Page 22 of A Rogue in Twilight

“Lord Struan.” She rose to her feet and hobbled close, and he took her arm to steady her. She was fine-boned, his hand large on her forearm. The contrast made him feel strong and protective. Needed, that was it.

She looked up and batted her eyelashes deliberately. “My lord.”

“Sand in your eyes?” he murmured.

“Sorry, is it too obvious?”

“It is.”

“I am not very good at this.”

“At what?” He was not very good at it either, whatever was happening here.

“Flirting, I suppose. Here, let me have this.” She reached up to tug on his neck cloth. “Your cravat would make a fine bandage, if you will part with it. Then you need not search.”

“Very well.” He undid the knot in the cloth, his hands brushing hers as she tried to help. Her small fingers worked the soft knot under his hands. He looked down, his brow and a fall of his hair brushing the top of her head. She smelled of rain and blossoms. Just then, she looked up just as he looked down. The tips of their noses touched.

He sucked in a breath. So did she. Too vividly, he recalled wild kisses behind potted shrubberies at Holyroodhouse.

“Please,” she said, breathless.

A surge went through him, hard and sudden. “Oh. The cravat.” He drew it away.

Her hands brushed his, and the air upon his bared throat felt sensual as a caress, setting a fire in him that only willpower smothered.

“A man might feel at odds without his cravat. Do you?”

“I have a dozen such. I will fetch another.” He sounded wooden. Her touch and nearness unsettled him, whirling hisusual composure off balance. He felt like stalwart iron drawn to a curving magnet.

“Sit, Miss MacArthur.” He pushed on her shoulder. She winced, sat. At least her injury was genuine, he thought, though he could not sort out if her attitude and eagerness were real or pantomime. “Let me wrap your foot.”

She lifted her injured foot to the stool and pulled up her skirts again, revealing her shapely bare foot and neatly muscled calf. His body surged uncomfortably.

The sight of her advancing bruise startled him out of a haze of desire. Kneeling, he wrapped the cravat carefully around her foot and ankle, circling and crossing to provide snug support. The cloth was too long, so he tore it, tying the ragged ends to fit. He did not have a dozen cravats, but he would not admit that.

“Thank you. That does feels better.” She wiggled the bare toes peeking out. “If you did not complete your medical studies, where did you learn to do this?”

“War,” he said succinctly. “I helped where I could.”

She watched him. “Quatre Bras was a terrible ordeal.”

He looked up, startled, silent. He had not told her that.

“The Royal Highlanders,” she said then. “The Black Watch. They were so brave, held their own, the day before Waterloo. But they lost so many men when the French came at them, where they held ground there.”

His hands grew still on her foot. “How did you know?”

“I heard there was a battle where the Scots held the day. But sometimes I see things in my mind like a dream, and I saw this just now for you. And I heard the name. Cot—cat—Quatre Bras. You were there.”

“Someone told you that.”

“The knowing told me.”

“Knowing?” He met her direct silvery gaze. “Miss MacArthur, do not play me for a fool. What a cruel scheme, to pretend to have a vision about my past.”

“I have no scheme. I saw it just now.” She leaned forward. He leaned back, tensing up. “I saw you on a battlefield, in a kilt and a red coat. Blood on your leg. I heard ‘Quatre Bras.’ I did not know until just now that you were there.”

He tugged fiercely at the torn ends of the neckcloth, simmering with anger.