Page 76 of The Earl She Once Saved

Rafe frowned. “Sergeant was lost.”

“Of course.”

Ezra handed him the glass and Rafe drank. The medicine was bitter enough to make him doubt the physician’s loyalty to mankind.

Rafe looked toward the door. He could still feel the back of her hand against his cheek.

“She married Roland,” he said.

The words sounded weaker than they once had.

“Yes.”

“She is his wife.”

“Yes.”

Rafe closed his eyes.

Ezra said nothing more. He knew when silence was kinder than argument.

***

Fever pulled Rafe downward again. This time there was no trench, no smoke and no dead men calling after him, only darkness, quiet and deep, with the memory of Verity’s hand resting against his face.

By morning, the fever had broken. Rafe woke to sunlight across the bed and the sensation that every bone in his body had been replaced during the night by something heavier. The physician stood beside him, listening to his chest.

“You are fortunate,” the man announced.

“I feel extraordinarily fortunate.” He could not hide the sarcasm in his voice.

“However you feel, you will remain in bed today.”

Rafe looked toward the window.

“And tomorrow.”

“No.”

The physician straightened. “Then you may remain in bed for a week when the fever returns.”

Rafe disliked the logic of this. He straightened a little, and only then did he catch Verity pouring water into a glass at the other end of the chamber.

Memory stirred and he remembered her face above his and a hand against his cheek. He reached for the rest and found only fragments.

I looked for you.

Had he said it aloud? The possibility sent a different kind of heat through him.

Verity carried the glass to the bed. Her expression revealed nothing.

“Drink.”

Rafe accepted it. Their fingers touched. She did not pull away at once.

“You stayed,” he said.

“I wished to be certain the fever had broken.”