Mad About the Marquess (Highland Brides Book 2) (26 page)

Alasdair was too stunned to speak, but she went on, her voice as thin and fragile as paper. “He’ll never forgive me for bleeding all over his Antipodean Cabbage Palm.
Dracaena australis
.” She was looking at the plant at her feet. “Came all the way here on
Endeavor
, with Captain Cook.”

“Bleeding?” She was hurt. “My God.” He dropped the rapier, and started for her.

“I don’t think your god has much interest in me. But perhaps he’ll spare the
Dracaena
, because I’m afraid I’m about to expire upon the poor—”

“Don’t you dare!” he yelled.
 

But of course, she disobeyed him in this as she had in everything else—her head lolled to the side, and then her entire body simply slumped straight for the ground. And she had no more control over her faint than he had over his impulse to catch her up in his arms before her head could hit the bricks upon which she had been so discreetly bleeding.

Damn him for every kind of fool. She had been shot.
 

He
must have shot her.

He had fired over her head, hadn’t he? He’d known she was the highwayman the moment she had uttered that remarkably characteristic curse. And he had been so bloody angry, so fucking betrayed, he had been dead set to stop her from doing anything more criminal or idiotic. To stop her before she got hurt.

But he was the one who had hurt her.

Alasdair laid her head on his knees to make a frantic search for the wound. Her hands, as well as her sleeve, were covered in blood, and the right side of her coat and breeches were sticky and wet to the touch. His hands slipped and shook as he fumbled with the buttons at the bottom of her waistcoat, trying desperately to open it up enough to see if she’d been gut shot.

He was hampered from yanking up the tail of her linen shirt and chemise because she had her arm clutched against her side. “Let me see, damn you,” he muttered as he tried to peel back the clothing enough to find the wound. But instead of a welter of blood and guts, he found plain, although slightly bloodstained white cotton stays, an unadorned chemise, and smooth white skin.

It was…remarkably normal. And remarkably feminine for a lass who was attempting to be a notorious highwayman.

“You needn’t swear at me, Strathcairn.” Quince’s eyes fluttered open for only a moment before they slid closed again. Her voice was nothing but breath and pain. “By all rights, don’t you think I ought to be the one who gets to swear?”

Relief and rage made a strange brew in his gut. “Swear all you like, you heedless, thoughtless idiot.”

“Aye. Heedless, I suppose. Not thoughtless. Thought it out very carefully, I did. Or thought I did. But you’re too clever for me. I should have known you would bait me out on the road the same way you baited the ballroom.”
 

“Aye, you should have.”

“Ah, well. I’ve always been the sort of lass who learns the hard way.” Her voice trailed away into nothingness.

Equal parts of fear and rage filled him like smoke, choking the heart out of him. “Quince!” He gripped her roughly. “Don’t you dare die on me.”

“Serve you right if I did.” She sucked a breath in through her teeth. “And I might still if you don’t stop yelling at me.”
 

Her voice had taken on a grudging, determined edge that he recognized. Relief let air creep back into his lungs. But not much—she was not out of danger. Not by a long shot.
 

A long shot that had apparently hit her. “Where exactly were you hit? Where is the pain?”
 

“My forearm. Hurts like hell.”

Another measure of blessed relief made him clearer-headed. A forearm was not so bad. A forearm was not a belly wound. A surgeon could fix a forearm, or at least save it. Aye. He would take her to a surgeon. Edinburgh was thankfully bristling with able, well-trained medical and surgical men, damn her for needing one. “I imagine it does hurt. That’s what getting shot feels like.”

“Been shot yourself, have you?”

“Nay.” He scooped her up into his arms, and made for the garden gate.

She immediately began to struggle. “Nay. Take me home.” Her thrashing was weak, but she was tenacious, managing to get her boot braced against the doorjamb of the glasshouse.
 

It was all he needed for her to put a foot through the glass, and then where would they be? “Quince, you need a surgeon.”

“Nay. Take me home. I must go home.”

