Conor's Way by Laura Lee Guhrke - Conor's Way Page B

I'm afraid we'd all starve."
    She laughed and walked away, leaving him to
his breakfast. But Conor noticed her watching him as he lifted a
forkful of grits to his mouth and he knew she was waiting to see
what he thought of them. He took a bite, and he wondered why
anybody, in Louisiana or anywhere else for that matter, would eat
them. A person might just as well eat buttered wallpaper paste.
But food was something Conor never took for granted. "Delicious,"
he said.
    Pleased, she gave him that astonishing smile,
a smile well worth a few mouthfuls of wallpaper paste.
    "You wouldn't say that if you'd come round
here about eight years ago," she said, pouring him a cup of coffee.
"Old Sally—she was our cook—had died, and I started doing all the
cooking. I'd never cooked a meal before in my life. My mama never
thought it was an appropriate skill for a young lady of quality,"
she added with a wry smile.
    "My first meal was a disaster," she
confessed, as she brought the cup of coffee to him. "Thank goodness
my grandmother collected recipes and wrote them down in a journal.
If I hadn't found that journal, I would never have learned how to
cook."
    While Conor ate his breakfast, Olivia
finished baking cookies. When he pushed back his plate and rose
from the table, she did not miss his grimace of pain.
    "Ribs still pretty sore, I imagine?"
    He didn't reply, but he didn't have to. She
walked over to the pantry to get her medicine box. "I've got a
camphor liniment that'll do wonders."
    "Don't bother. I'm fine."
    "It's no bother," she replied, and emerged
from the pantry with a fresh roll of binding and her medicine box.
"I want to have a look at your ribs anyway to make sure they're
healing properly," she said, crossing the kitchen to stand in front
of him, "and I ought to put a fresh binding on them."
    She set the box and the roll of linen on the
table beside her. When she turned toward him, Conor shook his head.
"There's no need to make a fuss. I told you, I'm fine."
    "You're not fine. You're a man with cracked
ribs, and I know they're causing you pain. So kindly remove your
shirt, and don't argue with me."
    She was certain he was going to refuse, but
in the end, he didn't. "Too bad they don't allow women in the
military," he muttered as he unbuttoned his shirt. "With you on
their side, the Confederacy might have won the war."
    She shot him a wry glance as he tossed the
shirt aside. She opened her box and removed a bottle of liniment,
then she turned to him and laid one hand against his ribs, pushing
gently with her fingers.
    "Ouch!" he cried, leaning away from her.
"Jaysus, stop poking me!"
    "Don't swear at me, if you please." She moved
her hand and pressed again, feeling him wince. "They seem to be
coming along well enough, although I think it'll be several more
weeks before they're completely healed."
    She unfastened the pins and began rolling the
long swath of linen that supported his injured ribs away from his
body. The task forced her to slip her arms around his waist, and
the intimate contact made her acutely aware of him, aware of sinew
and muscle and solid masculinity. It was an unexpected feeling that
robbed her of the ability to breathe, and brought back the memory
of him standing naked by the bed. Something warm and aching spread
through her limbs, making her want to lean into him. Her hands
fumbled and she dropped the binding. It unrolled as it fell to the
floor.
    "Oh, dear." She retrieved the swath of fabric
from the floor and set it on the table, then reached for the bottle
of liniment. She pulled out the cork, poured some of the liniment
into the palm of her hand, and began rubbing the pungent oil gently
into the bare skin of his torso.
    She heard his sharp intake of breath, and she
paused to glance up at him. "Did I hurt you?"
    "No," he answered, but his voice sounded
strained, his breathing slightly uneven. A tiny muscle worked at
the corner of his jaw. "No. You didn't... hurt me."
    She tried to finish her task