Kresley Cole - [MacCarrick Brothers 03] (37 page)

Oh, God, it
was
Ethan, though he looked altered. His face was haggard, his eyes burning with some emotion she’d never seen in him before.

He couldn’t truly have followed her into
this
place? Especially when she was already dying? He would have to know better. She gasped in air. “You have…to leave—”

“No’ without you. I’m takin’ you from here tonight.”

“Go…please. They’ll
shoot
you. You can’t…come here again.”

“Understand me,” he said in a low, seething tone, “I’m still your husband, and if I can die to save you from this, then that’s my goddamned right!”

Definitely not a dream…
Her rough-around-the-
edges Scot was behaving like a hero and still cursing like a sailor. “But, Ethan, I’m dy—”

“You will no’ die!” He reached for her, clutching her nape. “You hold on!”

She whispered, “
I think…it’s too late
.”

He grasped her chin, forcing her to face him. He was pale and staring at her with a crazed expression. “It’s no’! Damn you, Maddy MacCarrick, we’re goin’ tae be together. Believe me.” His eyes were wet, his lashes spiking. “Lass, I could no’ love you this much for nothing.”

A tear slipped down her cheek, and he brushed it away. She felt the smallest tinge of hope.

“Hold on, for me.” Two arms slipped beneath her, gingerly lifting. But where did Ethan think he could take her? “Just stay with me, Maddy girl.” She felt warmth enveloped in his scent as he wrapped his coat around her. In the cocoon of his arms, the constant screams finally dimmed, the cries dulled.

As Ethan carried her, hastening his long strides, Maddy heard one of the nuns cry, “You cannot take a contagious patient past the perimeter!”

We made it to the perimeter?
She squinted her eyes open again and found them at a doorway, so close to being outside in the night—

“You might kill her by moving her!” another said.

But if Ethan thought he could get her free, then Maddy wanted to leave this place. How fervently she wished not to die here—not to be burned on a pile of bodies.

“Step aside,” Ethan said. As if in a daze, she saw him draw a pistol and cock it. “I’ll kill anyone who gets in my way. And I’ll do it gladly.”

Then…she was kissed by the coolness of the night air.

“We’re goin’ home, lass,” he murmured down to her. “I’m takin’ you home.”

As soon as Ethan carried her across the threshold of that hell, blackness beckoned and she promptly passed out.

Forty-five

A
s Ethan ran a damp cloth over Maddy’s body, he could hear Fiona speaking in low tones with the doctors in the next room.

Two days had passed since Ethan had brought Madeleine here. Ethan had told Quin to make sure his house in Grosvenor was empty by the time he was due to return, but Fiona had refused to go, browbeating Quin into telling all. Then she’d set about assembling an army of physicians in London for a wife that Ethan had “neglected to mention to her.”

Even after two days, and all those doctors working, Maddy was still so pale, as if all the blood had left her body. She tossed in restless sleep, her breathing labored. Tonight she burned with fever again.

“I’m going tae get her well,” Ethan had declared to the physicians, but he knew what they’d deemed Maddy’s chances.

Yet they simply didn’t know
her
as he did. They only saw her size and felt her weak pulse. And after Ethan told them about her possible pregnancy and then of finding blood on the back of her nightgown in the infirmary, they’d informed him that she’d lost the baby and would be further weakened.

Fiona had said, “Doona worry, son, she’ll have more bairns once she gets—”

“Do you think I give a damn about that?” he’d snapped.

“But the look on your face when you realized…I just thought…”

His reaction hadn’t been from learning that she’d lost the babe; it had been from knowing she’d lost it in that hellhole.

By herself.

Maddy’s body had received his seed and had been ready to give them a babe. But his countless lies had driven her away, straight into danger, putting her in this grueling struggle for life.

When he’d first feared that they’d lost their bairn, his mind had whispered,
It could be the curse once more….

Yet Ethan knew none of this was about the curse—no matter how easy it would be to assign blame to it. No,
his
actions had precipitated all this, and he fully accepted all the fault.

Hour after hour, Ethan watched over her, staring at each rise and fall of her chest, willing her to keep fighting…one more breath in…one more breath exhaled….

