Highland Heiress - By Margaret Moore Page 0,42

in the wagon using Lady Moira’s lap for a pillow and what looked like her petticoat wrapped around his torso.

When Moira and Mr. McHeath had arrived at the earl’s residence after what had been the most harrowing journey of her life, Moira had ordered her servants to carry Mr. McHeath to the blue bedroom, the most spacious one aside from her father’s. Using warm water and clean linen, she’d done the best she could to wash the mud and blood from his face. She’d used her petticoat to try to staunch the bleeding before they’d moved him from the ditch and had been afraid to remove it or do anything more until the doctor arrived.

That had been at least an hour ago, and she had been walking the floor of her morning room ever since.

Once this had been her favorite room in the manor of the Earl of Dunbrachie. She had chosen a delicate paper depicting green, fernlike plants, and the furniture was light oak with mahogany inlays. The chairs and sofa were upholstered in a light green silk and pictures of the Scottish countryside hung on the walls.

Here she had believed a new and wonderful life was about to begin, of comfort and ease, parties and balls.

Here she’d dared to hope her father would never again indulge in too much drink and she would know peace and happiness.

Here Robbie had proposed.

Here she had broken their engagement.

And now here she waited with her heart in her throat for news about whether Gordon McHeath would live, or die.

Who had attacked him and why? Given how he’d rushed to her aid the first day they met, perhaps he’d come upon whoever was setting the fire and tried to stop it, or at least call out an alarm.

Whatever had happened, it had been near her school, and she felt responsible. She must and would see that everything possible was done for him.

She remembered the first time she’d seen him, when he came rushing down the ridge to her rescue. How handsome he was, how brave, how like a hero from a fairy tale.

She recalled the first time she’d touched him, when she’d jumped from the tree. The strength of his arms. The security he seemed to offer.

She vividly remembered the first time they’d kissed—that heated rush of desire, and the shock of mutual passion. It was a kiss like no other, until the second.

She would never forget the wondrous excitement awakened by his caresses and the vitality of his body, a vitality that surely must survive whatever injuries had been inflicted upon him.

A man cleared his throat.

She whirled around to find the butler standing on the threshold. “Is Mr. McHeath…?”

She couldn’t say the word. Didn’t even want to think it. “Dr. Campbell says you can see him now, my lady,” Walters said.

She nearly fell to her knees with relief, but since Walters was there she only drew in a deep, shuddering breath and said, “Thank you,” before hurrying from the room as fast as dignity would allow.

Once at the top of the stairs, she took a moment to catch her breath before entering the blue bedroom, then put her hand on the latch and went inside.

Although the heavy velvet draperies had been opened to allow the sunlight to enter, she couldn’t immediately see Mr. McHeath or the doctor. A screen painted with a scene of a medieval hunt had been put around the bed made of oak during the reign of Charles II and curtained with pale blue silk trimmed with gold.

The rest of the furniture shone in the bright morning light—the armoire inlaid with mahogany and hazel and polished with beeswax, the pedestal table near the hearth, the washstand by the door to the dressing room. The glass in the lamps sparkled, and the thick Aubusson carpet muffled her steps as she ventured around the screen.

Dr. Campbell sat beside the bed. The instruments and accoutrements of his profession, bottles of ointment and salve and his black valise, were on a small side table nearby. A basin full of bloody water and another containing several soiled linen cloths sat on the floor nearby.

She looked at the man lying so still in the bed.

Mr. McHeath was very pale, except for the bruises on his cheek and chin. The cut above his eye had been bandaged. His hair, damp with perspiration, clung to his forehead. He’d been carefully dressed in a nightshirt, and his chest rose and fell with his breathing.

He was alive, at least,