“But what happened?” Mrs. Juggs asked, bewildered. “It wasn’t all that hot.”

“He needs to drink more water,” Kibbles explained.

“And no ale if it’s sweltering out,” Piers ordered. “Not even one pint.”

“That was it, that was all it was? Just not drinking enough water?” Mrs. Juggs still looked confused, but Juggs swung his legs out of bed.

“I knew I wasn’t sick, not really.” He stood up. “I stay away from water if we’re going in the parade, being as there’s no place to piss without breaking ranks.”

“Adding to the problem,” Bitts said, scribbling madly.

Piers let Juggs and the missus leave with the Ducklings. “Mrs. Havelock, you can decide whether you want to go along with Miss Thrynne’s plans for my hospital, or you can find another position.”

She looked at him, her mouth so tightly shut that it looked like Sébastien’s suture work.

“Scratch that,” he said. “You’re sacked.” He took Linnet’s arm and led her out of the room, but she stopped in the corridor, holding him back until the nurse stamped into the corridor.

“His lordship was only jesting,” she told Nurse Matilda, giving her the smile that supposedly didn’t work on outraged housekeepers.

Piers opened his mouth, but she pinched him so sharply that he shut it again.

“We can discuss how to manage family visits tomorrow,” Linnet said. “Of course, we’ll have to figure out a way to disrupt your schedule as little as possible. I know how smoothly you run the wing, Mrs. Havelock.”

The smile clearly didn’t work on Matilda. Still, she froze there for a moment, obviously calculating whether to give in or not.

“I know the doctor’s humorous ways,” she finally said, heavily.

“Good day, Mrs. Havelock,” Linnet said, pulling Piers down the corridor.

Chapter Twenty

You’re an interfering little witch,” Piers said. “Wait a moment. My leg is aching.” He pushed open a door. “Look at this! An empty bed just waiting for a patient.” He limped in. “Perfect place to sit down and rest our weary limbs.”

Linnet leaned against the door frame, laughing.

“Big enough for two,” Piers said, making sure his tone wasn’t overly hopeful. “Or are you too sore?”

She scowled at him. “That’s none of your business.”

“Of course it’s my business. Here, come in and close the door. We don’t want to give poor Nurse Matilda any more shocks than she’s already been dealt in one day.”

Linnet walked in and closed the door. But she made no move to climb on the bed with him. “Come on, then,” he said, patting the bed. “Time for a private consult with your favorite doctor. Come tell me all about that nasty raw feeling caused by that seducing devil who took advantage of you.”

She laughed. “And I have to get on the bed to tell you about it?”

“How am I going to ascertain the injury until I do an examination?” he asked reasonably. “A close examination.”

“It doesn’t hurt that much. Besides, we can’t do that again.”

“Why not?” He held out his cane toward her. “Will you take that for me?”

She stepped forward and took the end of it, whereupon he jerked backward, reeling her in like a fish on a line. Linnet fell on top of him in a fluttering soft bundle of sweet-scented womanhood.

Piers’s arms tightened. “Damn, you smell good.”

“You smell like soap,” she said, sniffing. “Unpleasant soap.”

“Castor soap. We’re trying to cut down on hospital fever.”

“What on earth is that?”

“Fevers go around hospitals, and kill patients who weren’t even in line for a coffin,” he said, nuzzling her hair until he found a delicately shaped little ear. “This castle’s perfect because it’s got so damn many rooms that we can just stow most of the patients by themselves until their fever breaks.”

“I’d like to hire some village women to come in and read to the patients who are awake and not infectious,” Linnet said.

“Village women and reading. I see a problem there.”

“A village woman who knows how to read,” she said, not all that patiently. “I’m sure there are some. And another woman or two to entertain the children and perhaps work on teaching them to read.”

“Entertain? This is a hospital, or next thing to it. We’re not playing host to a traveling show.”

“The patients will get better sooner if they have something to think about. Why, look at Gavan.”

She shut her mouth, but Piers caught a tone in her voice that made him give her ear a little nip. “What are you up to?”

“Nothing. Gavan walked up and down the stables five times after luncheon. His leg is much stronger.”

Piers thought about her voice while he ran a hand over her truly magnificent bosom. “Are you sore?”

“Yes,” she said, a bit shyly, pink climbing in her cheeks.

“Want me to take a look and make sure it’s all in working order? It would be my pleasure.” And he meant it. Just in case she said yes, he kissed his way down her neck and onto the curve of her breast. Closer to the site of the problem, as it were.

“No,” she said, her voice sounding pretty definite.

But her hands were on his chest too, gliding over his shirt. He reached down and wrenched his shirt from his breeches to give her better access.

She pulled up his shirt with a charmingly greedy look. Then her fingers were running over his chest, leaving little trails of fire in their wake. Piers rolled to the side to let her explore as she would.

Linnet bent her head delicately, politely, as if she were a long-necked heron considering something in the water.

“Please,” he said, watching her, and was almost ashamed at the husky, needy tone in his voice. But not quite.

And particularly not after a small pink tongue curled over his nipple. A hoarse grunt escaped his lips. “Why do you have your eyes shut?” he made himself ask, forcing himself to think sensibly.

“You taste wonderful,” she said dreamily. “And you smell so good, just a little salty still, but like soap—not that awful soap, nice soap.” Small white teeth closed, nipped him, and his body instinctively arched toward hers, begging for what it could not have.

She was kissing lower now, on his belly, on the soft parts of his skin that no one had ever paid attention to before. Piers closed his eyes only to have them fly open when she said, “Hadn’t you better take off your breeches?”

He raised his head. “Take them off? We can’t do anything serious, Linnet. Your poor little twat cannot take another intrusion from—”

“This?” she said, stroking along it. “I’d just like to see it. Properly, I mean. If you have time.”

“Time?” he repeated, hardly believing his own ears. “I think, yes, I have time. Though perhaps we should put the latch on the door.”

So she got up and put the latch on the door, which meant that he noticed that her cheeks had gone a lovely rose color, and her eyes were sultry and a little wild. Her lust was like tinder to his, and he could hardly manage to shove down his breeches and smalls . . . but he did.