A Mistress for Major Bartlett (Brides of Waterloo)

‘Yes, yes, I shall do that,’ she said in a voice that sounded rather high-pitched to her own ears. She turned away swiftly and scurried out of the room, thoroughly relieved the man had offered her a good excuse for making herself scarce.

She pressed her hands to her hot cheeks once she’d shut the bedroom door behind her. Her legs were shaking a bit, but she wasn’t going to succumb to a fit of the vapours just because she’d almost seen a man have his breeches removed.

She forced her legs to carry her to the head of the stairs and made her rather wobbly way down. She was going to have to get used to a lot more than glimpses of a man’s, well, manliness in the days to come, if she was going to be of any use.

In fact, she was going to have to breach practically every rule by which she’d lived. She’d always taken such pains to keep her reputation spotless that she’d never been without a chaperon, not even when visiting the ladies’ retiring room at a ball. She could scarcely believe she’d just encouraged two hardened criminals to install the regiment’s most notorious rake in her bedroom—nay, her very bed.

Where he was currently being stripped naked.

Oh, lord, what would people think? Actually, she knew very well what they would think. What they would say, if they found out.

Right, then. She squared her shoulders as she marched across the yard to the stables. She’d better think of some way of preventing anyone finding out what she was doing, or they’d all be up in arms.

At least all the gossipy society people she knew from London had fled Brussels. She’d seen many of the most inquisitive in Antwerp. Even if any of them had remained, Madame le Brun thought Major Bartlett was actually her brother, so she couldn’t let anything slip.

And as for Justin... She chewed on the inside of her lower lip, as it occurred to her he might still be in that tumbledown barn, too gravely ill to move, let alone worry about what his flighty little sister was getting up to. Actually, he might have no idea she’d returned to Brussels, if he was still unconscious. Not that she wanted him to remain unconscious.

She bowed her head and uttered a silent, but heartfelt, prayer. And immediately felt a deep assurance that Justin couldn’t be in more capable hands. Moreover, even when he began to recover, Mary wasn’t likely to mention anything that might hamper his recovery.

She retrieved the medicine pouch, then made her way back to the house, feeling sorrier than ever for poor Major Bartlett. Having to rely on such as her. Nobody, not by the wildest stretch of imagination, would ever describe her as capable.

A crushing sense of inadequacy made her pause outside her bedroom door. For on the other side of it lay an immense set of challenges. All wrapped up in the naked, helpless body of a wounded soldier.

She pressed her forehead to the door. She’d already decided she wasn’t going to be one of those people who thought propriety was more important than a man’s very survival. But even so, it wasn’t easy to calmly walk into a room that contained two rough soldiers and a naked man.

What if she tried to think of this as a sickroom, rather than her own bedroom, though? And of Major Bartlett as just a wounded soldier, rather than a naked and dangerous rake? Her patient, in fact. Yes—yes, that was better. She wasn’t, primarily, a woman who’d been forbidden to so much as speak to him, but his nurse.

It made it possible for her to knock on the door, at any rate. And, when a gruff voice told her she could come in, Sarah found that she could look across at the Major with equanimity—well, almost with equanimity. Because he wasn’t lying in her bed. He was in his sickbed. All she had to do was carry on in this vein and she’d soon be able to convince herself she wasn’t a sheltered young lady who regarded all single men as potential predators, but a nurse, as well.

A nurse, moreover, who’d promised, when his men had begged for her help, that she would do her best.

In her absence, Madame had fetched water and towels. And the men had put them to good use, to judge from the mounds of bloodied cloths on the floor.

‘He ain’t so bad as he looked,’ said the First Rogue. ‘A lot of bruising and cuts to his back where the wall fell on him, but nothing broken, not even his head.’

‘Really ’as got nine lives, ’as the Tom C—’ The Second Rogue broke off mid-speech, but Sarah knew perfectly well what he’d been about to say.

Well, well. Perhaps he hadn’t only gained that nickname because of his nocturnal habits. Perhaps a good deal of it was down to him having more than his fair share of luck, too.

‘Sooner we can get it sewn up the better,’ put in the First Rogue hastily, as though determined to fix her attention on the man’s injuries, rather than his reputation. ‘Cut right down to the bone, he is.’

They were looking at her expectantly.

Oh, yes. They’d said that she ought to do the sewing, hadn’t they?

‘I...’ She pressed one hand to her chest. In spite of the lecture she’d given herself, about proving how capable she was, now that it came to it, her heart was fluttering in alarm. At this point, Mama would fully expe

ct her to have a fit of the vapours, if she hadn’t already done so because there was a naked man in her room.

‘You can do it, miss,’ said the Second Rogue. ‘Far better than us clumsy b... Uh—’ he floundered ‘—blighters.’

‘I don’t know how,’ she admitted, though she was ashamed to sound so useless.

‘We’ll direct you. And hold the Major still, in case he comes round.’

Yes. Yes they would need to do that. The pain of having his head sewn back together might well rouse him from his stupor. After all, hadn’t he roused once before, when the looters had been tearing off his shirt?

‘I can’t...’