by Kresley Cole
She billowed a sheet over him, then blindly endeavored to cut away his ruined trousers underneath it. Frowning in concentration, she placed the shears only to yank her hand back. She was fairly certain she'd stabbed his waist.
Focusing on the opposite wall, she tried again, but pushed the sharp tips into his skin once more. This time he moaned and she jumped back. She'd bet her Limoges porcelain that any red-blooded male would rather die than have an exhausted, unseeing woman cutting near his groin.
So she tugged the sheet down to his waist to shear away the remains of his shirt. His boots they'd discarded as unnecessary weight on the stairs. Which again left…his trousers.
Biting her lip, she unfastened and pulled free his sodden belt, noticing that his torso was flat, the ridges of muscle pronounced, with a thin trail of black hair leading down.
He was so heavy and yet he hadn't an inch of spare flesh on him. A strong body—he would heal fast if she helped him. But she'd never seen a grown man wholly nude before. No one here swam unclothed. There simply wasn't the laissez-faire attitude about nudity here as in neighboring Spain and France. And he was about to be completely unclothed, where she could see if she chose.
She would not choose! Disregard these thoughts, she commanded herself. Putting her shoulders back, she assumed a brisk attitude. She was a nurse today, and a lady always.
She opened the front of his trousers, ignoring the foreign, remarkable textures, the fascinating shape she brushed. With the fastening undone she was able to pull and cut around until they were off, always striving to keep the sheet between him and her eyes. And mostly succeeding.
Wiping perspiration from her brow, she began on his wrist, splinting it with the spoons and tight linen strips until she could cast it with flour in the morning. When she finished, she lay his arm back above his head and spread the other arm out to the side to wrap his ribs. Again and again, she pulled the cloth around him, tightened it, then forced the material under his back. His chest was deep, and bandaging it meant reaching over him, grazing him.
When she was done, she was oddly irritable and fidgety.
Though she wanted nothing more than a bath and her bed, her gaze kept returning to his good hand. Finally she gave in to temptation and leaned beside him in the bed to lift it. The fingers and back of it were as scarred as the rest of his body and the palm was abrasive. Her brows drew together as she placed the palm flat against her own.
She marveled at the size of his hand, at how it could swallow her own, and pressed each finger against his matching one. If he was a mercenary, and he must be, judging by all the battle scars, she wondered how many guns and knives and swords he had wielded with it. Had he ever used it to strangle the life from someone?
Had she been completely crazed to bring a man like this into her home?
For the last two days Annalía had wondered if he'd ever wake up. She'd browbeaten Vitale into washing the man each day—there were just some things she refused to do—and into helping her set his wrist with a cast. Afterward she'd settled into a daily routine where she would check the Scot's ribs and wrist and grapple to pour broth and water down his throat.
Each day some of the swelling around his eyes and jaws receded, but she suspected that even uninjured he still would look like a ruffian.
This morning had already heated the casa miserably. The wind was absent, and even the usually cool mountain nights had been balmy this summer. Though she'd already checked on him, she should probably return and make certain that Vitale had locked up after he tended to the man earlier.
Who was she fooling? Vitale was still convinced the Highlander would murder them all in their sleep without the proper precautions.
She would go because she was restless and watching the even rise and fall of his chest was…agreeable.
As was touching him. Every day she would trace the starburst scar just below his temple, along with each mark across his broad chest and down his muscular arms. She'd memorized them all and had imagined a scenario for each.
Though he was surely her enemy, his presence broke up the monotony and loneliness in the house. Since war was on the horizon, many of her people had fled to mountains even more remote than this one, and she could only get cooks and maids from the valley to come by a few times a month. With her older brother away fighting Pascal and her parents dead, Annalía had been living alone in the main house. She'd invited the ranch hands' wives and their children to stay, but they were ill at ease in the luxurious home. Even Vitale declined.
Before the Scot, she'd been alone in the echoing house, and she'd hated it.
