Duchess of Mine (24 page)

As if sensing Fleur’s worry about what to do,
Helen spoke reassuringly. “Mrs. McVicar is right to leave the wound
open. We just need to keep it clean. Let it air out a bit, then
seal it.”

“All right.” Fleur nodded and looked at Mrs.
McVicar. “How do we seal it?”

“Burn it, darlin’.” Helen responded again.
“Like the first burst tumor.” Sleepily she lifted the remaining
particle of her shift and let Fleur see her scarred right
breast.

Reality squeezed Fleur’s lungs shut, her eyes
closed, and her brain stuttered with the comprehension that Helen
couldn’t get chemotherapy. She couldn’t get radiation. Hell, Fleur
doubted she could get surgery.

“Surgery,” Fleur all but screamed out. “Can
we remove—?”

Helen clutched at Fleur’s hand, pulling on it
until Fleur looked at her in the eyes. “’Tis too far along. My
dear, my cancer has spread. ‘Tis sittin’ in my gut now, like a
toad, makin’ it so I’m almost always nauseated, makin’ it so I
throw up every day now. ‘Tis also in my lungs too. Can ye hear it?”
Helen was silent for a pause, letting Fleur listen to the slightly
sickly suckling noise Helen made with every breath. Then she
gracefully covered her raw, red, and scarred right breast with the
blanket. “I’ve always loved to be a healer. It gave me freedom from
my husband. Sorry, Mrs. McVicar, if that’s disturbin’ to hear.”

“Nay.” Mrs. McVicar gently began to clean
Helen’s chest with a basin of water and a white cloth. “I love my
husband. I do. But bein’ a midwife is much the same. ‘Tis about the
time when I’m thinkin ’I might slit his throat from ear to ear,
then a lass is needin’ me for birthin’. I spend a few days away
from home, and I can’t believe I ever thought of killin’ me
beautiful husband.” She giggled.

Helen joined her.

Fleur tried to make some kind of noise
similar to a chuckle, but the moment was heady with...it was far
too real. Tangible. Helen was an actual woman, who was dying. And
after nursing Na, watching her take her last breaths, she wasn’t
sure she was strong enough to do it again.

“As I was sayin’, Fleur, I loved bein’ a
healer, kenning the things I do. But when I first found the lump in
my breast, I played the most devilish game with myself. I kept
pretendin’ it wasn’ really there.”

“Ah, the things we tell ourselves, aye?” Mrs.
McVicar asked ruefully.

“Aye,” Helen said, her eyes again closed. “It
was Mrs. McVicar that kenned something was amiss with me, when I
had to ask her for help to lift one of the people I was carin’
for.”

Mrs. McVicar straightened and worked at a
knot along the base of her spine, also tilting her head. Her long
dark braid with a few silver threads cascaded down to a hip. She
grinned at Fleur with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. “Ye don’
think Duncan comes by his strength just because he’s so big and
brawny, do ye? Nay, ‘tis because his mother was one of the
strongest women in all of the Highlands, I’d wager. And when she
actually asked for my help, I kenned something was very wrong.”
Mrs. McVicar’s grin vanished as she looked down at her patient. She
lifted the basin to her hip. It was filled with dark bloody water
now.

“Let me get you more clean water.” Fleur
tried to jump up, but Mrs. McVicar held her hand out.

“Nay, Mrs. Cameron needs ye to hold her hand
now. She’s done this before. All alone. Now that the stubborn woman
has finally told, she needs ye.” With that, Mrs. McVicar left with
the red basin and red cloth, made all the more ominous from the
waning candlelight.

Helen cracked her lids slightly and glanced
up. “I do need ye. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, Helen. It’s my honor to be
here. I just—I—I’ll do my best. You let me know if I can do
anything for you, all right?”

Helen smiled, then released her grip of
Fleur’s hand and reached up to pat her on the cheek. “I finally ken
what having a daughter would be like.”

Fleur broke down. She’d wanted to be strong,
but she couldn’t stop her tears at that point. Nor the words she
spoke. “And I finally get to know what having a mom would be like.
Oh, I had my Na, my grandmother. And she did a wonderful job
raising me.”

Helen glanced up. “Aye, she did. Ye are so
good, so kind and considerate. Ye have a strong heart, strong
enough for Duncan.”

Fleur felt another wave of tears hit her.

