Chapter 9
NINE
YOU LOOK AT ME LIKE I’M DANGEROUS
Beth
“I have no idea what’s going on,” I took a step, gathering my courage, “but you look at me like I’m dangerous yet you don’t say a word.”
In his armchair, James dropped his head back. “I know.”
“All the times we talked, I thought we had… I don’t know. A connection.” Another step, my boots silent on the castle’s flagstone floor.
He didn’t raise his head, so I sighed and moved until I was between his open legs. “James! I’m going home in the morning.”
His eyes snapped open. “No.”
“Then—”
“Please, don’t.” James sat upright.
The wildness in his eyes had my pulse flying. Beside us, the fire blazed higher, wind howling down the chimney, fanning the flames and sending sparks flying.
“Help me out here.” I took his shoulders in my hands and pushed him back into his chair.
“You’re touching me,” he said.
“I am.”
The sheer confusion on his face had me hypnotised, and I wanted to fall right onto his lap. Onto his lips.
“We’re here, face to face, alone, and with a roaring fire. This has to be the single most romantic scene of my life, and I’m alone in it.”
“I swear to you, you’re not.” He took my elbow, pulled.
I landed on his lap. My breath hitched, but then every thought flew out of my mind, because James cupped the back of my neck.
And laid his lips on mine.
Holy Mother Earth. This was happening. From nothing to him claiming a kiss. I reeled with the action and leaned forwards, gripping the back of the chair to steady myself. Our mouths pressed together, and James took my waist, his thumbs caressing my ribcage.
I wanted it to be perfect but…it was the strangest kiss I’d ever had.
Chaste and slow. Warm.
Really warm.
I shifted on his thighs then brought my hands forwards to tangle them in his hair. At the same moment, he ran both arms around my back and held me to him, turning his face as he shivered against me.
He burned.
“You have a fever,” I stuttered.
“No. I’m cold.” He shivered again, violently, and gripped me, his muscles hard.
Oh boy. My stomach sank. He was sick.
And there was me thinking my womanly wiles had finally broken down his barriers. Heaving a sigh, I extricated myself from his grip and clambered to my feet.
“Don’t.” He stole my hand. “That was wonderful. Stay.”
“Bed,” I said, engaging the kind but firm mode I’d used with younger foster kids I’d lived with, and I squeezed his hand.
James’s reddened eyes widened.
“You’re sick, and I’m going to put you to bed.” I grabbed his other hand and hauled him to his feet.
He lumbered over me, impossibly tall and broad, but unsteady, too. I kept his hand in mine then led him to the staircase and climbed.
“C’mon. Almost there. You’ll be able to lie down soon.”
“I’m fine,” James muttered, but he didn’t let go as he traipsed up the steps.
Through the archway that punched a hole in the castle wall, we entered the bedroom hallway.
“Which is yours?” I asked.
“Keep going. Wait, no. I can get to my room on my own. Hey, weren’t we talking?”
“Mhmm.” I kept moving along the carpet runner, passing my bedroom and the one Callum had allocated to Mattie. Odds on she wasn’t in there.
We rounded a corner, and James halted, stopping me with him. He put his arms around my shoulders from behind.
“This is me.”
The heat of him repelled the chill of the draughty corridor, and for a moment, I didn’t move. I liked his touch, this almost-hug. I wanted this moment, but it wasn’t really a moment at all. The kiss hadn’t been real, and I was right back at square one.
James didn’t mean any of it.
Acute disappointment controlled my next actions.
I twisted the handle and threw the door open. Then I led him in, paying no attention to his personal belongings. Not wanting more reminders to obsess over. The details to make it real.
Beside his bed—a four-poster, for God’s sake—I shrugged off his arms and turned. With a forced smile, I pushed up on my toes and kissed him on the cheek. “Goodnight.”
“Stay, please.”
The intensity of his tone socked me in the gut, and I swallowed down my reaction.
