His eyes were half open.His brows collided.He opened his mouth to speak.
“Drink,” he croaked.
Then, his strength spent, he released her.His arm dropped back down to the bed.
“Och.Aye.”
The distant bells for matins rang out then.
“’Tis time for more wine anyway,” she told him.
She poured the Bordeaux and stirred in exactly three drops from the vial.Then she sat beside him on the bed to help him drink it down.As she lifted his head, she noted again the soft texture of his hair, at odds with the hardened muscle of his body.
But she wouldn’t think about that.Especially since he would shortly have it tonsured.Nor would she think about the way his mouth opened eagerly to receive the drink.The way his brow creased in concentration.And the way his lids lifted drowsily, revealing smoky, glittering eyes that pierced her very soul.
He finished off the wine.By the time she returned the bottle of Bordeaux to the table and added more peat to the fire, he was snoring beneath the thick fog of slumber.
It was a soothing sound.When at last she climbed between the linens of her own pallet, the rough, measured music of his breath lulled her to a dreamless sleep.
Hew awoke in the dark to the soft sawing sighs of a woman.He smiled.One of his favorite joys was rousing after a tryst to the peaceful sounds of his satisfied lover.He was too drowsy at the moment to recall who the lovely lady was or what they’d done.But he’d doubtless made her happy.
It was only when he rolled onto his side, brushing his arm against the linens, that pain brought him fully alert.He grimaced as his hand throbbed and memory came flooding back.
He’d been burned.The Samhain bonfire had ignited Carenza’s leine, and he’d extinguished the flames with his arms.
The recollection magnified the sting of his flesh.Heat emanated from his arms.His blistered palm pulsed like boiling lead with every beat of his heart.
He clamped his teeth against the pain as he recalled more.
He’d been brought to the laird’s chamber.The physician had given him wine.He’d drifted off shortly after that.
So who was in the room with him now?
The fire had gone out.It was too dark to see.
It must be either the laird or the physician.
He edged carefully onto his back again and closed his eyes, listening and willing the pain to subside.
That was definitely a woman’s breathing.He’d heard it enough times to know.He strained his ears, trying to detect more.
In the distance, muted bells rang, waking the breather.
“Prime,” she announced to no one.
He recognized her voice at once.Lady Carenza.But he wondered why the lass would care about monks’ hours.Unless she needed to pray several times a night to atone for stealing her father’s coo.
Not wishing to startle her, he feigned sleep as she scrambled out of the pallet and crossed the chamber.
He heard her poking at the hearth.The shadows on his closed eyes lifted as fresh firelight illuminated the room.
She poured something and approached him.
“Sir,” she whispered faintly.
Sir?Was she calling himsir?Surely they were on less formal terms.After all, she’d apparently spent the night in this chamber with him.
He ignored her.
