She tugged the thick folds of white flannel down as far as his waist. He, of course, gave her no help whatsoever. She reached down to tug the garment farther and from the corner of her eye caught the gleam of white teeth.
“You might help,” she told him
“Why? You’re doing so well.” How could he laugh when he was obviously in pain?
She left the nightshirt bunched at his waist. If he wanted to smooth it down over his hips and legs and . . . and other parts, he could do it himself. She briskly rearranged his pillows and straightened the bedclothes.
“What’s your name?”
He didn’t answer.
“Where were you headed? Is there anyone I can notify? A wife? Your family must be worried.”
He gave her a strange look. His forehead furrowed, then slowly his eyes closed. His skin was ashen and the lines of pain around his eyes and mouth had deepened again. He really was exhausted.
She felt a little guilty at forcing him into the nightshirt, but she felt so much better knowing he was dressed, more or less. She couldn’t leave him naked in her bed all day. Not with children in the house.
She wasn’t cross with him, not really. He was what he was. It was her own fault she was feeling so disappointed and upset. She was the fool who’d let herself start to care, who’d begun to build fantasies around an unconscious man. Thinking morning dreams could come true.
Maddy didn’t just need him decently clothed. She needed him out of her bed and out of her life as soon as possible.
He wasn’t sure how long it was before he woke again. He examined his surroundings with care, searching for some clue to where he was, apart from in a bed built into an alcove. He wriggled and the bed rustled. A straw mattress?
Half a dozen nails were set into a wall. Women’s clothing hung from them: a couple of dresses, a pelisse, a faded green cloak. Only one nail with men’s clothing: a coat, well-cut, doeskin breeches, and a fine linen shirt.
Nothing looked familiar.
He parted the curtains and found himself in a small, cramped cottage. The walls were rough-cast plaster, simply whitewashed, the floor made of uneven stone flags. The ceiling was low and blackened with smoke. The door was ancient and rough hewn, with a wooden latch to fasten it. Above the latch a heavy bolt gleamed new minted against the weathered wood. There was a fireplace with a fire burning and a kettle and a pot suspended over it.
His stomach rumbled. Something smelt good. Everything smelt good. Beneath the aroma of the food, there was a faint, all-pervasive scent of beeswax. Even the bedding smelt clean, of hay and sunshine and lavender.
Outside, children shouted at play. Whose children?
A woman moved into sight and he knew at once that this was she. She was familiar, yet not, slender, with a quick, graceful way of moving. Her dark auburn hair was coiled high on the crown of her head and he could see her pale, tender nape, kissed by a few fire-dark tendrils.
He knew what that skin smelt like, tasted like, felt like.
But he could not remember her name.
Her back was toward him. He admired the elegant line of her spine, the narrow waist and gentle swell of her hips accented by the strings of an apron. He liked the way her hips and her buttocks swayed when she moved around the cottage.
She returned to the table, this time facing him, and began chopping vegetables. She hadn’t noticed him yet.
She frowned as she chopped, deep in thought. She was lovely. Not conventionally beautiful, but definitely appealing.
Her face was heart shaped, with creamy-silk skin, her broad forehead tapering to a small, decided chin. Her nose was tip-tilted and opinionated, her mouth was soft with full, pink lips that were, at the moment, pursed.
He couldn’t tell from here what color her eyes were, and dammit, he couldn’t remember. A man should at least remember that.
And her name. Dammit, whatwasher name?
Her chopping slowed, and slowly, as if she knew he was watching her, she raised her eyes.
“You’re awake!” She dropped the knife and hurried across to him. “How do you feel this time?”
This time?He grimaced and touched the bandage gingerly. “My head . . .” The slightest movement set the hammers pounding at his skull, like blacksmiths around an anvil.
“Yes, you hit it when you fell.”
