by L. L. Muir
“Of course.” She spit both the words and the grit from her mouth.
As if to underscore Rory’s prediction, a thunderous boom shook the air and like a shot, the low roiling clouds fired a deluge of icy, stinging rain. Rory’s attempt to shelter Lilly within his plaid came too late, but she hurriedly shoved her precious papers at him, tucking them inside the thick wool, praying they weren’t completely ruined as they ran the rest of the way.
Soaked to the skin, Lilly shivered next to her car, fumbling with stiff, icy fingers to pull the key fob from the pocket of her jeans. After what seemed forever, she flopped on the driver’s seat, letting Rory close the door behind her before hurrying around to the other side. By the time he slid in beside her, she was talking to the heater. “Warm up, warm up,” she coaxed, over the chattering of her teeth. Her chin was so stiff with cold, her words sounded garbled.
Rory pulled the papers free of his plaid, careful not to drip on them.
“Are they ok?” Lilly asked, leaning over to get a closer look.
“Aye. They appear fine. He set them in the back, took her hands in his and alternately warmed them with his breath and chaffed them between his big palms. “Dinna fash, lass. The storm will likely blow itself out and be gone as quickly as it appeared.
“Probably.” Lilly couldn’t do much more than nod.
Finally, a hint of heat tinged the air coming through the vents. Manna from heaven.
She pulled her hands from Rory’s and held them next to a vent as the encounter with Kintray replayed in her head. “I c-couldn’t understand why Kintray refused to look at my paperwork, or s-show us what he claimed to have.” Her chin was stiff with cold, making talking difficult, but she needed to get the incident straight in her head.
“But then, when he used the same words, the same threat…” She felt a little queasy. “That was far more than some bizarre co-incidence.”
“Aye,” Rory ground out. “The blackguard is involved somehow, but I dinna ken—”
“It’s impossible for Simon to have known I’d be at McAdams’ office!” Lilly spat out, trying to make sense of her jumbled thoughts. “Or that I had any business dealings with him. Or, that I’d be arriving in Scotland at all. Especially, today.” She flopped back against her seat, feeling almost violated. “How could he have known?” Those words kept swirling around in her head, with no viable answer.
Unless… No. She trusted McAdams. The information couldn’t have come from there. Who then? His secretary? McAdams had made Lilly an offer from an anonymous buyer. Maybe that buyer was not so anonymous after all?
She felt betrayed. She may be jumping to some big conclusions, but there were no other logical answers.
“I was wrong to assume Simon Kintray wasn’t dangerous, Rory.” She glanced at him. “I’m sorry. I should have trusted you.” Maybe, he was the only person she could trust.
A strange look crossed Rory’s face. “I wish I’d been wrong.”
Lilly blew out a heavy breath, still feeling stunned and bewildered. “I still don’t understand how he plans to prove his claim. I hold the deed! He simply has no case!”
Surely my paperwork is legitimate.
McAdams had made it clear he wouldn’t be available for several days. Was that on purpose? It would be impossible to talk with him before she met with the constable in the morning, if in fact, there was to be a constable. Simon’s threat to take things into his own hands may prove far more ominous.
“Perhaps I should request a constable, myself.” Lilly said. “But he would only shift the burden of proof back to McAdams, and probably the courts.” She shrugged. “I have no further recourse than to wait until I can contact McAdams.”
Rory nodded. “Nay a legal one, anyway.”
Too tired, wet, and cold to even consider something like that, she lifted the weight of her hair off her neck and tried blotting the dripping ends with the sleeve of her jacket, far too saturated to be of any help.
“We must get ye out of those wet things and get some warmth in ye.” Rory stated, concern etching faint lines at the corners of his eyes. “Ye’ll catch yer death, if ye stay as ye are.”
Lilly nodded, her muscles beginning to ache from shivering. “I have some dry clothes in my luggage. But,” she attempted a stiff-shouldered shrug, “I’m afraid there’s nothing in there to fit you.”
Even though she’d been joking, she glanced at the kilt she’d grown overly fond of since she’d met him. She couldn’t imagine him in anything else. But it was imperative that he too, get into something warm and dry.
