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It seemed perverse to cherish that memory, but he did. He’d chosen an indomitable woman. Life with her wouldn’t be easy but, Lord above, it would be exciting. No milk-and-water miss for his marchioness. He’d marry this virago and sire a dynasty of hellions. The prospect shot tingling life through limbs that moments ago had been fit only for a shroud.
She dripped more water between his parched lips. Eagerly he lapped at the coolness. He was as dry as the bloody Sahara. Dear God, he felt like overweight elephants waltzed all over him. Surely his last bullet wound hadn’t been this painful.
He forced another word. “Love . . .”
Through the dimness, he saw her color rise. The pink in her cheeks was delicious. She was delicious.
“You were awake for that, were you?”
He tried to tell her with his eyes how he hungered to hear those words once more. She glanced down in sudden shyness, then met his gaze squarely.
“I love you, Nicholas Challoner.” The vow emerged steadily, firmly, without demur.
He closed his eyes against stabbing emotion. His eyes burned and his throat constricted. What a blockhead. The Marquess of Ranelaw never cried.
Her hand closed hard around his. “Nicholas, I swear if you die, I’ll shoot you myself.”
That’s my girl.
Still something worried him. “Forgive . . .”
Her hand tightened. Strength and vigor flowed into him, making him feel a hundred times stronger.
“I forgive you for snatching Cassie. I even understand why you did it. You’re misguided, of course, but not beyond redemption.”
If he’d had possession of all his faculties, he’d laugh. Misguided? Yes, that was one way to describe his sins. She turned his rash, dangerous quest for vengeance into a mere peccadillo.
“Not shoot . . .” Good God, he hurtled toward recovery. He managed two words consecutively.
Her lips curved in a misty smile. “I won’t shoot you today, at least.”
“Risk here . . .”
She shrugged. “I couldn’t let you die.”
“Not die.” A long pause while the pain in his side scaled giddy heights. “Live.”
Dizziness distorted his vision. Two sentences clearly sapped his strength. His last words emerged as a hoarse whisper. “With . . . you.”
“Yes.”
She pressed a fervent kiss to his knuckles. Then she leaned forward and brushed her lips across his. His overflowing heart leaped at that fleeting contact.
Through the pounding in his head, he wondered what she made of his last statement. He suspected she pictured an arrangement considerably less binding than the one he had in mind.
Bad luck for her.
There would be times, he knew, when she’d be sorry he’d claimed her. That didn’t mean he’d ever set her free. She’d had her chance to escape and she hadn’t taken it.
He struggled to muster fading strength. She needed to know she was his forever.
“As . . . wife.”
She’d tame the dissolute rake into a respectable married man. He could hardly wait.
“Nicholas . . .” she said in a faint voice, although she didn’t withdraw her hand. “Don’t make promises you’ll regret when you’re more yourself.”
Did she but know it, he was more himself now than he’d ever been. Through the discordant symphony of pain, he squeezed her hand. He probably managed little more than a tiny shift of his fingers, but in his imagination, he grabbed her hand with all the purpose in his soul.
