Dark Witch (The Cousins O'Dwyer Trilogy #1)(40)

“In a manner of speaking.” Resigned—and in any case the ice pack felt just grand—he sat back a little. “Are you trying to set my hand on fire to purify it?”

“It’ll only sting for a minute. What manner of speaking?”

The look he gave her could only be described as a glower. She’d always wondered what a glower actually looked like.

“You’re full of questions.”

“It’s only one,” she pointed out. “And talking will distract you. What manner of speaking?”

“Jesus. I worked my way through university fighting. Bare-knuckle matches, so this current situation isn’t new to me. I know how to tend to myself.”

“Then you should have done it. That’s a hard way to earn tuition.”

“Not if you like it, and not if you win.”

“And you did both.”

“I liked it better when I won, and I won my share.”

“Good for you. Is that how you got that scar through your eyebrow?”

“That’s another question. A different kind of fight—pub fight, and a broken bottle. As I’d been drinking myself, my reflexes were a bit slow.”

“You’re lucky you have the eye.”

Surprised by her response, and the matter-of-fact tone, he cocked that scarred brow. “Not that slow.”

She only smiled. “Switch hands.”

He had big ones, she thought. Strong, with blunt fingers and wide palms. The rough hands of a man who worked with them, and she respected that.

“Fin told me about the mare, and the bet.”

He didn’t glower this time, but shifted a little on the chair. “Fin loves a story, and the telling of one.”

“I’d like to meet her.”

“We keep her at the big stables. She’s skittish around strangers yet, and needs more time and pampering.”

“What do you call her?”

He shifted again, as she knew now he did when uncomfortable or mildly embarrassed. “She’s Darling. It fits her. Haven’t you done with that yet?”

“Nearly. I like that you drank him under the table for the horse that needed you. And I like that you knocked the crap out of him today. I probably shouldn’t. My parents tried to raise me to be someone who wouldn’t. But they failed.”

She glanced up to find his eyes on her again. “You can’t be what you aren’t.”

“No, you really can’t. I’m a mild disappointment to them, which is worse somehow than being a serious disappointment. So I’m working hard not to be any kind of disappointment to myself.”

She eased back. “There.” And took his hands gently by the fingers to examine the knuckles. “Better.”

Oh yeah, she thought as their eyes met yet again. Flutters and tingles, and a quick churning to top it off. She’d be in serious trouble if she didn’t watch herself.

But it was Boyle who drew away. “Thanks. You’d better get on. You’ll have things to do.”

“I do.” She started to reach for the kit, but he brushed her away.

“I’ll deal with it. Eight tomorrow.”

“I’ll be here.”

When she left, he brooded down at his hands. He could still feel her touch on them. A different kind of sting. He looked up when Fin eased into the doorway, leaned on the jamb. Smiled.

“Don’t start with me.”

“She’s a pretty thing. Bright, eager. And if she’d been flirting any harder, I’d have been forced to shut the door for privacy.”

“She was doing no such thing. She’d had it stuck in her head to tend to my hands, that’s all.”

“Not nearly all, and I know you, mo dearthair. You think of her, even as you tell yourself you shouldn’t think of her.”

Sure if he had, he was human, wasn’t he? But he was also not a stupid, irrational sort of man.

“She’s Connor’s cousin, and she works for us. I’ve no business thinking of her beyond that.”

“Bollocks. She’s a pretty woman, and smart and strong enough to make her choices—as she’s already proved. The power now, that worries you some.”

Now Boyle sat back, gave a slow nod with his eyes on Fin’s. “What it means, and what all of you, and me besides, as I’m with you, may be doing concerns me. And should be your priority as well. It’s no time for flirtations.”

“If not now, when? For this could be the end of all of us and I’d sooner die after bedding a woman than before.”

“I’d rather live, and bed the woman after the battle’s won.”

Fin’s mood lightened with his smile. “Eat your pudding first. You can always have seconds. I’ll be taking Alastar for a ride, see how he does.”

“Toward Branna’s?”

“Not yet, no. She’s not ready. I’m not either.”

Alone, Boyle went back to brooding. They needed to get ready, he thought, remembering the howl in the fog. Every blessed one of them.


*


AT THE END OF THE WEEK, IONA SAT IN BED AT JUST BEFORE SIX IN THE MORNING. She’d spent her last night in the castle. She wanted so much to make her home with her cousins, but to do that, she had to leave this indulgent dream.