It Was Only a Kiss

Luke brushed his thumb over her cheek. ‘We both know that you are Superwoman, but let me do this for you, okay?’

‘Okay.’

He heard her sigh of relief as the natural fabric and the heat of the bathroom eased muscles clenched from the cold. The faint hint of colour in her cheeks assured him that she was rapidly warming up, so the hot drink could wait until he’d sorted her injuries out. He had to stanch the blood, and her other leg had a graze that wasn’t as serious but he imagined painful enough. Luke took her hands and opened her clenched fingers, wincing at the deep scrapes on the balls of each hand. Once the shock wore off she was going to be one sore lady.

Sitting on the cold tiles in front of her, he flipped the first-aid box open and lifted her foot onto his thigh. He patted her tense foot. ‘Relax, Jess.’

‘I’m not used to being looked after—especially by a man,’ Jess confessed. ‘My father was usually lost in his own world and he left my mother to mop up my tears, and my brothers generally told me to suck it up and stop whining.’

‘And your exes? Didn’t you ever get sick and need looking after?’ Luke asked as he swiped away the blood with a damp washcloth.

‘I never got sick and I was the one doing the looking after. I’m good at it,’ Jess gabbled.

He could see shock settling into her eyes. Letting her ramble on was a good way to keep her mind off the injury.

‘You’re good at it too.’

‘I am?’

‘You do stuff for me—stuff that I don’t ask you to. Even before we slept together you did things. You always made me coffee, you checked the tyre pressure on the wheels of my car. You reglued the heel on my shoe, worked out why my computer was slow.’

And it made her feel unhinged. It was interesting to realise that she wasn’t used to being on the receiving end of generosity. If she was giving then she was in control...she was calling the shots.

‘If you fall and hurt yourself I will mop you up,’ he replied in a mild voice. ‘I will check the tyres on your car if I think they are flat, because I don’t want you stranded on the side of the road trying to change a tyre yourself. I reglued your shoe because the heel snapped in the kitchen and the glue was two feet away. If you have a problem, I will try to fix it. It is in my nature—hell, it’s in every man’s nature.’ Luke flashed her a grin. ‘Stop trying to control everything in the known universe, my little control freak.’

‘I’m not a... Oh, hell—of course I am. Dammit, it’s sore! Can I cry?’

‘You can.’ Luke ran his hand up her calf in a gesture that was as reassuring as it was tender. He rinsed the cloth and wiped her knees.

‘Cotton wool would work better. You might not get the blood out of that cloth,’ Jess said as she brushed tears off her face.

Luke looked at the cloth and shrugged. ‘So? I don’t have cotton wool.’

‘I do. In the bathroom at the manor house.’

‘I’m not going to go look for it in a storm when this is working,’ Luke replied, and smothered his whistle when he saw the extent of her injury. He might just have to bandage it up and haul her to the doctor, storm or not. The cut was three inches long and deep. He could see something white and wasn’t sure if it was bone or not. Blood still bubbled to the surface.

‘Can I get some painkillers? Morphine? A general anaesthetic?’

‘Soon,’ Luke replied, distracted. The cut needed to be disinfected and closed, and the sooner the better. And sewn up...

‘We have a hard choice to make, darling. This needs stitches—’

‘No, it doesn’t! Shove a Band-Aid on it and be done.’

‘Jess, it needs stitches.’ Luke drew circles on her calf with his thumbs. ‘Now, I can either try to butterfly clip it closed, or we head to the doctor.’

They both looked towards the bathroom window and watched the rain hammer the pane. The wind had picked up speed and it whirled around the house.

‘Butterfly clip it,’ Jess told him, her jaw set.

Luke looked down and assessed the cut again. He could clip it closed. Then he’d haul her off to Dan in the morning, just to make sure. Mind made up, he patted her leg and reached for a bottle of peroxide. Past experience told him that this was the most painful part, and he decided that she might topple off the toilet when he disinfected the wound. Then he’d be sorting out head wounds and replacing a shower door. Maybe.

‘Get off there and sit on the floor in front of me,’ he ordered. Jess looked as if she was going to refuse, so he placed his hands on the outside of her thighs, under the jersey, and rubbed her smooth skin. ‘C’mon, Jess.’