In between fevered dreams, for what felt like days, she’d heard Ethan speaking to her.

With his voice growing thick, he’d pleaded, “
Maddy lass, doona leave me.
” Other times, he’d threatened her. “You’ll never be rid of me,” he’d snapped; then, as if he worked to calm his tone, he’d added, “so you’d best…you’d best stay with me.”

And he’d railed at her, his voice booming so loud the bed had seemed to shake. “
You canna do this—take my goddamned heart and then leave me! You think I will no’ follow?
”

She knew he was constantly there, was aware of his movements and comprehended his words, but she couldn’t seem to open her heavy eyelids or speak.

At night, he would wrap his body around hers, keeping her warm, whispering against her hair, “You enjoy being contrary. Then prove them all wrong and get better.” He’d clutched her hip, then balled his fist there. “Ah, lass, they canna understand how strong you are.”

Sometimes she heard other voices, doctors, she thought, and occasionally an older woman with a Scottish accent. The woman spoke now: “Ethan, these physicians are doing their best.”

“It’s no’ good enough!” he roared in answer, then cursed the unseen doctors in some of the vilest language Maddy had ever heard. Directly after he kicked them out of the room, a door slammed, and a cool breeze whistled over her from the impact.

Finally, her eyelids didn’t feel too heavy to open. She blinked against the light for several moments. She perceived his form standing near the bed and waited as her vision began to focus.

He raked his fingers through his disheveled hair as a pretty red-haired lady frowned up at him.

“She’ll wake soon, Ethan. The fever has broken.”

“They said that
yesterday
. And still she has no’.”

“If she did right now,” the woman said, “you would scare the poor girl to death. You’ve no’ shaved or changed your clothes in days. And you look half-mad.”

“You ken I
am
half-mad, well on the verge.”

When he began pacing, she said, “You must calm yourself. Your anger with the physicians will no’ help your wife”—her gaze flickered over Maddy and away, then returned immediately—“but slamming the door like that just might wake her.”

“What do you—?” His shoulders tensed. He rasped, “Are you sayin’ she’s…?”

“You dinna tell me she has such pretty blue eyes. Look behind you, son.”

He whirled around, seeming to loom over the bed. Maddy stared up in shock. His eyes were red and wild, his beard growing. His clothes were wrinkled, his sleeves rolled. He looked as if he wanted to launch himself at her.

The woman said something in Gaelic that made Ethan scowl and his hand shoot up to his
beard
? He froze, and his brows drew together.

How long had he been with her?

Ethan looked at her with such yearning, but he seemed to force himself to back away from her. “You need tae drink,” he suddenly said, dashing to a nearby pitcher. When he poured, Maddy could hear the pitcher clanking against the glass.

The woman raised her eyebrows at Ethan, then told Maddy, “I’m Lady Fiona, your mother-in-law, and I’m verra pleased to be meeting you this morning.”

When Ethan returned to the bed with a glass of water, Maddy asked, “Where am I?”

He lifted Maddy’s head and helped her drink. “You’re in London, in our town house.” Maddy couldn’t seem to drink it fast enough. “Easy, then,” he murmured.

When he took the nearly empty glass away, Maddy asked, “C-Corrine?”

“I could no’ find her, but I have men searching in Paris,” he said. “Maddy, I doona believe she’d been sick.”

Maddy closed her eyes with worry, then quickly opened them, afraid to go to sleep again.

He ran his hand over the back of his neck. “But Bea—”

“No,” she whispered. “I know.”

Lady Fiona said something in Gaelic, then in English added, “Ethan, why don’t you go get cleaned up now while I visit with my new daughter-in-law?”

He hesitated, then the two of them seemed to share a look. Before he turned to the door, Ethan gruffly said to Maddy, “Verra glad you’re better, lass.” As he trudged from the room, she thought she saw him swiping a sleeve over his eyes.
Oh, Ethan.

Once he’d left, Lady Fiona said, “He’s been worried about you, to say the least.” She sat on the edge of the bed. “Now, I know you must have many questions….”

“I didn’t get anyone sick here, did I?”

“None of us. No’ at all. To be on the safe side, I’m staying in this house for a week.” She added dryly, “I hope you like cards.”

