Page 24 of The Iron Earl
The muscles along her back tightened into a thousand vicious knots and she shook her head, words sputtering out through chattering teeth. “I—I don’t—th—think—I—c—can.”
Lachlan exhaled a long breath through gritted teeth, his eyebrows drawing together. He stepped forward, moving to the side of her. His thick hands came down, landing on her shoulders.
Warm. They were warm, almost hot on the spots where his thumbs met skin.
In that moment she wanted nothing more than those hands to stay on her, to expand and warm every inch of her body.
He twisted her, spinning her in place so she faced the rear of the tent, and then he dropped to his knees behind her. Her hair had long since lost its pins in the water and he twisted the sopping strands into one long lock before setting it over her shoulder. Cool air hit the base of her neck.
Clearing his throat, his fingers started to untangle the knots in the ribbons that laced up her spine and secured her dress.
His rough, but warm knuckles brushed against her spine, his deep voice tempered with his next words. “Why did you jump in, Evalyn?”
“I did—didn’t jump—I was running—I thought I could make it to that boulder.”
“Running across water?” He jerked on the laces, yanking her torso backward.
She nodded.
“You felt the need to escape from me so desperately you were willing to drown yourself?” The exact opposite of the current of ire running through his words, she could feel his fingers soften to pick delicately at the knot at the top of the laces. “That’s a better alternative?”
“N—no.”
“It’s a damn dress, Evalyn.”
“I—I know.”
“Did you think I was about to beat you?” The knot free, he started loosening the laces, working down her spine.
Her head dipped forward for a long breath as she tried to control her clattering teeth. She lifted her head slightly, looking to the back corner of the canvas tent as she tried to draw warmer air into her lungs.
“Esc—escape. When I cannot escape—” Her words cut off as her teeth went into a spastic flurry of clanging. She grinded her molars together in an effort to control them. With another deep breath, a sense of normalcy came over her tongue, enough at least to talk. “When I’m trapped and cannot escape—I cannot think—my mind goes blank—and I do whatever it takes, Lachlan. I just—I just react—escape in my mind or in my body. And at the river my body could still flee you, so that’s what I did. I turned and ran.”
He grunted. “That’s going to get you in trouble someday.”
She smiled, a half chuckle breaching her lips as she glanced at him over her shoulder. “It just did. Again.”
He didn’t chuckle, but the smallest smile curved the hard lines of his lips.
Her gaze went forward. “I know I am on tenuous footing with you, Lachlan, and I fear my confidence is not bolstered by being regarded as the designated wench in the camp—and the adjectives that accompany it being constantly hurled at me.”
He was quiet for a long breath, his fingers working the ribbon. “They call you names, lass, because they don’t know what to do with you.”
“They don’t know what to do with me?”
“You’re not what they thought and they are still trying to figure you out.”
He pulled free the last loops of the ribbon along her spine. Silently, he moved away from her for a moment, returning to drape a wide fur-lined blanket across her shoulders. Heaven. Soft and dry against her skin, it coddled her in instant warmth.
“Are your hands thawed enough to move down your dress?”
She lifted her right hand, going to the strap of her dress. Her fingers still could not bend, not find a way through their shaking to grip the cloth from her damp skin.
More humiliation.
Not able to look back at him, she shook her head.
A sigh, and he bent forward, snaking his hands up under the blanket from behind her. His fingers found the top straps of her gown and he wedged the sopping cloth down her body, past her trembling arms, and then he settled it around her waist.