Scoundrel's Honor (Russian Connection 3)

It was simply too painful.

“That is why you wish to marry me?”

“You know why I want you as my wife,” he husked, his arms wrapping around her slender waist and his head lowering to bury in the curve of her neck. “The question is what do you want, Emma?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

DIMITRI HAD A VAGUE memory of being surrounded by angry soldiers and roughly carried to the citadel. Thankfully, he had lost consciousness only moments after passing through the great round towers built into the walls guarding the fortress.

He preferred to stay unaware of his humiliation of being hauled to the dungeons as a common criminal.

Unfortunately, there was no means of remaining senseless when his servant was using a large dagger to dig out the bullet that remained in his shoulder. Hell, that sort of pain would have awoken him if he were dead.

Wrenching open eyes that felt as if they were filled with a good measure of desert sand, he glared at the slender man kneeling beside the low divan that Dimitri was stretched across.

“Damn you, Josef,” he said, annoyed when the words came out as a thin whisper. “That is my shoulder you are poking and prying, not a slab of meat from the butcher.”

With a last brutal twist of the dagger, Josef sat back on his heels, a smile touching his scarred face as he held up the bullet he had just removed.

“The pasha did offer one of his numerous females to tend to your injuries.” Setting aside his tools of torture, the servant grabbed his silver flask and poured a generous measure of brandy into Dimitri’s wound. “No doubt they would be gentle enough for your delicate nerves.”

Dimitri ground his teeth against his shout of agony.

Why was it that a bullet always felt worse coming out than it did going in?

Sensing the encroaching darkness that threatened to overwhelm him, Dimitri grimly tried to focus on his surroundings.

Above him the vaulted ceiling was magnificently decorated with blue-and-white tiles, the superior craftsmanship unmistakable. Far too exquisite for the dungeons. Which was an improvement on this rotten day.

With a small movement, he turned his head far enough to sweep a glance over the large room filled with the divans and large pillows that were preferred among the natives, covered in yellow-and-green silk. The walls were covered with finely carved wooden panels, and there was a massive fireplace with a green-marble mantel. At last he shifted his attention to take in the arched windows where the early morning sunlight tumbled through the grilled screens.

He grimaced, realizing he had been unconscious more hours than he initially suspected.

Where was Emma? And most important, was she safe?

“They would certainly be preferable to gaze upon,” he absently muttered.

Packing the wound with clean linen, Josef efficiently wrapped a narrow strip of fabric around his shoulder to hold it in place.

“Do you want one fetched?” he demanded.

With his thoughts still on Emma, Dimitri managed a painful laugh.

“You just dug a bullet out of my flesh, in an unnecessarily painful fashion I might add. I do not relish the thought of having another removed.”

Josef snorted, washing his hands in the ceramic bowl filled with water.

“I doubt any of the females in the pasha’s harem carry loaded pistols.”

“No, but Emma would be eager to put another in my tender backside should she discover I allowed a beautiful female to put her hands on me.”

A completely unexpected fondness flickered over his servant’s narrow countenance.

“She is too honorable to shoot you from behind. She is far more likely to stab you in the heart with a dagger.”

“That is most reassuring.” Bemused, Dimitri struggled to sit upright, relieved to discover that the worst of the fiery pain seemed to be fading from his shoulder. Of course, he did not protest when his servant helped him slip on a pale blue robe and pressed a flask into his hand. “You surprise me, Josef,” he admitted, drinking deep of the fiery spirits.

“Why?” Josef gathered the bloody rags and dagger, dumping them on a silver tray. “I have stitched you back together more times than I can recall.”