“You don’t want that. Not really. Sleep, James,” I whispered.
Leaving him standing there, I walked away.
In my room, I readied for bed with automatic steps, my mind flat. Teeth brushed, pills—vitamin and contraceptive—taken, sleep cami and shorts pulled on.
I flattened myself on the quilt, and the room spun.
Nausea and a headache lurked. The sheer degree of hurt I felt from the mismatch of my day, of sweet anticipation meeting an unhappy reality, was too big to be real. I rolled over so the blanket wrapped around me like a burrito, then I buried my face. Why did I feel so awful?
Had I succumbed to the cinema’s sickness epidemic? Well, if I had caught it, it served me right for making a fool of myself this weekend.
It explained my extreme upset about James. How I’d come here wanting to know more about him but now felt farther and farther away. I didn’t get emotional over men—to do that would be to hand over my hard-won independence. The stability I needed to get through the day.
The darkness of the room swelled, and I lay in the gloom with only my thoughts for company.
Sleep refused to come.
I couldn’t get James out of my head. I fidgeted and pictured him, alone in his room with no one taking care of him. Worry simmered. People got fevers all the time. Was it dangerous for an adult? Surely not.
But as the hour ticked over, I’d tossed and turned enough.
If James got worse, I’d never forgive myself.
It wasn’t like I could ask Callum to go check on him, he and Mattie being in the middle of a manic sex-fest. It would be rude to interrupt.
And the other brothers would probably still be watching movies in the tower, and I had no idea which passageway led there.
I let that excuse make up my mind and I rolled off the bed, shedding my blankets.
The castle chill had me hugging my arms to my body as I left my room and darted along the hall.
No sounds came from any other room, but too late I realised I had no idea where the other brothers slept.
Oh well. I’d borrow something of James’s to make the run back, save anyone the sight of my short shorts.
I cracked his door.
Too dark to see. Slipping inside, I closed the door behind me and waited for a moment until my eyes adjusted. “James?”
“Beth? Where are you? I thought you’d gone. I wasn’t even sure if you’d been here.”
His low, babbling voice gave me a path to follow, and I made my way to the bed.
“How do you feel?” I whispered, finding the edge of his quilt. “I came to check on your fever. Sorry for disturbing you.”
James’s breathing sped up, but he made no other response. I knelt on the bed and reached out to touch his forehead, the lines of his face just visible now.
Still too hot. I’d had fevers any number of times—try living in a house with a constantly changing population of stressed kids and see how your immune system coped—so knew what to do.
“Listen. You’re burning up. You need to take something. Paracetamol, maybe. Do you have any?”
“Bathroom,” he murmured and twisted and curled toward me, bringing swathes of blankets with him.
“Bathroom,” I repeated, all action, and I traced my way over the dark room to the outline of another door. The rug changed to freezing tiles under my feet, and I felt around, locating a pull cord.
Oof. The bathroom’s overhead blinded me.
James gave a low moan, and I cursed myself.
The bedroom had flooded with light, too.
On the wall a few feet away was a large mirror with inbuilt bulbs.
Squinting, I found the switch and flicked it on.
A dim yellow glow flickered on, and I tugged the cord to kill the overhead, giving myself instant relief.
“Sorry,” I called softly then, hopping to keep my feet from turning to ice, I set to work filling a small glass with water and rifling through the cabinet set into the white plaster wall until I found an untouched packet of painkillers.
I returned with my bounty, leaving on the mirror light so I wouldn’t stub my toe.
Now I could see James properly, he was wearing more clothes than he had been earlier this evening. A hoodie, zipped up to his chin. More layers under that by the bulk.
I’d done the right thing, coming down. He’d bake like that.
“Sit up,” I instructed and curled an arm under his shoulder.
He grumbled but pushed the blankets back. Then he took the pills with a swallow of water.
A shiver took him as I put the glass on his bedside table. “Cold.”
