Why ask him? Damn it, how did he get to be the authority? But he crouched down, unable to resist that trembling lip. "Sure she is. She just got some bumps, that's all."
Ali's lips curved a little. "Okay."
"She fell off the cliff," Kayla continued. "And found Seraphina, and she got hurt, but you and Max came to pull her back up. Mrs. Williamson said Max should have a whole bushel of carrots."
He grinned, tousled her hair. "What do I get?"
"She said you already got your reward. What is it?"
"Search me."
"You got hurt too." Soberly, Kayla lifted his bandaged hands one at a time and kissed them. "Do they hurt? Does that make it better?"
Emotion swarmed through him, a stinging hive of bees that left behind a sweet ache. No one, in all his life, had ever kissed his hurts. "Yeah, much." He pressed his face into her hair for a moment. Wishing. Wanting.
"Is it all right if we go down and see Max?" Instinctively Ali stroked Michael's hair to soothe him. "To thank him."
"Yeah, he'd like that. Ah, your mom…"
"She's in the parlor. Everyone's supposed to be quiet so she can rest. But you can go in." Ali beamed at him. "She'd want to see you. And Kayla and I are going to get up every morning early before school and clean the stalls until your hands are better. You don't have to worry."
"I—" Coward, he thought. Tell them you won't be here. Tell them you're leaving. Couldn't. Just couldn't. "Thanks."
As they dashed off, he watched them, two pretty young girls racing away through fanciful gardens. He stepped over the scattered jacks, and after three tries managed to lift his hand and open the terrace door.
She wasn't lying on the couch as he'd expected, but standing at the window, her back to the room, looking out toward the cliffs.
She was so… small, he thought. Everything about her telegraphed fragility, and yet she was the strongest woman he'd ever known.
She should have seemed delicate just then, highly breakable, with her hair pulled back, the soft, fluid folds of a white robe wrapped around her. But when she turned, and those last gilded beams of the setting sun danced against the window at her back, she seemed simply indestructible. "I was hoping you'd come." Her voice was calm, as was she. A close brush with death had shown her that she could indeed survive anything. Even Michael Fury. "I wasn't able to thank you coherently before, or to see how badly you were hurt."
"I'm fine. How's the head?"
She smiled. "It feels as though I smashed it on a rock. Would you like a brandy? I'm not allowed, myself. My many medical advisers tell me I can't have any alcohol for twenty-four hours."
"No, I'll pass." The whiskey he'd downed earlier wasn't sitting very well as it was.
"Please, sit down." Leading with manners, she gestured to a chair. "We've had quite a d
ay, haven't we, Michael?"
"I won't forget it anytime soon. Your shoulder—"
"I've had enough fussing. It's sore." She sat, smoothing down her robe as she did. "I'm sore. My head aches, and occasionally I get this quick twist in my stomach when I let myself think about what might have happened. What would have happened if you hadn't found me."
Her brow lifted as she watched him prowl the room. Other than that first long stare when she'd turned to him, he'd barely looked at her. To keep her own hands still, she linked them in her lap.
"Is something else on your mind, Michael, other than my medical report?"
"I just wanted to see—" He stopped, hooked his thumbs in his pockets, and made himself look at her. "Listen, I don't see any point in leaving this business hanging between us."
"What business?"
"You're not in love with me."
Patiently attentive, she angled her head. "I'm not?"
"No, you've just got it all mixed up with sex, and now probably with gratitude, and that's just stupid."