“I can act as envoy, if you’d like?” Genevieve appeared agitated, as if she did not believe they were not in some sort of peril.
Victoria inclined her head. “I think that would be wise. Although, I do not need to know of anything he might say to you. As I have said, I no longer care,” she hastened to add, even though a part of her fervently wished to hear such things.
Maybe it was just the pain talking and he will show remorse and gratitude in due course. Or maybe I have been on my own for so long, that I have become desperate for a single kind word.
Left to stew a while in his agony, with Victoria’s sharp words lodged in his head, sharper than splintered steel, Camdyn tasted regret on his furred, parched tongue. Some latent sense of self-consciousness forced him to take the cloth from the side-table to wipe away the blood that trickled from his sewn-up wound, not wanting to stain the beautiful woman’s nice linens.
I dinnae need to speak to her like that. She were only tryin’ to do some good, and I went and acted like a stubborn bairn.
He sank back against the heavenly pillows, softer than anything he had ever felt in his life and cursed under his breath.
“This war has turned me cruel,” he muttered. He could still feel the slim bones of her wrists underneath his fingertips, and it turned his empty stomach. Having fought for so long, he had forgotten that not everyone was the enemy. Every day did not have to be a battlefield, yet he seemed forever primed for an attack, and that pretty angel had borne the brunt of his lashing tongue.
She were right, an’ all. If she had nae nursed me back to health, they’d have found me out there on the street and loaded me up on a cart, to toss me on a pyre with all the other corpses they dinnae care about.
He looked down at his stitched abdomen, wondering if it was truly possible that her dainty hands had done such precise work.
“It’s neater than the stitchin’ on me kilt. I reckon only a lass could’ve done this, after all.” He laughed, and immediately regretted it, as a jab of pain shot through him.
Throughout the many battles he had endured, he had watched his fellow soldiers being hacked up and put back together like cattle in a slaughterhouse. Physicians were a luxury, and the Jacobites only had bonesetters and men wielding glowing orange prongs, ready to sear shut a wound at a moment’s notice. In the aftermath, infection killed more than firelocks and canisters, and those who fought off the suppuration and festering injuries were left with ragged scars.
She said she dinnae care for the campaigns of kings and lords, said she dinnae care where folks come from, so long as she can help ‘em. And I spat her good deed in her face, like the uncivilized cretin she probably fears I am.
He shifted into a more comfortable position, though no position was comfortable in his state.
She was not at fault for the actions of men, any more than he was solely responsible for the loss at Culloden Moor. He hated that he had brought such irritation and hurt into her enticing green eyes, for he would have liked to have seen the way they twinkled again, like they had when he had first woken up.
He puffed out a resigned sigh. “I’ll have to apologize to her when the chance comes.”
The trouble was, he had the awful feeling that he had already set that bridge ablaze, and that angel would never cross the threshold of this room again. Why would she? He had already proven himself to be nothing short of a devil.
Chapter 6
Alone in his bedchamber, and going quite out of his mind with boredom, Camdyn’s head lifted as he heard the bedchamber door not long after daylight had transformed into the smoky black of evening. His eyes widened, hoping it might be Victoria, come to give him his chance to apologize.
Let it be that charmin’ angel, and I’ll never let her see me as a brute again…
Around noon, he had been visited by a sullen young man in smart attire who had delivered some soup and left again without saying a word. Since then, Camdyn had been left to his own devices, which he suspected he might have brought upon himself.
His heart sank as an older woman entered and he braced for another dose of silent treatment. Having been surrounded by soldiers, on and off, for the last few years, he did not care for quietude. It only served to allow the nightmares of what he had seen and done to come creeping back into his mind, and they were anything but silent.
“Good evening to you,” the old woman said. She had gray hair lacquered into a severe style that seemed to lift her eyebrows involuntarily, giving her a perpetually alarmed expression.
He folded his arms across his chest. “Aye, evenin’.”
“I suggest you tuck in that bottom lip of yours, Mister,” the woman scolded, observing him with pale blue eyes. “It won’t do you any good with me, and don’t you start railing again, or I will have to bring something from my mistress’s medicine collection to put you to sleep.”
He stared at her in surprise. No one had spoken to him like that since he left his mother’s hearth.
“At least ye’re talkin’ to me, unlike the lad what came in here earlier. If looks could kill, ye’d have found me a grave man.”
“Yes, well, perhaps if you showed some manners and some courtesy, you might be treated in kind.” The woman carried a tray of cloche-covered offerings, which she set on the side-table, before pushing a wingback armchair with red leather upholstery closer to the bed and plonking herself in it.
“Ye heard about that, eh?” Camdyn pulled a blanket higher over his torso, feeling suddenly exposed in this woman’s company. Although, he realized he had not felt the same embarrassment in front of Victoria.
The woman snorted. “The entire household heard that. Now, do you have a name? I can’t keep referring to you as, ‘that rude, ungrateful soldier,’ though I imagine that might satisfy my mistress.”
