Highland Outlaw (Campbell Trilogy #2)(28)

Fit for a king all right: King Campbell. He—an outlawed MacGregor—was sleeping in the Earl of Argyll's bed. The world must have come to an end. He swallowed the irony and looked around again, trying to remember. “How did I get here?”

Carefully, she pried his fingers from her wrist and stepped away from the bed. Standing with her back to the sunlight like that, her hair caught in a golden halo of light, and her skin as delicate as alabaster …

The air shot from his lungs as if he'd just been socked in the gut.

She didn't just sing like an angel, she looked like one. My angel.

Her delicate brows gathered together across her nose. “You don't remember anything?”

He shook his head, the small movement making him wince with pain.

She was at his side again, touching him. Her hand on his forehead. “Are you all right?”

She sounded … concerned, as if she were worried about him. “As long as I don't move my head.”

“Then I suggest you lie still,” she said with a teasing smile. She poured a glass of water from a pitcher at the table beside the bed and handed it to him. “Drink this. You must be thirsty.” He drained it quickly, the cool liquid sliding down his parched throat like ambrosia.

Handing the empty glass back to her, he asked, “Now tell me how I happen to find myself asleep in the Earl of Argyll's bed.”

A pretty pink blush crept up her pale cheeks, and once again she stepped away from him. “You were very ill, and the healer said you needed to be kept warm.” She motioned to the fireplace. “As this is the only private chamber with its own fireplace until the new tower and range is completed, it made sense.”

He frowned. “Ill?”

“Your men found you in the barmkin unconscious from the wound you received in your side.” She gave him a long look. “A day and a half ago.”

Damn. Apparently his injury had finally caught up to him. Normally the sign of weakness would annoy him, but not this time. If he'd known blacking out would get him half-naked in a bedchamber alone with her he might have tried it sooner. And from the way her eyes were avoiding his chest, he sensed that she was no longer thinking of him as a patient.

“You'd lost so much blood, we thought you'd died,” she added. “How could you say nothing of your injury?”

He shrugged. “I didn't think it was that serious.”

Her expression changed from concerned to irritated— angry, even. “Not serious? How can you say that? You were walking around with an open gash in your side about a foot long. Surely you must have felt it? Surely it must have pained you?”

Her anger—and the hint of sarcasm—momentarily took him aback. “A bit,” he admitted reluctantly, not quite sure what to make of this side of Elizabeth Campbell. His delicate little kitten, it seemed, had claws. “But it feels much better now.” A little sore, but he felt better than he had in weeks.

“Of all the stubborn … foolish …”

Her eyes flashed, and he thought she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. The ferocity hinted at the strong, passionate woman burning behind the paragon of duty and virtue.

God, he wanted her. As he'd never wanted anything before in his life. With an intensity that should have alarmed him, if he hadn't been so consumed with other matters. Like covering her with his body and lifting her hands above her head so that she was stretched out beneath him as he eased himself slowly inside her.

“You could have died,” she seethed. “Would have died were it not for the healer's help.”

“And yours,” he said, holding her gaze intently. The idea of her caring for him … he liked it.

She dropped her eyes. “I did very little.”

She lied. It had been her soothing his dreams with her songs and gentle hands.

Avoiding his gaze, she approached the bed, once again the dutiful lady of the keep. “I've come to check on your wound,” she said briskly. “I can come back if you'd rather do it later.”

“Nay.” The idea of her hands on him … “Now is fine,” he said, his voice unmistakably husky.

She hesitated, her gaze sweeping over his bare chest to the bedcoverings slung low across his stomach. Apparently he was feeling much better, because he stiffened like an untried lad under the weight of her gaze.

He sensed her nervousness but made no effort to cover himself. He liked her skittish, liked that she was aware of him.

“Very well.”

He lay back on the pillow and watched her as she worked. She leaned over him to examine the bandage, and her delicate scent hit him. Damn, she smelled good. Fresh and flowery. Like the lavender that scented his pillow. She wore a simple brown wool kirtle and fitted jacket that hugged the gentle curves of her br**sts. Lush, round br**sts that he was painfully aware were only inches from his mouth. He could lift his head and bury his face in their softness.

A lock of her hair fell forward on his chest. The feathery brush of flaxen silk on his skin nearly made him groan.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, quickly tucking the errant lock behind her ear. Still bent over him, she lifted her eyes to his. “I have to pull the bandage back to check beneath. It might hurt a bit.”

He was in pain all right, but not from his wound.

His c**k felt as if it might explode. She was so close. He couldn't breathe; every inch of his body was honed to a razor's edge. Somehow he managed a strangled, “Fine.”