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“I’ve heard of ye, Laird Moore.” She turned and pressed her shoulder to the hedge, backing away as quickly as she dared. With every step, she got further away from the exit. “I couldnae remember where I kenned the name, but I recall it now. Ye’re renowned across the country for… unsavory reasons. A dishonorable rogue who—”
He did not get to hear what he was supposedly infamous for, as Edwina’s heel clipped one of the uneven flagstones. With a yelp, she flew backward, sprawling out on the shadow-soaked ground. Though he was too far away to catch her before she hurt herself, Felix broke into a run regardless.
Sinking to his knees at her side, he took hold of her arms and pulled her into a sitting position. Her wild eyes stared into his, as he shook his head and murmured, “I told ye nae to run.”
* * *
Heart thundering, her leg pulsing with pain, Edwina did not know what to say. All she could do was stare at the man who loomed over her, so broad and muscular that he could either be intimidating or a safe haven. She had no notion of which he was.
“Ye frightened me,” she said, finding her voice at last. “Ye should announce yerself instead of appearing out of the dark like a… like a—”
“Like a beast?” he finished the sentence with a smile.
She swallowed uncomfortably. “I have nay desire to be alone with ye, so ye should leave me be.”
“Then, why did ye follow me out here?” Laird Moore raised a questioning eyebrow.
She raised her chin in defiance. “That is quite the assumption, Laird Moore.”
“Felix,” he corrected. “Yer faither outranked me, so I imagine ye’re of rank enough to call me by my name.”
The mention of her father jarred Edwina for a moment, as it always did. She wondered if a time came after a loss when certain words did not spark pain anymore.
“And if ye dinnae follow me out here, whyareye out here?” Felix added in the ensuing silence.
She turned her face away. “I needed some air. It is stiflin’ in the ballroom.”
“Ye couldnae stay on the terrace where it’s safe?”
She winced as a dull throb of pain pulsed up her leg. “I was curious, and it got the better of me. Still, it seems ye’re determined to cause me injury this evenin’. Were ye nae satisfied with my first near fall? Did ye wish to see me actually hit the ground?”
To her surprise, he chuckled, but did not answer. Instead, he reached for the exposed calf of her injured leg. She did not know when her skirts had ridden up, but they were almost to her knee. Propriety told her that she needed to push her skirts back down as swiftly as possible, but the shock of feeling his fingertips upon her stocking held her frozen.
Is this how ye gained yer reputation? Do ye cast a spell on the lasses ye desire, so they cannae refuse?Her breath caught in her throat as she watched him untie the laces of her shoe and remove it. Her lungs almost burst as he moved to the ribbon that held her stocking in place, unfastening it without hesitation.
Gently, he eased the material toward her foot, his thumbs tracing tingling lines down her shin. A different kind of shiver coursed through her as his hand cradled the back of her calf and lifted her leg up. With his other hand, he carefully moved her ankle, bending it up and down.
“Any pain?” he asked simply.
She nodded, flinching. “A little.”
“Now?” He turned her ankle from side to side.
She hesitated. “Nae as much.”
He lowered her foot onto his thigh, one hand still cradling her calf, while the other lightly gripped her ankle. Their eyes met, his gaze stealing her breath all over again for it shone with a feeling that she could not quite understand. It looked akin to hunger, paired with the fleeting lick of his lips. Or, perhaps, it was anger, as she had now ruined his evening twice.
“I daenae thinks its broken or twisted, just bruised,” he said, his voice thick. That raw tone clenched some of the muscles in her stomach, unbidden, for it made him sound as hungry as his eyes suggested. But what was he hungry for? That was the part she could not comprehend.
“I dinnae realize ye were a healer as well as a Laird,” she murmured, hearing that same, thick note in her own voice. Did that mean his stomach was twisting into knots and his chest could not seize breath, too?
His hands lingered upon her leg, far longer than necessary, their eyes locked in a gaze that confused and scared and excited her, all at once. She had never been proficient with languages, and the language of Felix Quinn was one she could not even begin to translate.
“I’ve seen enough people trip on these flagstones to ken when an ankle is broken,” he explained, giving her a strange craving to hear more of his voice.
She thought of all the rumors she had heard of this peculiar man, willing the vague memories to resurface. Now that she had put a face and some of the man’s character to the gossip, she realized there might be some truth in it.
At every ball and gathering and party and feast she had attended in the last couple of years, the nameLaird Moorehad forever bubbled up in conversation, regarding infamous bedchamber talents. The only reason it had taken her that long to connect the name with Felix was due to the slight alteration that the gossiping ladies used. They did not call him “Laird Moore,” but “Laird Give Me Moore.”
