did it. That settled Hallie’s resolve. She would take no more ridicule from her meddling sister. She snatched the basket out of Isabel’s grip and nodded toward the door. “Go.”
Isabel pressed her lips into a pout. “You’re making a mistake.”
Hallie couldn’t agree more. But it would be a bigger mistake to cede to Isabel’s whims. “Out.”
“’Twill jeopardize the peace if you hurt him, you know.”
“I’m not going to hurt him.”
“Maybe not on purpose, but…”
“Go, Isabel.”
Isabel picked up her skirts and stomped out the door, angry that all her best laid plans had gone awry.
But now that Hallie was left holding the basket, she began to wonder if perhaps Isabel’s plans hadn’t gone awry after all.
She got the sinking feeling that this was exactly what her conniving little sister had intended.
Chapter 23
Seated on the bed with the leg of his trews bunched above his knee, Colban had the bandage around his ankle halfway unwrapped when there was a knock at the door.
“Come!” he called out.
Bart had come and gone after filling the large wooden tub with buckets of steaming water. Colban expected that was the old maidservant, Burunild, arriving to help him at his bath.
As the door opened, he said, “I think the swellin’s down alrea—”
He looked up.
It wasn’t Burunild.
“Hallie.” He didn’t know whether to be pleased or horrified.
Hallie, carrying a basket brimming with linens, sponges, candles, and bottles, looked as uneasy as he felt.
“What’s all this?” he asked, though it was clear they were items meant for his bath.
“I’ve come to assist you.” By her grim expression, one would think she’d come to torture him.
Perhaps she had come to torture him. Just the thought of Hallie attending him at his bath—peeling his clothes from his body, drizzling warm water over his skin, running her fingers over every inch of him—seemed like delicious torment.
He wasn’t sure any of that was wise. Not in his present state. Though the swelling in his ankle had gone down, he couldn’t say the same about other parts of him, not with an enticing Valkyrie in the room.
“Bart told me that Burunild—”
“Burunild was called away. And no one else was available.” She sounded rather defensive. “I tried to find someone else. Abygail. Gillian. Hilda. They were all occupied or asleep.”
“I see.” He averted his eyes, returning his attention to unwrapping his ankle. If she’d tried to enlist so many others, it was clearly a task she was loath to do. Which was fine. He didn’t want her to do it anyway. Did he? “Well, I’m sure I can manage alone. Just leave the basket beside the tub and—”
“Nay, I can do it. I said I would. And I will.” She seemed resigned, as if she’d been commanded to do something repulsive. Like emptying his chamber pot.
The tone of her voice ruffled his feathers. She didn’t have to sound quite so unhappy.
“Look, ye clearly don’t wish to,” he muttered. “I understand. Ye’re the laird. Ye shouldn’t have to perform the work of a maidservant.”
His words seemed to annoy her. “You doubt I’m capable?”
He furrowed his brows. “I didn’t say that.”
“I won’t hurt you,” she blurted out, “if that’s what you think.”
He blinked in surprise. That wasn’t at all what he thought.
She seemed flustered by her own admission. She lowered the basket onto the floor beside the tub and removed two candles. Gripping them like a pair of daggers, she cast around the chamber, uncertain where to put them.
Colban might have found her awkward determination amusing if he weren’t growing harder by the moment, imagining her candle-gripping fists wrapped around…
He nodded at the candles and managed to mumble, “Just leave them on the table.” Then, deciding it really would be best if she left, he said, “I’ll be fine. Really. I’m sure ye have more pressin’ duties. Like ye said, the enemy ne’er sleeps.”
Again, she seemed irritated by his words. “Just because I’m in command of the knights doesn’t mean I can’t do more…womanly…tasks.”
“O’ course not.”
“I know how to give a man a bath.”
“No doubt.” His voice cracked on the words as he imagined her sliding her palms over his chest, his stomach, and lower. “I just meant ye needn’t trouble yourself.”
“’Tis no trouble.”
She planted the candles on the table and plucked a bottle from the basket. Removing the stopper, she poured a generous dollop of clove oil into the bath water, swishing it in with her fingers. Her eyes skimmed the surface of the water with cool indifference. But her hand stirred an agitated current beneath, and