Elizabeth Boyle (75 page)

Fading in and out of consciousness, Webb found himself hoisted up on his horse and Lily laid across his lap. Father Michel and Father Joseph walked on either side of the horse, steadying him and his precious bundle.

Try as he might, he couldn’t stay awake, and he collapsed over Lily’s still form.

“What do you think we have here, Father Michel?” Father Joseph stepped closer to the horse and caught hold of the man and woman before they tumbled into the street.

“I’m not sure, Father Joseph.” The older man guided the horse over the old
Pont Royal
, now known as the
Pont de la Reunion
and into the Left Bank neighborhood of the Flaming Thistle. “In Paris, it is better not to ask and trust that we won’t be led astray.”

Alex McTaggart had just settled in for his own version of holiday cheer. He’d shared an early dinner downstairs with a collection of fellow Scottish expatriates and stumbled upstairs to find his new mistress had left him an unexpected Christmas gift—herself, wrapped only in a lacy peignoir that must have cost him a small fortune.

No matter, the little baggage had been teasing him for a month, and now he was about to reap the rewards of a conquest well spent.

“Ah, my dear Giselle, what are you doing here?”

She giggled. “An examination, Monsieur Doctor. I feel a great pain here,” she said, her hand resting over her right breast.

He stepped closer. Gently he took her fingers and moved them to the left. “I think you mean here, over your heart, my little flower.”

Giselle giggled again, her pert breasts nearly jiggling out of the silk confines that barely concealed their bounty. “Oh, yes, my heart, it grieves me so.”

You little tart, I doubt you have one
, he thought, as he pulled her closer and started his examination by thoroughly kissing her.

The bell that announced his patients jangled loudly.

He let it ring and continued his examination by fondling her rounded buttocks and pulling her closer to him.

The bell clattered again, this time with a greater sense of urgency.

“Damn,” he cursed, wrenching himself away from his Christmas present.

“Can’t you tell them to go away?” Giselle pouted.

“If it’s not a matter of life and death, lass, they’ll be gone before you catch a chill,” he said, crossing the room and yanking open the window. He stuck out his head and looked down at the street below.

Two cloaked figures stood on either side of a horse. Astride the animal was a man holding a young woman.

“Monsieur, this man asked us to bring him here,” one of the men said before he tossed back his hood.

McTaggart saw the collar of a cleric and cursed.

He wasn’t an overly religious man, but he still held a holy if not fearful respect for priests. How could he explain to the good father that he wasn’t open for business because he was of a mind to commit enough sins to keep him in confession for a month?

He glanced wistfully back at Giselle. The wanton girl sat straddled on the arm of the sofa, her plump thighs spread wide and inviting, her finger curled in invitation.

If only he could be that sofa, he thought.

“Can you open the door, Monsieur Doctor?” the priest called out. “Before he passed out this man intimated he was in some sort of trouble.”

Trouble? Alex nodded to the priest. “Pull him under the lamp and let me get a look at him.”

The priest sighed loudly, as if asking for a little patience from on high, and then slowly guided the horse under the light. He tipped the man’s head up and gave Alex a look at his patient.

“Damn it to bloody hell,” he cursed, looking down at the bloodstained face of his foolhardy friend. The woman, he could only guess, must be the de Chevenoy heiress.

Trouble was hardly the word to describe the situation.

“I’ll be right there.” He slammed the window shut and turned to Giselle. “Sorry my sweet, but I’ve got patients.”

Her full red lips curved into an unhappy moue. “I could help,” she said, twirling the strings of her peignoir.

“Not unless you relish the sight of blood.”

She shuddered and traipsed to the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

Alex took the stairs to the street two at a time. He threw back the bolts and flung open the door. One of the priests had the girl in his arms and the other was carefully pulling Webb down from the horse.

“I’m fine,” Webb muttered, much to Alex’s relief.

“So you are alive,” he said, grabbing Webb’s arm and throwing it around his shoulder. With his hand around the man’s waist, he helped him toward the door. “I was afraid I wouldn’t get paid for this one. Dead patients can be so difficult about their bills.”

“A true Scot you are, Alex. More worried about your bill than about the patient,” Webb said, his words slurred.

