Eyes still closed tight, he hazarded a feel of the slender arms and legs around him. What woman would do this? Aching skull or not, he forced his eyes back open. Squinting against the light, he twisted around to identify her.
Lorna sprang to life and clutched him tighter. “Shh…it’s all right, Gunn. It’s all right. I am here.” Her voice crackled with hoarse weariness. “I have ye. Ye are safe now,mo ghràidh. Go back to sleep.”
He swallowed hard and relaxed back into her comforting embrace. She had called himmy dear one. What ailment had she pulled him through by clinging to him in the darkness? “Lorna?” he said. Or tried to. His voice broke, shattering into bits of unintelligible air. He forced a cough that stirred the pain in his skull and tried again. “Lorna?”
“Gunn?” She didn’t loosen her hold, but excitement and joy swelled in her tone. “Have ye come back to us?”
“Aye,” he managed to say loud enough to be heard.
“Praise God Almighty!” She started sobbing, hugging him tight and rocking back and forth. “We were so afraid ye had left us for good.”
“Dinna rock.” He found the strength to pat her arms. “Guts. Head. Pain. Please…stop.”
“So sorry.” She went still but rained kisses down the side of his face while her hand stayed pressed across his forehead, holding him close. When she hugged her cheek to his, the wetness of her tears made his heart leap.
She cared about him. Enough to weep for joy that he had returned from whatever hell had tried to take him.
“Do ye remember anything?” she asked.
He started to shake his head, then groaned and clutched it. “Hell’s fire. Demons pound inside my skull.”
“That’s because ye are coming out from the deadly nightshade’s effects. Mistress Thistlewick said if ye survived, ye would be miserable afterward. At least for a little while.”
The more aware he became, the more he found sweet relief in her cradling him. But what she said made no sense. He had not eaten any poisonous berries or drank any potions. “Nightshade?”
“Aye. We think she slipped the tincture of belladonna into yer wine. But of course, she would never admit it.” A heavy sigh shifted her behind him as she hugged her cheek to him again. “Thank heavens ye lived through it. Bella will be beside herself when she sees ye are all right.”
“I canna remember a bloody thing.” And the harder he thought about it, the more his head ached. “Who isshe? Who did this to me?” Although he only knew of one female potentially capable of such a thing.
“Murdina.” Lorna tenderly stroked his forehead. “I will no longer address her asLadybecause she is not one. Would ye like to try a sip of water? Mrs. Thistlewick had a chamber pot chair brought down for when yer stomach rebels. And a pair of buckets for the heaving if it comes. All are right here close if the water triggers anything.”
“Broughtdown?” he repeated, feeling like a helpless fool. “Where ishere?” The room was so dark. All he could see through the narrow slits of his squinting eyes was the fire.
“The library. It is where Bella and I found ye.”
“I canna remember a feckin’ thing, can barely see, and dinna ken if I can even crawl to a chamber pot.” He wanted to rage, lash out, charge through the keep, find Murdina, and wring her bloody neck. “I am weak as a mewling kitten.”
“Well, that’s because we have been here in the floor for almost two days now. When I wasna wrestling to keep ye from hurting yerself, Jasper was.” She shook against him with a weak laugh as she patted his chest. “Thank heavens ye fought him harder than ye fought me. I dinna ken how I wouldha held ye otherwise. But ye are alive. That is all that matters. And I will help with whatever ye need. Dinna ye worry about that.”
“Instead of nursemaid to my daughter, ye have become nursemaid to me.” A small part of him found comfort in her caring, but the greater part of him hated it. He should protect her, protect all in this keep. Not the other way around.
“I am not yer nursemaid,” she corrected him quietly. “I am yer friend.”
He covered her hand where it rested on his chest and squeezed it. “I dinna want ye to be my friend, Lorna. Not when ye have made my heart need ye to be so much more.” A tense knot loosened in his chest as though relieved he had finally accepted the truth and said the words aloud.
She pressed a kiss close to his ear. “Heal first. We will discuss everything else later. Yer healing is all that matters right now. Understand?”
“As long as ye stay here with me.” He held her hand tighter. He would not make the mistake of pushing her away again.
“I will. Swear it on my own headstone.” She gently pushed on his shoulders and helped him sit up higher. “Now, let’s get ye up on that couch, aye? By bum’s gone numb again from sitting on the floor so long.”
That made him smile, and he couldn’t resist asking, “Shall I rub it for ye to help bring back the feeling?”
She laughed. “Now I know ye will be fine. Come on now. Concentrate on turning to yer knees and climbing up onto this couch. We can talk of bum rubbing when ye are stronger.”
“My arms and legs are heavy as iron and clumsier than a newborn colt.”
“It’s the drug. Weakens muscles something terrible.” She slipped out from behind Gunn but stayed on her knees beside him with an arm wrapped around his waist to hold him steady. “Just move slow. Ye have not used those muscles for anything other than fighting through yer seizures.”
