Page 69 of Blackwicket
His gaze migrated from the moon-bright water to settle on me. He seemed human in this setting, in the late hours before night tipped into dawn. His presence was an assurance, if not exactly a comfort, and my interest in solitude waned. He monitored my approach, taking in my coat, the shoes still clasped loosely in my hands.
“Going somewhere?” he asked.
“To walk the cliffs.”
“It’s freezing.”
I eyed the windows, the frigid air bracing, fighting with the heat of the fire he’d tempted to life in the fireplace. He didn’t backtrack or elaborate.
“I couldn’t sleep.” I deposited my shoes on the windowsill, signaling my decision to linger and enjoy the same view. “Neither could you, I see. I bet this isn’t how you imagined things to turn out when you followed me here.”
“Actually, it’s right on par with how I expected things to go.”
“And now I’m sure you wish you were still in Devin.”
It was a friendly jest, but I regretted it. I no longer knew what the Inspector and I were, but it certainly wasn’t friends.
He trained his eyes on the sparkle of the water and said dryly, “I’m where I’m meant to be.”
I was bad at this. We’d never encountered each other as anything more than mutual enemies. The new ground I was attempting to walk, with no logic of why, was not just unfamiliar, it was unreciprocated. I grabbed my shoes.
“I hope you can get some rest,” I said in parting, flustered by briefly feeling less alone, only for the moment to cave in at my touch.
“It’s not a smart idea for you to leave the house, Ms. Blackwicket.”
“Talking about house arrest again? Well, if you or anyone else wants to keep me in here, you’ll have to…” My impertinent rebuttal tapered as I caught sight of the spot of red at the horizon of his shoulder.
“Do continue. I’m very interested in your next words.” Inspector Harrow’s tone implied he wasn’t in the mood to be patient with me.
“Are you bleeding?”
I marched to him, taking hold of his upper arm, urging him to turn enough that I could inspect his back. He permitted it.
There was a bloom of red spreading from his injury, with no other signs of smoke or oil, and no tear in the fabric. This wasn’t the shirt he’d been wearing earlier. The blood was fresh.
“Bang-up job patching your own wounds, Inspector.” I said.
“Are you scolding me?” There was an air of disbelief in his tone, like a storm surprised by the admonishments of a thistle.
“You’re being stubborn by rejecting help when you honestly need it.”
With some annoyance, he turned to face me, and I retreated a step to save myself from having to tilt my head quite so far to see his face.
“I find some irony in you daring to call someone else stubborn.”
“You’d honestly choose an infection over allowing me to tend to you, Inspector?” I asked, pointing out his obstinacy.
There was a tense beat of silence before Inspector Harrow began to unbutton his shirt, gaze steady on me. The action took me by surprise, and I glanced aside.
“Shy?” He untucked the hem, making discomfort my punishment for chiding. “How do you expect totend to meif you can’t even get to the wound?”
He wore no undershirt, avoiding fabric that would chafe against the raw edges of the laceration, and the olive-toned skin of his chest was exposed, showcasing the well-defined contours of his abdomen, marked by scars of varying sizes and colors, resembling notches in driftwood. But more than these, the prominent token of violence on his cheek trailed beyond his collarbone, to the center of his sternum.
“Just sit,” I said, agitated, motioning to the piano bench as I made to leave. “I’ll be back with a bandage.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The brief walk to the despicable kitchen for a raid on the cabinets, where my mother had once kept first aid, offered a much-needed moment to gather my wits. I was reacting foolishly. I’d seen men half dressed, in much more intimate circumstances than this, yet had never blushed like a bashful virgin, even when I’d been one.
