Chapter 7
D uncan felt fluid pass his lips and gagged. What ever it was tasted like low tide, salty and rank.
“Shh, Duncan.” A cool hand touched his brow. “You must drink this.”
Ack! He recognized the voice. Why would the woman not leave him in peace? He rolled away from his ladywife and white-hot pain shot down his left arm and spine. He flopped onto his back and struggled to open his eyes. His voice cracked as he managed, “Leave.”
“No. You need to drink this if you’re to heal.”
Heal? From what? His lashes finally untangled. Beth, his termagant wife, hovered over him with tears in her eyes and a hollow reed in her hand. Why?
He turned his head and saw he wasn’t in the solar but in one of the smaller third floor rooms. Ah. He’d relinquished the solar to his ladywife until her apartment could be completed. Soon she’d be locked away. Verra good.
“Duncan, open your mouth.” He turned his attention back to her and saw she now held a spoon.
“Leave.”
She shook her head and pinched his nose. When he opened his mouth to yell, it filled with broth. He choked as he swatted aimlessly. Dear God, what ailed him? His strength had evaporated.
Beth held out another spoonful. “You are going to drink this. We can do it the easy way or the hard, but one way or the other, it’s going in.” He shook his head and she reached for his nose again. Rather than drown he opened his mouth.
“Thank you. I’ll not have you dying of malnutrition after all you’ve put me through these last five days.”
He scowled. What five days?
She heaved a sigh as she approached with another spoonful of broth. He recognized the taste. It was one of Rachael’s noxious remedies. For what, he could not recall.
“You scared the stuffing out of me,” Beth mumbled. He scowled at her as he opened his mouth for another spoonful of broth.
“I swear I’ve never been so frightened in my life as I was that first night. You were so hot I honestly thought you’d have a seizure.” He opened his mouth again like a wee bird. She shoveled more broth in.
“It didn’t help having Angus hovering over my shoulder for the first three days looking like he wanted to slit my throat, either.” She shuddered. “I really thought he might the first time I removed your dressings.” She ladled more soup into him. “I couldn’t blame him, though. Your wound looked ghastly, and he didn’t know me from a hole in the ground and here I was, taking over, issuing orders. Thank God, he listened. Truth be told, your man-at-arms would have had his hands full had he done otherwise. And don’t get me started on that ass of a doctor. It’s no small wonder you didn’t die.”
What the hell is she rattling on about?
“Your shoulder still looks bad, but it’s a far sight better now, so…” She gave him another mouthful of broth.
Ah, his shoulder wound. He flexed his left shoulder. It still hurt but not nearly as much as it had just…
“Where—” He cleared the thickness in his throat. “Where is Angus?”
“In the hall. Would you like me to call him?”
“Aye.”
She put down the bowl, ran a tentative hand down his cheek and grinned. “You need a shave, but I guess that can wait.”
Shave? He touched his face and felt stubble. His beard was gone! What the bloody hell is going on here? He struggled to sit, only to find himself too weak to lift more than his head and his good shoulder. God’s teeth! “Angus. Now.”
She smiled. “As you wish, sire.” Too his utter surprise, she placed a kiss on his forehead before leaving.
#
“Finally, ye wake.” Angus clasped Duncan’s hand. “Ye know ye verra nearly shent my week by almost dying?”
“Dying?”
“Aye.” Angus dropped his voice to a whisper. “Had it not been for yonder wife, ye well may have. She’s not left yer side but to relieve herself in the garderobe. And why on earth did ye not say yer shoulder was a pestilence?”
Duncan shrugged his good shoulder. “I thought it healing.” Angus raised a disbelieving brow and grunted before glancing at Beth who now stood straight backed and staring out the room’s small window.
“Yer yon ladywife threatened all manner of mayhem when I suggested we bring back the doctor. Said she’d smote the man and then my bonnie self if ‘ the raunchy bastard so much as crossed the threshold! ’ Aye, those were her exact words.”
“I donna understand raunchy. ” Bastard, he understood just fine.
“Nor I, but her meaning sat clear as well water.” Angus chuckled. “And here I thought ye’d wed a pious woman.”
He had. Hadn’t he? She certainly wasn’t reticent about threatening, but swearing in Angus’s presence? No lady born would hazard such.
“Aye, and how she keened over ye, too, in the wee hours when she thought me asleep at the watch.” Angus shook his head, looking as bemused as Duncan felt. “She didna keen aloud, but silently, tears flowing like a burn, stroking yer brow. And she crooned when she thought herself alone with ye. I didna know her songs, but they were as soft as any lullaby.”
How odd. Not a moment ago Lady Beth had nearly suffocated him by holding his nose.
“And my beard?”
Angus shrugged. “She said ye needed stripping to break yer fever and strip ye, we did, down to the flesh, face and all.”
Was naught sacred to the woman? With trepidation, Duncan raised a shaking hand to his head and found his hair still attached but braided. Praise the saints.
Angus chuckled, “She appeared quite satisfied with uncovering ye face and left it at that.”
