by L. L. Muir
“Yes. It’s all for you.”
He was a little too excited and it broke her heart, knowing he was pretending just for her. But she wasn’t above taking advantage of his overacting. Every bite he took made him stronger, so as long as he was eating, she didn’t care why.
Or at least, she would pretend not to care as long as he kept eating. But as soon as he stopped, she was headed to the roof.
She glanced at the nail again, then at the window. No way the guy could have shimmied up that ladder without making a racket.
Her grandpa tried to distract her by moaning over the breakfast. “This is just what I needed. I thought you were going to make me eat mush again.”
She’d made him eat mush the first week they’d been in the apartment. Trying to be clever with their money, she’d made a detailed meal plan that would save hundreds on their food bill. But cracked wheat mush had been a bad idea. And the oatmeal.
He’d forced it down the first four days because she’d sold him on the idea of eating a traditional Scottish breakfast. But then he’d googled Traditional Scottish Breakfast and called her on the carpet.
The breakfast in the photos he’d found included sausage, eggs, ham, mushrooms, tomatoes of all things, and baked beans. Photo after photo had been the same, only some of them had some black stuff they’d learned was either Haggis or Blood Sausage, and she certainly wasn’t about to cook him those.
After the debate, she’d realized the cheapest option was to run down to the corner and get him a Sausage McMuffin most mornings.
Grandpa took a small bite of bacon and smiled. Then he turned green so fast she lunged for the empty ice cream bucket from the night before. He was able to keep down what he’d already eaten, but he insisted she take his plate away.
She came back with a cup of tea. He shook his head and closed his eyes, so she set the tea on his tray and turned to open the window.
“What are you doing?” He was wide awake again.
“Going up to see if I left that key in the shed, or in the lock.”
“Wha…what if my breakfast comes back up again?” She almost felt bad. He sounded so weak. But she stayed tough.
“You’ve got your bucket. I’ll be right back.”
The door buzzer interrupted. A climb up to the roof would have to wait, even though she wanted to get away from the thick, greasy smell of bacon that hung in the air like a cloud waiting for gravity to bring it down.
She went to the door and pushed the intercom. “Yes?”
“Hello?”
“May I help you?”
“Aye, lass. Ye can. This is Seoc Macbeth, from last eve. I’d appreciate the chance to apologize if ye will allow me to come up.”
She stepped to the end of the entry to exchange a look with her grandpa, whom she could see clearly with the portable screens moved out of the way. She half expected him to be jumping out of bed to come push the buzzer himself, but instead, his eyes were closed again. He’d dosed off. She couldn’t tell if it was a trick of the light coming through the big windows, but his color was wrong.
She hurried back to the intercom and pushed the speaker, while at the same time pushing the buzzer to release the door to the building.
“Yes. Please come. Apartment 404. And hurry!”
CHAPTER NINE
Cat already had the pulse/oximeter on her grandpa’s finger and was replacing the cannula with an oxygen mask when a very different looking Scotsman rushed into the room. His hair was tied at the back of his neck and he wore jeans and a baby blue t-shirt that was at least one size too small. It had a white logo on it, but she didn’t dare stare long enough to read what it said.
“He usually doesn’t need much oxygen in the mornings,” she explained in a quiet voice. “But he looks a little gray to me. And he’s usually not sleepy until about ten.”
The Scot came around the bed and she made room for him to get a close look. He picked up a pale, soft hand and looked closely at the nails. The oximeter beeped.
She peeked around his arm to read it. “Seventy-nine.” She adjusted the oxygen gage. “I should have tested him first thing.”
The Scot frowned at her. “Dinna look back, lass. Regrets are futile.”
She nodded. “Should we wake him up and make him take some deep breaths?”
He shook his head. “Maybe allow him to rest a wee while, aye? Let the machine do the work for a piece?”
She read the oximeter again. “Ninety-two. It’s recovering.” Only then did she start to shake with relief, or maybe from holding her breath too much, but either way, she was careful to hide her hands with her long sleeves.
With the Scot’s help, they placed the screens along the side of the bed, closed the curtains, and moved quietly into the kitchen. By that time, she was feeling normal again.
“I have to admit,” she said, “I’m glad you came when you did. I usually don’t freak out like that. I just…”
“Ye doona get enough sleep? Mm?” He stooped a little to make her look at him, then winked.
They’d ended up standing face to face in the narrow gap between the table and the cupboards. She smiled, but had to look away fast. The baby-blue of the t-shirt brought out the blue in his eyes and she was determined not to get lost in them. They were like two bright little puddles that she was careful to walk around or she’d ruin her shoes…or her life.
She’d always been careful to tell herself and everyone else that she would worry about making her own life later. She would date later. Have a family…later. Choose a real career…later. And no matter how long she held things off to take care of the grandpa, she knew she would never regret a day of keeping him close.
Besides, it wasn’t as if someone that looked like that would ever be interested in a simple barista with no time to waste at the gym, let alone go shopping for trendy clothes.
In a rather smooth move, she put some distance between them by turning her back and stepping to the stove. “Have you had breakfast?” When he didn’t answer right away, she faced him again. He was fidgeting with his hands.
