“I don’t need Bet, I’m fine,” he muttered, continuing what he was doing.

“The wound needs to be properly cleaned. Salve needs to be applied and then a fresh bandage has to be put on, Robert. You cannot do it alone,” she said firmly.

“I can,” he said stubbornly and Lisa shook her head, then glanced around as Bet appeared beside her with a basin of water, a cloth, salve and bandages.

Lisa stepped aside and gestured for the maid to enter, but remained by the door rather than risk seeing blood.

“Thank you, Bet,” Robert said quietly when Bet moved to the bedside table to set down the items she’d brought. “That’ll do.”

Bet hesitated, but it was definitely a dismissal, so she turned and crossed back toward Lisa with a shrug. What else could she do?

Once the maid was gone, Lisa closed the door, but remained by it, watching silently as Robert cleaned the wound properly and applied the salve. It was when he then tried to rebandage himself that he ran into trouble. Which was exactly what she’d expected.

“Lisa?” he said finally after spending several minutes struggling to get the cloth around himself just once. “Do you think you could . . . ?” He glanced over his shoulder to her apologetically.

Tsking with exasperation, Lisa straightened from where she’d leaned against the door frame, and crossed the room to stand in front of him, very kindly not saying I told you so. Much to her relief the one round of bandaging he’d managed to get around his chest, while crooked, covered the wound and was a clean, fresh white with no sign of blood to be seen. Letting her breath out, she took the roll of bandaging from him and said, “Arms up.”

“Lisa,” he murmured, reaching for her instead. “You can’t marry Findlay.”

“Don’t talk, Robert, it will just end in an argument,” she warned.

“But—”

“Shall I have Bet do this?” she asked, raising one eyebrow. The threat made him fall silent and sit back. Relieved, Lisa quickly began to run the clean white cloth of the fresh bandage around his chest.

“You smell delicious,” Robert murmured as she passed the bandage around his back, her arms around him and her face next to his.

“Thank you,” she said stiffly, bringing the bandage around his front again.

“And you’re beautiful.”

“Robert,” she said on a sigh as she began to run it around his back again.

“It’s true,” he said simply. “You smell good, you look good . . . you feel good,” he added, his hands lowering to run from her shoulders and down her upper arms and back as she brought the bandage around his back to the front again.