“Ye are more like my daughter in-law, but
I’ll always think of ye as my daughter.”

Fleur shook her head. “He hasn’t even—”

“Oh, he will, my beautiful lass. He
will.”

Chapter 21

F
leur came out the kitchen’s door,
close to the woodpile, and flung another dark red basin of water
and Duncan’s mother’s blood beside the pink wild rose bush.

“Fleur,” he whispered.

She jumped, since apparently she hadn’t seen
him. He’d been sitting on the chopping block. After splitting wood
through the better part of two hours, the sun had begun to just
kiss the horizon. It would be a lovely warm day, and the sky
streaked of violet and lavender, yet a few diamonds hung in the
sky. The stubborn stars made him think of when he was a lad and his
ma would ask him to make wishes not only on the first star in the
night sky, but on all the stars. She had wanted to give him every
single one of his wishes.

Lord, she’d tried so hard to make that true.
Even marrying Albert might have been construed as his wish, because
once he had wanted a father.

Fleur clutched her free hand to her heart,
but when she saw him, a grin quickly glowed from her bonny
visage.

“Sorry. I didn’ mean to frighten ye.”

Leaning over, she placed the basin on a large
stone that guarded his mother’s onions. She straightened as she
walked toward him, keeping her beam aimed at him. It made his
aching heart warm and grow. He continued to sit on the tree stump,
and when Fleur extended her arms wide, he took her, probably too
forcefully, and sat her on his lap to hold.

With his face deep in her long free hair, he
asked, “How is she?”

“Sleeping now. She’s had another dose of
opium, er, laudanum.” She talked beside his ear, sleepily, sweetly,
mayhap without her knowledge it also dredged in his mind and body
what making love to her might be like.

He pulled away from the floral scent of her
hair, trying to regain his senses. He took a deep breath, then
thought of his ma. “Is it—is it bad?”

Fleur’s face fell. He knew the answer.

He nodded. “How—how long?”

Fleur’s dark brows furrowed and the crease
above her nose appeared. Either she didn’t know what he was asking,
or didn’t want to tell him. Hell, he didn’t want to know the answer
anyway. He didn’t want to know how much longer he had with his
mother. He didn’t want to know how much more she would suffer.

He tried to think of anything else to say.
“Jesus, ye come here to my Highlands, because of some weird trick
of time, then ye’re spirited away, and now takin’ care of my
ma.”

“Yes, you do keep a girl on her toes.” She
feathered away some of his unruly red curls from his ear, still a
smile upon her lips.

He chuckled, but then buried his face against
her hair again, needing to hold her so close he couldn’t
distinguish himself from her. She wrapped her arms around his neck,
embracing him just as fiercely. Again, beside his ear, she
whispered, “You look tired, Duncan. You want to get some rest?”

He shook his head. “Nay. You?”

She sighed. “I am exhausted. I’m thinking of
diving into your mom’s cocaine stash.”

“Hmm?”

Fleur pulled away enough to look at him. “The
laudanum, the big black pills, your mom is taking is somewhat legal
in my time. It’s called morphine. Of course, laudanum is broken
down a bit differently from the morphine of my time. I can only
guess what your mom is taking is more potent. I should have deduced
she was taking it, her runny nose . . .” she sipped a breath and
shook her head. “Anyway, the laudanum affects her pain receptors,
making it nearly impossible to feel, well, much of anything. So
it’s worth it for her to continue taking. But the coca tea, cocoa
leaves, your mom was taking.” She stopped, tears forming in her
huge dark eyes. “She—she said she needed to take it because I was
her guest, to keep up with me. But I don’t think it’s good for her.
It might have exacerbated her—”

He pulled her against him then, shushing her.
“’Tisn’t yer fault, Fleur.”

“But I—”

“Shh, my Fleur. Shh. Don’t ye think it.”

“But I do. By being here, I might have made
your mom sicker.”

He shook his head. “Nay, darlin’. Ye made her
so happy, ye did. I—I don’ remember my ma ever that happy. The time
I walked in on ye laughin’ so hard, ye both rollin’‘round on the
floor with yer giggles, why, I’ve never seen her like that.”

Fleur leaned away again, a wee grin in place.
“She was telling me about how you were conceived, how she and your
father were making love against a—”

“I don’ want to ken that.” He made a
strangled, disgusted noise. “I really don’ want to ken that.”

