“No.” I said the word on a shocked, disbelieving breath. I’d known cats who liked baths more than Kamden McMillan. “You hate baths.”
I was a bonafide bath aficionado, but no matter how many times I tried to convince Kamden just how wonderful a bath could be, I’d never been able to get him to take one—even with me.
He flushed slightly but quickly turned away, burying his face in the freezer as he continued to rummage through its contents.
“They are not as terrible as I once thought them to be. Tonight, after trudging through the snow the mile from Margaret’s house, one seemed especially appealing.”
“Why did you walk all the way from Margaret’s house?”
“I knew her car wouldna make the trip, so I parked it in the old stables and drove her down in my own. By the time I left, my own car dinna see fit to make the trip either. I was forced to walk back.”
I shivered just thinking about it. It was a miracle he’d been able to manage it.
“Did that squelch any dreams you had of hiking Everest?”
He laughed and leaned back to close the freezer.
“Aye, ’tis funny that ye mention it. I was thinking just that about midway through the hike.”
It didn’t surprise me. Our thoughts usually followed along the same wavelength. Except when it came to matters of the heart.
Unless some miracle had occurred within the last five years, I knew that Kamden didn’t have a clue what to do with any of the dishes he was so hurriedly placing on the center island. Even with Margaret’s instructions, he would either burn the food or undercook it. With the initial surge of adrenaline subsiding, the growl of my stomach returned. I was far too hungry to let Kamden prepare the food.
“Why don’t you let me pick something and start warming it up? You can go finish up your bath.”
I moved from the doorway and made my way over to the island, not waiting for his answer as I began shuffling through the bags of frozen meals scattered on the counter.
“Aye, ye know better than to let me deal with the food. Thank ye.”
I stilled as his hands gripped my arms from behind. Before I could turn or say a word, I felt his lips gently touch the back of my head.
“Harper, ’tis good to see ye.”
He stepped away and left quickly, leaving me alone in the kitchen. I didn’t breathe until I heard his footsteps ascending the stairs. When I finally exhaled, my breath shook with need.
I slumped over, leaning my elbows on the counter and covered my face with my hands.
I was in so much trouble.
* * *
Morna’s Inn
* * *
“Jerry, come and see what I made wee Cooper for Christmas. ’Tis quite a bit larger than I intended, but I doona think it will be able to hold all the magic it needs to if I make it any smaller.”
She could hear her husband’s footsteps coming up the stairs, and she waited to say more until he entered. When his hands gently touched her shoulders from behind, she lifted it up for him to see.
“What do ye think? Will he like it?”
“It…’tis verra interesting. What is it meant to do?”
“Allow me to show ye.”
She waved him back, knowing Jerry well enough to know he wouldn’t wish to stand near her while she transported the gift backwards in time. It was an easy enough spell, one she used regularly for the letters she and the young boy sent back and forth to one another. While letters had always served the two of them just fine, Christmas was a time of magic. Why shouldn’t she fill the young boy’s life with just a little more of it?
“What exactly are ye showing me? Now that Cooper has the gift, how am I supposed to see what it does?”
Morna twisted and glared at her husband as she shook her head.
“Old age has made ye impatient and cranky. Give the child a moment to find it, will ye?”
Morna could sense the second Cooper picked up his gift, and she reached beneath her desk to retrieve her end of their new communication device—a small compact case, much like one she used to powder her nose. From the outside, Cooper’s looked like little more than a pocket watch. Inside, it would connect him straight to her.
She popped the case open and smiled as Cooper’s face appeared before her.
“Whoa, Morna, what is this? It’s awesome.”
“’Tis a new way for us to communicate. I made it small enough to put in yer pocket.”
He frowned, and his little lip twisted uncomfortably.
“I don’t have pockets.”
“I bet if ye asked Isobel nicely, she could sew ye some. Doona ye think?”
“Yeah, that’s a great idea. And she won’t tell anybody what the pockets are for either.”
Morna could see that Cooper sat on one of the castle’s stairwells. What she meant to tell him, all of his family needed to hear.
“Are ye alone? If so, can ye go and gather everyone around? I need yer help this night.”
Without saying another word, Cooper snapped the lid shut. She waited patiently for him to return. When he did, he was surrounded by all of McMillan Castle’s residents—Mitsy, Baodan, Eoghanan and Grace, even Jane and Adwen stood in the background.
Grace spoke first, her tone gently admonishing.
“Morna, you spoil him. The letters are enough. You know that he’ll never give you any peace now.”
She ignored Grace. She would never cease to spoil Cooper whenever she could.
“As ye all know, I’ve a penchant for matchmaking. I canna help it. ’Tis my calling and it allows me to indulge in my intrusive and meddling nature. There is a descendent of yers, a man who has ended up far more alone than any in the room with ye will ever have to be. He misses his family, and he needs a second chance at love. I mean to show him the magic this night, and I wish for him to have access to it from now on. Ye all can give him part of the family he craves. I canna bring back what he lost, but I can connect him with what I can. Will ye welcome him?”
The response was no less than what she expected. It only took a few minutes for them to work out all of the details. She bid them all a Merry Christmas and a quick goodbye. When she turned to face her husband, he looked baffled and exhausted.
