Page 27 of The Horseman of Sleepy Hollow
Stiffly, painfully, I turned my body over in the bed until my back was facing the Horseman. And I let the tears flow, hot and silent, over my face and into the pillow.
***
Eamon woke me with a warm hand on my shoulder. "The food is ready."
"I don't want any." But even as I spoke, my stomach rumbled audibly.
"I think your body says otherwise. And as your physician, I must insist that you eat."
"Very well." I hauled myself to a sitting position, flinching at the stab of pain. "But I don't promise to like it."
He gave me one of his half-smiles and handed over a bowl of stew. While I ate, he paced doggedly in and out of the room, carrying water, heating it, filling the tub he used the other day. The sight of the tub triggered a vivid memory of his body, the muscles highlighted in amber firelight.
When I finished eating, he collected my bowl and pointed to a chair beside the tub. "I have laid out soap and cloths for washing and drying. There's a bucket for rinsing as well. You should be careful not to get your wound too wet."
"How am I supposed to wash my hair and everything else while keeping the wound dry? That's impossible." I hissed the last word through clenched teeth. I had planned to lure him into helping me bathe, and then—some kind of seduction? Now I could not imagine trying to seduce him, when I knew it would only lead to further humiliation and rejection. But the fact remained, that I could not bathe properlyandkeep my wound dry without his help.
"There are some things you cannot ask a man to do," the Horseman said tightly.
"Did I ask?" I snapped.
"No, but—"
"Leave. I will manage somehow." I pushed myself from the bed and stood up, shaky, willing the stars to stop dancing across my eyes. "You have made it clear that I am too much trouble. So I will impose on your hospitality only this night, and tomorrow I will walk home. At least in the valley there are people who do not wish me dead. Now leave, unless you are prepared to face the extraordinarily distasteful sight of my body."
Fire gleamed in his eyes—but whether it was anger or something else, I could not tell. "I have emptied your bedpans, Katrina. I think I can handle distasteful."
I poured the full force of my anger through my eyes. "Are you...comparing...my body...toshit?"
"No!" he exclaimed. "I'm only saying—"
"Whatareyou saying? Because after baring your soul to me, you seem suddenly eager to insult me in every way you can think of. Is that any way to treat someone who knows your secret?"
"No—I—are you trying to blackmail me into being kind to you?"
"I prefer kindness to death wishes, yes."
"I don't wish you dead!" His voice rose in volume and force, and I fisted my hands to brace myself against it. "I only said that because, after telling you all those things about myself, I feel—exposed. Weak. You make me feel helpless, undone, and vulnerable in a way that I cannot—that I do not—I hate feeling this way, and it makes me cruel."
Understanding latched into place inside me, like a peg slipping neatly into a hole, like a drawer skimming smoothly shut.
"You are not cruel," I said. "You have little authority over your life, so you control what you can—your secret. And when that is revealed, you become anxious, and afraid. I understand. These 'games,' as you call them—the way I play with men—it is my own way of taking control, of making the choice and the process more about me and what I want. But it has never really worked. I am left always unsatisfied, always knowing that my options for love are limited, that my path in life is already marked out, that marriage will be a prison of propriety. Why do you think I have put it off as long as I can? So yes, Eamon—I understand why you are struggling. You gave up a bit of control, and it unsettled you." I stepped nearer, laying a hand on his arm. "But you are neither a bargaining chip nor a game to me. I owe you my life, in the most literal sense. You have shown me kindness and consideration—you speak to me as an equal, which even my suitors rarely do. You have opened your deepest truth to me. Your compassion, your humor, your intelligence—and yes, your beauty—they affect me deeply. But I understand if you have no inclination toward me. I suppose I am not very appealing, after all."
The Horseman's hands landed on either side of my head, and for the barest second, I thought perhaps I had gone too far, and that he was going to wrench my skull clean off my spine. But instead he planted his lips on mine, and a lightning-sharp thrill ripped through my body.
He tasted like the stew, warm and savory and salty, with a tantalizing spiciness that was uniquely him—his taste, like his scent, roughly male, with an edge of something wild and Otherworldly—a crackling whisper of magic. I lifted my arms, curling them around his neck. Kissing was better than coy glances, better than sugared cakes, better than wine, better than books—hismouth—mygod.And his tongue—the Devil himself did not have such a tongue, capable of eliciting a manic tingle between my thighs as he swept it along my teeth and across the arch of my mouth. I whimpered and pressed closer to him, heedless of the pain spiking in my wound.
But Eamon pulled back, as if he could sense my pain somehow. His palm drifted down my back to the bandage. "I am sorry. I let myself be carried away."
"You should be carried away more often," I whispered. "So—you do think I am appealing."
He let out a shuddering sigh. "Katrina."
"What? I think you should be able to say it. You think I am beautiful."
"You know you are beautiful. But that is only one of many things I find compelling about you."
"Tell me."