“It’s Camdyn McKay,” he replied, feeling gloomy about the bad first impression he had made upon Victoria. Evidently, she was determined to hold a grudge, and he could not blame her for that.
“I’m Genevieve Greaves. A mouthful, but I don’t expect you’ll have to say the full thing very often.” She plucked off the nearest silver cloche and brought a bowl of soup to rest in her hands, readying a spoon to dip into the tantalizing, amber-colored liquid. He spied small chunks of meat floating in the broth, with some orange slices of carrot, and what appeared to be a neep or two. His mouth watered in anticipation.
“Are ye that other lass’s ma?” Camdyn could not take his eyes off the glistening soup, the meaty, rich smell enveloping his senses.
Genevieve laughed. “Lord, no! Don’t you know anything of polite society, Mr. McKay? I’d not have called her my mistress if she was my daughter.” She paused in thought, the spoon so close to touching the soup. “Although, we’re quite like a mother and daughter in many ways. For one, I’ll scold anyone—man, woman, or child—who speaks to her in a coarse tongue and leaves bruises on her wrists.”
Camdyn flinched. “I dinnae mean to grab her. It took me a while to figure out where I was, and what were goin’ on. I imagine ye’d be the same, if ye’d thought ye were a dead man, and ye waked in some odd place.”
“Be that as it may, if you so much as look at her in a way that I don’t like, you can expect a hiding from me, even if your innards are hanging out.” Genevieve clicked her tongue, but he spotted a slight curve in her mouth that suggested she was teasing him. At least partially.
“It’s naught personal,” Camdyn muttered, feeling as though he were on trial. “If ye were on the losin’ side, ye wouldnae be too friendly toward the enemy, either. Especially if ye woke up to find one starin’ at ye.”
Genevieve tutted. “The Countess is not your enemy, and I think you know that. You are just choosing to be stubborn because, in the case of my mistress, you are in the wrong.” She scooped some soup into the spoon and blew on it. “If you want to blame someone, blame the Duke of Cumberland and his men. He is the one bleating about his successes and spurning your people.”
�
��Countess?” Aside from Laird Young and his lovely wife, Bernadine, he had never met a member of the peerage before. He had certainly never had one tend to him.
Genevieve lifted the spoon to Camdyn’s mouth. “Yes, the Countess of Desiglow. Fortunately—or, unfortunately, depending on your perspective—there is no Earl of Desiglow to haul you out of here by your breeches. She is risking a great deal by keeping you here and nursing you back to health, so I suggest you be a little more respectful.”
Camdyn recoiled from the spoon. “Ye’re nae goin’ to feed me like a bairn.”
“I am, because that ‘lad’ who brought you soup earlier said you did not eat any, and I will not have you die of malnourishment after all of the effort that myself and my mistress have put into your healing,” Genevieve replied firmly, reminding him ever more of his mother and grandmother.
Reluctantly, he sipped the soup off the insistent spoon. “Did that Countess really sew me up, then? Is she some sort of… medicine woman?” He had heard of those among the Highland clans, though they were usually reserved for childbirth and women’s ailments, rather than fixing up wounded warriors.
“They would call her a physician if she had what you had between your legs,” Genevieve retorted, with a coarseness that stunned him.
To his surprise, a laugh rasped from the back of his throat. “Ye dinnae butter yer barmbrack, do ye?”
“I have no idea what that means. If you are calling me direct, then yes, I should say that I am.” Genevieve flashed him a wicked smile, as she spooned more soup into his mouth.
He could not deny how good it tasted. After weeks of bone-dry oatcakes and anything else the Jacobite army had been able to pilfer from nearby farms, he had forgotten how comforting a good meal could be. Gingerly, he chewed a soft piece of beef, willing to suffer the pain of the bruising in his jaw for the sake of that rich and sustaining meat.
What I wouldnae give for one of Venruit Castle’s hog roasts, with neeps and tatties piled high on me plate.
If the Jacobites had triumphed at Culloden Moor, he imagined that fantasy might have become a reality, for Laird Young would have been sure to put on a victory celebration in those hallowed halls.
His mood soured as he took in more of the soup, thinking of all the friends and fellow soldiers who tasted nothing but dirt and death now.
Nae everyone’s lucky enough to fall at the gates of a strange Sassenach with healin’ hands. Nae everyone left that battlefield.
“What’s troubling you?” Genevieve cut through his sullenness.
He shook his head. “Ye wouldnae understand.”
“I won’t if you don’t enlighten me,” she replied, her tone softening.
“I dinnae want to talk about it.” In truth, he did not know if he could. Scotsmen were expected to take everything on the chin, and brush off every challenge and worry as if it were nothing, but being here without any of his countrymen around him, and Genevieve’s maternal timbre jostling a more emotional side of him, he felt incredibly vulnerable. If he started to talk, he did not know if he would be able to stop.
