Page 17 of Ten Rules for Loving the Wrong Rake

She got out of bed. Pressed her palm flat against the joint until the worst of it passed. A draught moved through the room, though every window was shut. It passed across the back of her neck and was gone. Standing motionless, she looked around the room, though she was uncertain what she was searching for.

She pulled her robe over her nightgown and tied the sash and took her cane and headed downstairs for the laudanum.

The kitchen was not empty.

The tin bath sat in front of the range, steam still curling from the surface. He was standing beside it with his back to her, a length of linen slung low around his hips and nothing else. His hair was wet. Water tracked down the muscles of his back and caught the firelight. He was drying his arms with a cloth, unhurried, and had not heard her over the creak of the floorboards or the hiss of the range.

She should leave. She should turn around and go back up the stairs and take her hip and her laudanum and her pride with her. That was what a sensible woman would do. That was what Lady Kendal would do.

She stayed. She had been married for six years. She had seen the male form. It had not impressed her then and it would not impress her now.

She crossed to the shelf. Her cane tapped the flagstone and he turned.

They looked at each other across the kitchen. The fire between them, the steam from the bath, the smell of soap and hot water and him. His chest was bare and wet and the scar below his collarbone caught the light and the burn on his ribs was dark against his skin. Water sat in the hollow of his throat. The linen clung where it was damp.

She was now revising her position on the male form. Or at least this one.

She crossed to the shelf without looking at him. The laudanum was on the second shelf. She couldn't reach it. She stretched, bearing most of her weight on her good leg. Her fingers brushed the bottle, and it slid further back.

She pulled a chair to the dresser. Climbed onto it, balancing mostly on her good leg. Her foot slipped and she caught the shelf edge and the laudanum tipped and rolled and his hand caught it before it hit the floor.

He was standing behind her. The moisture on his chest dampening her dress. For a moment she could not breathe. The next moment, she was furious.

“Is this how you feel good about yourself? Intimidating a helpless woman? Go ahead. Trap me again. Threaten me.”

They stood still for a while. Her shallow breaths against his deep ones. His chest expanded against her back, hot and strong.

Without a word, he stepped away. She felt his absence immediately. Missed his heat and firmness instantly, and the shame of that was worse than anything he had done with his hands.

Holding onto the dresser, she stepped down and saw that he was still there, his right arm extended as if to catch her if she fell. That was confusing. He needed to make up his mind if he was to be a bastard or a gentleman. Once she was on solid ground, he picked up the tin tub and disappeared toward the side door.

She poured a measure of laudanum and drank it. The bitterness hit the back of her throat, and she grimaced and waited for the warmth to follow. She took her cane and turned to leave.

Her cane caught the edge of a loose flagstone and the tip skidded sideways and her bad hip buckled. She managed to grab the dresser before falling on her front, taking the pot of marmalade with her, which shattered a foot away from her face.

She pushed up on her hands, avoiding the shards of glass and the sticky raspberry preserve, and sat up. A hand was presented to her, palm up. Her hip screamed and the humiliation burned hotter than the pain.

She slapped the hand away and stood, one hand on the dresser, a cane in the other.

“How long has that stone been loose?”

“Since before I got here.”

“And you did not think to mend it?”

“I didn’t expect you to be that clumsy.”

She whirled around to face him. He was leaning against the wall, still bare-chested, the linen around his hips showing outlines of what was underneath. She raised her gaze to his face.

“Clumsy? Typical of you to believe whatever is convenient for you.”

“Meaning?”

“You share nothing, assume everything, leave a gaping hole that I nearly fell through and the chimney that’s been missing since God knows when. Forty-six repairs on my list, and you have not done any of them.”

“I disagree.”

“With what?”