Page 47 of The Cruel Highlander's Healer

Her head gave another throb, but she forced her gaze to focus on his face. He looked a little more awake, but not by much. His eyes, however, were dancing with amusement.

Why would he find that humorous?

“Ye promise?” she asked.

Her throat was dry, making her voice thick, and she tried to swallow past it.

Conall nodded.

“Aye,” he answered, his mouth tugging up in a smirk. “Nae for yer lack of tryin’ though.”

Dread spread through her at his words.

“What do ye mean?”

He chuckled darkly, the sound sending a thrill dancing through her. She watched as he pushed himself up onto his elbows, regarding her with a vicious, tantalizing smile.

“Ye tried to kiss me again,” he explained, giving her a shrug as if it was truly nothing.

Although the humor he found in it clearly indicated something entirely different.

He studied her face, seeming to sense the terror, and his gaze softened uncharacteristically.

“It was nothin’,” he assured her. “Ye were pished, and ye asked why I kissed ye the other night. Then, ye tried to do it again.”

His words tugged at something in her mind, some kernel of truth.

A momentary weakness.

That is what he said when she’d asked him. And then she’d tried to…

“Oh God.”

Eliza covered her face with a hand, embarrassment filling her.

How had she allowed herself to get that drunk? Why had she tried that?

Conall chuckled, and she felt his fingers wrapping around her wrist a moment later. He gave a soft tug, moving her hand away from her face.

“It was nothin’,” he said again. “Ye have nothin’ to be embarrassed about.”

She studied him, her gaze meeting his. The scar running across his face was pale, contrasting with the circles beneath his eyes. But he wasn’t teasing her, not anymore.

Eliza decided to believe him.

“Alright,” she nodded, ripping her gaze away from his as she turned to glare out the window.

The sun had fully risen, but not by much. It was still early morning. However, the sound of life still filled the air beyond the inn.

There was no way she would be able to lie back down and go to sleep.

“I suppose it’s time to get up,” Conall grunted, moving the arm that just moments before had been tucked around Eliza.

She stared at it longingly, watching as he retreated fully to his side of the bed. Would it have been so bad if she would have sunk back down into it and tried to fall asleep again in his arms?

He sat on the edge of the bed, bending so that he could pull his boots back over to him. Eliza took the moment when he was distracted to shake herself, banishing all thoughts of Conall and falling into his arms from her mind.

She moved as well, pushing herself to the edge of the bed. Her own shoes lay scattered on the floorboards, the laces barely undone from where she’d kicked them off the night before.