his armpits and knotted it over his shoulder, like a toga. She hoped it was warm enough. His feet and his long brawny calves were bare and probably cold, but it was better than having him trip. Or naked.
She wedged her shoulder under his armpit and steered him towards the stairs. The first step was in a narrow doorway with a very low lintel, for the cottage had not been designed for such tall men as he.
“Bend your head,” she told him. Obediently, he bent, but lost his balance and lurched forward. Ellie clung to him, pulling him back against the doorway, to keep him upright. Fearful that he would straighten and hit his injury on the low beam, she cupped one hand protectively around his head and drew it down against her own forehead for safety. He leaned on her, half-unconscious, breathing heavily, one arm around her, one hand clutching the wooden stair-rail, his face against hers. White lines of pain bracketed his mouth.
There were only fourteen steep and narrow stairs, but it took a superhuman effort to get him up them. He seemed barely conscious, except for the grim frown of concentration on his face and the slow determined putting of one foot in front of the other. He gripped the stair-rail with fists of stone and hauled himself up, pausing at each step achieved, reeling with faintness. Ellie held him tightly, supporting him with all the strength she could muster. He was a big man; if he collapsed, she could not stop him falling. And if he fell, he might never regain consciousness.
There was little conversation between them, only the grim, silent battle. One painful step at a time. From time to time, she would murmur encouragement—” we are past the halfway mark,” “only four steps left”—but she had no idea if he understood. The only sound he made was a grunt of exertion, or the raw harsh panting of a man in pain, at the end of his tether. He hung on to consciousness by willpower alone. She had never seen such stubbornness, or such courage.
At last they reached the top of the stairs. Straight ahead of them was the tiny room where Amy’s bed was tucked—no more than a narrow cupboard it was, really, but cosy enough and warm for her daughter. On the right was Ellie’s bedroom.
“Bend your head again.” This time she was ready when he lurched forward and stumbled into her room. She managed to steer him to the small curtained-off alcove where her bed stood. He sprawled across it with a groan and lay there, unmoving. She collapsed beside him, gasping for breath, weak with relief. Her breath clouded visibly in the icy air. She had to get him covered, while he was still warm from the exertion of the climb.
She had no nightshirt for him to wear. He was too broad in the shoulders and chest for any of her clothing and she had long ago sold anything of Hart’s that remained. The few thin blankets she had did not look warm enough to keep an unconscious man from catching a chill. The thickest, warmest coverings were on Amy’s bed.
She wrapped him in a sheet and tugged the covers over him. She took all the clothes she possessed and spread them out over the bed—dresses, shawls, a faded pelisse, a threadbare cloak—any layer of cloth which would help keep out the cold. She fetched the hot brick and set it at his feet. Then she stood back. She could do no more. She was shivering herself, she realised. And her feet were frozen. She normally got into bed to keep warm.
But tonight there was a strange man in her bed.
Amy’s bed was only a narrow bench, as long and as wide as a child. No room for Ellie there. Downstairs, the fire was dying. Ellie sat on the wooden stool, drew her knees against her chest and wrapped her shawl even tighter around herself in an illusion of warmth. She had used up all her extra clothes to make the bed warm for the stranger. She stared across at him. He lay there, warm, relaxed, comfortable while she hugged herself against the cold. He had collapsed. He was insensible. He wouldn’t know she was there.
She crept to the edge of the bed on frozen toes and looked at him. He lay on his back, his breathing deep and regular. In the frail light of the candle the bandage glimmered white against his tanned skin and the thick, dark, tousled hair. There was a shadow of dark bristle on his lean, angular jaw. He seemed so big and dark and menacing in her bed. He took up much more of it than she did. And what if he woke?
She couldn’t do this. She crept back to her stool. The chill settled. Drafts whispered up at her, insinuating themselves against her skin, nibbling at her like rats. Her chattering teeth echoed a crazed counterpoint to his deep, even breaths.
She had no choice. It was her bed, after all. It would do nobody any good if she froze to death out here. What mattered propriety when it came to her very health? She ran downstairs again and fetched her frying pan. She took a deep breath, wrapped the sheet more tightly around herself and stepped into the sleeping alcove, frying pan in hand. Feeling as if she were burning her bridges, she closed the curtains which kept the cold drafts out. In the tiny, enclosed space, she felt even more alone with the stranger than ever…
Outside, pellets of hail beat against her window.
Carefully, stealthily, Ellie tucked the pan under the edge of the mattress, comfortingly to hand, then crept under the bedclothes. He wasn’t just in her bed, he took up most of the space. And almost all of the bedclothes. Without warning, she found herself lying hard against him, full length, his big body touching hers from shoulder to ankle. Threadbare sheets were all that lay between them. Ellie went rigid with anxiety. She poked him. “Hsst! Are you awake?” Her hand hovered, ready to snatch up the pan.
He didn’t move; he just lay there, breathing slowly and evenly as he had for the last fifteen minutes. She tried to move away from him, but his weight had caused the mattress to sag. Her body could not help but roll downhill towards him. Against him. It was a most unsettling sensation. She wriggled a little, trying to reduce the contact between them. Her frozen toes slipped from their sheet and touched his long legs…and she sighed with pleasure. He was warm, like a furnace.
Fever? She put out a hand in the darkness and felt his forehead. It seemed cool enough. But that could be the effect of the cold night air. She slipped a hand under the bedclothes and felt his chest. The skin was warm and dry, the muscles beneath it firm. He didn’t feel feverish at all. He felt…nice.
She snatched her hand away and tucked herself back in her own cocoon of bedclothes. She closed her eyes firmly, trying to shut out the awareness of the man in her bed. Of course, she would not get a wink of sleep—she was braced against the possibility that he was awake, shamming unconsciousness, but at least she would be warm.
She had never actually slept with a man before. Hart had not cared to stay with her longer than necessary. After coitus he had immediately left her, and once she had quickened with child he had never returned to her bed. So the very sensation of having a man sleep beside her was most…unsettling.
She could smell him, smell the very masculine smell of his body, the scent of the herbal poultice she had made for his injury. His big, hard body seemed to fill the bed. It lifted the bedclothes so that there was a gap between him and her smaller frame, a gap for cold drafts to creep into. She wriggled closer, to close the gap a little, still lying rigid, apart from him, straining against the dip in the mattress.
Slowly, insidiously, his body heat warmed her and gradually her defences relaxed. The combination of his reassuring stillness and the regularity of his deep breathing eased her anxious mind until finally she slept.
And as she slept, her body curled against his, closing the gap seamlessly. Her cold toes slipped from their cool linen cocoon and rested on the hard warmth of his long bare calves. And her hand crept out and snuggled itself between the layers that wrapped him, until it was resting on that warm, firm, broad masculine chest…
Weak winter sun woke her, lighting the small, spare room, setting a golden glow through the faded curtains that covered her sleeping alcove. Feeling cosy, relaxed