When she unlocked the door, she saw he tossed in bed, with sweat beading his forehead. After a check of his bandages and cast, she felt his skin but found no real fever. He was probably just hot from the stuffy room. The window was open but offered no relief. She nibbled her bottom lip wondering if she should cool him, try to make him more comfortable.
Decided, she poured water into the bowl at the dresser, then soaked a cloth. Returning to the bed, she ran it over his forehead, neck, and chest above his rib bandages.
After guiltily looking around her, she pinched the edge of the sheet on each side of his hips and tugged it down, placing it, arranging it perfectly so his privates were just covered. Her hands shook as she lifted the cloth to the strip of skin below his bandages. She ran it across his hard stomach, and frowned when the muscles rippled and dove in reaction.
When she inadvertently dripped water on the sheet over his groin she could see his manhood outlined beneath it. Could see it even more than she'd been able to on the previous days because it was larger, harder.
She tilted her head, wondering what it would feel like—
"Tell me, lass," the man's voice rumbled, "do you like what you see?"
Chapter Two
T he woman gasped in surprise, dropping her cloth, the cloth that had started on his body clinically and purposefully, as he'd awakened, but had soon skimmed over him in sinuous movements.
Her heels clicked on the polished wooden floor when she retreated. Court watched as she smoothed her already crisp dress, then the perfect knot of hair at her nape, then the choker at her throat with slender hands. At each of these tasks, her chin rose higher.
"I-I was merely caring for you," she answered in accented English.
Instead of coming to in a haze of pain, he'd woken to her breasts glancing over the hair on his chest as she reached across him, and to one of her soft, pale hands gripping his hip while the other rubbed over his skin. As he'd felt fat drops of water hitting the sheet, he'd caught the scent of her hair, making even his beaten body stir. "Then consider me still in need of your care."
Her cheeks turned pink.
He tried to sit higher in the bed, then grimaced in pain. As if in answer, all his other wounds finally sounded the call. He glanced down at his wrist to find a cast. "Who are you?" he ground out. "And where am I?"
"My name is Annalía Elisabet Catherina Tristán. I am mistress of Casa del Llac, where you abide now, and daughter of the family Llorente." Her accent told him English wasn't her first language, though she spoke it perfectly and without hesitation, the words rolling from her tongue in a manner that was pleasing to the ear. She'd said the name Llorente proudly, as though he'd recognize it. He did feel as if he'd heard it before but couldn't place it.
"Where did you find me? And how far are we from the village?"
"Straight down this mountain on the banks of the Valira, four mountain passes to the south."
Four passes away? He wondered if his men thought him dead. He needed to send a message—
"I would ask the name of my…guest." She indicated him with a nod.
He studied her face, noting the high cheekbones and bright hazel-green eyes that matched the green-gold stone at her neck. She looked familiar to him—though he didn't see how he could ever have met then forgotten her—and he had a vague impression that she didn't like him. So why was she "caring" for him? "I'
m Courtland MacCarrick."
"You are a Scot."
"Aye." At his answer, he could have sworn there was a flash of sadness in her eyes.
"And you are in Andorra because…" She trailed off.
The truth whispered in his mind: Because I was hired to tyrannize the people here. "I was just passing through."
The sadness he'd sensed disappeared, and she said in a haughty voice, "You chose to pass through a tiny country in the Pyrenees known for some of the highest mountain passes in Europe? For future reference, most simply go around."
Her condescending tone annoyed him, and his body was rapidly becoming a mass of pain. "I'm a Highlander. I like high lands."
She glared at him, then turned to leave, as if she couldn't wait to be away from him, but he needed information.
"Was I out for an entire day?" he hastily asked.
She looked longingly at the door, but then faced him. "This is your third day here."
Christ, three days? And from the feel of his ribs, he'd be another week healing before he could even sit a horse. "How did I come to be here?"