The sudden image of Rory in nothing but a towel, fresh from a steamy shower flashed in her mind, and once there, wouldn’t leave.
His chuckle was a deep, warm, rumbling sound. “Aye. ’Twould take a bonny big pile of yer wee things, to cover me.”
“We’ll…uhh, have to find you something.” She shifted the car into gear and concentrated on steering back across her earlier tracks, desperate to wipe away her thoughts and the ominous cloud of Kintray’s threats.
“I hope we can get out of here without getting stuck. I recall passing a B&B not too far back. Maybe, we can get a room there.” She felt the embarrassing warmth of a flush creeping up her neck. “Rooms…I mean.”
“Lodgings?” Rory asked, an odd timbre to his voice.
“Yes,” she replied, turning onto the main road, struggling to see through the deluge and the rapidly flashing windshield wipers. “So we can both— Oh!” She flashed a quick, horrified gaze at Rory. “Oh! I’m sorry, that was presumptuous of me. In all the excitement, I…forgot.”
She focused on the road and the slick cover of water, as much to hide her face as to steer the car. “I really am sorry, Rory,” she repeated, contritely. “I’ve been so caught up in what I wanted, what I needed, what my problems were, I actually forgot about our bargain. Which is absurd, after you just recently said you couldn’t promise to…stay.”
“Lilly, I’ve—”
“It’s just that…well, you’ve become important to me. A…friend.” She swallowed hard, trying to understand why that word felt so hollow, why it wasn’t enough to encompass everything she felt about him. How could she accept his leaving her so soon?
But, friends don’t take friends for granted, she reminded herself.
“Aye, well, I—
Without taking her eyes from the road, she reached over and grasped his hand, struggling to keep her disappointment from coloring her voice. “I apologize, Rory. I’ll drive you back to Culloden Moor, or your home, or wherever you want to go. I guess I didn’t anticipate how difficult it would be to move forward on this journey without you. It feels like we’ve been friends for a very long time. Not just a day.” She tightened her grip and felt his fingers squeeze hers, in response. “The strangest part of all is that for some reason, it feels like you belong to that land as much, maybe even more, than I do, and—”
“Stop, Lilly.” He laughed. “Let me get a wee word in.” He placed his other hand atop hers. “Aye, ’twas a day we bargained on, and I still have a debt I must honor, but I ken it can hold one extra day. But I’ve only the one more to give ye.” He brushed his thumb over the back of her hand. “On my honor, Lilly, if more tomorrows were mine to give, ’twould be yours without the askin’. I dinna ken anywhere I’d rather be, than beside ye. Especially…” His sigh was a mixture of worry and regret. “Especially with Kintray’s threats more reality than bluff. I wish…”
She could tell how conflicted he was. When she glanced at him, it showed in the tight lines around his eyes and mouth. Whatever debt he owed, must weigh heavily upon him.
Despite feeling guilty for causing both his anxiety, and his delay, she grasped at the chance to keep him with her another day. “Thank you, Rory,” she whispered. “I’m grateful.”
She was shamefully relieved he’d be beside her to face Kintray. But, she realized, she wanted him to stay for far more than just backup for a difficult situation.
Somewhe
re along the way, she’d come to care about him, a great deal. Her only surprise was how right that felt.
He raised her hand and pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist. “Ye’ve a few hours still remaining of yer birthday. For tonight, why don’t ye set yer troubles aside and celebrate coming home to yer McCallum roots. Yer grandmother Iseabail would be verra proud of ye.”
The burn of tears struck without warning, brimming over her lashes before she could stop them. She did have her land and another day to spend with this remarkable man. For tonight, that was everything.
~ ~ ~
A mixture of melancholy and elation battered Rory as they pulled into the lodgings Lilly remembered passing. Charming, she had called the old structure sitting back within a circle of ancient trees. Even in the rain, lights sparkled amid the thrashing branches, like a burst of wee sprites, to welcome them.
A fitting place, he supposed, to spend a few quiet hours with Lilly, though he dinna wish to share her with the innkeepers, or other stragglers like themselves, looking for shelter from the storm. Selfish or no’, he wanted her completely to himself.
