He took a long step toward her. “Etta, it isn’t troubling me if you share your fear or your upset. I want to hear it. I want you to be able to let it out.”
She did face him then, slowly, her dark gaze flitting up and down his body. “You are so different from my husband, Theo. He would have blamed me for being so foolish as to stand close to the street. He would have said that I brought it on myself. That what happened or nearly happened was a consequence of my own bad choices.”
When she said the last sentence, he realized she was not repeating the berating her bastard of a husband would have said, but punishing herself for what she’d done or not done that night. He closed the distance in two long steps and gently cupped her cheeks.
“It wasn’t your fault,” he said. “It could have happened toanyoneon that street. It was a series of unfortunate actions that nearly…” He couldn’t finish that sentence and turned his head.
“Nearly caused you harm,” she said for him.
He blinked down at her. “You are worried about me?”
“Yes,” she said. “Of course. You put yourself at risk to pull me to safety. What if you had—”
“Don’t,” he interrupted, and leaned down to kiss her briefly. “Don’t.” She let out her breath in a shuddering sigh and reached back to steady herself on the window ledge. “God, you look exhausted. Come, let me help you out of those torn clothes,” he said.
She didn’t protest as he drew her closer to the bed and turned her around so he could unfasten her gown. It wasn’t the first time he’d done so, of course. She’d been coming here to his bed night after night in the past week, he’d taken off her gown many times, but this was different. He wasn’t trying to seduce her—he was taking care of her. And he had admitted to himself that he loved her, and so as he gently unbuttoned her, it was like seeing her for the first time.
He pulled the gown down one arm and then the other, wincing as he noticed her scraped elbow and a rapidly forming bruise on her shoulder. He pulled her dress down around her hips and it swished at her feet. She turned to face him in her short chemise and pretty stockings, which were now torn just around where her knee was bruised, her slippers filthy with both dirt and a little blood from a cut on the top of her foot.
“Jesus,” he breathed.
She shook her head. “It’s not that bad.”
He frowned. “You are cut and bruised all over your body,” he said. “Please don’t minimize that for my benefit, I have eyes.”
At that, the tears she had been fighting not to shed began to slide down her cheeks. She made no move to wipe them, just stared at him as they fell. He took her hand and held it, wanting to wrap her up in his arms, but knowing that what she might need was just to let it out for a moment or two.
And she did, her breath becoming shorter as she whimpered, “The horse just came so fast. I wanted to move but I couldn’t. It was like being in a dream.”
“A nightmare,” he said with a shudder.
She sobbed, “A horrible nightmare.”
And with that she stepped forward into his arms. He smoothed her hair, letting her cry into his chest until her breath became steadier. Then he retrieved a monogrammed handkerchief from his pocket and gave it to her.
“Let me get the items from the antechamber. Why don’t you sit by the fire?”
She did as she was told and he heard her blow her nose as he exited the room. Kimball had arranged everything Theo had asked for on a tray, and he carried it in and set in on the table next to the basin in his room. Etta had taken a place on the settee by his fire, half collapsed on the pillows while he was gone. He could feel her watching him as he filled the basin and then dipped a clean cloth into it, rung it out and turned back to her.
“May I tend to some of those scrapes?” he asked.
She nodded, watching him as he returned to her. For a moment he considered sitting beside her, but he would have a better angle on his knees, so he took to them, ignoring the soreness in his own muscles as he removed her slippers and set them aside, then glided his hands up to untie her garters. She took in a short breath as he did so and he supposed she must be thinking of the last time he’d done this.
With his teeth.
He glanced up at her and gave his cheekiest smile to ease her mind. “You were so kind to tear these to shreds. It gives me so many ideas.”
She laughed a little and he was relieved at the sound. It meant she wasn’t entirely broken by what had happened. “I would have much preferredyoutear them.”
“Yes,” he agreed, and tossed each stocking away. He dabbed at the scrapes on her feet. She gripped the edge of the settee and hissed out her breath. Once again, he was struck by the dichotomy of forcing that sound from her lips with pleasure versus this.
He continued to wash each scrape on her feet and legs, then got up to rinse the rag and switch to a new one. When he returned, he sat next to her and went to work on her hands and arms. When she winced or grumbled with the pain, he felt like he was being stabbed, himself.
“I’m sorry,” he said at last, without looking at her face.
“Why?” she asked. When he didn’t answer, she slid a finger beneath his chin and forced him to look at her. Her expression was so gentle, so warm, so very…her that he almost couldn’t breathe. “You saved me.”
“But I should have protected you,” he said, and his mind took him back, once again, to that night on the terrace so many years ago. When he could have saved her, truly saved her, from all the pains she had suffered in the intervening years. When he could have married her.
