“It might be worth it, just to—”
Her words cut off as she felt her heel sink, then slip in mud. If she hadn’t been so distracted, she might have noticed how close she’d been walking to the edge. She certainly would have taken care in how she righted her stumble, and where she put her next step.
Because where it landed, was in the air.
Eight
To a bystander, the act of falling off a hill might seem to be a very sudden thing. One moment a person is standing there, and the next moment she’s not, ergo—sudden.
But for the unfortunate individual actually engaged in the act of falling, it is an event that takes an inordinate amount of time—at least initially.
Mirabelle had the opportunity to remember the box she’d watched drop slowly to the sidewalk the day before, and she had the time to think she really—really and truly—ought to be able to grab hold of a branch or a bush before it was too late. But even as her fingers reached out, the long hill rushed up before her.
After that, things moved along at a very brisk pace, indeed.
She hit, she rolled, she bumped and slid. Sky and ground raced past in a dizzying circle. She slid to a stop a good fifty yards from the top, and still a distance from the water. For one terrible second she couldn’t feel her limbs and feared she might have lost them sometime during the tumble.
Then the pain came—stings and burns mostly, that niggled more than truly hurt. Her ankle, on the other hand, positively screamed, and had her bolting up to grab hold of her leg.
“Oooh, ow! Ow…ow…ow!” Between each exclamation of pain, Mirabelle mentally injected the list of invectives she’d apologized for only the day before.
With an oath of his own, Whit came crashing through the brambles to crouch at her feet.
“Look at me, imp. Look at me. Do you know where you are?”
Hurting, and irritated with what she considered a tremendously stupid question—had the man been struck blind in the last five minutes?—she shook her head at him and concentrated on breathing hard through her teeth.
His hands cupped her face, forcing her to look from her throbbing ankle to his worried gaze. “Tell me where you are.”
She glared at him. “Bottom of a hill.”
“Good.” He pulled one hand away to hold in front of her. “How many fingers am I holding up?”
Understanding began to seep in, and she made herself count the slightly blurry fingers. “Two.”
He flicked his eyes along her forehead before turning his attention to her leg.
“Move your hands. Let me see what you’ve done to yourself.”
“No! Don’t touch it!” She swatted at him. It was an instinctual response brought on by fear and pain, and Whit didn’t react to it other than to reach up and run a soothing hand down her arm.
“No more than a sprain, I imagine. The worst of the pain will pass in a moment. But just to be safe, be a brave little girl and let me have a look.”
Mirabelle stopped rocking—a motion she hadn’t even been aware of making—and narrowed her eyes at him. “Little girl?”
“There now, feeling better already, aren’t you?”
She was, actually, and because distracting her from the pain had apparently been his sole reason for delivering the insult, she couldn’t very well be angry with him for it. Besides, he actually looked a bit pale, and there was a line of worry across his brow.
Lord, was he lying about the sprain? Could she have seriously injured herself?
She swallowed hard and released her grip on her ankle. “Don’t move it or…just don’t move it, Whit. Please.”
“I’ll have to, I’m afraid. Just a little,” he assured her when her hands came back up and tried to push his away. “Just to make certain it isn’t broken.”
He unlaced her boot and pulled the leather away with exquisite care. Using only the tips of his fingers, he prodded gently at her ankle. It hardly hurt at all, she realized. In fact, it felt rather nice, rather comforting. She felt herself begin to relax under the soothing ministrations. Then the flat of his hand pressed against the bottom of her foot and he pushed her toes up and her heel down.
“Ahh!”
He winced and immediately stopped. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. It had to be done.”
She couldn’t manage anything more than a stifled moan and a nod.
Whit tucked behind her ear a lock of hair that had fallen loose. “It’s all right, now. It’s done. Take a deep breath. There you are. Better?”
She nodded again, and found her voice as well. “Is it broken? My ankle?”
“No, only a sprain. You’ll be up and about in a few days—a week at most.”
Just in time for her uncle’s party, she thought miserably. There were times life seemed distinctly unfair. She may have grumbled about it a bit, but Whit distracted her by slipping out of his coat and carefully draping it over her shoulders.
Confused, she blinked at him. “I’m not cold.”
“You’re shaking.”