“Oh, very well – it was mostly not my fault.”
She rolled her eyes. “I suppose it is rather too late to suggest we all simply agree never to speak of any of it again?”
Theo considered her. “Are you referring to the duel? Or our little fiction of an engagement? Or, dare I say it, to those two rather memorable kisses?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Ideally, all of the above.”
“That is a great many things to forget. And I must confess, I possess an excellent memory where scandal is concerned.”
As if to underscore his remark with misplaced bravado, he made a valiant and very unwise attempt to sit upright. He managed no more than a few inches before a groan escaped him and his hand flew to his side, pressing against the bandages. A patch of red was already beginning to bloom through the linen of his shirt. “Blast,” he muttered through gritted teeth.
Hetty rose at once. “Do not move, you absolute idiot.”
“I was merely – ”
“Attempting to expire again? Yes, I can see that. Must you do it upright? Lay down at once.”
Without waiting for leave, she bent beside him with her hands already at the hem of his shirt, brushing the linen aside to inspect the wound. Theo had the good sense to stop breathing as her fingers ran along his bare skin and over the crude stitching.
“The stitching has held,” she murmured, inspecting the binding with clinical detachment that belied the colour draining from her face. “Though how, I cannot say. The man stitched you as though he were darning a sock.”
“I thought I might bleed out fashionably,” he offered, because her face was so very close to him, and her hands were on his skin, and silence made the moment feel far too real.
“Do be serious,” she said, adjusting the edge of the bandage with uncharacteristic gentleness.
“I find seriousness most dreadfully overrated.”
“You are not to jest on this matter.”
He blinked, startled by the sudden change in her tone.
“It is not amusing,” she continued, more quietly now. “I slept past sunrise. Lottie had already departed by the time I awoke, and when I realised – ” She faltered, drawing back, though her hand remained resting lightly against his ribs. “I feared I should not reach you both in time. That I might find you – or Benedict – or perhaps both of you – stretched upon the grass like some absurdly tragic scene from a gothic romance.” Her voice dropped further. “And then I arrived… only to find Lottie waving that dreadful pistol about as though it were abonnet at a country fair – ” She paused again, her throat working. “It was my hand,” she confessed at last.
Theo frowned. “I do not understand your meaning.”
“When the pistol discharged,” she said, without lifting her eyes. “It wasmyhand. I was trying to wrest it from Lottie. I thought I had hold of it. And then you – ” Her voice cracked. “You made that sound. That dreadful, strangled sound. And then you fell.”
Theo swallowed, wincing as pain clawed up his side. “Hetty – ”
“You were bleeding. On the ground. Because of me.”
He regarded her quietly. Her eyes remained fixed on the place where her hand hovered near the wound, though her fingers lay still, curled against his ribs. She was pale, drawn and quiet clearly ashamed.
He reached out, slowly and with no small amount of discomfort, placing his hand gently atop hers. “Hetty,” he said, as gently as breath would allow, “you were trying to stop it.”
“I failed.”
“Well – yes,” he allowed, with the barest trace of his usual levity. “Though in fairness, your record of successful duel interruptions has never been particularly impressive.”
She responded with a soft inhalation.
“And for what it is worth,” he added, “if I were to be shot by anyone… I believe I am rather glad it was you.”
She glared at him through glistening lashes. “That is, without question, the most idiotic thing you have ever said.”
“Give me time,” he said weakly. “I am grievously injured. One cannot expect coherence under such conditions.”
She gave a choked laugh and then sighed. “I was frightened, Theo. You are my oldest friend, and my – ”
