“No,” she lied.

He shifted in his seat, and Sarah glanced down long enough to realize that he was adjusting the position of his leg. He seemed to be most comfortable with it stretched out before him; she’d noticed that the previous night at supper. But whereas that table had been laden with guests, this one was quite empty save for the two of them, and there was plenty of room to—

“It doesn’t hurt,” he said, not turning even an inch in her direction.

“I beg your pardon?” she said, since she had not been looking at his leg. In fact, after she had noticed that he was holding it quite straight, she had been quite purposefully looking at at least six other things.

“The leg,” Hugh said. “It doesn’t hurt right now.”

“Oh.” It was on the tip of her tongue to retort that she had not inquired about his leg, but even she knew when good manners called for restraint. “The wine, I imagine,” she finally said. He hadn’t had much, but if he said that it helped with the pain, who was she to doubt him?

“It is difficult to bend,” he said. And then he did look at her, full straight and green. “In case you were wondering.”

“Of course not,” she said quickly.

“Liar,” he said softly.

Sarah gasped. Of course she had been lying, but it had been a polite lie. Whereas his calling her out on it had been most assuredly not polite.

“If you want to know about it,” Hugh said, cutting off a small bite of cake with the side of his fork, “just ask.”

“Very well,” Sarah said sharply, “are you missing any great big chunks of flesh?”

He choked on his cake. This gave her great satisfaction.

“Yes,” he said.

“Of what size?”

He looked like he might smile again, which had not been her intention. He glanced down at his leg. “I’d say about two cubic inches.”

She gritted her teeth. What sort of person answered in cubic inches?

“About the size of a very small orange,” he added. Condescendingly. “Or a somewhat massive strawberry.”

“I know what a cubic inch is.”

“Of course you do.”

And the bizarre thing was, he didn’t sound the least bit condescending when he said that.

“Did you injure your knee?” she asked, because drat it all, now she was curious. “Is that why you cannot bend it?”

“I can bend it,” he replied, “just not very well. And no, there was no injury to the knee.”

Sarah waited several seconds, then said, primarily between her teeth, “Why, then, can’t you bend it?”

“The muscle,” he said, letting one of his shoulders rise and fall in a shrug. “I suspect it doesn’t stretch the way it ought, given that it’s missing two cubic inches of, what did you call it?” His voice grew unpleasantly droll. “Ah yes, a chunk of flesh.”

“You told me to ask,” she ground out.

“So I did.”