If he had been dragged behind a runaway carriage, he could not have felt in worse condition than he did now. Even so, damn it if his cock didn’t twitch to attention. He took the opportunity to study her as she slept. How innocent she seemed. As serene as an angel.
Hell.
His illness must have rotted his brain. Where was such maudlin tripe emerging from? An angel and Bridget O’Malley did not belong in the same thought. The fiery banshee was as far as one could stray from the beatific.
She had tended to him though, had she not?
As the fever claiming him had ravaged his body, his rare moments of lucidity had been marked by her presence. Her husky voice singing lilting ditties, her fine-boned hands pressing a cool cloth to his brow, her arms helping him to lift his head so he could drink water.
He recalled asking, surly as a bear, why she was in his chamber.
Her response had been simple. Baffling. Because you need me, Duke.
He had not needed her. He was a man who needed no one. He was the Duke of Bloody Carlisle. He did not even require sleep.
The daring of the woman. She wore her hair confined in a heavy coil of braids pinned to her crown, but a few tendrils had come free. One curled over her cheek, and he could not resist brushing it away. As he did, his touch grazed her face. Her skin was a smooth temptation beneath his fingertips. Suddenly, he found it impossible stop his tender exploration.
Over her cheekbone, down her nose, pausing at the perfect pout of her rosebud lips. Just the whisper of a touch, one swipe of his thumb, but it was enough to jostle her from her dreams. Thickly lashed eyes fluttered open, and he found himself ensnared in the brilliant gaze of the last woman in the world he could trust and the only woman in the world he wanted.
She smiled sleepily at him, and it struck him that it was the first genuine smile he had seen gracing her luscious lips.
“You’re awake.” Then she blinked, jolting into a seated position. “You’re awake!”
His own lips curved, but it well could have been a grimace. “Am I awake?”
Her hand went to his brow, checking to see if he was feverish. Her palm on his skin was a soothing balm and a deep ache, all at once. Suddenly, he was starving for her touch, for any point of contact between them.
“I must be dreaming,” she said, her brogue in strong evidence. “Surely this cannot be the Duke of Carlisle making a sally?”
“Yes.” He grinned more. Though his body was weak and weary, he was simultaneously imbued with the simmering rush of wakefulness, his body humming with gratitude to be free of the fever and in such proximity to her as well. “It can be and it is. I fear the illness rotted my mind.”
“You do not feel feverish,” she announced, her touch lingering as if she too was reluctant to sever the connection. The air was thick and smoldering with something. His illness and her determination to see him back to health had momentarily removed the barriers keeping them from each other.
He did not want them back, though he knew they were necessary. “I believe the fever has mercifully broken. How long was I ill?”
Gradually, the strains of reality were returning to him, intruding.
“Two days. You were very ill, Carlisle.” Her smile faded. “The entire household was quite worried for you.”
He noted she had said the household and not her. Why it irked him, he could not say. Or perhaps he could, but he wished not to. And then something else belatedly occurred to him, even more troubling. “Why are you not in your chamber? And how did you come to be in mine?”
“Wilton inadvertently locked herself inside my chamber.”
When she said it, her nostrils gave a small, adorable flare. He instantly admonished himself for such an observation. This woman was trouble. And she was lying to him. Again.
He stared her down calmly. “You are giving yourself away once more, my dear.”
“Perhaps Wilton had some assistance in locking herself in my chamber.”
“Indeed.” Trouble was far too tame a word to describe her. “But that does not explain your presence here. Why would my staff allow you to tend me on your own?”
She flushed, removing herself from his bed with stiff grace, spending an inordinate amount of time fussing with her skirts before deigning to offer a response. “You are not the easiest patient, Your Grace. You gave poor Wilton such a fright with your caterwauling, and the incident involving the broth meant the domestics were only too happy to allow me to take on the onerous burden of looking after you.”
He vaguely recalled hollering and throwing a bowl of broth against the wall when he had been gripped in the throes of the fever. He had been certain someone was poisoning him. It was simply the suspicious nature of his mind, coupled with the illness. No poisoning caused the symptoms he had suffered, and he knew that now with a clear, lucid mind. He had simply taken ill, much as the knowledge aggrieved him. He preferred to think of himself as invincible, but the world occasionally liked to remind him of just how wrong he was.
“Christ,” he muttered. “I did not frighten you?”
“You seemed calmest in my presence,” she said.
This time, her nostrils did not flare. Not even a tiny twitch.
Damn it.
She was telling the truth.
More fragments returned to him. Her husky voice, lilting and soothing. She had spoken to him in the language of her homeland. Had soothed him, comforted him. When he had been cold, she had layered him in blankets and wrapped her warmth around him. When he had been hot, she had traced cool cloths over his heated skin, bathing him.
Why would a Fenian rebel tend to her captor with such tender dedication?
It made no more sense than the leader of the Special League assigned with eradicating Fenians marrying one and finding himself falling under her spell.
Against his will.
Very much against his will.
Not that it mattered. Either way, the burgeoning emotions he felt for her, swelling like the rising tide in his heart, were a betrayal of his duty, his family, and his men. Bridget O’Malley was not meant to be his wife. And neither was he meant to want her to remain that way.
