloth on his brow. He looked up and saw the woman bending over him with a contrite expression.

  “I’m very sorry I snapped at you,” she said, dabbing the refreshing cloth here and there on his face, “but I’m very tired, you see. I was up half the night tending you through a fever. I’m extremely untidy this morning, too,” she continued, self-consciously pushing back the tangled hair that fell in abundance over both shoulders. “And that always puts a lady out of sorts.”

  “You look fine to me,” he murmured.

  “Apparently so,” she said, rosy spots appearing on both cheeks. “When I woke up, I noticed you were … er … touching me.”

  “I beg your pardon for that,” he answered awkwardly. “I was confused. I thought you were … someone else.” He couldn’t very well tell her he’d mistaken her for a lightskirt.

  She looked thoughtful as she redipped the cloth in a basin of water, wrung it out, and bathed his neck. “Considering your condition, I’m surprised you had the strength to attempt … well, you know,” she commented shyly.

  Jack smiled. “Men are surprisingly resourceful when it comes to finding strength for … well, you know.”

  The woman blushed again, then apparently decided that she’d had enough improper conversation and assumed a businesslike mien. She returned the cloth to the basin and stood up, elbows out, hands clasped loosely together at her waist. “You are doubtless thirsty and hungry, sir. Is there something you drink besides liquor?”