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He stormed over to her, shoving her hands aside and unbuttoning the skirt. Unceremoniously, he jerked the skirt and the petticoat sewn into it down her legs and off her body.
The dog growled at him.
He glared at it, baring his teeth. “I’m not chasing after that thing pissing inside.”
He spun around, hanging her skirt off the back of a chair close to the fire to both dry and suck in warmth.
The dog still growled behind him and he paused, facing the fire, calming himself.
For someone that never showed, never felt any emotion, a hurricane’s worth of emotion was rolling through him at the moment. Rage at her. Fury at himself. Frustration. Lust. Defeat.
Damnable woman.
She was nothing. Nothing.
She could be nothing.
He forced his chilly façade into place and turned around to her, moving to the bed. Without a word, he loosened and dragged the boot off her right foot, then set it with her left boot by the fire.
Half propped up on her elbows, Victoria stared at him. The puppy now sat by her waist and she buried her fingers into its fur, the ire in her eyes replaced with what—fear? Wariness?
Definitely wariness in her eyes.
He was scaring her.
Hell, he was scaring himself.
With a heavy sigh, he stripped off his great coat, jacket, waistcoat and boots, leaving him in only his lawn shirt and trousers, then climbed onto the foot of the bed, turning and resting his back on the wall.
He grabbed both of her red, swollen feet and pulled them into his lap. Keeping her left foot atop his thighs, he tucked her right foot between the side of his torso and his triceps to trap heat onto the skin.
His hands clasped around the center of her left foot. Blast. Still like ice.
She twitched at the touch, her leg instinctively jerking from the pain. He held her in place, his thumbs moving over the top of her foot.
“It hurts?”
Her eyes closed and she nodded.
“Good. It was a stupid thing you did.” The words seethed out, anger pouring from him. She had been stupid. She could have lost her feet, or worse. What if he hadn’t come back? What if she’d been stuck out there?
The fury welled up into his throat, choking him at the thought.
“It wasn’t stupid, the puppy needed help.” Balancing on her right elbow, she tucked the pup closer into her left side and it pushed its nose into her cloak, fluffing the wool until it was satisfied and settled.
Still so aggravatingly stubborn.
He rubbed her foot harder, willing warmth into it, even as she twitched, the blood flowing back into it causing pain.
She exhaled a hostile sigh. “Would you rather have me pass by a helpless creature in need? Would you rather have me heartless?”
“I would rather you safe.”
Her eyes narrowed at him. “Yes, well, that thought disappeared the second you did, didn’t it?”
His head shaking, he looked away from the whirling storm of aggravation she’d whipped herself into, settling his gaze on the fire opposite them.
What in the hell was she doing to him? Making him snipe like a five-year-old whelp with no control on his emotions. Emotions he should be above.
