By the time the sun dipped behind the hills, the forest had closed around them again, the path narrowing until it felt less like a trail and more like a suggestion. The air cooled quickly once the light thinned, gray bands slipping between the trees as evening claimed its ground.
Jacob slowed the mare and drew her off the trail onto a low rise ringed with brush and a fallen pine, the trunk half-rotted and silvered with age. It was far enough from the path to escape notice, but he circled the area anyway, mapping the ground in his mind before he trusted it.
“This will do,” he said, easing the mare to a halt at the rise.
Elena slid from the saddle before he could dismount to help her. The movement was careful but not graceful; her knees wobbled as her boots hit the ground, and she steadied herself with a hand against the steed’s coarse coat.
Jacob resisted the instinct to move to her, to offer a steadying hand. Instead, he turned his attention outward, scanning the trees, listening past the ordinary sounds of the forest. Birds settled and wind moved through leaves, but nothing else.
“Same as before,” he advised. “We should sleep fast and move before dawn.”
She nodded, taking a moment to stretch her arms over her head. “I’m nae sure how I can be so exhausted, having done naught but sit and ride all day.”
Jacob knew she didn’t expect an answer. Riding asked more of a body than it appeared to, and she was learning that lesson quickly enough. He tied up the reins and crouched to brush aside a few scattered branches from where they might sit and breathed in a hissed breath as pain flared hot and suddenly up his arm.
Elena turned immediately. “What?”
He shook his head, already schooling his expression. “It’s naught. Just stiff.”
“It isn’t,” she said, crossing the small space between them without hesitation. “I heard that. Is it your arm?” Her gaze dropped there at once. “I wanted to look at it anyway—to be sure it’s nae infected.”
Pride rose first, instinctive and unhelpful, the old reflex to keep weakness hidden, but he tamped it down. He had harbored the same concern since morning, having the heat beneath the skin, the tightness that went beyond soreness. Jacob understood what trouble an ignored wound could cause on the road. Better to see to it now than pay for it later.
He nodded once, conceding the point.
Elena was at his side as he rose to his full height.
She reached for his sleeve, but then pulled back, possibly realizing the sleeve could not be shoved up high enough, that the tunic would have to come off. “Let me see,” she demanded with quiet authority.
Grunting, Jacob doffed his tunic again, and Elena stepped closer at once, her fingers careful but sure as she loosened the linen and unwound it. Jacob looked down as well and winced inwardly. The skin beneath was reddened and warm, irritated bythe pressure of the wrap, the grime of the day, and what little had been done to help it in the first place.
Elena’s frown did not ease. “Oh, Jacob, that dinna look guid.” She pressed the tip of one finger close to the open wound but not directly on it. “It’s hot,” she announced unnecessarily. “But what can we do?” she asked, raising her concerned gaze to him. “Oh, shite,” she said, having her first good look at him after having spent the day behind him in the saddle. “Jacob, your face is all flushed.” She lifted her hand and pressed her palm lightly to his forehead.
The coolness startled him.
Her fingers lingered, brushing back a loose lock of hair with an absentminded care, her gaze following that small action.
“Ye may be feverish,” she murmured.
The wound, any possible fever, the forest itself and the concern of pursuit—all receded from Jacob's awareness as Elena filled his vision.
He watched her as she stared back at him, brows crinkled with honest concern, and a wee bit of dawning awareness. He found himself acutely aware of the space between their bodies, which had shrunk to almost nothing; aware, too, of the invisible line he ought not cross. He stood stock-still, his mind and body narrowed to this small, magnificent circle where her hand touched his face, and she seemed only to wait. She was close enough now that he could see the individual flecks of emerald in her green eyes, the faint scar at her right brow, the freckle high on her cheekbone that vanished into her hair when she smiled.
The forest dimmed around them, the last light gilding her features—weary, unguarded, expectant.
His gaze dropped to her mouth. Her lips were parted, just enough to betray the quickening of her breath, their color deepened by the twilight into something rich and tempting. They looked soft, as if they would yield gorgeously under his.The sight of them struck him with a sharp, physical pull, an invitation he had no right to accept and suddenly found difficult to refuse. Treacherously, he imagined the feel of them beneath his own, the way they might warm and soften at his touch. The thought tightened low and immediate, his body answering before his mind could restore reason. It would take so little. A single step. The smallest tilt of his head.
Before he was aware of any conscious decision, he lowered his head.
His fingers brushed her waist, an instinctive touch meant to draw her in, but the simple action changed everything, leaving no doubt about his intention. Elena’s hand drifted downward from his brow, along his cheek. Her breath caught, barely audible, and her eyes were locked on his, her long lashes fanning downward.
He leaned closer, close enough to feel the warmth of her exhale against his lips.
And then clarity struck.
Liam MacTavish would have his head.
Jesu.
