A Scoundrel by Moonlight (32 page)

“Drink up,” Hillbrook said.

Leath stared hard at Eleanor. “She’s been out so long. It can’t be right.”

As if she’d heard, Eleanor flinched and whimpered. To Leath, this moment when her eyes cracked open felt like watching his first sunrise.

“James?” she asked feebly.

“I’m here, darling.” He shoved his glass aside and crossed the room.

“James?” Her hand rose in a shaky attempt to find him. “Where are you? What happened?”

Ignoring the doctor’s frown, he laced his fingers through hers. “Greengrass shot you.”

“The swine.” This time when she looked, he knew that she saw him. “I hope… I hope you shot him back.”

The response was so like his darling that a choked laugh escaped. “I did indeed.”

“Good.” She closed her eyes. For a moment, he thought
she’d drifted off again, but her hand tightened weakly around his.

“Don’t talk.”

She ignored his command. She definitely returned to life. “Did you hear me say I love you? I do, you know.”

The tightness in his throat made speaking difficult. “Yes, you told me before you took that damned stupid risk in attacking Greengrass.” A damned stupid risk that yet might finish her.

A faint smile hovered around Eleanor’s colorless lips. “I knew you’d beat him.”

His grip firmed, as he dared destiny to steal her away. “If you leave me, I’ll never forgive you.”

The smile strengthened. “Don’t be a dunderhead, James. I told you, you won’t lose me.”

The doctor’s face was austere. “I’m Dr. Manion, young lady, and I’m here to tell you that you’ve had a lucky escape. The bullet scraped your skull without any lasting damage that I can see. But head wounds can be unpredictable so I’m advising only cautious optimism.”

Leath stared speechless at the doctor. When he’d carried Eleanor inside, he’d been so sure that she wouldn’t make it.

“I’m not going to die, Doctor.”

Her certainty made Leath want to kiss her. “You’re damned right about that.”

“My lord, I really would proceed better if you all left me in peace,” Dr. Manion said sternly. “I’ll send for you if there’s any change.”

“James…” She drew a breath. Even this short exchange tested her strength. “James, please do as the doctor says.”

Hillbrook stood beside him. “Best to cooperate, old man. I’ve got the steadiest set of nerves in England and even I’d
shiver in my shoes if you glared at me the way you’re glaring at Dr. Manion.”

Only with the greatest reluctance did Leath agree to go. He lifted Eleanor’s bloodstained hand to his lips for a kiss of heartfelt gratitude. “I’ll be right outside. I love you.”

She regarded him with such trust that his heart turned over in his chest. “That’s all I need to know.”

Her voice faded. Her eyelids drooped and the hand in his went limp.

“Doctor?” Leath turned to Manion in panic.

“She’s asleep.”

Sedgemoor ushered him away. Leath was in such a daze of anxiety and hope that he barely noticed. The last he saw of Eleanor as the door closed was her lying heartbreakingly quiet under the doctor’s ministrations.

N
ell stirred and carefully opened her eyes. Her skull thumped as though devils played football inside it and the light streaming through the windows made her wince.

Immediately she remembered everything. When she gingerly turned her head, she wasn’t surprised to see James slouched asleep in a chair beside her bed. He looked utterly exhausted. Dark hollows surrounded his eyes, deep lines ran between his nose and his mouth, and his usual morning stubble threatened to become a fully grown beard. His bruises faded to a mixture of blue and yellow and gave him an uncharacteristically disreputable air.

He looked like he’d been to the gates of hell and back. She’d promised him that she wouldn’t die, but she could see that he hadn’t believed her. A faint sound of distress escaped her.

He jerked and sat up, rubbing his eyes, then leaned forward to seize her hand where it lay above the covers. “Eleanor, darling, are you awake at last?”

“I think so,” she said croakily. She felt like sandpaper lined her throat.

Relief flooded his face. He kissed her hand, then turned to pour a glass of water from a jug on the nightstand. With a gentleness that made her heart cramp, he slid his arm behind her. “Drink. Steadily now.”

Her instinct was to gulp the lot, but she took his advice and swallowed a few sips. The coolness was heavenly and she closed her eyes in bliss. A little more and she raised her hand.