Genevieve nodded. “Then I won’t make you, not until you feel ready.”
Over the next few days, Genevieve was the only one who visited Camdyn in his room. Every time he heard the door open, he sat up straighter, praying that it might be Victoria instead. His apology weighed heavy on his mind and, with so many hours of nothing to occupy himself, he found he could think of little else but her, and his desire to make bygones be bygones.
If it were not for the daydreams of her angelic face, her beautiful green eyes, her narrow waist, voluptuous hips, and pert bosom, he might have been able to let it lie. As it happened, she refused to budge from his thoughts, often bringing a fire to his loins that he was still too weak and too embarrassed to alleviate.
“Only me, I’m afraid,” Genevieve said on the fourth evening without a single glimpse of Victoria. She had evidently caught the disappointed glimmer in his eyes.
Camdyn sat back. “She still will nae see me?”
“She is very… resolute, and she has other patients to see to, besides you.” Genevieve took up her customary position at his bedside, though she had ceased to feed him. Now, she passed him a bowl of hearty lamb stew with a hunk of fresh, buttered bread and let him work through it of his own accord.
“She does?” He had not realized that she performed these physician duties regularly, as a true physician might, and hoped Genevieve would keep talking of Victoria, for the older woman was his only window into the inner workings of the mysterious Countess.
Genevieve nodded. “She aided two of yours just this morning, though they were not in such a state as you. A bit of tincture and some bandages, and they were on their way again.”
“Jacobites?” He sopped up some of the stew with his bread but did not bring it to his mouth. He was too eager to hear what Genevieve said next.
“That surprises you?” Genevieve replied. “I have been telling you, she treats anyone who comes to her door. I do believe she would nestle a throng of lepers to her bosom if they called for her aid.”
Camdyn’s throat tightened as he thought of that fine bosom, concealed by the flimsy cotton of her high-collared shift and the cameo brooch that had hidden away the full, swan-like length of a neck he would have liked to kiss in gratitude for the help she had given him.
“Aye, well she’s done showin’ me care.” He ripped off the sodden bread with his teeth and chewed furiously, feeling oddly envious of the two unknown comrades who had received her kindness. He doubted they had behaved as he had, frightening her away.
Genevieve sighed. “You’re still in her house, aren’t you? You’re still eating her food, aren’t you? I would not say she has stopped showing you care entirely.”
They settled into a companionable silence as Camdyn finished off the rest of his dinner. And once she had taken away his tray and retired for the evening, he was left alone with his own thoughts again, listening to the sound of wood pigeons roosting in the trees outside, and an owl hooting somewhere in the darkness.
This war has twisted me up inside. It’s broken and torn up more than me outside. It’s bashed up me insides, too.
Thanks to Genevieve’s patience and motherly chastising, he had begun to see the error in some of his ways.
These two lasses had naught to do with Culloden, and they had naught to do with me losses.
It was not as though they had recalled 12,000 men from the Continent or marched up north to destroy the cause he had followed for so long.
So why am I bein’ a brute to ‘em, when they’ve done naught but speak differently to the way I do?
Closing his eyes, he dreaded the nightmares that his slumber would bring. He would not have slept at all, but it was the only place where he could see Victoria’s face again.
“Save me, Victoria,” he whispered. “I need ye.”
Down the hallway, ensconced in the warmth of her own blankets, Victoria tossed and turned in a shallow slumber. She had not slept well since the morning she had walked out of the soldier’s room, and never returned.
“Camdyn,” she murmured, unaware of what she said. Genevieve had informed her of his name, and though she had refused to speak it out loud during her waking hours, she had no control of what escaped her lips as she slept.
Her hands clawed at her linens, her breath coming in shortened gasps as her head rolled from side to side upon her pillow, thrashing in a frenzy. A sheen of perspiration glistened upon her brow, droplets trickling down, following the path from her jaw and along her throat, where they came to rest in the notch at its base.
In her mind, she was no longer within the safe and comfortable confines of Desiglow Manor. No sooner had she drifted off to sleep than she had been transported to a wild and windswept realm, where green hills undulated and snow-capped mountains seemed to graze a dusky sky in the distance.
She stood upon a shingle lakeshore with a log cabin at her back, her dreamy eyes gazing o
ut at the still water, stirred only by the occasional leap of a trout snaring midges for supper.
The crunch of the shingle under heavy boots distracted her gaze. A figure walked toward her across the shore, bare-chested in the last of the evening’s sunlight, turning his skin bronze. A leather strap cut diagonally across his athletic torso, and the long handle of a broadsword bumped against his right shoulder with every step he took.
“Camdyn,” she whispered. He met her gaze as though he had heard her, and broke into a run, his kilt flapping behind him as his powerful calves made easy work of the distance between them.
Highlander's Fallen Angel : A Steamy Scottish Historical Romance Novel Page 5
