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26
Mercedes
The large, muscular arm yanks me against him, my head lolling into his chest as he carries me away. I cough, the sound weak, my lips numb, and I wonder if I’m dreaming. Did Judge get to me in time? Or did I actually die?
I don’t want to accept the latter, and the only thing I can do is try to make sense of what’s happening as I listen to a door open, and then a woman’s shocked voice fills the space around me.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know.” The male voice echoes from above me, but it doesn’t sound right because it isn’t Judge.
That can’t be right. I’m curled into him, too weak to put up a fight. But it doesn’t matter because a moment later, he’s draping me across something soft. A bed?
“Jesus.” The woman’s voice draws closer. “She looks like she’s been beat to hell and back.”
“Let me get these off you,” the man says, turning me onto my side.
I’m so numb I don’t realize he’s undoing the restraints around my wrists until the blood starts to flow back into my hands, pricking my nerves so painfully I can’t help but cry out.
Soft fingers brush against my face. “Shh… it’s okay.”
I want to believe him. I want to cling to any small bit of comfort I can right now.
“Please.” I try to speak, but it comes out garbled.
“I know.” He removes the leathers around my head and finally the bit from between my chattering teeth. “I’m going to get you warmed up. Can you go turn on the shower?”
I hear the sound of footsteps disappearing somewhere else and then the sound of water in another room. I try and fail to open my eyes as dizziness returns and makes me want to vomit.
“Who are you?” I ask.
There’s a moment of quiet before the man answers. “Well, today, it looks like I’m your hero.”
Before I can respond, he scoops me up into his arms, and this time, I notice he’s not wearing a shirt. We’re skin to skin as he carries me into the bathroom and steps beneath the hot spray of the shower.
I cry out in pain as it pelts against my cold skin, and he adjusts it to a lower temperature, pinning me to his body with one unyielding arm.
“Better?” he asks.
I nod. He holds me against him for a few minutes, allowing the water to warm me and bring me back from the brink of what I’m certain was almost death. When I finally manage to open my eyes, I’m surprised to see the same man from the family portrait in Judge’s study. The man I know to be his brother. He has dark features too. The same type of brutish handsomeness that manages to make my stomach flutter every time I look at Judge. But there’s something slightly different about him. Something more uncivilized. More charming, but also… more dangerous, I think.
“You like what you see?” he teases as he notices my eyes roaming over him.
I try to laugh at the awkwardness of the situation, but it hurts too much. My lungs are still burning, and I think I must have coughed up water. I think he must have resuscitated me.
“Do you think you can try to stand?” he asks. “I’ll help you get cleaned up so we can dress your wounds.”
“Yes.” My voice is too faint when I speak, but he hears it, nonetheless, and gingerly lowers me to my feet.
He keeps a firm hold on me until I prove that I can actually stand, and then he reaches for the bottle of soap. It occurs to me then that I’m completely naked, and how inappropriate this is, but I can’t muster an ounce of modesty to care at the moment. I’m too weak to clean myself, and there’s blood streaking down my legs and my stomach from where the skin has split. Not to mention all the cuts on my feet. And from the feel of it, I’m guessing my face is pretty banged up too.
It’s a strange sort of intimacy to have with a stranger, letting them wash you this way. And Judge’s brother is as meticulous as he seems to be, paying attention to every inch of skin his hands move over. When he pauses on the cuts and bruises, taking extra care with those, I almost burst into tears. Not because it hurts, even though it does, but because he’s being kind to me.
“I can do that—” I protest when his fingers skate lower and lower, delving toward my inner thighs.
“Don’t worry.” He flashes me a charming smile. “I’ll be a proper gentleman, Scout’s Honor. But you have a cut just there.”
He’s touching my inner thigh when the sound of a door crashing open in the cottage startles me, making me jump. And then comes the thunderous voice I’d recognize anywhere.
