“I don’t need relief,” he grumbled. “I’m perfectly well. Perfectly capable.”
“Capable and well are not the same. And I would never suggest you are other than capable. Of course you are. You never stop moving, working, thinking, helping. Of course you are bloody capable.”
She tucked her legs beneath her and curled over him until her lips met his scar. She kissed it. “The most capable. I know from experience. But”—she straightened, letting her fingers play across his thigh like his flew across a pianoforte—“being perfectly capable does not mean we are entirely well.”
His fingers trailed down her arm, the top of her thigh, traced circles on her knee.
“May I? I think you’ll enjoy it.” She found a cheeky grin, just for him.
He drew in a shaky breath. “I’d never tell you not to touch me.”
“I was counting on that.” She pulled the stopper from the bottle and drizzled a bit of the oil into her palm. Holding it like a pool of gold in her palm, she stoppered the bottle once more and set it aside, then rubbed her palms together until they fizzed with warmth. Then she cupped her hands and breathed into her palms. “Best to heat it first.”
“I’m already hot, Clara.”
And the spark in his eyes gave truth to his words; the rhythmic stroking of his fingers down her thighs sparked heat in her, too. Later. She needed to heat up his leg first.
She curved her palm around his hip at the top tip of his scar and stroked downward, coating his leg with the oil, applying just the tiniest bit of pressure.
He groaned.
“Hurt or…?” She paused, watching his face for an answer.
“Or.”
“Don’t lie, Atlas Bromley.”
“A bit of both.”
She restarted her rubbing, up and down, pressing the sharp edges of the side of her hand into the downward motion. “It is a… terrifying wound. Will you tell me about it?” A gentle smooth upward, a hard rub down.
He would not answer her.
She sighed.
“The battle would be won in an hour or so.” He gave a brittle laugh. “So close to escaping without more than a few scrapes.” He fiddled with the hem of her shift. “The gate had been closed. We were holding against the French. Everyone… elated. Me too. No, not quite. The stench of death too thick for that. But… a body doesn’t always know when it’s hurt. I’d felt a burning tear. I’d seen the man’s eyes who’d done it. Wide and bright with fear.” He closed his eyes. His head lolled to the side, the scruffy profile of jaw hard against the snowy white of the pillow. “I killed him. So I got the better end of the deal.”
Still she massaged his leg, now rubbing little circles slowly around the scar’s raised edges.
He groaned and shifted. “Wasn’t till later, after the gate was secured and the French inside the walls”—he swallowed hard—“all dead, that the fire in my leg— God. I couldn’t hold myself up anymore. Only risked looking at it once. What a bloody nightmare. I was lucky, though. Still alive. And found and tended to early. Others… they remained for days on that field. Dying. Not dead.” He cursed, closed his eyes. “I was lucky. Had agood surgeon to sew me up. Didn’t lose the leg. Came home, and my mother tended me. Not long.”
She wept a bit. Inside, where he could not see. For him, she snorted. “You wouldn’t allow her to for long, I’m sure.”
The corner of his lip tipped up. Thank God. “No, I wouldn’t.” He sighed and opened his eyes. “My family less lucky than me.”
Her hands stilled on his thigh. “Not at all. You were alive! Quite lucky indeed.”
“But unable to help Raph on the estate. Giving my parents all kinds of worry. As if we didn’t have enough woes already.”
She massaged a bit harder than she perhaps should, digging her knuckles into a tender spot.
His body jerked. “Hell! Clara?”
“Yes?” she asked sweetly. “Too hard? I do apologize.”
He hinged at the waist just enough to send his muscles flexing, scattering her thoughts. Not that she needed them after he wrapped his hand up in her hair and pulled her down to the bed for a kiss. “Minx.”
“Shall I continue?” She licked the seam of his lips. “Or…”
