Page 20 of Persuasions of an Earl's Daughter

“Let us make haste before you freeze.” He broke the connection suddenly and turned then offered a hand.

She took it, the chill in her limbs counteracting any need for independence. If it were any other situation, she’d avoid his aid, she told herself, but she was reckless not a fool. If she didn’t take his ungloved hand, she might collapse.

It was nothing to do with the fact she wanted to see what his bare fingers felt like against hers of course. Nothing at all.

They were as warm as she’d anticipated and even though she already shuddered from the chill, it sent a flurry of awareness through her. His ungloved fingers were slightly rough which made her frown. What sort of a privileged gentleman had rough fingers? She supposed hers were no better, though.

He aided her up and she gasped as she twisted to sit with her legs to one side. A sharp stab of pain rushed through her side, making itself known like the strange, sharp pain a person sometimes felt for no reason at all after sitting in the wrong position.

August tugged her down swiftly, bundling her into his arms as she clumsily slid from the saddle. “What is it?” he demanded. “What’s the matter?”

“My side,” she said and drew in a breath to wait for the pain to abate. It remained albeit feeling more like a prickling, burning sensation rather than a sharp pull now.

He stepped back and she motioned to where the discomfort lingered.

“I must have hurt myself jumping perhaps.” She couldn’t remember much. Just the rush of water, the fight to stay afloat as the water drove her along and the relief when she was finally able to drag herself to shore by latching the rope about a branch.

His jaw ticked as he eyed the sodden bodice of her gown. His gaze swung up to hers then back to her ribs. He pressed his lips together. “Do I have your permission to look?”

Lilly almost laughed at the formality. It was the last thing she expected from a man with a reputation as sordid as August’s. She waved a hand. “Yes, yes.”

The flippant tone to her voice belied the trembling of her hands as he shoved back the jacket and set to the work on the buttons on the front of her gown.

“Wait.” August put a hand to hers and she froze. “It’s torn,” he explained then dropped to his knees. “Your dress that is.”

Any other day, she might have enjoyed having Lord August Beresford on his knees in front of her, but this was all too odd. It was made worse when his finger upon her bare skin made her gasp.

“Forgive me,” he murmured.

She wouldn’t correct his belief that his touch was painful. It was in some ways. Painfully odd at least. Even as he skimmed a finger over the sore area, she fought the desire to lean into his touch. Perhaps she had hit her head and hadn’t realized it. After all, craving the touch of a man who was by all accounts an immoral, potential horse-thief had to be about the most foolish thing she’d ever done, and had she not just told herself she was no fool.

“You must have caught yourself on something. It’s cut through your clothes.” He rose and reached toward her.

Words and thoughts fled her when his hand brushed her side and he rummaged around in the inner pocket of the jacket, his whole body so close she only needed to take a step forward and be effectively in his embrace. It was incredibly tempting.

Lucky for her, he found a handkerchief swiftly and moved back to press it to her side. She sucked in a breath through her teeth.

“Sorry.”

“Stop apologizing,” she said through her clenched mouth. “Stop being nice to me.”

If he continued, Lilly was not certain what she would do. She might be used to being rash, but she did not fling herself at men she liked let alone the ones she did not.

“It’s quite deep.”

Either he hadn’t heard her or decided to ignore her annoyance.

August turned this way and that and pointed down the road. “There’s a village that way. Not far past the bridge. I think it best we go there for aid. Your wound needs tending.”

“Or we could just return to the inn.”

“We’re miles away and you need warmth and something clean on this wound.”

Any fight left in her vanished the moment he took her hand and set it over the clean handkerchief before looping an arm around her. She hoped it was the cold or the pain addling her wits and nothing else or else another moment in August’s company could become more dangerous than her would-be kidnappers.

∞∞∞

The nearest village was but two miles away. August had travelled through it a few times on the way up north and there wasn’t much there apart from a few shops and a cluster of cottages. He didn’t regret his decision to take Lilly there, though. Not when she shuddered vigorously in his arms and her head lolled against his chest.

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