He took the glass away. “Enough?”

She nodded, then wished she hadn’t. Movement sent those crashing, overactive imps in her head on another rampage.

“Does your head hurt?” He set the glass on the crowded nightstand.

“No.” Gradually she became aware of the details of the room. She remained at the Royal Swan. Faint traffic noise from outside penetrated the closed window. A roaring fire blazed in the hearth. Sickroom paraphernalia littered every surface.

His expression was skeptical. “I’m sure it does.”

“Maybe a little.” She paused. “Having you here helps.”

“There’s laudanum if the pain’s too bad.”

“No.” She’d slept enough. Having come so close to permanent darkness, she wouldn’t waste time in oblivion that she could spend with James.

“Don’t try to talk,” he said softly, setting her back on the bed.

“I want… to talk.” She reached out. When he caught her hand, strength flowed through her. She managed a smile. “How long—”

“Three days. At first, Dr. Manion was hopeful, then on the second day, you took a turn for the worse.”

The flatness of his voice indicated how bad that “turn” had been. “I told you… I wouldn’t leave you.”

His laugh was gruff, but like his touch, it fortified her. “For a while there, I feared you lied.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” she said drily, closing her eyes against the light.

“Stay alive and I’ll find it in my heart to forgive you,” he said equally drily.

To her dismay, a couple of tears squeezed from under her eyelids. “I hate to think how I misjudged you.”

“Forgiven also.”

“And if I hadn’t run away when you proposed, I wouldn’t have caused all this trouble.”

“That’s harder to forgive.”

Her eyes flew open in shock to find him watching her with such tenderness that she felt ready to get up off this bed and waltz around the room. “You don’t mean that,” she said faintly.

“No, I don’t.” He sighed and his grip on her hand firmed. “Eleanor, despite everything, we’ve come through. Let’s put our mistakes behind us and just be grateful.”

“I am.” She tried to sit, but didn’t get far. So much for dancing. “I want—”

“To sit up?”

“Yes, please.”

He frowned. “Dr. Manion said I wasn’t to tire you.”

“From what little I saw of him, Dr. Manion is an old nag.”

“Who saved your life.” With more heartbreaking gentleness, James propped her against the heaped pillows.

“Yes, well, I suppose I should give him credit for that.” She settled back with a muffled groan and lifted her free hand to the constriction around her head. She discovered linen bandages and nothing else. “My hair?”

“Gone, my love.”

This time she shed more than a few tears. “How dare that quack cut off my hair?”

Compassion softened Leath’s face. “Eleanor, sweetheart, don’t take on so.”

It was ridiculous to regret the trifling matter of a haircut when she’d nearly died, but she couldn’t muffle another sob. “This is a tragedy of epic proportions.”

She waited for mockery, but he sat beside her and drew her against him. This was what she’d wanted from the moment she’d woken, his nearness, his heat, the steadfast love in his touch. She rested her sore, shorn head on his shoulder in that special place meant just for her.

“Is that better?” he murmured, stroking her back through her nightdress.

“Yes,” she said shakily without shifting.

He kissed her hand again. “It will grow back.”

“In about a hundred years,” she muttered into his shirt. “You loved my hair.” Her tears had tested her. She was absurdly feeble.

His laugh was a low rumble in her ear and she pressed closer to the sound. “Not as much as I love you.”

Her distress faded. At last he’d said the words.

“Eleanor?” he whispered eventually. “Are you asleep?”

“No,” she murmured, floating between dark and light.

“I said I love you. Don’t you have something to say to me?”

She smiled into his neck. He smelled so wonderful there. The glorious essence of James. That scent alone was enough to bring her back from the grave. “Do I?”

His hold tightened a fraction. “Yes, you do.”

“You know how I feel about you,” she murmured, surprised she found energy to tease him.

“Tell me again.”

“You’ll become impossible.”

“Not if you have any say in the matter.”

“That’s true.” She nestled closer. She’d always loved his big, powerful body.

“Darling?” he asked softly. She realized she drifted off again. “Does that mean you’ll stay with me?”

“Of course,” she said without needing to consider her answer.

