“Never.” Her voice was strong, sure, incontrovertible. “Now that’s settled will you guide me the rest of the way to my room or allow me to find it myself?”
“We’re at your door.” He moved toward her, brushing against her, and opened the door, letting the faint glow of the fire out into the hall. She could see him then, his dark and light beauty, his troubled eyes.
/> Don’t, she thought desperately. Please don’t. “Thank you for your assistance this evening, Lord Brandon.”
“Brandon,” he corrected her.
The moment stretched. “Are you expecting me to invite you into my room, Lord Brandon?” Her voice was steady, and she congratulated herself on sounding so unmoved. “I don’t think you have the price.”
“You’re right,” he said slowly. “The only man who’s going to get in your bed is going to have to love you, and I’m afraid that’s a part of me that never healed.”
It felt like a blow. Why should the word “love” even be mentioned between them? “You’re stronger than I am,” she said calmly enough. “You could take what you wanted. I’m a professional, remember? I know when a man wants me.”
His smile was wry. “Oh, I want you very much. I doubt there’s a man who sees you who doesn’t want you, with the possible exception of my brother Benedick. Even a stuffy old prude like Charles wouldn’t be immune. But you’ve been hurt, you’re weak and trembling, and I don’t make a habit of taking advantage of frightened little girls.”
“I’m not. . .” she started to protest, when he bent down and brushed the softest, sweetest kiss against her mouth, gone almost before it had begun, so quickly that she could do nothing more than stare at him in astonishment.
“You are,” he said softly. “Good night, Emma.”
She stood outside her door, bemused, as he faded into the shadows. She put a hand to her lips, expecting some monumental change. They were no different—soft, slightly open. He’d kissed her, and life would never be the same.
Chapter 13
She climbed into bed with his taste on her mouth. The feel of his body against hers as he caught her before she tumbled down the stairs. The warmth of him. . .
Stop it, Emma Margaret, she reminded herself sharply. There’s no room in your life for such lollygagging. Concentrate on your work, not schoolgirl fantasies.
But she looked at the heavy medical tome on the desk and simply sank deeper into the bed. She felt peculiar, almost dreamy, and she wanted to hug that feeling to herself for just a little while. Oh, she had a thousand plausible excuses not to get up and get her mind back where it should be, but she knew the essential truth. She wanted to curl up in bed and think about Brandon Rohan.
It had been a cold, rainy evening when she’d arrived at St. Martin’s Military Hospital. She’d rolled up her sleeves and put on one of the unfortunate leather aprons they were required to wear, not unlike those worn by butchers to repel blood. There were few women who worked as volunteers at night—most of them were required to earn their living in the dark hours, either on the streets or in a house and they couldn’t afford the time. Yet the nights were hardest for these poor lost boys, and that was when she was needed.
“You’ll need to go stay with Number Thirty-seven,” the nursing sister told her. “He won’t make it through the night and he’s restless. See what you can do to soothe him. The rest are all doing as well as can be expected.”
She’d nodded. Number Thirty-seven had come in with a new shipment of the wounded from the Afghan Wars. The worst ones died on the trip and were buried at sea. Few in his condition survived this long, though there were a handful who held on until they reached their home shores—only to die once they’d accomplished that. Death was a strange thing, she’d observed. The body made its own decisions, regardless of medical wisdom, and when a patient decided to die all the brilliant treatment in the world couldn’t save him.
Number Thirty-seven was one of those. He had no name or memory, in fact the thirty-seventh in that condition to die like that. She wove her way through the parallel rows of beds to the alcove near the fire—the place the patients ghoulishly referred to as “the Styx” in reference to the Greek river leading to hell. It was believed that moving a mortally wounded patient there eased the others, but in truth it only made the entire process more mysterious. Death was a fact of life, Emma knew, and it was only through these checks and balances that things began to make sense.
The boy was still and silent when she sank down on the stool beside him. He was very bad indeed—the entire left side of his body had suffered terrible damage, including his face, but he had managed to survive the long trip home despite it. He’d spoken very little since he’d arrived, and she had known he wouldn’t be with them long.
She reached out and put her hand on his thin, almost claw-like, one—not bothering to wonder at her compassion for these poor, lost boys. As a rule, she despised men, but these were the wounded who needed nurturing, not unlike the women she lived with in Melisande Carstairs’s vast house. Their need put everyone on an even footing, and she looked at him with tenderness.
He’d opened his eyes then, looking up at her. They were clouded with pain and acceptance, and he pulled his hand from hers. “Don’t waste your time on me, sister,” he said. “The living could use your sweetness more than I.”
If she’d taken his dismissal, things would have gone very differently in her life, but her contrary nature had kicked in, She caught his hand in hers, holding it tightly. “I’m not a sister,” she’d said. “I have no medical training—I come in here to help.”
“Then help me by leaving me alone.” His voice was far from strong. He would die that night—she recognized all the signs. Except that she wasn’t going to let him.
And he wasn’t a boy, though they all seemed like boys to her, helpless and dying. He was probably near her own age, and he didn’t have the hard look of a life of toil. He didn’t belong in this hospital—somewhere he had family looking for him, and they would never know he died.
He wasn’t strong enough to pull away from her, and she could see his frustration. “Go away,” he choked out.
“Stay,” she said to him.
Her single word seemed to startle him, and he looked at her in shock, no longer struggling. “Why?” he whispered.
It seemed as if the two of them were alone in the vast building, the moans and snores simply background like the crackling of the fire. “Because I did,” she said simply. “I stayed. Dying is easy. It’s making a good life, despite all the terrible things you’ve done, that’s hard.”
“You don’t know the terrible things I’ve done. The things you do in a war. You can’t even imagine it.”