She hesitated before saying, "I found you on the shore and dragged you up here."
She looked like a stiff wind could blow her away. "You?"
"My horse and I."
His brows drew together. "There was no man who could do it?"
He was nearly six and a half feet tall and weighed more than seventeen stone. He could imagine how difficult it had been to haul him back even with the horse—especially if she lived high on the mountainside.
"We managed fine."
Court owed her a debt of gratitude; he despised being indebted in any way. He grated, "Then you saved my life."
She peered at the ceiling, appearing embarrassed.
Forcing the foreign words, he said, "You have my thanks."
She nodded and turned to go, but he didn't want the lass to leave yet. "Annalía," he said, unable to remember anything else from her catalog of names.
She whirled around, eyes wide, no doubt at the use of her given name. In a flash, he remembered her. Her beautiful countenance and curious expression had waned into sharp and glaring by the riverside. He rubbed his forehead with his good hand. In fact, she'd lamented the fact that he lived.
"That is Lady Llorente to someone such as you! You would do well to remember that."
His eyes narrowed. He'd been right. "Why did you call me an animal? Because I was so beaten?"
"Of course not," she said with an incredulous look. "I could tell you were Scottish."
Court wrestled with his temper. "Scottish?" Many people held prejudices against Scots, and some hated them sight unseen, but no context on earth gave an Andorran the right to look down on one. "Then why would you save 'someone such as me'?"
She shrugged her slim shoulders. "I would spare a mangy, rabid wolf suffering—"
"So now you think me a mangy, rabid wolf?" His head had begun pounding on both sides of his skull.
She stretched out one hand and studied her nails, a perfect picture of disdain. "If you'd let a lady finish her thoughts, I would have added that I lowered my standards to accommodate you."
He'd be damned if he'd allow this prig-arsed Andorran to look down her pert little nose at him. "A lady?" He snorted and glanced around the room. "Alone with me. No chaperone." He lifted the sheet to glance down before giving her a smirk. "And you got quite a gander. If you're such a lady, then why were you two seconds away from takin' me into your hand?"
She looked as though she fought for breath. "I…I was—"
"Granted, you doona seem like you're used to entertaining men in their rooms." He looked her up and down, not bothering to hide his blatant perusal. "But I'd wager you'd be a natural at it."
She stumbled back as though hit, her lips parting.
When she rushed out of the room, with her shoulders, which had been jammed back, now slumped, his brows drew together. He was puzzled as much by her behavior as by the unfamiliar seed of guilt that lodged in his chest. As he tested to see if he could rise from the bed, he wondered why a coldhearted bastard like himself would regret his treatment of a woman who thought him no more than—no, worse than—a beast.
He was determined to find the reasons for both reactions.
Annalía had feared she was one of those women ever since she'd known of their existence.
She'd feared that she could be one among those who lusted and acted on their passions even to their own ruin. Her discovery that the Highlander's brawny chest could fascinate her for hours had been dismaying. Realizing that each glimpse of his private place, outlined beneath the thin linen sheet, made her heart race had been devastating.
Now, worse than her own fear, a thick-skulled, barbaric Scot had looked her over and concluded she was a "natural."
Just as her Castilian mother had been.
Denying her true nature had been easy before. If she heard whispers about her "hot blood" in the village, she ignored them. She kept herself busy with the estate and with the people here. But after the Scot had come, each night became a struggle.
Just last night, she'd lain in bed thinking about his body—all of his body, which she'd studied and touched—until she'd slowly unbuttoned her nightdress and bared her breasts. The meager breeze fluttering past the curtains had grazed over her heated skin, making her shudder, making her…long.
She'd never known what to call the urges she'd felt in the night—not lust, because they never had been focused on any one man. So she'd thought of them as longing, but not last night. She'd truly felt lust, and it had been so strong she'd finally run her fingers over her own breast and down her belly.