Another wry laugh, full of affection. “Should we talk about this later when you’re feeling more yourself?”

The hand she’d hooked around his neck tugged at the silky strands brushing his collar. “You need a haircut.”

“Clearly hair is much more important than our future.”

His touch restored her better than any medicine. Every moment she lay in his arms, she felt stronger. “You need to look… respectable at our wedding.”

Beneath her cheek, his muscles tensed into rock hardness. He caught his breath. “What did you say?”

With some difficulty—curse this weakness—she braced to sit up. He looked completely bewildered. “You need to be tidy for our wedding. God knows, I’ll look a fright so the groom must appear the part. Although I think we should wait at least until your bruises fade. At the moment, the vicar will faint clear away with terror to see such a ruffian standing before him.”

“You never look a fright.” He frowned, his gaze searching. “Eager as I am to marry you, perhaps we should postpone this discussion. I’m not sure you’re in your right mind.”

“Are you saying I’ve gone mad?”

Amusement sparked in his eyes. “Some would say that marrying me is the act of a madwoman. Let’s talk tomorrow.”

“No.” She started to shake her head, then stopped
abruptly when the movement made her vision swim. “Let’s decide now.”

“Eleanor…”

“Please?”

For an extended interval, he stared hard at her as if he saw into her soul. If he did, he couldn’t doubt her commitment to becoming his wife. Or her love for him. “Then let’s do this properly. Can you manage leaning against the pillows, my love?”

“Yes,” she said, and found that it was true, although she hadn’t been sure.

Careful not to bump the bed, he slid off the mattress to rise on one knee. Her hand still lay in his. His gray eyes told her that even in bandages, to him she was the most beautiful creature in the world. “My darling Eleanor, light of my life, the most wonderful woman I know, my reason for living…”

He swallowed and she realized that despite her declaration at the point of death, he still wasn’t sure of her. His hand tightened and he cleared his throat. Nervousness didn’t come naturally to James Fairbrother. Nell’s heart squeezed with love. At this breathtakingly significant moment in their lives, he was a million miles from his self-confident self.

His voice softened to the velvet that always made her ache with longing. “My darling Eleanor, I love you with all my heart. Will you do me the inestimable honor of agreeing to become my wife?”

She still marveled that such a man should love her. Marveled, but accepted. Whatever the right or wrong of it, she couldn’t meet that gray gaze and doubt that he pledged lifelong devotion.

She was shaking, and not this time because of her injuries. With all the adoration burgeoning inside her, she raised his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles.

“I love you, James,” she said in a choked voice. “The honor is all mine.”

He frowned. “Is that yes?”

Nell realized with a stab of guilt how she’d wounded him with her wavering and rejections and mistrust. Silently she swore to spend the rest of her life proving that he was the center of her world. She summoned a smile, although tears hovered close once more.

“Of course it’s a yes. The last few days have given me a salutary lesson in sorting out what’s important from what’s merely trivial society nonsense.” In a gesture of boundless tenderness, she laid her palm against his bristly cheek. “Nearly dying showed me that I want to live. And when I say I want to live, I mean that I want to live with you. Always.”

“My darling.” Radiant joy lit his eyes. He leaned forward to place a reverent kiss upon her lips. When he raised his head, he stared at her as if she’d cooked up the stars in her kitchen.

With shaking hands, he tugged the Fairbrother signet from his hand and slid it onto her ring finger. It was too heavy and too big, and she never wanted to take it off again as long as she lived. She smiled through more tears as she stared down at the rich gold. “I love it.”

“It’s only a stopgap. I’ll get you something as beautiful as you are.”

“You’ve turned me into a cursed watering pot,” she complained thickly.

“Marchionesses are allowed to cry whenever they want to,” he said, the huskiness undermining his attempt at lightness.

It was miraculous how a happy ending soothed a headache. “I wish you’d told me that before. I’d have married you weeks ago.”

This time, his humor was a shred more convincing. “Well,
my
marchioness can do whatever she wants.”

“In that case, she wants to kiss the marquess,” Nell said unsteadily.

Gently he gathered her in his arms, his lips quirking into the smile that set her heart aflame. “My darling, I do so love it when you and I are of one mind.”