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When he saw who it was he stood, the chair bumping back against the bunk. ‘Cleo? You should not be in here.’ The frown was still there, two marked lines between the straight slashes of his eyebrows, his mouth unsmiling.
‘I brought you some apricot pastries.’ She offered the box and when he did not take them she put them on the bunk.
‘And that is what made the risk of robbery and rape worthwhile, is it?’
‘No.’ She took a tight hold of her temper and reminded herself that Quin had rescued her from a situation of her own making. ‘I bought fabric and fashion plates and thread and ribbon.’ And fine lawn underclothes, not that I am going to mention those.
‘That’s all right then. If I had known it was something that important—’
‘There is no need to be so sarcastic. It might not matter to you—you’ve got trunks full of fancy clothes, apparently. You aren’t going to feel like something the cat dragged in when you meet strangers.’ To her horror her voice almost wobbled. She must be more afraid of what was to come than she had realised if she needed the support of fashionable clothes and pretty ribbons to support her.
‘Those clothes aren’t so bad.’ He frowned harder as he contemplated the odd cut and lumpy waistline
‘If I had to wear Egyptian dress, that would not be such a problem, I would merely look foreign and strange. These,’ she said with a sweeping gesture at her skirts, ‘look like laughable imitations of the real thing.’
‘I see. Do you have enough supplies to make something better or shall I escort you ashore again?’
What had come over him? ‘Thank you, but we were on our way back when we missed the main street to the harbour.’
‘When we get to Gibraltar there will be ladies there who can help you fit yourself out more suitably for England. Quite a few have accompanied their husbands to the garrison.’ Quin sounded almost as if he was concerned for her frivolous feminine needs.
Cleo sat down on the edge of the bunk. ‘Why are you being kind to me? I was wrong to go ashore, I admit it. Maggie has a badly bruised ankle as a result and things could have been much worse,’ she added scrupulously.
‘I owe you my life, perhaps twice over,’ Quin said. He spun the chair around and sat down, his arms crossed along the back of it.
Cleo stared at the defined muscle and sinew under the tanned skin, the dusting of dark hair. She had tried so hard not to look at him when she was nursing him. Now it was as though she held a magnifying glass up to his skin. She shrugged, the movement repressing her instinct to lean forward and touch his arm. ‘That was different.’
‘True,’ Quin agreed. ‘Certainly I was not enjoying myself on those occasions.’
‘Enjoying?’ She looked at his face and saw he was smiling. ‘I don’t understand.’ This was not good. She had thought she was beginning to be able to read Quin, to understand him. Now... ‘I am confused.’
‘I was walking down the hill away from my meeting feeling as if I’d been stuffed into my clothes. My shoulders were stiff, my head was full of facts and hints and I just wanted to do something irresponsible and free and physical. Starting a brawl in a foreign city minutes after leaving a diplomatic meeting counts as all of those, I suspect.’ The smile had become a grin.
‘We might all have been killed!’
‘I very much doubt that, not with your skill with a knife and Maggie’s lethal tricks with a dead rat.’
There was a light in his eyes that she remembered from the moment when he had sent the felucca weaving its dangerous course through the barges full of soldiers, from the tense minutes after he had hoisted the makeshift flag and brought them safely into the British camp. She had glimpsed it in that fight as well.
‘You enjoy the danger. Why are you not a soldier if you like to fight?’ And he had made her think he was angry with her, displeased over her trip ashore when all the time he had been enjoying himself, the wretch. More deception.
‘I prefer not to kill people.’ He unfolded his arms and leant back in the chair. ‘I enjoy the challenge of problems. I like the moment when the solution comes clear. When that sometimes resolves itself into physical action I relish it, too.’
‘You understand yourself very well, it seems.’ She wished she had the same clear self-knowledge. Freedom, yes, she knew she wanted that. But what then?
Quin’s smile became wry. ‘Too well sometimes.’
‘You know what you want.’
‘Oh, yes. I know that.’ The smile faded altogether.
Cleo thought back to the night on the felucca when he had woken her, talked in his sleep. He had sounded bitter and driven. He might know what he wanted, but it did not seem to give him peace. ‘Quin...’ She put out one hand as if to reach him.
