The only thing Drew was interested in upon staggering to the house that particular evening was bed. A long, long night’s sleep in his bed with nothing and no one bothering him.

He would more than likely dream of ornery, impossible steer throughout the course of his sleeping, but it mattered not so long as he did sleep. His only hope was to awaken with the deep, throbbing soreness of his muscles having resolved itself overnight.

Perhaps he might convince Anne to boil water and fill the washtub on his behalf. A long soak in hot—

He came to a sudden halt just inside the front door. The main room, where Anne ought to be tending supper and the bairns ought to be at play, was empty.

“Anne!” he shouted, his voice far too loud for the small space, echoing to the point where it rang in his ears.

Within moments, there came a clattering noise from the twins’ bedchamber. Anne flung the door open, dashed out of the room and closed the door behind her in one single movement, or so it seemed.

“They are sleeping,” she whispered, going to the fire where a second pot bubbled away.

“Sleeping? So early?”

“They are ill.” Anne ran the back of her arm over her forehead, then tucked an errant lock behind one ear before wrapping her apron around the handle of the smaller pot and lifting it from its hook over the fire.

Drew’s heart clenched. “Ill? How so?” He joined her at the work table beneath the window, where she placed the pot before turning to fetch clean rags from a pile at the other end.

“Grippe, or so it appears.” She hardly looked at him as she went about her work, stirring the dreadful smelling mixture in the pot before dipping the rags into the mess.

“What is that?”

“It aids in healing,” she explained. “Once the mixture cools, I shall apply it to their chests and allow them to sleep with it against their skin.”

“And what will that do?” Lord above, he could hardly breathe. They were ill. Ill! With the grippe! “Are they not too young to be so ill?”

Finally, she looked up into his eyes, her own widening as if in sudden understanding. “Och, Drew, they shall be well. I promise ye. They shall cough and bring up phlegm, and their fevers will run high for a day or two, but it shall pass. They are healthy otherwise. If they were sickly children, I would be more concerned.”

“Just the same,” he insisted, grinding his fist into his other palm. “Perhaps I ought to fetch a healer.”

She went back to work, shrugging lightly. “If ye insist, but I would wager nearly anything in the world that any healer would tell ye as I have. If they dinna try to sell ye some strange tonic or poultice the moment they see how worked up ye are.”

“I am not worked up, lass.” He stormed to the closed door and opened it, but just a crack, just enough that he might see into the room. Anne had left a candle burning on the table, by which he could see the pair of them asleep.

How his heart seized at the way their wee heads turned left and right, soft rumbling sounds in their chests as they coughed. Owen let out a soft whimper which nearly brought tears to Drew’s eyes. How pitiful they looked and sounded, with their flushed faces and uneasy slumber.

“Drew,” Anne whispered, beckoning him. “Allow them their rest. Do ye not recall being ill as a laddie?”

He closed the door as softly as he might, trying to remember back that far, and when he did, his aching heart ached all the more. “Aye. Bridget nursed me.”

Anne’s expression fell somewhat. “Och, I see. She was a fine sister to ye.”

“The finest,” he agreed. A bucket of water sat by the hearth, as always, and he used it to rinse his face and hands. “I ought to fill this with fresh, that they might have plenty to drink. That is one thing I recall Bridget forcing me to do.”

“A fine idea.” Anne flashed a warm, genuine smile as she hung the soaked, stinking rags to cool over the edge of the table.

He was glad for the excuse to be out of the house, for the memories of his sister were too thick and too tender to be examined while in the presence of the lass. They reminded him of a half-healed bruise which did not cause pain during normal movement but hurt like the devil when prodded.

Bridget’s smile. Her kind, caring words and the gentleness with which she’d mopped his sweat-soaked brow. How she’d sung to him in low, gentle tones—wordless, mostly, just a sweet melody which had lulled him into sleep.

He’d thought of her as the closest thing to an angel imaginable.

Moira would look a great deal like her mother someday.

It was nearly enough to make him laugh at himself. Was he a woman now? Allowing himself to give in to emotion over a simple illness which children survived every day? He gritted his teeth as he turned the crank to raise the bucket. Foolishness, plain and simple, and he was not a foolish man.

Yet there was no ignoring the way his throat tightened when he imagined their discomfort; to say nothing of how he’d already come to rely on their happy, laughing voices when he entered the house every evening.

They would be well soon enough, or so he told himself. Anne was correct. They were healthy children, not sickly or weak. They would be well.

Even so, he made haste to return to the house with the water, for there was no telling when they would need it.

“They shall remain home, with Anne, until they’re well enough to visit ye,” Drew explained. “I would not have them coughing and disturbing ye now.”

“Poor lambs.” Davina was out of bed, the first time he’d seen her up and about in many weeks. She fussed over a pot of soup, its aroma enough to make his mouth water.

Shana sliced potatoes at the long kitchen table. “How is Anne? Worn out, I would imagine.”

“Aye, that she is, but there is no convincing her to rest. I wish she would, and that is a fact, but she insists she can care for them both. She was hard at work when I left, preparing a new poultice, with bedding hanging over the line to dry. She’d just scrubbed it in the tub behind the house.”

“I shall send ye back with soup tonight,” Davina promised. “The poor thing ought to at least have supper prepared for her.”

“And by yourself, no less.” He grinned. Seeing her on her feet, bustling about the kitchen as if she’d never taken ill, was a true relief. “I’m sure Rufus was relieved to find ye well enough to get up from bed.”

The women exchanged a look. “I would not say he was relieved,” Davina murmured, eyes downcast. The flare of her nostrils, the set of her jaw reminded him of the fiery lass he’d met on the road to the farm. How she had tormented his cousin with her stubborn ways. She was not to be trifled with.

He could only imagine the thrashing she’d delivered when his cousin had balked at the notion of her being on her feet.

“He shall come to his senses,” Drew predicted. “He merely wishes to keep ye safe and well—yourself and the bairn, as well. He has good intentions.”

“Those good intentions shall be the death of him,” she muttered, her hand tightening around the handle of the kettle. “Or I shall be if he does not learn to give me space.”

Shana offered a reassuring smile before glancing toward Drew and grimacing. So the fight had been a woeful one. He was nearly sorry he’d missed it, though Anne had needed his assistance to fetch more water, hang the sodden bedding and more before he left to begin his work.

“Remind Anne that she ought to take care with herself,” Shana suggested. “It would be a pity if she wore herself out while tending the twins.”

“I shall do just that,” he promised, backing from the room. “And Davina.”

She looked up, frowning—likely with the memory of the fight with Rufus, or at least he hoped. Woe to he upon whom she looked with those angry, sullen eyes and that defiant jaw. Would that she never looked upon him that way. He was uncertain he’d live through the ordeal.

“I shall speak to Rufus,” he promised, “and when I visit the village on the morrow, I shall pay another visit to the healer.”

The anger in her eyes cleared. Her jaw released. “Ye need not bother. I can do it.”

“Nonsense. I already plan to take the cart in. And dinna even think of handing me a shilling,” he added. “Think of it as a gift.”

“I was correct about you,” Shana smirked.

“What’s that?”

She shrugged as if it meant little. “I told Anne ye were a good man. I suspect she did not believe me, but perhaps she will with time.”

He wished fervently that she had not spoken a word, and felt it best to leave the matter alone.