Alex turned to the priest by the horse. “Take that beast around back and rouse the stable lad. Tell him McTaggart said to see that it’s well fed and cared for. Then once he’s done that, to take the saddle and anything else with a crest on it and see it tossed in the river.”

He watched the two priests exchange a look, as if to say, I told you there was something wrong about all this.

“I thank you both for your help, and if you’ll leave the name and address of your parish, I will see a contribution sent there in appreciation of your assistance,” Alex told the man carrying the girl up the stairs.

The priest huffed and puffed his way to the top and then laid his burden carefully on the sofa.

“I have some experience with healing. I could be of assistance,” the priest said, his tone more that of an order than of a question. Especially when he proceeded to remove his cloak and jacket.

No arguing with a cleric
, Alex thought. Besides, with two patients, he might just need the help. He opened the cabinet where he kept his medical supplies and pulled out bandages for Webb’s head wound, then he caught up a pitcher of water and a bowl he kept handy. Kneeling beside Webb, he started to sponge away the blood on the man’s head so he could find the source of the bleeding.

Webb shook him off. “I’m fine, you horse doctor. Take care of Lily first,” he said, pointing his finger at the girl.

Alex handed the bloody rag to the priest. “If you’re of a mind to help, clean up his face, so I can stand the sight of him.”

The priest grinned. “Scots. I never get used to your blunt manners or brusque ways.”

Alex eyed the man. “Is that a brogue I hear to your speech, Father? An Irish one, if I’m not mistaken.” He relaxed as the man nodded.

“Father Joseph O’Brien, late of Dublin and traveling through Paris on our way to Rome.”

If not French, his loyalty wouldn’t be in question, Alex thought. And if he was as he said, just passing through, he wouldn’t be in the city long enough to tell anyone what he’d seen. “Well then, do a good job there, Father Joseph, and I’ll dig out a bottle of my finest Highland whisky. Good whisky, mind you. Not that poor watery stuff you Irish drink.”

“From the sound of your voice, you’ve already been into it,” Webb commented.

“Mind your manners, lad,” Alex told him.

It took every ounce of Webb’s patience to sit still while the good Father Joseph cleaned up his head wound.

He stared across the room, guilt and fear twisting his gut.

If he hadn’t stopped for a drink with Alex … If he hadn’t insisted to his father that she should come along.

If … if … if … his head throbbed with recriminations.

Webb watched each movement Alex made, hopeful that his patient would open her eyes and let into him with the tongue-lashing he probably deserved for not reaching the de Chevenoy house in time.

“Webb?” she whispered, her voice dry and cracked. “Where are you?”

“Lily, I’m right here.” He crossed the room in two quick strides, and then dropped beside the small settee on which she lay. Despite the dizziness washing over him, he tried to focus his eyes on her face.

Her image blurred and swayed in front of him and he caught up her hand, the one uninjured from the blast, and held on to her. The other hand had minor burns, which the doctor had cleaned and covered with an ill-smelling salve and clean linen.

It seemed the thick horse blanket that Fouché’s henchmen had wrapped her in had protected her from the worst of the explosion.

He looked at Alex for the answer to the question he was too much of a coward to ask.

How is she?

Alex shook his head. “I don’t know what’s wrong. But this happens with head injuries. She’s got a hell of a blow here,” he said, pointing to the ugly beginnings of a bruise by her temple. “And enough bruises over the rest of her body to have internal injuries, but I can’t tell just yet. It would be better if she woke up. I won’t lie to you, lad. The longer she wavers like this, the worse it will be.”

“Webb?” Lily’s fingers tightened around his palm.

“Lily, you’re going to be all right, but you have to wake up.”

She tossed and pushed his hand away. Her face twisted in pain as she moved in and out of consciousness.

Webb leaned closer. “Wake up, little Lily. Wake up. I won’t leave Paris without you. I won’t ever leave you. Not for anything. Just wake up and live your life with me.”

Her breathing became frantic, as if she’d just tried outrunning a thoroughbred. “Go,” she told him. “Please, go.” For a moment her lashes fluttered as if she were going to open them, but then her body relaxed and her breathing evened out.