“Help me up.”
Angus rested a hand on Duncan’s good shoulder. “Nay. Yon doctor wife would have my sweeties in her fist within a heartbeat. Ye are fevered still, though not as before. I’ve seen yer back, man. ‘Tis still a long way from healed.”
Duncan heaved an exasperated sigh. He had a hundred things he needed to attend to if he’d truly been out like a doused fire for five days. “As yer liege lord, I order ye to help me up.”
“Nay. I’d rather face yer fury on yer next good day, than deal with yon lady’s ire on this one.” He patted Duncan’s hand. “Oblige me by staying put, do as she asks, and mend.”
Angus raised his voice and addressed Beth. “My lady, I take my leave, entrusting my lord into yer capable hands.”
Beth blinked in surprise. Her husband’s second in command was leaving his post? “As you wish—-luste, Sir Angus.” His surprise at her deference registered before he could mask it. “Have a good day, Angus, and thank you for all your help.”
Looking bemused, he bowed.
Beth returned to Duncan’s side. “So, now it’s just you and me against the world, huh? Are you hungry?” When his brow remained furrowed she made eating motions with her hands.
“Aye.”
“I’ll see what the kitchen has to offer. Hopefully it’s not that dreadful haggis again.” She shuddered, picturing the sheep gut stuffed with oats and Lord knew what all else. She wouldn’t have been the least surprised to learn they packed a pig’s squeak in with its blood.
A few minutes later she returned with a trencher of diced lamb and porridge. When she finished shoveling the contents of the bread bowl into him, she gently dabbed the corners of his mouth.
Glory, you’re a handsome man.
She’d been so pleased to discover a beautifully crafted mouth and square jaw under all the hair. And his lashes were to die for, so long and thick they tangled as he slept. She sighed, reluctant to admit she hovered precariously close to a precipice, one she couldn’t risk falling over, of falling head over heels.
You’d better stop mooning and start focusing on the hard truth, Beth. Duncan might eventually feel gratitude, but he’ll never feel love. Besides, you’re going to find your way back to coffee, toilet paper—-she still couldn’t get over using Lamb’s Ear leaves—and your little black cases of much-needed Chanel.
“What ails ye?”
She cleared her throat. “Nothing.” She checked his temperature with her palm. “It’s time to sponge you down again.” He said nothing, which she took as consent and readied the bed.
As she placed sheeting under each of his limbs he started to scowl. When she soaked a cloth in cool water and wiped his face, his gaze never wavered from hers. What was he thinking?
She bathed his neck then his arms. Still he remained mute.
Realizing she’d put off the inevitable for as long as she dared, she lowered the sheet to his hips. Feeling a blush creep up her neck, she glanced away.
She’d thought nothing of touching his body intimately while he lay unconscious—it simply had to be done—but now her handsome husband-in-name-only stared at her, quite aware of where her hands and gaze traveled. She took a deep breath. Get a grip, Beth, and just do it.
If he has a problem with her bathing him, he’ll let you know in short order. Then you can get huffy and tell him it’s for his own good and to just shut up.
He said not a word as she sponged the broad, muscular planes of his chest and arms. As she readied another cloth to wipe down his well-delineated stomach she dared to glance up and found him staring at her through hooded eyes. She caught a slight twitch of his lips. Suspecting he was near to grinning, she cleared her throat and put on a stern face. Better he think her annoyed by having to do this, than suspect the depth of her embarrassment. Unfortunately, touching him while he was fully aware was a decidedly new experience. Totally unnerving, in fact, since his body was the first adult male’s she’d ever touched, seen naked outside of a movie. And he was breathtaking.
He murmured, “Dosth ye approve?”
Her face suddenly felt like a blast furnace.
She chewed her lower lip. What the heck should she say? If you were healthy, I’d kill to spend one night in your arms? Not likely. “Aye, you’re being very good, staying so still.”
This time his lips did curl into a grin.
Duncan, she wished, why don’t you just close your eyes and let me finish with this before I expire. Good gravy.
Her hands shook as she wrung cool water from the cloth. She grabbed a lung full of air and placed the cloth on his muscular abdomen. Her fragile confidence wavered when glorious muscle rippled under her hands.
You can do this, she silently chided. Hell, she’d done it for five days. Today should be no different.
Right.
Her hand grazed the fine, curly hairs on his lower abdomen, and a steeple appeared within the sheeting covering his privates. She nearly swallowed her tongue.
Oh, good Lord. Now, what? She couldn’t just stop. He had a fever. Was this…reaction…simply a biological thing that happened whenever cold water came too close to a man’s plumbing? Probably. Yes. It certainly couldn’t be a response to her.
Though the tenting was surely a temperature issue, she retreated, wash basin in hand, to the end of the bed. She lifted his left foot. As her hands rose along his leg, she kept her gaze locked on the cloth in her hand. Minutes later Beth accidentally glanced up to find the steeple decidedly taller.
To her horror, hot blood flair in her cheeks.
God, if you get me through this, I swear I’ll never curse again in my life.