“Thank you for your diligence,” he forced himself to say, discomfort making his tone abrupt. Leo prided himself on the inability to feel a goddamn thing. But whether it was the sickness or his own bloody weakness, his cold, dead insides had been hit by a spring thaw. “You need not have done what you did.”
“I know.” Her gaze did not stray from his. “I wanted to do it. I have a great deal of experience tending to invalids. Consider yourself fortunate I did not bind your wrists while you slept as you did to me. Or leave you beneath the dubious care of Annie.”
He deserved those barbs. “You know as well as I that you could not be trusted.”
Abruptly, she turned in a swirl of skirts, moving to a table across the chamber. “What of now?” she asked, her back to him.
If only he knew the answer to that question. “Logic tells me no.”
Bridget faced him and closed the distance between them, seating herself once more on his bed. She offered him water, and he had not realized how parched he had been until that very moment. “What does the rest of you say?”
His cock said it didn’t give a damn whether or not he could trust her.
And his heart…his heart said yes she could be trusted. Yes he could trust her. He already had.
But he admitted none of that aloud. Instead, he accepted the water from her and gulped it down in large, greedy swallows. It occurred to him that with her back to him, her body obscuring his view of what she had been about, she could have adulterated his water somehow. The truth was, however, she could have done anything she wished to him while he had been ill, and yet, she had not. Instead, she had taken care of him until she was so exhausted she laid down at his side and fell asleep.
No woman had ever shown him such care, aside from Lily.
“Enough,” she cautioned sternly, plucking the cup fro
m his weakened grasp. “If you drink too much at once, you shall be ill, and I’ll not be mopping up your mess.”
His stomach clenched as if on cue, then offered up a loud, angry growl. “I think I require sustenance, if you would be so kind.”
“I will see that some broth is sent up.”
“Broth can go to the devil.” He gave her his most ferocious frown. “I require something fortifying. Beef. Chicken. Ham. Even some bloody boiled potatoes would suffice.”
The banshee actually clucked her tongue at him. “The doctor was clear you are to have liquids only when you first wake. You need to follow his orders or risk sacrificing your health. I have already had reports from the domestics that you spend entire days without sleeping. Little wonder you took ill. Moreover, you know as well as I your French chef would never serve boiled potatoes.”
Grim disbelief swept through him. The woman had been consulting his physician concerning his illness and recovery? And she had interrogated his servants about his lack of slumber? That was to say nothing of the comment concerning Monsieur Brodeur, which was utterly accurate.
He could not like this. It was as if she had settled in. Made herself at home.
It was as if she were his wife in truth rather than in name only.
“I do not want broth, madam,” he bit out, aware he sounded stubborn. Perhaps even childish. Not caring a whit. He wanted something fortifying. He was already mending. He had neither the time nor the inclination to be an invalid.
Her eyes glinted as they bored into his, and he swore the wench was enjoying this moment of role reversal between them.
“You will have broth or nothing. And afterward, you shall bathe. You stink, Duke.”
Here too were words he had spoken to her before. But she was also not incorrect in her assessment, and he was willing to sip broth like a consumption patient and bathe if he could have what he wanted most in return. “Very well. I shall have the broth and the bath, but I must insist upon one condition.”
She raised a brow. “Name your condition.”
If she wanted to truly play at a reversal of roles, he was more than willing, regardless of how much he knew he should not. He met her stare with an unflinching one of his own. “I want you to bathe me.”
The bath in the bathing chamber adjoining the ducal apartments had been prepared. It was warm and sweetly orange-scented, humid air clinging to her lungs as Bridget inhaled. The massive tub was empty, but that was a problem which would be remedied soon enough when she helped the duke into it.
The thought should not fill her with such trepidation, but it did. It plagued her with the repetitive tenacity of a small child asking his mother an endless barrage of questions. Cullen had been no different with her as a lad. She could still hear his little voice now.
Why is the sky blue, Bridget? What is the sky made of?
She loved her brother. Needed to help him to escape from Kilmainham by whatever means she could, and she must not forget that.
Where do clouds go when the moon is out, Bridget? Why do our feet stop growing when we get old?
“Why indeed,” she grumbled to herself, her eyes stuck upon the steaming tub, knowing what it represented.
She was going to see the Duke of Carlisle.
Naked.
She was going to lay her hands upon his bare flesh. Stroke his corded shoulders and strong arms with a soap-laden cloth. Trail suds over his chest. Dip her hand beneath the slick warmth of the water. Run the cloth…elsewhere.
Another why plagued her then: why had she agreed to such madness? Why had she remained at Blayton House, tending to the Duke of Carlisle for two days, when she could have fled and been long gone from his reach?
She tried to tell herself it was in Cullen’s best interest if she stayed, gleaned as much information as she could, and used her evidence as a means to bargain with John and gain her brother’s freedom. But the truth of it was, Bridget had stayed on because she had wanted to.
There it was. Shameful and wicked and wrong. A betrayal of her own flesh and blood. Of everything she stood for. She could admit it to herself, own her ignominy.
“I am ready, wife.”