With most of his hair tied back, she could see his face clearly. She couldn’t imagine what he was embarrassed about.
Finally, he spoke. “I admit I was up and at ‘em early this morn. I found a pastry shop and thought it would be a shame not to sample some of their confections while they were warm. And though I had intended to bring a box of them to share with ye and Alonzo… I am ashamed to say they did not survive the journey.”
She laughed. “Don’t tell me. Voodoo Donuts?”
“Aye,” he grinned. “They say the magic is in the hole, but I believe they are wrong.”
They laughed together then, but quietly.
She lifted an empty plate and shrugged. “If you ate the whole box, I don’t suppose you’d like bacon and eggs then.”
He craned his neck to look at the stove like a starving teenager. She rolled her eyes and told him to sit down at the table.
“Ah. Before I do that, I must make a confession, lass. Perhaps ye’ll wish to recant the invitation.”
She leaned back against the oven door and folded her arms. He’d sounded pretty nervous, which made her nervous too. But the only thing that might really upset her was if he started talking about Grandpa going downhill. If he did, she figured she could use the spatula to get him back out the door before he said too much.
He dug two fingers into his jeans pocket, pulled something out, and set it on the table. It was the key to her potting shed on the roof. She would have recognized the little jute loop anywhere.
“I took advantage,” he said, then stood at attention and waited.
“I don’t think you took the key on your own.” She glanced at the living room. “You couldn’t have known what it unlocked unless someone told you.”
His brow furrowed like he worried she wasn’t taking him seriously. “I accept all responsibility.”
“Oh, sit down, would you?” She turned her back to him again, dish
ed up a plateful, and set it on the table in front of him. “Some protein to go along with your donuts.”
He pulled out a chair and sat, apparently willing to forgive himself. She fixed another plate and two cups of coffee. He popped back to his feet when she joined him.
Manners. There in her own kitchen.
“So, are you homeless?”
He took a napkin from the pile on the table and wiped his mouth. She tried really hard not to watch, but failed.
“Only for a pair of days,” he finally said. “I’m…fresh from the boat, ye might say.”
“From Scotland?”
“Aye. And I’ve no ken how long my…plastic will last—”
“So you don’t want to pay for an expensive hotel?”
“Just so.”
She relaxed a little. Pinching pennies she could understand, but a doctor pinching pennies? Then again, maybe they didn’t pay British doctors like those in the U.S.
“So, what kind of doctor are you?”
He took a long sip of coffee and wiped those chiseled lips again. “Battlefield.”
Wow. The guy was just one surprise after another.
“Afghanistan?”
He finished off his last bite of toast and wiped his mouth again. She would have stopped grilling him while he ate, but he was already done. He pushed his plate back, gathered his mug between his hands, and leaned forward. The sleeves of his t-shirt would have groaned if they were capable of making noise.
“I served wherever my fellow soldiers fought.” He watched her face closely, then shrugged. “But I haven’t doctored anyone for quite a while now.”
That explained why he might have to pinch pennies.
“Well, I’m sorry you had to sleep on a lounge chair.”
“The chair and the fresh air was grand, lass. It was generous of yer grandfather to offer it, aye? But it pained my conscience to do it behind yer back, and I would ask yer forgiveness.”
“Forgiven.”
He insisted on helping clean up. For the next twenty minutes they danced around each other while they washed pans and tried not to clang them together. Every once in a while, one of them would make a misstep and they’d bump into each other, or clink the coffee cups, and they tried to not giggle. When it was all finished and the dish towel hung on the back of a chair to dry, she was almost sad it was over.
They faced each other in front of the sink. There was no reason for him to stay, no excuse to ask him to. But he wasn’t exactly running for the door.
“I’d like to thank ye for the breakfast, lass.”
“You’re welcome. And my name is Catherine.”
He shook his head. “Nay, Catherine. I’d like to thank ye properly.” He took two tiny, slow steps closer, swaying as he came. His hand rose to the side of her face just as it had the night before, and she realized he was going to kiss her.
He’s a stranger. Don’t let him do it!
The angel on her other shoulder urged her to wrap her arms around his neck and make it last until he ran for the door. She settled for something in between.
He lowered his head toward her, glancing back and forth from her lips to her eyes, giving her plenty of time to protest, giving her plenty of time to burn the moment into her memory. Finally, when he touched his lips to hers, she was relieved. In the back of her mind, she was expecting him to come to his senses and turn away at the last second.
But he didn’t.
Much to the disappointment of both angels on her shoulders, she didn’t push him away or hold him hostage. His hands rested lightly on her waist for a second or two, then he broke the kiss and stepped back. It was then she wished she would have taken the advice of angel number two…because it was going to be a very long time before anyone would get close enough to kiss her again.
“You’re welcome,” she said, then ducked her head, embarrassed. Avoiding his gaze, she turned and headed for the bedroom. “I’ll be out in a minute.”