“How do ye ever dream up such schemes? Ye doona intend to only send the lad through one travel, but two? I fear ye have a better chance of putting him in a psych ward than mending his heart.”
Morna hoped Jerry was wrong, but she couldn’t deny that she was more nervous about this spell than most. Never before had one of her subjects endured two entirely different travels in such a short period of time. She just had to hope that the man and his lass were of sound mind and body. For if not, her Christmas would be spent repairing damage rather than enjoying festivities with her husband.
Chapter 8
Kamden changed and left his room quickly. It wasn’t until he walked into the castle’s great room and met the portraits of past McMillans face-to-face that shock set in. Thoughts moved slowly through his mind and his limbs grew suddenly heavy. Unable to continue his path toward the kitchen, he leaned against the room’s back wall and slumped to the floor. He always sat with the room’s portraits when he needed guidance. Now he needed their reassuring presence to reaffirm his sanity.
Had what he remembered really happened? Was Harper truly standing in his kitchen right now, warming a meal for the two of them after all this time? The chances of it were so slim that it seemed impossible. And yet, he knew that it was true.
He knew it if for no other reason than the fact that Sileas refused to follow him upstairs. If it were only the two of them in the house, Sileas would have been on his heels every step. But if Harper was here, Sileas would choose her company over his any day of the week. The castle dog adored her—always had. Although, he couldn’t think of anyone that didn’t adore Harper. In all the years he’d known her, he’d never heard anyone say a bad word about her.
She tried to hide her shaking hands from hi
m, but he saw them before she slipped them into Sileas’ coat. It was the first place his eyes had gone—his effort to measure if Harper’s surprise at seeing him was genuine. Strong emotion of any kind always caused Harper’s hands to shake. Nervousness, excitement, even anger would send her hands bouncing. They validated everything she told him—she never would have come if she’d known he was here.
At first glance, the briskness of Harper’s tone and stiffness of her stature made her seem like a stranger, but once she joined him in the kitchen, he knew she was still the woman he knew and loved. He was glad for it. In his mind, nothing about her needed changing.
She was still the same bright, funny mind reader she’d always been. He loved how she could pick up on his thoughts before he said them. Just as he was about to suggest that she cook instead, she offered. It was always that way with her. She knew and understood him on an intuitive level that no one else in his life ever had.
In this dreary, dreadful storm, fate had blessed him with another chance. He was not the same stupid, frightened man of five years ago. He wouldn’t let her slip through his fingers once again.
He would have to tread slowly with her. While Harper’s strength still shone just as brightly through her hazel-colored eyes, there was hurt in them as well. Hurt he’d caused. Hurt that would take time to heal.
He hoped the storm would give them both enough time to return to one another.
* * *
Thirty minutes after Kamden went to change, I remained alone in the kitchen. While I’d never known him to take more than ten minutes to ready himself for anything, I understood why he took his time to join me. We both needed time to process. I was appreciative of the time alone.
After looking through the food that Margaret left, I chose an American favorite—meatloaf. The first year I dated Kamden, Margaret made it her mission to convince me of the merits of good Scottish cuisine. She never made anything other than traditional fare and quite stubbornly refused to let me cook. Despite her efforts, I never warmed to Scottish food.
By our second year, she started to believe that I was in it for the long haul and reluctantly began incorporating dishes that she knew were more suited to my tastes. They just so happened to be Kamden’s tastes as well. For as much as he loved fried, fatty, dreadfully unhealthy foods, he should have been born in America. To everyone’s annoyance, his body didn’t seem to change one bit no matter how much junk he put in his mouth.
In the years since I left Kamden, much about my own diet had changed radically. While I’d never been overweight, I’d never been skin and bone either. My mother always called me “squeezable.” Seeing as I didn’t find anything wrong with the way I looked, the label never bothered me.
Once I left Scotland, heartbroken and angry, I needed an outlet—something to burn off all of my pent up energy. I found cycling and eliminated most of the crap from my diet. With time, my soft physique turned into a sculpted I-bet-I-can-kick-your-ass bod that helped to reinforce the don’t-come-near-me vibes I worked so hard to put off. Pushing people away allowed me to control my own life, and it kept me safe from any other emotionally-stunted men that might wish to break my heart.
If someone had asked me only days before if I enjoyed my life of solitude, I would’ve said yes. Albeit, I have no doubt it would’ve sounded rather unconvincing. Now, I wasn’t so sure about anything. I didn’t know if it was just nostalgia or some long locked away part of my heart struggling to break free, but part of me longed to be the girl I used to be. I wanted to be the easygoing girl, the “squeezable” one who knew love and wasn’t afraid of it. I wanted to be the girl that went to bed wrapped in the arms of another. Since I knew there was no chance of that girl returning to me tonight, I decided to at least allow myself the meatloaf.
Standing in his kitchen brought back the memories I knew were inevitable upon coming here. I doubted many people on earth were as complicated as Kamden McMillan. He was always kind, attentive, and funny with me and everyone else around him. In all our time together, I never saw him be unkind to any of his employees. Even as overwhelmed as he’d been during our first year together while he was trying to save this place, even with all of the pressure of being a full-time college student with a castle estate to run, he stayed level headed, thoughtful, and kind.
