There was nothing else Douglas could do but go downstairs to the kitchen. Had there not been a patient involved, he was certain he would have gathered his belongings together and slunk out the front door, never to be seen again in Edgar. He took a deep breath and opened the kitchen door.
Her red hair gathered into an untidy topknot, Miss Grant was just preparing one of six loaves of bread for the oven. She smiled at him, not a hint on her face of embarrassment. Her cheeks were rosy, but the kitchen was warm.
“How is our patient?” she asked, and somehow that made all the difference. She was inviting herself into his world, and he was happy to let her in.
“Wanting some food,” he replied. “Said he could eat a seagull, feathers and all.”
“Too fishy for a convalescent,” she said. “Tell him I said no. Baked oats will do, with cream on top. Some for you too? I have boiled eggs, as well. That’s what my breakfast crowd likes. Sit a minute.”
He did as she asked and felt his face grow warm whenshe sat across from him. With no hesitation, she took his hand in hers.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Bowden. How on earth could anyone go through a lifetime of war and not have a bad dream or two?” She released his hand and just looked at him, her face so pleasant, even with freckles and funny eyes. He couldn’t think of a time he had seen such kindness, which made her face nearly beautiful.
“Thank you,” he said quietly. “If … if that happens again, just leave me be. I’ll wake myself up and go back to sleep.”
She shook her head slowly. “Not under my roof you won’t,” Miss Grant said, her voice low and full of emotion. “My father was a minister, and he didna raise me to ignore suffering.”
Douglas swallowed. “It’s not much suffering, not in the great scheme of things.”
He tried to turn his nighttime anguish into a joke, but she wasn’t buying it.
“Not under my roof,” she repeated, but softer now. “Let me fix a tray for Tommy and you.”
She did an odd thing then, something he never expected. Without a blush or qualm, she took him by the chin and held his head steady so she could look into his eyes. “Do we understand each other?”
He nodded and she released him.
“This will not come up for debate or discussion again, Mr. Bowden.” She shook her head, as though vexed with herself. “You must think me a dreadfully managing sort.”
“I wish you had been my pharmacist mate in any number of battles,” he told her, which did bring out the red in her cheeks, making her even more colorful. “Done and done, madam. How about that food, and handsomely now.”
Miss Grant laughed and moved quickly to do his bidding. He poured some coffee and filched a piece of cold toast.
“Try my lemon curd on it,” Miss Grant said as she sliced two squares of baked oats and poured cream over them.
He had no plans to ever argue with Miss Grant again, so he did as she said, which meant he ended up licking the knife too. He had never eaten anything so good in his life. “Magnificent,” he said. “The coachman mentioned it yesterday. I was skeptical because I have been nearly three days in Scotland and my taste buds died when I crossed the border.”
“Wretched man,” she joked, which made him smile, because she rolled her Rs even better than other Scots he knew. Maybe it just sounded better, coming from a lady.
And so it was with good humor and calm heart that he took a tray of food upstairs for a brave boy and a man beginning to suspect that peace had its perquisites.
But he had forgotten about the horribly named Duke, who looked at him, ever hopeful, when he came into the room with the tray. “Oh,” was all he said, because Miss Grant came up the stairs right behind him with a bowl of scraps.
She held it under Duke’s twitching nose, his tail wagging rapidly, and then walked with it into the hall and down the stairs, the pup in hot pursuit. “I’ll bring him back when he has had a turn in the garden,” she called, making it sound for all the world like Duke was a valued guest who needed to take the air.
“Amazing lady,” Douglas said as he set the tray on the bedside table and helped Tommy into a sitting position.
The boy was so hungry that he forgot his pain. He wolfed down the baked oatmeal and inhaled the blood pudding Miss Grant had added. He looked around, still hungry, at the same time Douglas declared that he couldn’t eat another bite and offered the remainder of his breakfast to the boy.
“Life is hard for you, lad,” Douglas commented, knowing he did not ask a question.
“Aye, mister,” the boy replied. “Me mam … Sir, please.”
“I’ll go find this Mrs. Cameron and see how she fares. Do you have a direction?”
“Behind me house and over one,” the boy said as he finished the last of Douglas’s blood pudding and leaned back, exhausted.
Without a word, Douglas gave him a lesser draught, lowered him down again, and sat beside Tommy until he gave a long sigh and surrendered to poppy sleep. Douglas sat there a moment, knowing that he could leave Edgar right now, and Miss Grant would keep Tommy Tavish alive. He closed his eyes and smiled over the heterochromatic beauty that a woman with red hair, almost a burgundy color, and faded freckles, blue and brown eyes, and a nose just shy of being labeled masterful could possess. He had no argument with her figure, which he would characterize as comfortable, an attribute probably most pleasing on a cold Scottish night. He already knew she had more brains than a roomful of females. Oh hang it, likely more gray matter than most men.
