“Oh good, you’re awake.” She stopped midsentence and midstep, her mouth open. “Oh dear God.”
“Good morning to you too.” He inclined his head and then wished he hadn’t. He’d woken like this before, after consuming copious amounts of whiskey and port, tasting as if a dog had squirted in his mouth while he’d slept. But never after a fight. He wondered if she’d half brained him at one stage.
“Your face looks just awful. You should have kept the cold press on it.”
He rose and approached her slowly, her eyes never leaving his face as she studied him with pain in her gaze. He didn’t have to tip her head back to inspect her neck. He could well enough see the bruises and swelling from there. “You should have put the compress on your skin.”
“I told you, I will be fine. You on the other hand need to get cleaned up. Hobson tells me a ship has been sighted off the bay. We need to investigate.”
He said the first thing that sprang to mind, his brain trying to catch up and push away other niggling revelations. “The innkeeper said a ship could not get close. The waves are too high and the beach too rocky.”
She threw him a look he was beginning to know well. The one that asked how he was still alive and if he was a complete idiot. “I suspect he lied. It sounds exactly what a smuggler might say to keep a nosy lord away from his less-than-legal activities.”
James bristled. What in God’s name had she done to him? His instincts were one of his best assets and she was ruining them with her distracting presence.
“Where were you just now?”
“We needed clothes.”
“So you went out into the inn dressed like that?” He could just about see through the cotton and her ankles were on full display.
“I went out into the hall, yes. I found Hobson loitering there and asked him to find me something to wear.” She dropped one arm’s bundle on the bed and held the other closely to her chest.
He deliberately ignored the matching bruises on her wrist and arm in favour of an argument. “He wasn’t loitering: he was ensuring you didn’t escape. He was watching out for trouble.”
“Fine, loitering was an exaggeration. He was sleeping in a chair. I could have easily got past him and been on my way. You two really are very bad at this. He didn’t even wake while we were beating each other senseless.”
James swore under his breath.
Daniella smiled as she slipped behind the dressing screen, unable to resist another jibe. “You are lucky to have retired from the army before someone succeeded in killing you both. Do you think it is age that slows you down?”
“How long does Hobson think we have?” James asked, ignoring her. He made a mental note to remind Hobson what was at stake and on which side his bread was buttered.
“He is having the innkeeper’s daughter make a basket of food and Patrick is readying the carriage and horses as we speak. No time at all.”
James rubbed a hand over his jaw, grimacing at the stubble covering his cheeks and chin. He no longer appeared the gentleman in any capacity.
Her voice broke into his thoughts once again. “Let me know when you are decent. Unless I can convince you to return to your own room to dress?”
He rifled through the clothing on the bed. There was a clean shirt, fresh breeches and hose, and a coat. “I have everything I need right here.”
“Suit yourself.”
He wondered what Hobson had found for her to wear as he stared at his face in the looking glass. Dark growth covered much of his cheeks, chin and neck but he left it there. Better to be unnoticeable than clean-shaven and looking every inch a gentleman who had been robbed of everything including his dignity.
Beaten by a woman.
Hobson was going to laugh until he rolled on the floor.
“Did you tell Hobson what had happened to your neck?” he asked as he used the strip of linen to wash the caked blood from his face and the top of his chest. He searched for the nick to his neck from the dagger, wondering if it was part of the dream or if she had actually meant to stab him in the throat. He breathed easier when he found no evidence.
Daniella had said he looked awful and he did. It wasn’t even the worst it was going to get. That would come later in the day and into the night. He hoped his eyes weren’t going to swell shut. That was all he needed.
Movement in the looking glass had him swivelling, the dagger in his hand before he’d even thought the thought. She made no sound as she moved; there was no rustle of skirts or petticoats to warn him she was there.
“You…” he sputtered, swallowed, inhaled. “You are not wearing that. Who gave you those clothes?” The reason he hadn’t heard a rustle of skirts was because she wasn’t wearing any. Damn her. Damn Hobson!
“There is nothing else. And anyway, I prefer breeches.”
“And I prefer to not draw attention!” When had she worn breeches before? On the ship? With the shape of her calves on display? He damned her father while he was consigning all others to the deepest pits of hell.
“I do believe you are going to have an apoplexy, my lord.” Her smile was too knowing in the dawn light.
He lifted his gaze from her tightly encased legs. Could he actually see each individual muscle making up her thigh? “You did this on purpose?”
“I did not. You were the one teaching me a lesson when you cut through my dress. I would have been happy to wear it again today. Well, not unhappy at any rate.”
“So find Hobson again and tell him to buy or steal you another dress. The innkeeper’s daughter or wife will have clothing they will part with.”
“No.”
His fists clenched