She smiled wider. “Right. I wouldn’t either,
but it is a funny story about a tick going—”

He made a gagging noise, thankfully
preventing Fleur from saying anything further.

She giggled. Slowly her laughter waned as she
stared at him.

Lightning struck through him, first his
heart, then it zipped from his solar plexus straight to his cock.
He wasn’t sure if it was her or him, but suddenly he was kissing
Fleur. Her lips tasted of chamomile tea, then she slid her tongue
in his mouth, and he tasted honey too. The energy from his heart
intensified. He pushed his tongue against hers, and she let out a
soft mewl. He fisted his hand through her hair, amazed at the
luxurious silkiness of it, the weight of all that black in his
palm.

She pulled away, huffing slightly. “I just
kissed you for the first time only a few hours ago.”

“Aye.”

“It seems like a lifetime ago.”

He agreed, but couldn’t find the words. So he
kissed her again. And again. Nibbling down her neck, her soft
floral scent invaded his blood, his brain. He stopped thinking
then, and only needed. He needed her. This was more than just
desire. He needed her here. But she—how long would she stay? How
could
she stay? She had said something about needing to take
care of his ma. Then what?

Reaching back up to her lips, he plunged his
tongue in her mouth once more.

Jesus, she would leave one day. She
would.

And if she did . . .

His heart broke.

He stopped kissing her, leaving his forehead
against hers, feeling her panting breath against his face. He
prided himself in that. She wanted him.

But how could she ever need him?

Both he and Fleur heard a woman’s voice
softly being cleared. He glanced up and saw the smiling face of
Mrs. McVicar.

“Sorry to interrupt.”

Fleur stood and he did too. He had no clue
how tired he was until he did so. Lord, he wasn’t sure if his legs
would hold for much longer.

Mrs. McVicar came into full view, her grin
still in place as she looked at the both of them. But then she took
a sharp breath. “I think it best to take turns with yer ma.” She
looked more at Duncan then. “I—I ken it uncustomary to have a man
care for her, but being her son...She might—”

“I
want
to care for her,” Duncan
said.

Mrs. McVicar nodded. “She’s properly covered
now, Duncan, so ye can. Ye both need yer rest. One of ye watch her
for a few hours, then the next. The last thing ye need, or Mrs.
Cameron, is for both of ye to get sick, aye? So try to rest.”

It was like the noise of a cannon exploding
nearby—the stark realization that Mrs. McVicar was giving
directions to tend to his mother in her sickbed, as if it might
soon be her deathbed. Granted, he knew she was ill. Very ill. But
until that moment, he had thought she might bounce back at any
second.

His throat clenched shut, and his eyes
pricked like sand was lodged in them. He nodded.

Mrs. McVicar tried to muster another grin,
this one, Duncan thought, was the one he’d seen his mother give
when he was a lad and followed her to the sick. She’d give it when
the people were gravely ill, when their loved ones needed comfort
and strength.

Fleur turned to him, tears standing in her
own eyes. “Why don’t you get some rest, Duncan? I’ll watch her now,
then wake you in a bit.”

But the dark shadows under Fleur’s eyes made
him summon the strength to stay awake for hours more. He shook his
head. “Nay, my princess, ye had a rough couple days. Ye need yer
sleep. I’ll take the first watch.”

“I’ll return toward the evening,” Mrs.
McVicar said.

“Rory, Captain MacKay, said something about
seeking a physician from Tongue.” Duncan thought it best to alert
the mid-wife. “The doctor might be here about the same time.”

“Do ye ken if it’s the famous Dr. Robertson
that’s comin’? I’ve always wanted to meet him.”

Duncan shrugged. “Sorry, I don’ ken.”

Mrs. McVicar nodded, then took another
breath. “Well, make sure ye both get rest, aye? Take good care of
each other. Don’t forget to eat, ye hear? Ye need yer
strength.”

Both Fleur and Duncan nodded. Then Mrs.
McVicar said her farewells and vanished.

Fleur turned and planted her arms around
Duncan, snuggling her head against his chest. Lord, that felt so
good, to have her do that. It made him feel as though he was the
perfect compliment for her. They matched. He threaded his fingers
through her hair.

Against his chest, she asked, “You sure about
taking the first shift?”

“Aye.” He lifted her hair in his hands over
and over again, surprised it was so heavy, so soft.