“Well?” Lilly asked, turning off the car and facing him. “Ready to get wet again? I need to grab my suitcase from the trunk before we make our mad dash for cover. I don’t know about you,” she gathered her purse and the keys, “but I’m starving.” Their eyes met in the dim interior and held a few moments before she broke away. “Let’s hope they serve something here besides breakfast.”
“Aye.” Rory agreed, noting the odd tone in Lilly’s voice. Though his belly was achingly empty, his real hunger would no’ be satisfied by any amount of food. ’Twas Lilly he wanted. Tonight, tomorrow. Forever.
“Ready?” Lilly asked, her expression a mixture of a tease and a promise. “Set. Go!” She launched herself into the deluge before he could ken what her words meant, but he caught up with her as she opened the trunk and he reached inside for her case.
Lilly closed the trunk, flung her arms wide and spun in a circle, much as she’d done when first seeing her property. “You’re a part of me, Scotland. I love you!” She shouted into the gusting rain. “I love you.” She spun again. “I love you.”
“I love you.” On her last spin, and whispered declaration, she stopped in front of Rory, close enough her steaming breath fanned his face while her words tore at his heart. He knew ’twas for Scotland, no’ him, but ’twas the closest he would ever come to hearing those coveted words.
With great difficulty, he swallowed the urge to repeat them back to her. “Are ye daft, lass?” he asked instead, looking down at her. “Ye’ll catch yer death, and then what will Scotland do, without ye?”
They stood inches apart in the swirling wind and rain, gazes locked. There was something haunting about the look in Lilly’s eyes that Rory couldn’t quite read.
“What will I do without Scotland?” she whispered back.
Long seconds passed as Rory clenched his fist around the handle of the case, wanting desperately to drop it and gather her close, press his lips to the rivulets cascading down her face, to know if those were tears mixing with the rain, as he suspected. But if he did, he wasna sure he could step away again. ’Twas no’ fair to her, to either of them, to suggest there was hope he could stay, where naught existed.
“Ye’ll keep going,” he finally answered, struggling to maintain the distance between them. “Ye’ll fight for yer dream, like all the Scots afore ye. Ye have yer grandmother’s courage, Lilly. I believe in ye.”
Her chin quivered, from emotion or cold, he couldna be sure, but she seemed to come to, or accept, some decision. “Aye,” she finally whispered. A few seconds passed before she tucked her arm through his and turned them toward the lodging house. “Let’s get out of this rain.”
They stopped under the cover of the porch and shook the worst of the water off themselves but ’twas too late to do more than wipe their feet and drip their way inside.
A blast of warm air assaulted them, along with the pleasant scent of spices and the wide smile of a middle-aged woman. “Welcome!” The woman waved them in. “ ’Tis no’ a night for anyone to be outside.” She folded her hands over her broad waist. “Is it a room ye’ll be needin’, then?”
“Yes. Please,” Lilly replied. “One night. Perhaps, longer. May I let you know tomorrow?”
“Of course.” The woman smiled, leading her to a desk. “ ’Tis fortunate ye arrived when ye did. I’ve but one room left.” She glanced out a window. “The storm ye ken. But ye’ll like this one. ’Tis our best.”
“Thank you.” Lilly rummaged in her bag and handed the woman two wee cards.
After a moment, the woman handed Lilly’s cards back, along with a key. “Just up the stairs to yer left. The honeymoon suite.” She gave them both a shrewd grin. “Ye’ll be wantin’ to get settled and into some dry things. I’ll send up some tea and buns in a bit to tide ye over until six. That’s when we set out a wee supper buffet of soup and cold meats, if ye care to partake.”
“Thank you, that sounds lovely,” Lilly said to the woman.
Rory was tantalized by the mention of food, but felt a bit daunted by a honeymoon suite. He knew full well what a honeymoon was, but did they require a full set of rooms to that end, in this century?
He glanced at Lilly who didn’t seem the least bit troubled as she took his arm and moved toward the stairs.
Rory didn’t have words to describe what he beheld when Lilly opened the door to their room. In truth, his gaze didn’t get too far beyond the wide bed dominating the center of the room. He’d never seen anything so big or so high. Thick sturdy posters anchored a swath of sheer white drapery that covered the top like a mist over the moor, and cascaded down each poster, to puddle on the floor.