“In this fancy bed?” The posts of the bed rose around us in curves of dark wood.
“Callum and Gordain put it in here before I moved in. A joke. You know, because I outrank Callum. Earl to laird.”
I had no idea what he was talking about, but this was fever speak. He wouldn’t know what he was saying. Now for the trickier bit. Of all the times I’d imagined undressing this man, this scenario had not featured.
“You’re not cold. You’re really hot. I need you to take off some of your clothes. Cool you down.”
He blinked owlishly at me but didn’t move.
“How about we start with the hoodie.” Kneeling on the bed, I carefully tipped up his chin. “I’m going to undress you. Do you understand?”
James dragged in a quick breath and, though I knew I was doing the right thing, a sense of anticipation surrounded me, emanating from him. This was as unsexy as could be, him with a fever and me with a pounding head and unhappy stomach, yet tension held in the air.
He helped me, the top layer sliding over his biceps and up his arms. When he emerged from underneath it, static messed his dark hair, strands falling into his eyes.
“Now the sweater.”
Together, we peeled off the Henley.
But as it came, the sweater dragged James’s final layer, exposing his stomach.
“You can keep the t-shirt—” I started, but then I caught sight of his mangled skin, and my words died on my tongue.
Deep scars twisted James’s side.
The low light did nothing to conceal the pitted jagged-edged scars that tore through his form. The ruin that was the left-hand side of his torso.
How…?
God.
James’s hands covered mine, and I lifted my gaze, my mouth open. Shock silencing me. Because I knew. Instantly I knew how the scars had been caused. The sheer amount of damage could only be as a result of a devastating accident.
Like a car crash.
“Ugly, isn’t it?” He swayed a little, pulling the t-shirt down and the sweater off. “It doesn’t hurt, if you wanted to ask. This room is so cold.”
“I… It…”
“Do you know what the funny thing is?” James’s words ran together, his fever maybe affecting his reason. “If you’d been driving the car, it would have been so different.”
My voice came out faint. “Yeah?”
“They wouldn’t have died. If my father had half your skill, they’d all still be alive. Ella wouldn’t hate me. Richard wouldn’t have given up everything to step in.”
I clamped my hand to my mouth. Holy shit. He meant his parents. They’d died in a car wreck.
Then I was falling, pitching forwards, dragged by James. With a huff of breath, I landed on his chest, and his arms banded around me.
“It’s freezing in here. You’ll get cold.” He reached out an arm and hauled the quilt over my legs, aligning our bodies in the warmth of his bed.
The chill of the room had me frozen, and James’s heat sank deep. I shuddered against his hard body.
“Beth, you’re sick, too,” he whispered, his face nuzzled into my hair. “You shivered. I made you sick by kissing you. I wanted to tell you how amazing it was but I ruined it, didn’t I? I’ve wanted to kiss you for a long time and I ruined it all.”
With a gentle touch, I reached out and found the back of his hot neck. He turned his head to give me space, and I made small circles in the soft hair at his nape. Really, I should climb off him, remove my knee from between his legs. Stop caressing him.
“I’m not sick,” I said into his t-shirt, though I wasn’t sure if that was true, “and I liked the kiss.” James held me harder, radiating heat. It reminded me why I’d come to his room. “You should take your jeans off.”
He shifted to perform my command. Once his jeans hit the floor, he slid back in beside me.
Long, powerful legs, rough with hair intertwining with my bare limbs.
I tucked into his side, pulling the blanket from his chest, and we sank into the same close hug.
It was too comforting, and I told myself that I could keep a better eye on him like this.
“I’m sorry about today. I get caught up in my head. Agree and be silent, I’ve always been told. I’m so glad you came. Please don’t leave.”
“I won’t. I’ll stay.”
James’s vulnerability, the truths revealed by his fevered mind, had destroyed any frustration I had at how he’d behaved. My heart ached for his loss, and if he needed a hug, I’d hold him all night.