Read Online McAlistair's Fortune by Alissa Johnson - Free Book Online

back down.
    He raised his dark head to catch her eye and ran his tongue across his teeth. “I’ve been looking at your knees all day.”
    “I know.” Or, at least, she’d known he could have, and if she weren’t feeling so wretched at the moment, she probably would have been gratified to learn he had. “I’m sorry. It’s a spontaneous response to having a man push my skirts up.” Oh damn, that sounded dreadful. “That is…I’ve never been in the position before, but—”
    “It’s all right.”
    He gathered up the material again, and this time lifted it gently and slowly. Still, she had to fist her hands to keep from shoving it back down again. How ridiculous. She had been riding about all day with her dress caught up above her knees. Why should it bother her now?
    Because she’d been on a horse, riding a comfortable distance from McAlistair, she realized, not on the ground with him only inches away—certainly not with his bare hands on her bare leg. Never mind that she couldn’t feel his hands at present; she could see them—the way he carefully danced his fingers along her ankle, her calf, her knee.
    “Nothing at all?” he asked.
    She shook her head, unable to speak. She was mesmerized by his hands—the size of them, the elegant fingers with blunt tips, the way the tanned skin stood out so starkly against her pale leg. She imagined how they would feel—rough and strong and—
    “How far up?” he asked.
    “What?” She blinked rapidly for a second. “Oh. Er…” She hesitated, then touched her hip. “All the way, I’m afraid.”
    He moved to push her dress up farther, and she slapped his hand again. “I’ll not apologize for that. You haven’t been looking at…at that all day.”
    She would have sworn, absolutely sworn, she heard him mutter something that sounded suspiciously like, “Pity.”
    “Did you just—”
    “We need to get the blood flowing,” he said, effectively cutting her off.
    “By looking and prodding?”
    “By massaging.”
    “Oh.” She used her hands to keep her skirts pinned above her knee. “Right. I can do that.”
    He shook his head. “Lie back.”
    Lie back? In the middle of the woods with a strange—or very nearly strange—man, whilst her skirts were gathered about her waist? “You can’t possibly be serious.”
    He was, apparently. He pried her hands free, and took her by the shoulders to gently, but insistently, push her down. “Stay.”
    “I’m not a dog, Mr. McAlistair.”
    “Stay,” he repeated, keeping his hands on her shoulders. “Or I’ll tie you down.”
    Such a threat would normally have elicited a furious response from Evie, even if only on principle’s sake, but the urge to fight back eluded her at the moment. She found it comforting to have his warm hands on her arm and his broad form looming over hers. Though his face remained hard and set, she could see the concern in his eyes.
    “I’ll stay,” she muttered. Then, because her pride wouldn’t allow for complete submission, she added, “But should you ever attempt to tie me down, I’ll attempt to break every bone in your body, and after they heal, break them all again.”
    The faintest smile touched his lips. “Fair enough.”
    He drew back and she felt, through her strong leg, her skirts being drawn up. Uncomfortable with the spark that shot through her at the sight and feel of McAlistair’s dark head bent over her legs, she shut her eyes and concentrated on what was happening to her numb appendage.
    There were movement and pressure first, odd sensations that seemed to originate above her hip. After a time, the first signs of life began to return. Her toes started to tingle, little pricks and stings she found more relieving than uncomfortable. Though she’d tried to block it out, she’d been harboring the small and irrational fear that feeling would never return—that her leg had gone from troublesome to completely useless.
    Her relief at having that disturbing possibility