The shallow cuts were just irritating as they stung like hell and had only ceased bleeding due to some cabbage-green sludge from Mrs Dawkins. The condition of his cheekbones was unknown as they’d numbed but his faithful housekeeper had thought nothing broken.
In fact, Hugh was uncertain how he’d made it back, just known he’d been compelled to prattle on in order to stay conscious as the hackney driver had chosen to search out and surmount every raised cobblestone in London.
He limped from his bedchamber in breeches and shirt but was halted by a lurking Cruikshank.
“I believe, Sir, that Miss…Jones is awaiting you in your library.”
“Yes, thank you, Cruik. And, er… There’s no need to keep a close eye on her anymore as she’s…as she is…” He scrunched his nose.How to explain?
“One of ours, Sir?”
“Indeed.”
“One did wonder.” The butler clasped hands behind his back. “Henceforth, Miss Jones will be accorded all freedoms.” Cruikshank cleared his throat. “Not that she wasn’t, of course. Do you require tea, Sir?”
“No, no. Give my thanks to everyone and send them to bed.”
Hugh made his way down the corridor but paused before the library, breathed deep…ouch, pulled back his shoulders…uff, ran a hand through his hair, stripping the remaining skin from his knuckles, and then opened the door.
What a wondrous sight for his sore eyes.
With cheeks scrubbed clean of coal dust and rosy from the fire, Amelia wore a cream robe that covered her from neck to ankle but her flaxen hair was loose and it flowed over her shoulders like the sinuous River Dwyryd in Wales.
Manfully, he strode into the room. “You look rested and unharmed, Amelia.”
Her eyes began at his bruised physog, lowered to his shoulders and then to his stomach as though she could see through his shirt and to the gruesome state of his innards.
“I am. But are you yourself unharmed?”
Hugh was about to say he felt fit as a fiddle, that the occasion a crazed horse had kicked him in Hyde Park had been worse.
But there was no reason for falsehoods.
No reason to concoct a tale for distraction.
She’d been there with him. Had likely saved his life and only deserved the truth.
“I feel,” he said, sinking into the sofa next to her, “horrendous. My guts throb. My cheekbones are numb. I can’t move my shoulders.”
A cleft of concern appeared between her brows. “You seemed in fine fettle in the hackney home.”
“I was prattling. I only prattle when in pain.”
“Oh. In that case, turn to one side.”
He frowned but did as requested and…groaned as nimble fingers kneaded his shoulders.
Such bliss and his head sagged.
“I’m not hurting you?”
He mumbled something but she continued, so it must have been vaguely coherent.
Gads, never before had he returned from a mission to care such as this.
Fingers pressed and circled, unravelling each taut muscle and strained tendon, and an agreeable lassitude besieged him.
Except as the hands wandered down his spine, another sensation entirely made itself known.
