Page 114 of Death at a Highland Wedding
Just need to rest. Give me a moment. I’m fine.
“Mallory.” His hands grip me, and I can dimly sense his face over mine. I struggle to open my eyelids and manage to see his eyes, burning with intensity.
“I’m sorry,” he blurts. “The proposal. As I said in the letter, I would never trap you like that. I only thought… I thought you might come to… to care for—”
My eyelids flag. I want to hear what he’s saying. Ineedto hear it. But I can’t keep my eyes open.
“Mallory. Don’t go. Please.” His voice cracks. “I do not think I can bear it again.”
Bear what? Go where?
A sound in the darkness. A beeping. Familiar, but wrong. I focus on the noise, and harsh light blasts through my eyelids. Then the beeping, slow and steady.
The beeping of a hospital monitor.
I’m sliding back into my old body. The one lying comatose in a twenty-first-century Edinburgh hospital.
I yank myself back so fast I gasp, gulping breath as my heart races.
“Here,” I say on an exhale. “I’m here.”
His arms go around me, pulling me to him in a hug fierce enough to stop my breath. There’s a moment of complete silence, as we stay there, both of us just breathing. Then—
“Dr. Gray?” a voice says.
Gray makes a noise in his throat, lets me go, and turns to a groom asking what to do with Müller.
“Put him in the stables,” Gray says. “I will tend to him after I have seen to Miss Mitchell.”
“Do you need help carrying her—?”
“No, I do not,” he says, and scoops me up and continues on toward the house.
THIRTY-SEVEN
The bullet hit the rib, as I thought Gray said. Only he didn’t mean my rib. He meant the rib of my corset. It was a small enough caliber that the main damage is to my corset, which is ruined. The spot will bruise, and it hurts like hell, but the bigger concerns are that blow to my stomach and the ones to my head. Gray will need to monitor me, and he thinks I have a concussion. While I’m in rough shape, I’m in no danger of dying.
In danger of crossing back to my time?
We don’t discuss that. At some point, we’ll need to, and I’ll admit that I really did start sliding back so we can figure out how to handle that.
But not now.
What makes me cross over? The last two times—coming here and then going back again—I’d been strangled unconscious. Losing consciousness from chloroform didn’t do it. Does it need to be a serious threat to my life that also induces loss of consciousness? I don’t know, but I need to figure it out. I made my choice, and as much as I would love to see my parents again, I don’t want to risk not being able to come back here.
Once I’m taken care of, it’s time to look after Müller. Gray doesn’t want to do that, and I’m not even sure he should, given the murderous look on his face when I remind him.
McCreadie is up now, and he’s with us, as is Isla, and they help convinceGray that he needs to tend to Müller. The man cannot die on our watch, or Constable Ross is likely to arrest me for murder. That gets Gray moving.
McCreadie goes with him, leaving me with Isla, who is under strict instructions not to let me fall asleep. Is that because I may have a concussion? Or because he’s worried I’ll go back to my own time?
Hedidseem very concerned that I’ll go back. I’m groggy, and I can’t remember exactly what he said. That whole period from the time I nearly collapsed on the road until he got me inside is only snatches of memory. I remember telling Gray about Müller. I also remember hearing the hospital monitor beeping. I think he said something before that, about… a letter? I have the sense that I really need to remember what he said, but I can’t.
The important thing is that I remember everything up to the point where I collapsed on the road, meaning I remember what Müller said. Gray hadn’t wanted me straining myself as he examined me, so that story needs to wait until they return.
They do, quicker than I expect. Müller lost blood, but not enough to endanger his life. The cut was shallow; the bleeding had already stopped by the time the grooms got to him. He’s regained consciousness, and he’s demanding to be released, but no one’s listening, obviously.
When Gray and McCreadie return, I start my story at the point where Müller ambushed me, only to have Isla cut in with, “You were outside walking alone?” She stops, cheeks reddening. “I apologize. That sounds as if I am blaming you for what happened. I am only surprised.”
