She only wished Logan could hear her say it.

Grant looked from her to Logan and back. He chuckled and nudged Logan in the shoulder. “MacKenzie, you lucky bastard.”

The other men came rushing in, no doubt drawn by the clamor of the table overturning.

“Help him, please,” Maddie said, seeking out the field surgeon. “He’s hurt.”

Munro knelt at her side.

“I won’t know how bad it is until I remove the knife. And I canna remove the knife until I know he’ll stay immobile. He has a few cracked ribs. Too much thrashing about, and one of those broken ends could puncture his lung.” He looked to Maddie. “Do you have any opiates in the house?”

She nodded. “I’m sure we do. My aunt has about twenty different elixirs and tonics and miracle remedies ordered from ladies’ magazines. I’d wager they’re all primarily laudanum.”

“Go and get them, then.”

She nodded and prepared to stand.

Logan’s hand closed tight around a fistful of her skirt. “No,” he murmured. “Na tréig mi.”

Her heart wrenched. “I can’t leave him.”

“I’ll go retrieve the medicines,” Rabbie said.

“In my aunt’s dressing room,” she said. “Two stairs up, fourth door down the western corridor.”

“Na treig mi,” Logan rasped again. “Dinna leave me, Maddie.”

“I won’t.” She took his hand in hers. “I’m right here.”

He squeezed it tight. “You must swear it, mo chridhe. You’re my heart. If you leave me, I’ll die.”

She pressed her hand to his cheek and looked into his eyes. “I won’t leave you. You’re not going to die. Munro is going to patch you up. I’m going to be right here while he does. Neither you nor I are going anywhere.”

Rabbie returned with an armful of dark bottles. Munro uncapped and sniffed them, one by one. He handed a dark green vial to Maddie. “This should do.”

She placed the bottle to Logan’s lips. “Now drink this.”

He did as she asked, choking down the bitter liquid with barely a grimace. His eyelids began to grow heavier at once.

“Munro.” Logan turned his head from side to side, seeking the surgeon. “Munro, do you see this woman beside me?”

“Aye,” Munro answered. “I see her.”

“You see how bonny she is?”

Maddie blushed.

“Aye,” the surgeon said, smiling. “I do.”

“Well, we’ve been married for weeks now,” Logan said, lifting his head groggily. “I’ve only bedded her the one night. And I’ll be damned if that night will be the last. You had better mend me, Munro. I have a lot of pleasuring to do.”

“Understood, Captain.”

Maddie’s face burned, but she couldn’t help but laugh. She pressed a kiss to Logan’s forehead.

“Maddie . . .” His voice grew thick. He sounded as though he were speaking to her from a dark, deep well. “Mo chridhe, I . . . I . . .”

“Hush,” she told him, holding back tears. “I’ll stay with you, Logan. Always. Just please promise you’ll stay with me.”

Logan came through the surgery easily enough—­or so he later assumed, given that he could not remember it. It was the days afterward that threatened to dig him an early grave.

A fever set in the evening after Munro had removed the knife from his thigh.

The next few days were a blur of fitful sleep, racking chills, cool cloths swabbed over his body, weak broth offered to him on spoons . . .

And dreams.

His sleep was a riot of wild, vivid dreams. So many dreams that he suspected his mind was compensating for those lost years of darkness. He dreamed of people and places he’d long forgotten. He dreamed of battlefields and bedsport.

Most of all, he dreamed of Madeline. Her dark eyes and her slender fingers, and her sweet, essential taste.

When he finally woke, his fever broken and his mind at rest, she was right there beside him.

But the woman would not let him get out of bed.

For anything.

Sponge baths were not nearly so amusing as a man might think they’d be. Not even when administered by a beautiful woman.

On the third straight day of his invalid treatment, Logan rebelled. “I hope you know I despise every moment of this.”

“I do know.” She swabbed him under the arm with a soapy sponge. “That’s why I’m enjoying it so much.”




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