Biting her bottom lip, Maddy said, “I…Lady Fiona, I lost the baby, didn’t I?”

Fiona brushed Maddy’s hair back from her forehead. “Aye, but a slew of doctors all agree you’ll be able to have more.”

She’d known she’d miscarried, but still, hearing the news made sadness sweep over her, sharp and heavy. “But Ethan’s not…well?”

“He does no’ look it, but he’s no’ in ill health. I doona think he’s slept in a week.” She raised her brows as she said, “He loves you quite, well,
fiercely
. I’m just happy you’ll be able to be together and start anew.”

Maddy’s eyes began to grow heavy again. “Lady Fiona, I don’t know what you’ve been told—”

“Lass, I know everything. But understand, he’s changed. Speaking no’ as his mother but one woman to another…when a man like Ethan finally learns to love, it’s forever.”

“Bloody hell!”

He’d nicked himself again. His hands were shaking so badly, yet Fiona expected him to shave and clean up? Said he’d frightened his own wife with his appearance.

He probably had as he’d battled the nigh overwhelming urge to squeeze her in his arms. Maddy’s eyes had been wide in her pale face as she stared up at him.

It had been everything he could do to force himself to leave that room—but earlier his mother had suggested she speak with Maddy alone once she woke. Fiona had told him there was a small chance Maddy might not even have known about the baby.

He clung to that.

When he nicked himself again, he threw the razor down. He rested his hands on the basin and hung his head.
Please, doona let her have known.
With Bea’s death and his betrayal and Corrine’s disappearance, he didn’t know how much more his lass could take….

How long did his mother want with Maddy?

Ethan couldn’t stay away any longer. He hastily dressed, then returned. As he strode in, Maddy’s eyes were heavy-lidded, as if she was struggling to stay awake.

When he hurried to sit beside her, she weakly lifted her hand to graze her fingertips over a nick on his jaw. He took her small hand in his, kissing her palm, but she’d already closed her eyes. Just as he felt a surge of panic, Fiona said, “She’s just sleeping now, Ethan.”

“Did she know about the babe?”
Say no….

“Aye, she did. But she’s a strong one, I can tell. She’ll heal from all this if you help her.”

Maddy might not want his help—or want anything to do with him. “Did she say anythin’ about me?” he asked, sounding as desperate as he was. “About what I did?”

“She broached it. But she’s in love with you, son. I can tell. You will be able to win her back.”

Never again would he feel anger toward Fiona for what she’d said and done in the hours after his father’s death.
If Maddy had…
He shuddered and squeezed his eyes closed. “I need you tae leave.”

Without a word, she hastened from the room.

Just before he lost all control of his emotions.

Forty-six

O
ver the last five nights, Ethan had silently crept into her room to sleep with her, easing away each morning. Her fierce Highlander craving to sleep with her made her heart soften, but then she grew exasperated.

Every time she’d tried to talk to him about what had happened, he’d shied away, clearly thinking she was not strong enough to handle his confessions after only six days of recovery. But she was healing rapidly now that she’d turned the corner. Today, she’d been able to sit up for a good part of the afternoon to play cards with Lady Fiona, who was scheduled to return to Scotland the next day.

She truly liked Fiona, enjoying that she still scolded Ethan. He grumbled, but Maddy sensed that whatever conflict between them had finally been resolved.

Maddy needed to get something resolved with him as well, settled for good or ill, just so she could begin to make sense of all that had transpired.

That night, she made herself stay awake, waiting for him to steal into the room. He came directly after midnight and quietly undressed. When he slowly pulled back the cover, about to ease in and join her, she said, “Ethan, don’t you think it’s time we discussed what happened?”

He exhaled. “Aye, I suppose it is.” He slung on his trousers without energy, then turned up the bedroom lamp. After placing pillows behind her and helping her sit up in bed, he pulled a chair beside her. “How did you find out?”

“I’d written the land agent at Iveley about visiting the property because I’d wanted you to see where I grew up. But apparently, you had not only been to Iveley Hall—you’d owned it for years. Since my father died.”

“Aye. I’d bought up his debts. Including the one against Iveley.”