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“Marissa. Marissa.”
The voice of the patient startled Teagan awake from her perch on a wooden chair at his bedside just as nearby roosters crowed. “Easy. Relax,” she said in a soothing voice as she dipped a clean cloth in cool water, squeezed out the excess and bathed his face, neck, and chest. Sometime during the night he’d developed a fever.
As she gently ran the cloth across his brow she said softly, “Who is Marissa? Is she yer wife, yer betrothed, or yer mistress?” Does she possess yer heart? For some unfathomable reason, Teagan didn’t want his heart to belong to another woman. As she bathed his chest, lightly sprinkled with fair hair, her hands quivered and her breathing increased.
Who was this man? And why did his blue eyes plague her restless sleep? Having no answers to her questions, she placed the cloth in the chipped basin and went into the main room to mix a potent drink with healing herbs, hoping to get him to take some. She would do anything to keep him alive. If he died she would, for the remainder of her life, wonder about him. Think about him.
Back at his bedside, she inspected his wounds for infection. All looked much the same as yesterday. There was no rancid odor, which was a good sign. The fever was due to something else. Something she could not see.
“Good, ye are up,” Teagan said to Lachlan when he entered the room rubbing his eyes. “Could ye help prop him up while ah get him tae drink?”
“Is that...” Her brother winced at the black concoction.
“Aye. And if ah recall ah saved your sorry arse with it more than once. Move him a little higher.”
“Bossy this morning, aren’t ya lass?”
“I’m trying tae save a life here. And ah added some of yer brandy tae help with the taste and the pain. If only we had laudanum.”
“A stranger gets special treatment, but ah as yer brother didn’t?”
She laughed. “Ah added brandy tae yers as weel, ah just didn’t tell ye. Now steady while ah force his mouth open, hopefully without him biting my fingers off.” Teagan knelt on the side of the bed and reached for his jaw, pulling it down. No luck, his teeth were mashed up tight. She tried to use her fingers to pry his mouth open. Didn’t work. “Pinch his nose for me, that’ll get him tae open his mouth. When ah pour it in and close his lips, keep his nose pinched until he swallows.”
Lachlan did as she said and sure enough the injured man opened his mouth to gasp for air and she poured some medicine in and quickly closed his mouth, hoping he would swallow. He did, only to begin coughing and some of it sprayed her face. She grabbed a cloth and first wiped her face then his mouth and chin.
“Are you trying to kill me?” said her patient in a weak voice.
“Quite the contrary. We’re trying tae save yer life.” Teagan waited, hoping his good eye would open. As his lids began to flutter, she held her breath. One sky blue eye, foggy with fever and pain, stared at her. The other remained swollen shut.”
“What is your name?” He breathed out.
Struck dumb, she stared wide-eyed at him. Every fiber of her being responded to his penetrating stare.
“Maggie,” Lachlan admonished. “He asked yer name.”
“Aye. Tis Maggie. And yers?” Mortified to find she still knelt on the bed, her knee pressed against his warm side, she quickly stepped off.
His eye closed and he inhaled deeply, making her fear he wouldn’t answer.
“Sebastian Seabrook.”
“Sebastian Seabrook,” Lachlan said. “What brings ye tae Northumberland?”
“Is that where I am?”
“Aye.”
“Tired.”
“Who is Marissa? Ye spoke her name in yer sleep.” Teagan said, ignoring her brother’s knowing look. Unfortunately her patient fell back to sleep before he could tell her.
“Please dinnae tell me ye are jealous of this Marissa?”
Heat suffused her cheeks. “Not at all.”
“Let me remind ye lass that ye didnae want tae save the mon. You wanted tae follow the highwaymen. Ye thought him dead at the river. Then you complained when ah tried tae bring him home.”
“Ah changed my mind,” Teagan huffed as she left the room to heat water for tea and make biscuits, leaving Mr. Seabrook in her brother’s capable hands for now.
The next two days went on much the same, only Lachlan went to work at the blacksmith’s shop.
