He scowled at her. “Getting dry.”
Feeling awkward and silly and terribly uncomfortable, she looked away. She didn’t want to see Robert Davidson without his shirt. Seeing him shirtless and brooding would make her remember, and the last thing she wanted to do was remember how things had once been between them.
But for all the warnings blaring inside her head, she couldn’t keep her eyes off him for long. She turned her head and watched him drag the sweater up and over his head. Her mouth went dry as his flat abdomen came into view. She saw black hair and taut flesh, and sudden heat flashed through her. He winced a little as he worked the sweater off his shoulders and draped it over a makeshift clothesline he’d fashioned from a coil of old wire.
Aware that her heart was hammering, she stared at the red slash just above his bicep for several long seconds before realizing it was a wound. “What on earth happened to your shoulder?”
Frowning as if the bullet wound were nothing more than an annoying bee sting, he looked at it. “It’s nothing.”
“Nothing?” Rising abruptly, she crossed the short distance between them. Shock rippled through her when she realized the damage had been done by a bullet. “My God, you’ve been shot.”
“It’s a graze, Lily. Hurts like the dickens, but it’s not serious.”
“How can a piece of lead tearing through flesh at a high rate of speed not be serious?”
“The medical term for it is flesh wound.”
“Why on earth didn’t you say something?”
“I didn’t want to distract you.”
“Distract me?”
He shrugged. “I didn’t think you could run and fuss over a flesh wound at the same time.”
A noise of exasperation escaped her. “I thought doctors were supposed to be smart about injuries.”
“We don’t panic.”
“For God’s sake, Robert, you could have been killed.”
“Any of us could have been killed,” he returned evenly.
The words chilled her because she knew they were true, and the guilt twisted brutally inside her. Because she didn’t want to think too hard about all the terrible things that could have happened, she turned her attention to the wound. The sight of it made her wince. The bullet had opened a two-inch-long gash. It wasn’t deep, but the surrounding flesh was swollen and badly bruised. She could tell by the stain on his sweater that it had bled quite a bit. “At least the bleeding has stopped,” she said.
He shot her a canny look. “Think you can butterfly me?”
Lily jerked her head. “Of course I can.”
Scowling, he limped over to Jack, knelt and set his hand against the baby’s plump cheek. Lily watched as Robert’s features softened, and in an instant he went from annoyed man to gentle father. “He’s sleeping well,” he said softly.
“Up until recently he was always a good sleeper,” she said, coming up behind him. “The vitamins really helped.”
Robert picked up one of Jack’s tiny hands and inspected his fingers. “Nail bed coloration is good.”
Kneeling beside him, Lily brushed her hand over Jack’s forehead. “Is he going to be all right?” she whispered.
For several moments, the only sound came from the crackling fire and the incessant rain outside. “He’s going to be fine,” Robert said.
“Promise me,” she said.
“I promise.”
She knew it was a promise he couldn’t ensure, but she desperately needed to hear it, needed even more desperately to believe it. “Thank you.”
The fire had eased the dampness from the cave. Slowly, Lily felt the tension at the back of her neck begin to unravel. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world when Robert reached out and brushed the wet hair from her cheek.
“Are you holding up okay?” he asked.
Lily nodded, resisting the urge to press her cheek against his hand. The backs of his fingers were warm and dry, and his touch reassured her as nothing else could have. Her heart beat a little unsteadily against her ribs when he brushed his thumb over the scar at her brow.
“I wouldn’t have left you that night,” he whispered. “If I’d been able to stay. I would have found you.”
Lily saw something she couldn’t quite identify in his eyes. Tenderness, perhaps. Affection tempered with caution. She wanted that to be enough, but it wasn’t. “I know.”
Taking her hand, he rose, and she rose with him. Need and the sweet ache of memories past tangled within her. She knew it was a dangerous thought, but she wanted to step into his embrace. She wanted to be held. She wanted to be kissed. For a short while she wanted to forget about all the troubles in the world. The dangers she had brought down on them.
“You’re shivering,” he said quietly.
“It’s cold.” But Lily knew damn good and well she wasn’t shivering because of the cold.
His gaze dropped to her mouth, but he made no move to get any closer. “We need to get your clothes dried.”