Page 16 of Mr. Darcy’s Fiery Passion

He should have refused. He should have sent her back to bed and rung for Bingley's man. Instead he got up and dragged the footstool across the carpet with his foot. He sat on it, with his back to the fire and his knees nearly touching hers. She tucked her bad foot to one side, out of his way.

"You will have to take off your shirt," she said. Her voice was very even.

"I cannot."

"Of course you cannot. Lift your arms."

He lifted his arms.

She leaned forward in her chair and took the hem of his shirt in both hands. She drew it up slowly, over his stomach and his chest. It caught at the stuck place, and she stopped at once. She eased the linen free with her fingertips, a little at a time. Each small tug went through his side to the spine. He kept his raised arms steady and fixed his eyes on the ceiling.

She drew the shirt up over his head and off his raised arms, and laid it on the table.

He sat before her, bare to the waist, in the firelight.

He looked at the carpet, not her face, and felt her eyes on him. They moved over his chest and his shoulders, and the long bandage wound round his ribs. The skin of his back prickled in the heat from the fire.

"Well," she said, a little unsteadily. "Mr. Jones was right. It is very slow."

"You do not have to do this."

"Hold still." She leaned past his shoulder and tipped the kettle on the hob over a cloth. She laid the warm cloth against the stuck linen, and held it there. Her other hand rested flat on his shoulder to steady herself. Her palm was cool on his skin.

He held his breath.

"Does it hurt?" she asked.

"No."

"You are..."

"Yes. I am lying. Do not stop."

She did not stop. She soaked the linen and eased it, and soaked it again. When it came free at last, she unwound the rest. She had to lean close to pass the roll behind his back. Her arms went around him, and her plait fell forward over his shoulder and lay against his bare chest.

He shut his eyes.

He had imagined her hands on him. He had imagined it far more often than a gentleman should. He had never imagined this. Her breath was on his neck and her careful fingers on his ribs. Her face was a few inches from his in the firelight. She was frowning with concentration. She was entirely absorbed in her task, and entirely unaware of what she was doing to him.

Think of anything else, he told himself. Think of drainage. Think of the north farms.

He thought of the north farms. It did not help at all.

She cleaned the burn without flinching, though it was an ugly thing, red and raw along his side. She soaked fresh lint in the liniment, and wrinkled her nose at the smell, and laid it on.

"You have done this before," he said.

"When Lydia fell into the copper at eleven. And Mrs. Hill scalded her arm once, on the stillroom pan." She reached around him again with the fresh linen. "I am the one who does not faint."

"And your mother?"

"My mother faints very well. It is her great accomplishment."

He laughed, though it hurt his side.

She wound the bandage round and round. Each pass brought her arms around him, and each time she drew back, he felt the loss of her. She tied it off at his side with a neat knot.

She took up his left arm and turned the forearm to the light. The burn there was smaller, but it wept too. "This one next," she said. "Rest your elbow on my knee."