“Have it your way.” Actually, it was a fine idea. If he took her into the house, her parents would have to know what had occurred. Not that he wanted them to know
he
had shot their daughter, but that their daughter had been out of their house, out on the roads, posing—nay, acting—as a highwayman, robbing Edinburgh’s rich and powerful blind.
 

“Lord Cairn.” It was Lady Plum, standing in the middle of the glass house in a night rail and dressing gown. “Whatever are you doing with my sister?”

Alasdair had not forgotten his last conversation with Lady Plum. So what came from his mouth was entirely due to his need to salvage his reputation as a gentleman.
 

“I was attempting to elope with her, if you must know, Lady Plum.” But now that he had stated the obvious—that he was going to marry wee, inconvenient, inappropriate Quince Winthrop—he felt instantly better. He felt right. “But unfortunately, my beloved has gone and injured herself.”

“I did not ‘injure’ myself,” Quince objected against his chest. “You shot me.”

“Oh, my God.” Lady Plum rushed forward as if she would wrest her sister from his arms. “I knew you were in over your head with him. What on Earth happened?”

“Told you. He shot me.” Quince was nothing if not tenacious with her point. “Though I will say I deserved it.”

“No one
deserves
to be shot!” Lady Plum’s glance was filled with frightened disbelief. “Did you?”

“Aye,” he admitted with as much gentlemanly grace as possible. “It was a terrible mistake. I thought I had fired over her head—a warning shot.”

“Warning? Oh, my God,” Lady Plum repeated. “I told you that you were out of your depth with him,” she chided her sister. “And now he’s shot you. Carry her into the house, you horrible man,” she ordered him. “I’ll get Mama.”

“Nay,” Quince said against his chest.

“Aye. Get her mother. And her father.” He held Quince more tightly lest she try to struggle out of his arms and injure herself further. “I will take my betrothed up to her room, if you would please bring her lady mother directly.”

Lady Plum disappeared across the lawn at a run in search of Lady Winthrop, and Alasdair followed at a more measured pace, trying not to jar the slip of a lass in his arms.

Who held firm. “I’m not your betrothed.”
 

He ignored her attempt at argument. “Which way?” he asked at the terrace door.

“Left to the servants’ stair,” she whispered, clearly fighting the pain. “Third floor, I’m afraid.”

“I’ll survive.” He took the stairs two at a time. The lass in his arms looked even paler in the warm lamp light than she had in the blue refracted moonlight of the glass house.

She let out a careful, tight breath. “Holy painted trollops, it hurts.” She sucked air back in through her teeth.

“You’d do better to faint again,” he advised her, trying not to think about the pain he had caused. If he concentrated on what he was doing for her—trudging his way up three flights of stairs, he could see his way through this mess.
 

“Can’t be done, I’m afraid,” she said between her clenched teeth. “Didn’t faint the first time.”

He did not bother to argue with her. “We’ll get some laudanum into you as soon as may be to blunt the pain.” But to do that they’d need to get a surgeon to look at the wound, to see if the ball was still in her arm. And he had no idea who was the best local surgeon.

“I am sorry I can’t seem to bear it any better.” She was surprisingly agreeable when she was in pain. “And this is where you tell me I deserved it, I’m sure. The wages of sin and all.”

He would have told her so if he had thought of it. Remarkable, frustrating, stupid lass. “Are you quoting the Bible at me?”

“It’s normally a useful gambit.” She let out a sigh that was nearly a groan. “I’m out of my mind, clearly. From the blood loss. It’s a common result, or so I’m told.” Even in pain, she was not done twitting him.

“How can you laugh?” he asked, as he paused briefly on the landing. “How can you pretend that nothing is wrong?”

“How can I not?” Her voice was weak, but lacking none of her characteristic insouciance. “Crying will not solve anything. And I look dreadful crying. Ugly. Troll-like. Best to avoid.”

“Then I suppose I must be grateful for your morbid sense of humor.”

“Just I am grateful for your bad aim. Laughing is the only thing that keeps me from being terrified.”