A noise had startled her—just the house settling—but she'd jerked her hand away, ashamed.
Not only was she one of those women, she was alone in the house with a man who knew it….
When she'd finally guided the shaking key into the lock of his door, she'd fled outside, hurrying in the direction of the meadow in front of her home.
Vitale met her on the path. "What has happened? You're white as a sheet."
"It's nothing. The Scot woke."
"He's a mercenary?"
"I'm almost positive, though I am convinced he's an obnoxious man." At least he'd be gone soon. She was sure that he'd be eager to return to indiscriminate killing and sharpening knives and practicing pistols and whatever else mercenaries did.
"Did he frighten you or threaten you?"
"N-Not exactly…"
"You never listen to me!" Vitale cried with a volley of Gallic hand gestures. "You've been too sheltered—can't comprehend that there are bad people in the world that shouldn't be saved! You're too…soft!" He said the word with disgust.
"I am not soft!"
"When I saved you from that footpad, you were too stunned to give him your choker and you quaked like a little girl."
"I was a little girl and I wasn't quaking." Nor had she been too stunned. The choker had been her mother's, and she'd already known how much she needed it.
He eyed her. "The Scot will still be weak enough that we can throw him back like a bad catch."
"Vitale!" Unconsciously, she drew her hand over her neck. Frowning, she glanced back at the house, puzzled at her uncanny feeling that she was being watched. There was no way he could have risen. No, not with those injuries.
The sun was directly in her eyes, and she could see nothing. After a last squint, she said, "Vitale, he'll be out of our lives soon enough. One day we probably will find him—and our silver—gone." With that, she walked on.
Once in the meadow, she sank into the carpet of narcissus cladding the entire shelf of land. She'd always been able to lose herself in the scents and daydream as she gazed out over the lake and farther beyond to the twining river.
On the next plateau down, their champion horses played and jumped, their copper coats gleaming in the sun. On the lowest plateau skirting the river, rose of Canolich swathed the ground in yellow. But here, a cloud o
f white blooms. She plucked a flower, brought it to her nose, and inhaled, closing her eyes with pleasure….
He'd said she was a natural! Her eyes flashed open. What was it about her that made people continually come to this conclusion? She'd saved his life, and he made disparaging comments? When one is nursing a man, contact is made and…parts are seen.
Especially when they were drawing attention to themselves. She shivered.
She would simply forget the scene, banishing it from her thoughts. She might be one of those women, but she'd been trained to be a lady. Burying uncomfortable thoughts was one thing at which ladies excelled. She looked down to find the flower crushed in her hands.
Soon he'd be gone, and life would return to normal. Unfortunately, even then her existence would be anxious and cheerless. She continued to await some news from her brother Aleixandre, the only family she had left. She had heard nothing for more than a week, and worry preyed on her.
A strong breeze blew for the first time in days, it seemed, flattening the grass in waves and teasing a lock of hair loose from her tight braid. Out here, the compulsion to rake it back into place wasn't so pressing, but still won over. She smoothed her hair and picked another flower.
Even when her brother routed Pascal and returned, she still would be in a vulnerable position. This fight had only postponed Aleix's desire that she wed. When their father died two years ago, she'd been brought home from school so that a marriage could be contracted for her. Just as Aleix had begun narrowing the choices, Pascal had arrived.
Before he'd shown his true nature, Pascal had surprised them by asking Aleix for her hand, though they'd never met. Aleix had refused, incurring the general's anger, but her brother had never trusted the man even before his vile army of mercenaries and deserters had taken over the area.
Aleix repeatedly lamented the fact that he hadn't forced her to marry earlier. At twenty-one, she was more than old enough, and she'd been born and raised for it, but she'd never met a man she wanted. She never could imagine doing the perplexing things the girls at school had whispered about, those painful, aggressive things done in the dark—no matter how much she longed. Whenever she'd envisioned those acts with any of the men she'd been introduced to, she'd cringed.