The Surrender of a Lady by Tiffany Clare

Author:Tiffany Clare [Clare, Tiffany]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Romance, Historical, Victorian, General
ISBN: 9781429946469
Google: zMxUsres-coC
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2010-09-27T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Awakening

The fog that had wrapped around her mind seemed to have eased. She’d been fighting it forever. At least it felt like forever.

Her eyes seemed too heavy to open. Her world spun in darkness. Never-ending circles, dancing round and round behind her lids. Her stomach clenched. She was rocking. It was as if she were swaying with the motion of a boat. Her stomach cramped some more, and a groan escaped her dry lips.

“Shh.” Someone whispered close to her ear.

She opened her mouth to speak, but her tongue was thick, dry and swollen. There was no saliva in her mouth to help aid her voice. She let out a croak, and the swirling circles came back with a force all their own, dancing viciously, nauseatingly in her head.

She groaned again and flung her arm out. The other arm felt like dead weight; maybe she was lying on it. Someone was with her. She hadn’t enough strength to open her eyes. She wrapped her hand around a big, hard male body. An arm?

“Amir?” she choked out.

The spinning got worse. Her stomach heaved, trying to expel its contents; but nothing came up. A hand wrapped around her stomach as she pitched forward, holding her in place.

“Give it some time. Be still.” Such a gentle, soothing voice.

She couldn’t be still. Did Amir joke? She only ever felt this ill when she was on a boat. “Amir,” she groaned again.

Buzzing in her ears made it hard to hear; her head was not only spinning, it was pounding unrelentingly.

Wetness touched her lips.

Water.

Her tongue touched the tip of a water skin. Fresh, so fresh and cool against her parched mouth.

“Drink,” the voice said.

It was so far away, as though someone were yelling to her through a wind tunnel. She sputtered, water flowed over her lips and down her chin.

“Slower . . .”

Coughing out the refreshing sustenance, she lurched forward and tried to vomit again.

She was on the floor, rocking back and forth. Someone held her tight from behind. Was that to keep her from moving? From falling?

“Water,” she tried to say.

He must have understood since the skin brushed across her mouth.

She took smaller sips. Her tongue felt less weighty, her lips less sore with the liquid swilling through her body. She felt so empty. As if she hadn’t eaten in a week.

“Sleep,” the soft voice said.

But she couldn’t sleep. Her head hurt, her eyes wouldn’t open, her stomach roiled with every wave of nausea that clutched her body. She must have come down with some illness.

“Amir?” Was she dying?

“Shh . . .”

“What’s happened? Dying?” She sobbed and heaved up nothing again. She sucked in great gulps of air only to heave once more.

“You are fine. We’ll make port in a few hours.”

“Port . . . ?”

She tried to open her eyes again. They seemed so heavy, so swollen. There was only darkness when she managed to crack one lid halfway, then she closed it when the pounding behind them worsened.

She was on a boat. That explained the sickness, and it also meant the man holding her was not Amir.

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