Alasdair didn’t know whether he was relieved or satisfied at this small show of sense—or if it wasn’t sense, it was at least a show of humanity and vulnerability, which brought out his own sense of compassion. “I am sorry. Sorry I shot you.”

“I’m sorry, too—sorry I made you shoot me. It hurts a bloody, awful lot.” Her words came out in little pants of pain. “And I’m sorry for cursing.”

“Curse all you like, if it helps.” He started up the next flight.

“It doesn’t help. It’s bloody uncomfortable.” Within his arms, she had curled herself into a tight little knot. “What an awful mess. I am sorry I got you into it. But no matter what, I’m not your betrothed. So whatever your reason for saying so to Plum—and I ken you must have a reason in that evil, ginger brain of yours—don’t say so in front of Mama.”

“Did I say that?” He knew exactly what he had said. And he was even coming to understand it. “Well, it’s just as well.”

“It is not just as well,” she insisted through gritted teeth. “It’s ridiculous. You’ll have to hope Plum forgets you said it, and doesn’t tell Mama.”

Alasdair took a deep breath—not least because he had just climbed three sets of stairs, and had another still to go. “Actually, I think it best if she does tell both your parents. I think it best if we proceed under that assumption.”

“That I’m your betrothed?” She tried to thump her fist against his chest, but she was so weak it barely registered. “Do you think it will keep people from knowing that you accidentally shot me?”

“No, I think it will keep people from knowing
why
I accidentally shot you. Or do you really want all of Edinburgh, from your father to the Lord Provost, to know that you are
Monsieur Minuit
? Well,
ma belle
?”
 

She considered the question in silence until they at last reached the landing. “I suppose not,” she admitted.

“Then you had best marry me.” His satisfaction was not nearly as…satisfying as it ought to have been. “Your secret will be safe with me if you consider yourself bloody well engaged.”

“How else could I be engaged at the moment?” She made a small gesture of raising her injured and bloody arm, but winced in pain.

“Keep still, damn you.”

“You do growl at me so charmingly, it’s a wonder I can resist you.” She had closed her eyes again, and every word was laced with pain. “I will say we are engaged. But I will not marry you.”

“You will,” he insisted. Because there were too many reasons not to. Because now that he had made up his mind, he was certain. And because a wide-eyed maid had appeared at the top of the servants’ stair, gaping at them. There was nothing for it. “Lady Quince’s room?” he asked her.

“Just along here, sir.” The lass scurried ahead to open the door to a bedchamber with a small fire in the grate.
 

“Thank you,” he said as he laid Quince down on the bed. “Send for a doctor.”

“Aye, sir.” The poor maid’s voice was full of terror. “I’ll have Mrs. Mowatt—”

“Nay.” Quince found her voice. “Annie, have Mrs. Mowatt send for the Reverend Mr. Talent, at the West Kirk of Saint Cuthbert’s.”

“Saint Cuthbert’s? You don’t need a priest. You’re not going to die.” Not if he could help it. And he could. He knew enough of the basics of field dressing to get the bleeding stopped. He stripped off his cravat and used it to apply pressure to the wound. “You need a surgeon.”

“Ow, ow, ow,” she protested at the pressure. “He is a doctor. A physician, trained at the university here in Edinburgh. He’ll ken what to do even if he isn’t a surgeon. He’s close by. And he’ll ken how to keep his mouth shut.”
 

The image of the reverend doctor escorting Quince out of the orangerie earlier in the evening rose before Alasdair like a specter. And something else—some virulent, ugly feeling that was too close to jealousy for his taste—took root in his chest. “Patch you up a time or two already, has the good reverend doctor?”

“Nay.” She gave him a pointed look out of the side of her eye. “You’re the only person who’s ever shot me.”

“Lucky me. Do you think you might refrain from telling the whole of the world, Quince? For your sake, if not for mine?” He shot a speaking glance toward the maid. “Send for the Reverend Mr. Talent in his medical capability,” he instructed the quivering girl, “from Saint Cuthbert’s.”