Scandals Bride (Cynster 3)

the salve felt on her scorched flesh. She studied her palms while he returned the pot to the shelf. His left hand appeared; he grasped her right wrist and tugged forward. She stepped forward and looked up-and stubbed her nose on his back. "What…?"

For answer, he clamped her right forearm beneath his right arm-tight as a vise. She pushed against his back; it was like pushing a mountain. "What are you doing?"

On the words, she felt the soft touch of gauze; she whipped her head around and scanned the shelf-the roll of gauze bandage she kept there was missing.

"Richard!" She tried to wriggle and accomplished nothing. The gauze wound steadily about her hand. She glared at his back. "Stop it!"

He didn't. He was surprisingly deft; when he released her hand, she found herself staling at a perfectly neat bandage, secured by a tight knot. He reached for her other hand-

"No!" She danced back, hiding it behind her.

"Yes!" He stepped forward.

"I'm the healer!"

"You're a stubborn witch."

He was unstoppable; despite her protests, despite her active resistance, her left hand, too, was carefully wrapped in gauze, so her fingers were locked together with only her fingertips protruding. Defeated, she stared, first at one mittened hand, then the other. "What…? How…?

"There's nothing you need do until morning-that'll give the salve a chance to sink in."

She narrowed her eyes at him.

"Come here. You have ashes in your hair."

He pulled her to the stool; resigned, she sank down and stared at the flames as, standing behind her, he pulled out her pins, searching through the wild mass her hair had become to find them. He shook the long tresses out, then fetched her brush from her dressing table and proceeded to brush out her hair.

"Thank God-or The Lady-there are no burned or singed locks. No thanks, however, to you."

Catriona wisely kept mum and concentrated on the tug of the brush through her long hair, on the soothing, repetitive rhythm. The flames in the hearth burned strongly; she closed her eyes and felt their warmth on her lids, on her naked breasts. With him behind her and the fire before her, she felt secure and warm. Her senses spread, sure and calm; about her, her world had steadied.

"I didn't expect you back-I thought I was dreaming when you appeared in the yard." She made the statement calmly, leaving it to him to respond if he would.

His eyes on the burnished flame of her hair, rippling and glowing beneath each stroke of the brush, Richard drew in a slow breath, then replied: "I got as far as Carlisle. We spent the night there, and I decided I'd made a mistake. I didn't want to go to London-I never did." There was nothing south of the border for him now. He paused, then brushed on. "And if I'd needed any prompting, discovering this morning that, after my arrival at the inn last night, Dougal Douglas had been inquiring after who I was and where I was headed, clarified the position nicely."

"Douglas?"

"Hmm. He lives near there and was in the town when I drove in. He quizzed the ostlers, then made the mistake of approaching Jessup late that night in the tap. Jessup reported his questioning to me this morning."

"And that brought you back?"

Lips compressing, Richard held back the impulse to agree. After three long strokes, he managed to get the truth out. "I'd already decided to return, but the notion that Douglas knew I'd left the vale, leaving you, in his terms, alone, made me hire a horse and ride. I left Worboys and Jessup to follow with the carriage."

"I didn't hear or see you ride in."

"No one did. You were all engrossed with the fire." He gave the lock he was holding an extra tug. "With running into a burning building."

She didn't respond. He brushed on, steadily removing flecks of ash from her bright mane. Under the brush, her hair came alive in his hands, like living fire. Warm, fragrant, gentle fire.

"Will you be staying?"

There were times, Richard decided, when he definitely did not appreciate being married to a witch. To a woman who could hold her demeanor to the calm and serene regardless of her true feelings. He never could tell what she really felt. Her question-surely one of the most vital facing them-had been couched as the most politely distant, totally innocent, query. Which, he decided, after all they'd shared, was too much to accept.

Frowning, he stared at the back of her glossy head. "That depends on you."

She clearly expected him to sleep with her-while in this house, he was still, quite obviously, to her, her husband. But what were the boundaries of his role in her eyes?-that was something he didn't know, something he needed to find out. Something they needed to discuss.

Abruptly, he stopped brushing. Grasping her shoulders, he drew her around on the stool, then hunkered down before her, so his eyes were level with hers. "Do you want me to stay?"