Terrified of what sound might come out of her mouth next, she closed the door behind her, hurried over to the bed, and buried her face in a pillow. Her outburst was a cross between a scream and a laugh. It was just too insane to believe that a guy like him would look twice at her, let alone everything that had happened since she’d seen him at the coffee shop.
Was there a catch? Was there something she didn’t understand?
Maybe she’d been so busy with her current responsibilities that some fairy godmother had been forced to bring Prince Charming to her.
Now, wouldn’t that be nice?
But there was no room in her life for Prince Charming—at least not for a while. And it sounded like the guy wasn’t going to be in Portland for long anyway.
She sighed and rolled over onto her back, then got to her feet.
I guess he was just meant to be a one morning stand.
After a quick check in the mirror to make sure she wasn’t blushing anymore, she walked out into the living room with absolutely no idea what she would say next. But it didn’t really matter.
He was gone.
CHAPTER TEN
Seoc could have kicked himself all the way back to the coffee house. And mentally, he tried.
He was a fool. He’d allowed a lass to ruin everything!
Why hadn’t he made his excuses and gone on his way as soon as he realized the old man was terminal? Why? Had the Battle of Culloden taught him nothing?!
There had been a mistake made, of course, and young Rabby had made it. The morning after the battle, he’d met Seoc rising from his grave and pronounced he was the 76th ghost to join what soon became Culloden’s 79. What the others hadn’t understood was that he was never meant to be counted in their number. It should have been Culloden’s 78.
The blame lay on his own shoulders, of course. He never corrected the boy even after he’d gotten his bearings and realized he was, indeed, a ghost. It didn’t take long, however, for Seoc to understand that his reasons for holding tight to the in-between was not the same as his comrades’.
The others felt cheated, he knew. They were angry to have been taken from the physical world before they’d had their fair share of it. And they longed to be revenged, or at least have their tragedies heard, and rightly so.
But for Seoc Macbeth, it was different. It wasn’t the physical world he clung to, but the next life he fended off. On the far side of that shimmering veil that appeared from time to time to beckon him onward… stood a good sized army…waiting for him.
For two hundred sixty-nine years, he’d ignored that beckoning. He’d been content to bide out eternity on the moors. After all, there was no substance to time as it passed. No regrets for time squandered, no desperate search for the meaning of his existence. And when he felt a twinge of loneliness, there were humans to examine, tellies to watch, or 78 other ghosties who gathered from time to time to play at war.
Although, he did share one thing in common with the others—his attachment to a certain wee lassie who turned out to be a witch. He’d watched her grow, watched her interact with Number 79 and others. And all along, he’d suspected she had not come in vain.
On the night of the Summer Solstice, when she’d put forth her challenge, it had all become clear to him. She was to be their savior, but she’d meant to doctor their souls first. The carrot she’d dangled before them, the chance to exact their revenge on Prince Charles Stuart himself, had been the perfect bait for the rest.
Obviously, the offer hadn’t interested Seoc, and he’d wondered, when Soni got down to the last of them, how she might compel him to leave the moor. She’d been so confident. Had she known he was not like the rest?
Of course she had. She’d told him, there at the end, that she knew the desires of his heart.
Surprisingly, it hadn’t been until Rabby was sent away that Seoc truly considered leaving Culloden. The lad couldn’t have been harboring revenge in his heart, for he’d been too young for that deep a passion.
Nay. In a child that young, it
had to have been a fear for the next life that had tethered him to the moor. And in Seoc’s case, it wasn’t a fear, but a knowledge of what awaited him…
This patch of common ground between him and Rabby is what made him ask himself if he might be ready to face that wee army after all. It had been a long while since the shimmering veil had come to beckon him. And the new door Soni opened between one world and the next might well and truly close for good.
Content as he was to stay at Culloden for eternity, there was enough curiosity left in him to give it a go. Surely, what that army had in mind for him wouldn’t last forever either.
He was eager to face it and have done—if a certain witch would simply give him his task and remove him from Portland, Oregon before he did any more damage to the living. The night before, he’d slipped back into his old ways, thinking he could make a difference for the lass. But he couldn’t remove that terror from her eyes or her heart unless he lied about her grandfather’s condition. And then, when the old man died anyway, her heartbreak would be trebled.
Better to leave her and her grandfather be.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The scent of coffee grew stronger the closer he got the building to which Soncerae had delivered him. But with it came the memory of a certain kiss.
Damn that smile.
He lifted his forearm to his mouth, intending to wipe away the memory, but he couldn’t make himself do it. Had he so many such memories that he could afford to wipe this one away?
Nay.
He dropped his arm and left the tingling alone.
The line for coffee was out the door, much like the line for Voodoo Donuts had been just before dawn. His mood turned more sour when he stopped to wonder how many of the men in that line had come to patronize not the coffee house, but the sweet lass who worked there. Those fellows would be sorely disappointed.
Feeling smug, he pardoned his way past the line and into the building. The coffee he’d just enjoyed had been far superior than could be anything on the menu, what with a kiss for a sweetener. But he wasn’t there for coffee. He had come to clear his head and perform his task. Better to complete his quest and go before someone’s heart was injured—not just the lass’s, but his own.