Read Online Wild about the Witch by Cassidy Cayman - Free Book Online

shocked.
    “Can you believe that?” she asked him, resting against the closest tree.
    “I can hardly believe any of this, Miss Burnet,” he said, leaning against the tree next to her and smiling ruefully.
    “I think after everything we’ve been through, you should call me Lizzie,” she said, never wanting to be called Miss Burnet again as long as she lived.
    “Very well. I thank you.”
    She laughed at his relentless civility and leaned closer so the burly guard who came along for the ride didn’t overhear. “We definitely came forward. Just not far enough.”
    “That seems to make you happy, but we ultimately failed,” he said with a frown.
    She closed her eyes for a moment, so tired the scratchy tree bark and damp moss almost felt comfortable to her. Opening them and getting into a more upright position so she wouldn’t fall asleep until she knew Quinn was going to be all right, she smiled encouragingly at Oliver.
    He was really a fine young man, both handsome and kind. Why hadn’t she let him and Catie fall in love and get married? What had been the point of her meddling? It all seemed so long ago.
    “Don’t you see, Oliver?” she asked, still smiling. “That thing you did worked. If it worked once, it’ll work again. We’ll keep trying.”
    Quinn howled in pain and the dreamy languor that had begun to overtake her vanished. She jumped to her feet and pushed past the guard and Pietro to kneel beside him. The physician had his case opened next to him, a series of bloody instruments laid out on a none too clean looking cloth. He held up the squashed bullet in his ungloved fingers, a triumphant look on his face.
    “Got ye, ye wee bastard.”
    He placed it on the cloth and poured some clear liquid over the wound, causing Quinn to turn ghost white, clench every muscle he had, then knock the physician in the side of the head.
    “Ah, hell, Quinn. Now who’s going to wrap ye up?” Pietro asked, choking back a laugh as Bella rushed to make sure the doctor was okay.
    “I’ve got it,” Lizzie said, rummaging through the medical kit and finding a roll of thin linen cloth.
    Pietro and Bella moved aside, dragging the unfortunate healer out of the way. Lizzie dabbed at the wound, made all the more jagged and vicious looking from the doctor digging the bullet out with his instruments of torture. She wanted the man to wake up so she could punch him herself.
    “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, thinking Quinn was passed out again.
    “Not your fault, lass,” he mumbled, opening one eye to look at her.
    She began carefully wrapping his shoulder, gently lifting his arm to get the bandage under it. He was covered in a thin sheen of cold sweat, and he shivered, goosebumps sprouting up and down his arms and the exposed part of his chest. His shirt had been mostly torn off him to keep from having to move him too much and she tried to cover him as much as she could with the pieces.
    “Isn’t it all my fault?” she asked, not a hint of sarcasm in her voice. He flinched when she tucked the bandage in at the top, and she loosened it a little.
    Despite his obvious pain, he smiled at her words. “Ye think verra highly of yourself, for all of it to be your fault.”
    The fact that he was teasing her after everything made her press the heels of her hands to her eyes to keep from crying. He took her wrists and gently pulled her hands from her face.
    “I am sorry that he hit ye,” he said, tracing the line of her cheek, feather light, with his forefinger. “And from the looks of it, more than once.” He turned his head to the side, almost looking at her in the way that he used to. “But did I perhaps see the telltale blackened eyes and swelling about the nose on that wee madman to suggest ye got a blow in yourself?”
    She blinked away the unshed tears and laughed darkly. “I did. I broke his nose.”
    “Good,” Quinn said, looking at her intently.
    She didn’t know what to say or do under his unsettling gaze and