She gave a start at the resonant voice, rumbling with heat and mystery and power, even though he was scarcely recovered from the illness he’d suffered. Bridget turned to find he had walked to the bathing chamber unassisted.
He wore a dressing gown belted loosely at his waist, a vee of beautiful chest bared to her wandering gaze. Beneath its hem, his calves were strong, his feet large, yet surprisingly elegant for a man of his immense size. He was pale, his dark hair in need of a sound washing, his jaw shadowed by the potent masculinity of his whiskers. Although he had been ill for two whole days, not even the sickness that had ravaged him could detract from his appearance.
She strove to keep her countenance an expressionless mask. “You should have called for me, Duke. I would have assisted you.”
“You would have assisted me with one hand, and a sharpened knife clutched in the other behind your back, yes?” he asked.
She flinched at the question. “If I had wanted you dead, English, I would have had ample time to accomplish it. Instead, I nursed you through your illness.”
“Fair enough, banshee,” he returned, his eyes assessing. “Forgive my attempts at being droll. It requires an old, unpracticed muscle. But I am not so weak that I cannot reach the tub on my own strength, though I thank you for the offer.”
He came toward her then. Not in the stalking, thunderous manner he often possessed, but slowly, taking each step with care. He came near enough to touch, and then his long fingers were upon the loose knot keeping his dressing gown in place.
She knew she ought to look away, to grant him privacy. Or perhaps to exercise her own sense of modesty. But she feared, where he was concerned, she had none. And she could not wrest her gaze from him as the knot opened. He turned, presenting her with his back, and then the dressing gown gaped. The twain ends of the belt dangled at his sides. One shrug of his broad shoulders, and the entire garment slipped away from him.
It pooled on the floor, forgotten.
A gasp tore from her before she could quell it. Lord in heaven, the man was a masterpiece. No sculptor could have carved a more perfect work of art from marble. His legs were long and strong, his bottom high and taut. She had never imagined that particular part of a man could be a thing of beauty, but on him it was. His back too was magnificent, muscled and lean at his waist, leading to broad shoulders. He moved his arms, stretching, and the thick cords in his shoulders and arms flexed. Here was the evidence of his well-honed power.
She could not speak a word. Her mouth went dry.
Slowly, he stepped over the rim of the tub and lowered his body into the water, letting out a guttural groan of pleasure as the warmth washed over him. That gorgeous, masculine sound echoed between her thighs where she felt aching and heavy and wet. Even her nipples hardened beneath her corset.
Bridget had just seen the Duke of Carlisle naked.
She had seen his arse.
Beneath the water, he remained utterly, deliciously nude. And now she would have to touch him. To bathe him.
How would she manage it?
She felt as if she were about to swoon, and Bridget O’Malley did not swoon. Not ever. Perhaps it was the consequence of witnessing her first entirely nude man.
The back of him, anyway. He had kept his front to himself, and she had to admit a stab of disappointment at the denial, along with a flush of curiosity. Though she was a virgin, a lass who grew up in the stews of Dublin, then went on to become a shop girl in London, she had known her fair share of amorous-minded gents. She was no stranger to the ways of the world.
She had been kissed and wooed and groped. Her skirts had been raised. When she had been sixteen, she had allowed Thomas Muldoon to stroke her in her nether regions, and when her mother had discovered what she’d done, her ears had received a sound boxing.
Other boys and
men, both before and after Thomas, had made attempts. She had rebuffed most, allowed kisses from a scant few. No one—not one single man—had ever had the same undeniable pull as the Duke of Carlisle. He robbed her of the desire to want anyone other than him.
“Plotting my murder, banshee?” he asked, draping his arms over the lip of the tub, sending fat water droplets dripping to the tiled floor. His dark head leaned back. He sounded as weary as he must be, after having taken so ill over the past two days.
The intimacy of the scene—him in his bath, his skin bare and glistening with the kiss of warm water, steam swirling around them, the decadent scent of citrus and musk perfuming the air—conspired against her. Made her forget why she must never allow herself to feel even a hint of feelings for him.
Too late, crowed her heart.
“Not your murder,” she forced herself to say, taking up the soap and cloth left by his manservant when he had readied the bath. “But perhaps revenge.” She had not forgotten he had allowed her to dip beneath the water when he had been helping her to bathe.
“It is in poor taste to exact revenge upon a man who has just been ill,” he protested.
She rounded the tub and realized his eyes were closed.
Did he trust her that implicitly already, or had the sickness sapped him of all caution?
She could not be certain, but either way, warmth unfurled within her as she stared at him. His brow was smooth, lips slightly parted, and even his jaw, ordinarily tense and sharp, appeared relaxed. She liked this side of him. He seemed more…human somehow. Less a god of war and more a simple man.
But she must not allow herself to get caught up in such confounding thoughts. “Surely it is not in any more poor taste than attempting to drown a woman you have already shot,” she said drily, seating herself on a small chair alongside the tub left there for just such a purpose.
“There was good reason for both of those actions,” he said, eyes still remaining closed. “Though you may rest assured that when I shot you, I only intended to disarm you, and when I dunked you in the tub, I only wanted you to answer my questions.”
Heartless Duke Page 16
