Page 64 of Surrender Your Grace
“Of course I did,” he growled as he bent to help her up. “Should’ve dragged you out the moment I laid eyes on him. Now you’re hurt, and I’m out of a job.”
“Why would you be?”
“Your husband doesn’t strike me as the forgiving sort. I let you get hurt on my watch.”
Cici leaned against the shelf, wincing. “I’ll speak to His Grace on your behalf.”
“You’d better.” He squatted a bit to study her face. “Can you walk on your own?”
“I think so but wait—” She bent awkwardly and sifted through the wreckage until her fingers curled around a faded red spine. “Here it is,” she breathed.
Henry let out an exasperated groan. “That old book better be worth the trouble you’re borrowing.”
She smiled weakly and tossed her reticule to Mary. “Pay the man, or this was all for nothing.”
Minutes later, the carriage rolled toward Mayfair. Cici sat with her foot propped on the bench, the book beside her, ankle throbbing. Something nagged at her.
Not the bruises. Not Andrew’s temper.
Only the man. The twitch. The cane.
She had seen him before—she was certain. But the memory dangled just out of reach.
***
As she set her foot down to test its strength, pain shot up her leg. Cici glanced toward the townhouse. She might be able to hobble as far as the walkway, but the stairs were an impossibility.
“Mary, run in and see if my husband is at home. I think I’ll need his assistance getting inside.”
Her maid hurried up the stone steps. Henry cleared his throat. “I can carry you. His Grace won’t thank me if I let you injure yourself further.”
“I don’t think that would be proper.”
Her arched a brow. “Much like entering that bookstore in the first place, I suppose.”
Mary reappeared, flustered. “His Grace has not returned yet.”
Cici sighed. “I supposed we have no choice.”
Henry scooped her up easily and carried her up the six stone steps, shifting her slightly so she wouldn’t knock her head onthe doorframe as they passed. Even that mild jostling made her shoulder ache and her ankle throb mercilessly.
“The book, Mary!” Cici called over his shoulder. “It’s still in the carriage. After what we went through to get it, I’d hate to lose it.”
Inside, the entry was quiet, but Andrew arrived like thunder from the opposite end of the hall. “What in blazes is going on here?”
She squirmed to get down as Henry turned, almost dropping her. He caught her at the last moment around the shoulders as her legs thumped inelegantly to the floor.
Cici didn’t know which hurt more, her shoulder or her foot, and doubled over as she clutched both in pain.
Andrew crossed the foyer in two strides, swept her up, and carried her to the salon. He lowered her gently onto the settee. Book-spine bruises marked her everywhere, including her posterior. She sucked in sharply and shifted gingerly.
“Someone had better explain.”His eyes flicked from Cici, bruised and disheveled, to Mary, his expression harder than stone.
“We were… in the book… shop… when a shelf… fell. It near killed Her Grace,”Mary’s stuttering tearful explanation was mostly unintelligible.
“Andrew, you’re frightening the poor girl.I’m fine, except for a tender ankle and a battered shoulder.”
He sat beside her and raised her foot to his lap. In front of everyone, he reached beneath her skirt and peeled down her stocking. “It’s black and blue, and swollen,” he murmured as he examined her injury. “Can you move it?”