Kamden and I did everything together. We talked endlessly about everything. Everything, that is, except love. Kamden didn’t speak about love in any context. I never heard the word come out of his mouth once. I understood why. The pain of growing up with a cold-hearted, closed-off toad made him weary of emotions. At least that’s what he told himself and anyone that ever asked about it.
In truth though, Kamden showed love unlike anyone I’d ever known. He showed his love for his home by tending to the castle during some of its toughest times. He showed his love for his education by sticking with school despite all of his obligations here. His employees knew that he loved them by his countless acts of kindness toward them. If one of the castle workers needed their water heater replaced at their home, he would be the first person to see it fixed. When one of his tour guides found out she was expecting, he saw to it that she didn’t lift anything heavier than five pounds until she went on leave. He was just that sort of guy.
I knew that he loved me, too. I never doubted it. He showed it in how he listened, expressed it in how he made love to me. I told myself that knowing he loved me was enough. I was careful to never tell him that I loved him either. I showed him in everything that I did and said, but if he wasn’t willing to say the words, then neither was I. We continued like that for years. Until the day that he proposed.
On that day, our silent agreement suffered a swift, clean break. As much as I loved him, as much as I knew he loved me, in that moment, I needed to hear the words. I simply couldn’t say yes without them.
In my joy at seeing him down on one knee, the words I love you slipped out of me easily—like I’d said them to him a thousand times. In my mind I had. I didn’t even realize that I’d made a mistake until the smile fell from his face and his grip tightened on my hands. When he should’ve reciprocated my words—in that moment more than any other—he closed himself off to me completely—all while continuing to slide the ring onto my trembling finger.
My heart shattered in the middle of that awful silence that hung between us, and I realized that for me, knowing wasn’t enough. I deserved more than he offered me in that moment.
Tears streaming down my face, I handed the ring back to him, walked over to where his car was parked and—leaving him stranded in the middle of a snowy field—I drove away. Some part of me always expected him to realize his mistake, sort through his issues, and come bring me back. He never did.
The memory no longer hurt the way it used to. For the first few years, each time I would play that scene over in my mind, I was filled with a mixture of heartbreak and rage that was so potent it would bring me to my knees. But with time, the feeling of loss decreased, and any anger that I felt for Kamden dissipated.
Kamden never meant to hurt me with his silence. If anything, I think my confession of love broke his heart, as well. I’m not sure he realized what he felt for me was love. He believed himself safe with me. Once I said the words to him, his illusion of safety shattered. He’d fallen into the most powerful emotion any person can feel, all without his knowing it.
I stood peeling potatoes when the sound of Kamden’s voice in the doorway caused my fingers to slip, sending the blade skimming across the end of one of my fingers.
I screamed and looked down to see blood saucing our side dish.
Chapter 9
Kamden was beside me in an instant, ushering my hand into the flow of water he turned on as he reached for me.
“I’m not much in the mood for potatoes. Do ye mind if I throw them in the bin?”
Our eyes met as I glanced up at him, and we both burst into laughter.
“I should never be allowed around anything sharp. Yes, throw them in the
trash.”
He stepped away to clean up the mess on the counter while I washed my hand. When he returned, he rested one hand on my lower back while his other moved to guide my hand away from the running water.
“Ye need to bind this. Hold a towel against it. I will go and grab a bandage. What did ye choose?”
Once exposed to air, the sliced skin burned quite badly. I gripped it tightly and tried to ignore the fact that it still bled profusely.
“Uh, meatloaf. Is that all right?” My voice sounded strained and aggravated. I’d always been a big wimp when it came to pain.
With his hand still on my back, Kamden steered me out of the kitchen, up the stairs and to a giant leather couch in the middle of the great room. A fire burned next to it.
“Aye, I love it. Sit here. I’ll return in a moment.”
As soon as I relaxed into the sofa, Sileas jumped up and cuddled into me. I could still feel the touch of Kamden’s hand on my back. Nervous, needy pinpricks raced up and down my spine. He was going to need to keep his hands off of me if I was going to manage to keep a level head over the course of the coming days.
Attraction didn’t erase the past. Attraction didn’t mean that Kamden could offer me all that he couldn’t years ago. Attraction was little more than a physiological response to the memory of our shared intimacy. It was normal, natural, and completely ignorable.
By the time he returned with gauze and bandages, the bleeding had stopped. I attempted to pull the supplies from his hands, but he resisted as he crouched down in front of me close enough that his knees bumped up against the edge of my shoe.
“I’ll do it. ’Twould not be verra easy for ye to manage on yer own.”
Hesitantly, I extended my hand and braced for the warmth of his fingers as they touched my own. My hands began to shake on impact, and I could see a grin begin to spread from the corner of his mouth. Damn him. He thought my shaking was a sign of arousal. And it was, but I sure didn’t want him knowing it.
A McMillan Christmas - A Novella: Book 7.5 of Morna’s Legacy Series Page 4
