Page 43 of Go, Rogue

“I’ll help you.”

“No.”

“Then I’ll get you a chamber pot.”

“No.” She shakes her head and her voice is still raspy from the fire. He’s sure her throat must be sore.

“Menace—”

“No.”

He sighs. “I know how to empty a chamber pot, Menace.”

“Not mine you don’t. I’ll not have you anywhere near my chamber pot, thank you very much.” She tries to move again. “Just help me to the water closet.”

“I’m not in the mood to scrape you off the deck.”

“Help me and you won’t have to.”

He sighs deeply and sends up a little prayer to Elphame for strength. “Aye, alright. But then you’re to rest.”

He knows from his sister that women have as much pride as men. Maybe more. And if he refuses to help, she’ll just try to do it by herself again. And then he really will have to scrape her up off the deck.

He leans down and brushes an errant strand of hair off her face, tucking it back behind her ear. “Promise me,” he says, “that you will rest if I help you to the water closet.”

“I promise.” She holds her arms out to him and he sweeps her up as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

The cabin boy arrives sometime later with their supper and a small bucket of water for her to wash.

“I’m sorry I cannot spare another bath for you, lass,” McGann says as he sets the bucket on the deck. “But this will take the scent off you at least.”

She raises an eyebrow at him. “Are you saying I smell, Captain?”

He only smirks back at her. “Aye, you do. Like you rolled around all evening in the hearth instead of that bed.” He pauses. “Doesn’t make sense, though, that you’d smell so much like smoke. You weren’t in the galley or mess or berthing where the fires were. I found you in the hold.”

“Wasn’t I?” she asks and eases herself up to standing. She’s steadier on her feet now, but he still moves to her side quickly to help her walk.

“Not that I’m aware. But damnation only knows what path you took from the cabin to the hold. Do you not remember anything more?”

“Only a little. I was here, reading a book.” She glances at the small table beside the bed but the Robert Burns book she was reading is gone. “A volume of Burns’s poetry. But I don’t see it there now. And then I smelled smoke.” She furrows her brow, trying to recall anything substantial from the hazy pieces of her memory. “You were calling for me, so I opened the door.”

“You did not hear the shouts?”

“No.” She shakes her head. “Not that I remember. Just you yelling, ‘Catherine!’ until I opened the door — but you weren’t there.” She raises her hand gently to the back of her head. “And then something hit me.”

She hears him inhale a sharp, harsh breath. “You heard Catherine?” he asks. “Not Menace or lass? Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she says but then shrugs. “I believe so, anyway. I wish I could remember more clearly but I don’t. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not important now. Come and eat your dinner.”

He leads her to the table, one arm wrapped around her, her hand resting on his bicep. She squelches the urge to run her fingertips over its curved summit, carved out like a mountain range. A rugged Scottish peak, not the little English molehill of her own.

“McGann,” she says as she sits, but he only shakes his head at her, making his dark curls flop onto his forehead.

“That’s Andrew to you.”

She grins at him while he pours her wine and sets her food on her plate.