“Maggie.” He put the food down on the table, before his hands took her gently around the upper arms and he guided her onto the nearest chair. She sighed heavily in resignation, and a feeling of apprehension came over him.
A flesh-colored bandage covered several inches along the side of her shin, midway between her ankle and knee. He hadn’t paid much attention to it before; he’d just assumed she’d wrapped her sore ankle, and other parts of her had commanded most of his attention. But now that he looked closer, the wrap wasn’t down around her ankle, it was higher than that.
“What happened?” he asked, his fingers automatically reaching for the edge of the bandage.
“It’s nothing,” she said, attempting to swing her leg under the table. Michael’s grip was gentle but firm, holding her leg in place between his knees. He shot her a look that suggested she not even try. Another sigh.
Michael pulled away the bandage and found an ugly gash several inches in length surrounded by swollen, bruised flesh. “Jesus, Maggie! What did you do?” Instead of waiting for an answer, he was on his feet, retrieving the first aid kit he’d seen in her kitchen.
Maggie hissed as he poured antiseptic over the wound. “I did all that already,” she bit out through clenched teeth.
Michael’s face was hard. “What. Did. You. Do?!”
“Nothing, it was just a little accident, that’s all.”
His heart pounded in his chest, but his well-trained hands were steady, moving with rote, practiced movements. It was a good thing, because he found that he wasn’t thinking all that clearly at that moment.
“Maggie.”
“I was chopping wood, aimed wrong, glancing blow, end of story. I’m fine.”
“Jesus Christ, Maggie! You cut yourself with an ax?” His voice was sharp, making her flinch. “What the hell were you thinking? And why in God’s name didn’t you say anything?”
“Stop yelling at me!” she said, her tone wounded, and Michael felt a slight pang of regret, but not enough to quell the uneasiness within him. He’d treated hundreds of patients with injuries much more serious than this without batting an eye, but this was Maggie.
“I was thinking that with the power out for several days I needed to split a few more logs. And in case you’ve forgotten, I’ve been a bit occupied since you got here.”
Michael took a deep breath, praying for patience. He wasn’t sure who he was more upset with – Maggie, for doing something that got herself hurt and not telling him, or himself, for not checking the wood supply before he left or noticing that she was wounded because he was too busy slaking his lust on her.
His jaw was clenched so tightly she must have heard his teeth grinding, but he refrained from making any further comment while he redressed the wound. He felt Maggie’s fingers softly threading in his hair. It soothed him. Slightly.
“Michael,” she said softly, “I’m alright.”
The hell she was. At least she’d had the good sense to clean it out well. It looked as though she had applied some kind of poultice as well. He would have to remember to ask her about that later when he could think logically again.
“Get dressed. We’re going to the hospital. You need stitches. Definitely a tetanus shot. Maybe an X-ray because it looks like you might have clipped the bone.”
Her hand stilled in his hair and he felt her tense. It was as if a field of static electricity sudden powered up around her as she pulled away from him. “No.”
He tilted his head up and pinned her with a stare that brooked no argument as he fastened the bandage. “I’m not kidding around, Maggie. Get dressed.”
“Neither am I. I am not going to the hospital. Now stop overreacting and let’s eat. I’m starving.”
Michael felt like a wire strung so tightly it was in danger of snapping. The feeling was so alien to him that it was difficult to get control of it. Clearly the woman had no sense of perspective whatsoever.
“Overreacting?! Maggie, you put a fucking ax blade into your leg!”
She winced at his words, at the authority that rang through his tone. He was a man used to being obeyed. Clearly, she was not a woman accustomed to being told what to do. Her eyes narrowed, her chin lifted defiantly.
“You’ll not be getting me into any hospital, is that clear?” The faintest hint of an accent colored her words, a shadowy echo that resulted from growing up with her Ireland-born grandmother.
“Maggie - ”
He saw real fire in her eyes then, which took no small amount of courage. He towered over her, his expression as fierce as it got, every muscle tensed. In contrast, Maggie seemed to shrink before him, all but for her eyes, which held absolute conviction.