She looked up, which surprised him. He’d thought she was far too involved in her search to be listening, let alone responding to him.
“I won’t argue with you about this,” she stated. “So you might as well save your breath.”
James realized she spoke the truth. Elizabeth Hotchkiss wasn’t the sort to leave projects unfinished or responsibilities unmet. And if she insisted upon tending to his bruised eye, there was very little he—a peer of the realm, a man twice her size—could do to stop her.
“If you must,” he murmured, trying to sound at least a little bit put out by her ministrations.
She twisted her hands around something in the sink, then turned around and held it out to him. “Here.”
“What is that?” he asked suspiciously.
“It’s just a wet cloth. What did you think—that I was going to slap Lucas’s catch of the day on your face?”
“No, you’re not angry enough today for that, although—”
She raised her brows as she covered his bruised eye with the cloth. “Are you intimating that you think you might someday anger me enough so that—”
“I’m not saying anything of the kind. God, I hate being fussed over. You merely—No, it’s a bit to the right.”
Elizabeth adjusted the cloth, leaning forward as she did so. “Is that better?”
“Yes, although it seems to have grown quite warm.”
She jerked back a few inches and straightened. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s just the cloth,” he said, not nearly noble enough to pull his gaze off of what was directly in front of him.
He wasn’t sure if she realized he was staring at her breasts, but she let out a little “Oh!” and jumped away. “I can cool this off again.” She did so, then held out the wet cloth. “You had better do this yourself.”
He moved his gaze to her face, his expression as innocent as a puppy dog. “But I like it when you do it.”
“I thought you didn’t like to be fussed over.”
“I didn’t think I did.”
That earned him a half-beleaguered, half-sarcastic, one-hand-on-hips pose. She looked rather ridiculous, and somehow at the same time amazing, standing there with a dishrag hanging from her hand. “Are you trying to convince me that I am your angel of mercy, come from heaven to—”
His mouth spread into a slow, hot smile. “Precisely.”
She threw the cloth at him, leaving a wet spot in the middle of his shirt. “I don’t believe you for one second.”
“For an angel of mercy,” he muttered, “you have a rather short temper.”
She groaned. “Just put the cloth on your eye.”
He did as she asked. Far be it from him to disobey her when she was in such a temper.
They stood regarding each other for a moment, and then Elizabeth said, “Take that off for one second.”
He took his hand away from his eye. “The cloth?”
She nodded once.
“Didn’t you just order me to put it back on my eye?”
“Yes, but I want to get a look at the extent of the bruising.”
James saw no reason not to comply, so he leaned forward, lifting his chin and tilting his face so that she could easily look at his eye.