He swallowed hard. ’Twas no a bed for a hardened, grimy warrior who’d been sleeping in naught but a hollow in the ground for the last few centuries. No matter, he chided himself. He had no place there. Lilly dinna belong to him. And he could never belong to her.
“Isn’t it lovely?” Lilly asked, stripping off her wet jacket. “It’s the most charming room I’ve ever been in.” She removed her shoes and set them on a paper she found in the open closet. “Do you mind if I shower first?” She was already undoing buttons as she peeked through another doorway.
His gaze was fixed on her fingers which were now on the fourth button, and swiftly moving down.
“Rory?” She prompted.
“Huh?” He dragged his gaze to her face. “What?”
“Are you going to put that down?” She gestured toward the case. “I need to get some dry things from it.” She pointed at a folding stand against the wall. “How about there?”
Rory followed her instructions, trying not to touch anything or step anywhere unnecessarily. To keep from staring at the slightly gaping opening in Lilly’s shirt, he let his gaze wander the rest of the room. “Dinna ye ken ’tis a wee bit too—”
“Much?” she finished for him, laughing. “Not for a honeymoon suite. They’re always designed to make the honeymoon couple feel special.”
“Special?” He let the word hover in the air a moment to see how it fit. “Nay,” he shook his head. “ ’Tis a bit of a fright, I’m feelin’. I dinna belong in such a place.” He turned to her, worried he had disappointed her, yet again. “Does it make ye feel special, Lilly?”
Her smile faded as she stepped close to him and lifted her face to his. “A little,” she whispered, untying the leather thong that held the top portion of his hair back, letting it fall around his face as she fanned the length of it across his shoulders. “But not as much as you do.”
His gaze drifted down her face, to her lips and further, where her curves teased the gap in her shirt with each deepening breath. Smothering a groan and struggling to banish his thoughts, he came back to her face, determined not to take advantage. Doing so would hardly constitute a heroic deed, no in Soni’s mind, anyway. Nor in his, truth be told. Lilly was far too precious to him.
>
“Ye’re trembling, lass. Best ye get out of these wet things.” At the slight widening of her eyes, he added, “And into something warm.”
The corners of her mouth curved slightly. “Why, Rory Patterson, I believe you’re blushing.”
He stepped back, horrified. “I…if… Nay! ’Tis naught but the cold ye see.” Even he could hear the falseness of his words and was shamed even further. “Were ye no’ intendin’ to take a bath? Was someone to tote the hot water up for ye? I’d be happy to go get—”
“Tote?” Lilly laughed. “They’re sending tea up for us, but I’m sure they can manage.” She turned toward her case. “I’ll hurry so you can have a turn, then we’ll have that tea together.”
He was still confused about the bathwater, but decided not to say more about it.
As she disappeared into the adjoining room, he decided to light a fire in the fireplace to take the chill off the room and dry himself a bit before he risked damaging the furniture.
Watching the flames flicker to life, lick the wood and gain strength, he thought of what he’d faced today, in Kintray’s shed. His old fears and haunted memories had slammed into new and present dangers for Lilly.
He wasna sure what they’d face tomorrow, but staying with Lilly, protecting her, was the right decision. He couldna ken how Soni would see it. Mayhap, ’twas more a selfish choice than a heroic one, but ’twas the only choice his heart could make.
CHAPTER TEN
Twenty minutes later, the fire had taken the chill from the room, but Rory, still damp to the core, shivered as he gazed out the window at the thrashing branches of the trees, unmercifully battered by the storm.
The click of a door opening turned him as surely as a puppet string. Lilly emerged from the steamy room like a waif appearing though the mist on the moor, just as tiny, just as lost. Just as vulnerable. But he knew her to be strong. Independent. Determined. Mayhap the most determined lass he’d ever known.
By the saints, how he wished he had a life to share with her!
“Sorry I was so long, but that hot water felt so good, I could have stayed in there forever,” she said toweling the ends of her damp hair. “But, I decided to leave a little warm water for you.”