Page 28 of The Last Kiss

Gritting his teeth, he rolled up his trouser leg and unstrapped the prosthetic, setting it aside. Olive had draped a square of muslin over her lap and he lifted his leg onto it, turning to look out of the window as her cool hands came to rest just below his knee. “It’s healed well,” she said, with a clinical curiosity that made him smile. “I’ve seen much worse. The wound itself healedverycleanly. You’re lucky, Ashleigh.” A pause. “Not lucky. I mean — ”

“I know what you mean, and you’re right. Iamlucky.” He turned from the window to look at her face, that strain he’d noticed earlier tightening around mouth. “Tell me how you are.” Olive’s hands stilled in the act of sliding the tape measure around his knee. “You seem rather tense. Are you alright?”

She gave him a stiff smile and carried on working. “You pay too much attention.”

“I try to. Will you tell me what’s troubling you?”

“Oh, it’s nothing really, simply that… Well.” She took a measurement, noted it down with a pencil in the notebook. “It’s just that my father is rather heaping on the pressure on the marriage front.”

“What kind of pressure? Has someone made you an offer?” He smiled. “Or does he expectyouto propose?”

She gave a short laugh. “I think he’d prefer to do that himself. At least” — she glanced up, her gaze falling just shy of his — “I’m rather afraid he’s spoken to Sir Arthur. You know, regarding your intentions.”

“Oh.” His face heated, but Olive didn’t see because she was concentrating on measuring from his knee to the truncated end of his leg.

Would it be so bad, he thought, it if was Olive? They could probably be friends and God knew he’d make no demands on her in the bedroom. It would certainly be convenient to have a wife, a veil to draw over his friendship with Harry. And perhaps it would give Olive more freedom, too? He cleared his throat. “Um, Father’s not mentioned anything to me, but — That is w-would you l-like me t-to offer — ?”

“Good God no!” She jolted back, aghast, and it took a moment for her to compose herself enough to add, stiffly, “Nothing personal, Ashleigh. I just couldn’t abide anyone…” She closed her eyes and gave an involuntary shudder. “I don’t want to marry, that’s the crux of it. I don’t want to…to become a man’s possession. And that’s what marriage means, you know, when it comes down to basics. A married woman has few rights, even over her own body.”

Mortified, Ash simply nodded. What had he been thinking even considering the idea? He may not have any intentions on Olive’s person, but she couldn’t know that and he could hardly explain. Besides, wouldn’t it be just as wrong to use her as a…a screen? As if she had no desire for personal happiness and intimacy, no dreams for her own future beyond marrying. He felt thoroughly ashamed of himself. “P-please don’t trouble yourself. I d-don’t have any immediate plans to marry.” He wanted to assure her that her robust refusal hadn’t offended him. “M-my father is keen on it, that’s all.”

Olive watched him with that assessing gaze of hers, as if she were trying to lift his skin and see how he worked beneath. Eventually she said, “He’ll be disappointed, then. Your mother too. Good Lord, andmymother!”

“Ha!” Ash gave a rueful smile, relieved that the tension was broken. “They’ll be furious withme, for not asking you. I see your tactics, Miss Allen. Very shrewd.”

“I promise to do all in my power to deflect any blame. Perhaps…” A sigh. “Perhaps I shouldn’t call so often? But I rather enjoy your company, Ashleigh. I can’t bear the endless parade of afternoon teas and dinner parties Mother drags me to in search of a suitable beau. I feel like a prize heifer at the market.”

“Then call here anyway. We can be friends, can’t we, without the world expecting us to marry?”

“I find the world to be extremely intrusive in general.” She cocked her head. “Not too keen on your friendship with Mr West, is it?”

His heart kicked; her penetrating gaze was rather unnerving. “Harry saved my life,” he said blandly. “My friendship with him is not negotiable.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Boyd tells me West got you back on a horse.”

“He did.” The thought of that ride made him smile and he had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning like a loon. “We’re riding out again tomorrow, in fact.”

“Splendid.” Olive smiled, but it was a wistful expression. And then all in a rush she blurted, “Oh, don’t you wish you could just escape?”

He laughed. “From Hampshire?”

“From Hampshire, from society. From everything! I wish we could just do what we pleased without anyone telling us we shouldn’t.”

Ash identified with that wish in ways Olive couldn’t imagine. Clearing his throat, he said, “What is ityouwant to do, Olive, if you could?”

For a moment she didn’t answer, but he suspected she was considering whether to confess rather than what to confess. She lifted her chin and said, “I’d be a doctor at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson hospital in London.”

“Heavens! That’s quite an ambition.”

“For a woman, you mean?”

“For anyone. But, yes, surely more difficult for a woman. Do they even…?” He felt gauche asking whether any medical schools admitted women. “That is, where would you train?”

“At the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine for Women, in London. But — Well. Major Edwards thinks I have potential, but without Father’s support how could I ever afford it?” Her shoulders sank, her hands coming to rest on Ash’s leg. “I won’t inherit anything until I marry, and since I refuse to do that…” She forced a smile, over-bright with frustration. “As it is, Father already thinks it’s high time I stopped volunteering at Chewton — now the war’s over.”

Ash snorted. “Has he forgotten all those men who still need nursing, who’ll need it for the rest of their lives?” His anger flared just thinking of those poor souls at Chewton Lodge, hidden away from the world behind swaying pine trees. Not so glorious as the dead, were they, those maimed and disfigured men? “The war’s not over for everyone.”

Olive squeezed his knee, a gesture of solidarity. “My father — our fathers, I suppose — want things to go back to the way they were. But we can’t let them, can we? No matter how much the old men huff and puff, we can’t let things go back.”

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