Page 9 of A Fierce Wind

Zoé would not tell her aunt what he had said or what he had done while the fever ruled him but she remembered his skin beneath her fingers and the feel of his muscled chest against her palm. She looked down at her tea, hoping her aunt did not see the blush she could feel rising in her cheeks.

Freddie’s sister went to stand at his bedside, smoothing his hair off his forehead. “I spoke with M’sieur Bouchet as I was on my way here and he was encouraging to me as well, but then he always is.” With a catch in her voice, she said, “Let us continue to pray he recovers.”

“He was very courageous,” said Zoé, wanting her aunt to know how proud she was of her friend.

Returning to her tea, Tante Joanna said, “Jean has told me what happened in Granville. I shudder to think you both might have been shot if not for my brother. Freddie was always a brave one, even when we were children. Once he rushed in to save a cottar’s child from a raging river. And, when our father was killed in the American war and then our elder brother in his duty with the Coldstream Guards, it was Freddie who was the stalwart one, the one who held us together. He encouraged our eldest brother, Richard, to take up the title and the leadership of the family.”

Zoé sipped her tea, thinking of her fevered companion. “I never saw Freddie as a hero until now. He was only my childhood friend. But now… I owe him my life.”

TanteJoanna, her auburn hair and brandy-colored eyes much like her brother’s, regarded Zoé over her tea. “Very often, the ones we think know best are the ones we know not at all.”

Zoé thought for a moment. “I’m beginning to see how true that is. We form impressions of people and even though they change and grow, we do not alter what we first believed about them.” She was only beginning to understand the man Freddie had become.

Rising, her aunt picked up the tea tray and smiled. “You have grown into a young woman of character, Zoé. I like to think I had something to do with it but, in fairness, I can hardly take credit.”

“You have much to do with who I am, Tante Joanna. You are the very model of the woman I hope one day to be.”

“Just don’t emulate my faults! Now, I will leave you to your tedious book and your patient. If you would like help or someone to relieve you, you have only to ask. I’ll send up the housekeeper in a while to look in on you.”

Zoé thanked her. The door softly closed and she went to Freddie’s side. When she was certain he still slept peacefully, she walked to the window that faced the front of the house. Outside on the green lawn below, a sculpture of two bronze stags, their antlers locked in combat, reminded her of the struggle for France’s future. The forces of all things she considered good fought the evil of Robespierre’s régime. Surely, in time, good must win. When that happened, would Freddie return to England? The possibility did not please her.

Behind her, Freddie moaned. The effect of the laudanum was wearing off, but she would give him no more if his fever was waning. She returned to his bedside and felt his forehead, thinking it might be cooler than before. With this encouraging sign, her spirits rose.

“At last you are naked and as beautiful as I’d imagined,” he murmured.

He might have meant the words for another woman but it was Zoé whose body reacted as she imagined standing before him, not in a gown but naked. The scandalous thought made her wonder, would he be pleased with what he saw?

Freddie woke to the heady scent of flowers wafting on a breeze. The intoxicating smell carried on the balmy Zephyr could only mean he was back on Guernsey.

Still alive then.

“’Tis about time you joined us, sleepy-head.”

Pigeon. He opened his eyes to see her sitting in a chair beside his bed, a clouded expression on her lovely face. Concern for him? His wound must have been serious then. He remembered a burning in his shoulder just before he lost consciousness. The throbbing ache he now experienced reminded him of his encounter with the republican soldiers. “The prognosis?”

She gave him an indulgent look. “You are fortunate the ancient Pierre Bouchet decided to retire on Guernsey. He no longer practices medicine, but he agreed to tend your wound as a favor to Oncle Jean. When I inquired of the good surgeon a short while ago, he pronounced you ‘recovering’. I am not so sure. You appear particularly gaunt and pale.”

The throbbing pain in his shoulder told him the bespectacled physician from Lorient had dug deep to remove the ball. His left shoulder was swathed in white muslin, his right shoulder bare above the blanket.

There was genuine worry in Zoé’s gray eyes.

“How delightful,” he said, trying to sound cheery. “And does my ghostly appearance appeal?”

“All Englishmen appear pale to me,” she replied pertly, “but I would prefer you returned to your usual good health.”

He acknowledged her comment with a small smile, sensing he’d lost track of time. “How long?”

“You burned with fever for more than a day and slept the next.” With a shrug of her delicate shoulders now swathed in blue silk, the tender mounds of her breasts just visible beneath her lace fichu, she said, “I’ll spare you your ravings. I paid them no mind.”

From her blush, he assumed his mutterings had spoken of her. He could only imagine what he had mumbled in his fevered state. He often woke from dreams of Zoé that featured heated kisses.

Avoiding his eyes, she leaned over his bed and plumped his pillow, bringing her slender neck close to his lips. He inhaled her scent of roses and was sorely tempted to close the distance to her ivory skin with his lips.

A stabbing jolt of pain forced him back against the pillow. “I don’t suppose Bouchet left me anything for the pain?”

“Laudanum, but he said ’twas best, once you were awake, to eat something and take more only when the pain requires it and you are ready to sleep. Given how long you’ve been without food, I agree.” Thrusting a bowl of something steaming in front of him, she lifted the spoon to his mouth. “On this rare occasion that I offer to feed you, dear Freddie, you’d best submit. Besides, after the soup, there is your favorite truffle omelette.”

Suddenly aware of his half-dressed state and her presence in his bedchamber, he said, “I’m hardly dressed to entertain young ladies.”