Feet shuffled to the door.
“One more to close it completely,” the doctor said.
Beatrice moaned again.
“Can you hold her shoulders?” Reynaud said tightly to the maid. “Don’t let her move.”
“Yes, my lord.” She went to the head of the bed.
The doctor tied a knot, slowly and carefully. Reynaud frowned at his hands, silently urging him to hurry.
“That’s got it,” the doctor finally said, and snipped the thread.
“Thank God.” Reynaud felt a bead of sweat slide down his face.
“We’ll bandage her,” the doctor said briskly, “and then it’s in the hands of God.”
Reynaud nodded and stood, watching closely as the doctor did just that. He produced a bottle of some potion from his bag, gave instructions to administer the medicine when the patient woke, and then left just as abruptly as he’d come. The usurper followed him out of the room, presumably to see him to the door, and Reynaud turned to Quick.
“Let’s make her comfortable.”
The maid nodded and brought over a fresh basin of water. She sponged and patted dry the area around the bandage while Reynaud gently wiped Beatrice’s face clean. She still had not woken, and he frowned at her as he took the pins from her hair and combed flaxen locks over the pillow. At least she did not look as if she was in any pain.
“She’s as settled as she’s going to be, my lord,” Quick said. “I’ll just stay here if—”
“No,” he said swiftly, interrupting her. “I’ll stay. Leave us, please.”
The maid looked uncertain for a moment, but when Reynaud stared at her, she bobbed a curtsy and left the room, closing the door behind her.
Reynaud unsheathed his knife and laid it on the bedside table. He took off his wig and set it on a chair. Then he pulled off his boots and climbed into the bed. Carefully, tenderly, he gathered Beatrice to him, her uninjured side against him as he lay.
He brushed the hair from her face, feeling helpless. All his strength, all his determination, mattered not a whit here. It was up to Beatrice and what strength she had.
“Wake up, sweetheart,” he whispered into her hair. “God, please wake up.”
THERE WAS SOMETHING warm against her side. Big and warm and, oh! so very nice to lie next to. Beatrice shifted a little, intending to burrow her nose into the warmth, but something cut into her side. “Ouch.”
“Don’t move.”
Her eyes flew open at the deep voice, and for a moment she simply stared up at black eyes framed in thick black eyelashes. He did have such pretty eyelashes; it almost made her jealous. Why a man should have…
Her mind ground to a halt over the thought and then carefully retraced her steps. A man…
Beatrice blinked up at Lord Hope. “What are you doing in my bed?”
“Taking care of you.”
The words were soft, but his face wasn’t. She studied him lazily, too tired somehow to get up. He’d left off his wig, and the hair on his shorn head was barely longer than the stubble on his chin. It lay sleek and flat against his head. She wanted to touch it, to see if his hair was soft or prickly. The three birds flew about his right eye, all of them similar but all slightly different. And his midnight eyes watched her back, his brows knit as if with concern.
“Why do you need to take care of me?” she whispered.
“You were hurt,” he said, “and it was my fault.”
“How?”
“There were three assassins outside of Jeremy Oates’s town house.”
She remembered now—the man with the walleye and the other two smaller men, loitering. “Why? Why were they there?”