The clock on the mantel struck eleven and Alex put his hand on Webb’s shoulder. “You should get some rest. I’ll sit up with her.”

“No. I’m not going anywhere.” Webb shot an angry glance over his shoulder. He turned back to Lily and took her hand in his. “Do you hear that, hoyden? I’m not going anywhere.”

Lily opened her eyes and found herself in a shadowy room. She heard the solid
tick
of a clock, the soft sounds of a banked fire. An odd, pungent smell pervaded the room, the likes of which she couldn’t place. She blinked her lashes and tried to discern where she might be, but nothing was familiar.

Nothing save the man at her side.

Webb’s head lay against her, his hand holding hers. She sighed.

Webb was safe.

But then she looked again and saw the linen cloth wrapped around his head, his tousled brown hair matted in places with dried blood.

As she tried to reach out to him, to offer him comfort, she stopped as a sharp pain throbbed through her arm all the way down to her fingertips. She looked at her hand, which was covered by a bandage similar to Webb’s.

“So you are going to rejoin us, my lady,” said a voice she didn’t recognize. “That will make our friend very happy.”

She turned her head toward the speaker and saw a man wrapped in a thick wool plaid sitting up in a straight-backed chair. While his black hair was peppered with gray, his unlined face belied any specific age. He could be thirty or twice that for all she could tell. “Do I know you?”

The man grinned. “I’m your doctor.”

She closed her eyes for a moment. “So why do I feel so awful?”

The doctor laughed, a low friendly chuckle. “Oh, I couldn’t have picked better myself.”

“Picked what?”

“A wife for that stubborn fool at your side.”

She struggled to sit up. “I’m not his wife.”

At her abrupt movement, Webb roused. His expression was first confused, and then instantly his eyes grew wide and his mouth split into a lopsided smile.

“Hoyden! You’re back!” He leaned over and kissed her, his mouth tenderly caressing her lips, though beneath his caring burned a passion barely held in check.

She let him kiss her once, well, maybe twice, and then pulled away. “I told you not to call me that,” she said. “There was an explosion. How did you find me? How did I escape? Are you badly injured? You look terrible. Where are we?”

Webb glanced up at the stranger. “A complete recovery, Alex. She’s as ornery and full of questions as ever.”

The doctor coughed politely, his eyebrows arched in dubious lines. “Let me be the judge of that.” Alex knelt beside her and placed his hand on her brow.

“How is he?” she asked, her gaze moving from Webb’s injuries back to the doctor.

“He’ll make a complete recovery, as will you, if you’ll let me do my job. Our friend’s untrained assessment notwithstanding, how do you feel, my lady?”

How was she? She hardly cared. Not when Webb was going to live.

“My lady?” the man persisted.

Lily closed her eyes for a moment and did a mental tally of the general aches and pains. If only she could get past the feeling that she’d swallowed a bag of loose wool. Her thoughts and senses fuzzy and scratchy all at once. She searched her memory for what had happened, and for a moment, all she could see were flames, but then out of the fires, came images and words.

An explosion.

Fouché’s threats. The meeting in Henri’s study.

The blow from the henchman.

The moment she’d come to in the carriage, sputtering as a drink was forced down her throat.

And then nothing but a hodgepodge of noise and smoke and voices.

“My head hurts, but that could be whatever it was they made me drink.”

The doctor cocked his head. “Do you know what it was?”

She shook her head. “No, it was something to make me sleep so I wouldn’t draw attention to the carriage. It tasted sweet.”

“Probably laudanum. No wonder you have a headache. And no wonder you were out for so long.” He tipped his head and studied her. “Anywhere else?”

“Just my hand,” she told him, holding up her injured limb.

The man smiled at Webb. “It sounds like your bride-to-be is going to live long enough to make the nuptials. I’ll send you my bill along with a little something for the wedding.” The man crossed his arms over his barrel of a chest. “It appears once again I have been exceedingly brilliant.”

At this, Lily noticed two shadowy figures rising from pallets beside the fire.

“Is she coming around?” a kindly voice inquired.

“Aye, Father,” Alex told the man, who had gotten up and now stood behind Webb. “It looks as if you and Father Michel saved both their lives by getting them away from the blast so quickly.”