Despite his exhaustion, he smiled at her. She was as dirty as he was, and her face and bare hands, now she’d removed her gloves, were white with cold.
“Why, it’s my home, mo chridh.”
And one day yours, if heaven grants me the privilege.
She shifted around, lighting more candles. Outside, she was a companion in adversity, almost genderless. But in this confined space, he became powerfully conscious of her femininity.
He tore his gaze from Charlotte and surveyed his surroundings. “Well, this is a bonny place for a shepherd to take his leisure.”
The hut was unheated but dry. Right now, after the deluge outside, dry was enough.
“It comes in useful when the weather turns bad.”
“Aye, I can see that.”
“We can catch our breath before we check on the sheep.”
“Sheep now?”
“Yes.” In the gloom, her eyes were deep and mysterious. “Are you hungry?”
I’m hungry for you.
When she struggled out of her oilskins, he took off his thick gloves and moved to help. During the last hours, he’d come to loathe the smell of rain. But the scent of the storm clinging to Charlotte was fiendishly appealing.
Under the oilskins, her outfit was unconventional for a lady, but perfect for slogging through the mire. Her blouse and serviceable skirt cut to mid-calf over boots reminded him of her Cinderella costume.
He closed his eyes, resting his hands on her shoulders and praying for control. Where the hell did he find the energy to think of sex?
“My lord?” she asked uncertainly, turning to him. “Has your voice rusted away?”
In a gesture of affection and admiration, he squeezed her shoulders. And stepped away from temptation. Only a barbarian would leap on her now, when she was weary and distracted and defenseless. Anyway, damn it, he had more livestock to rescue. He needed to conserve his strength.
“Not quite.” He shrugged off his oilskins. They’d protected him from the worst of the wet so his clothing beneath was damp, not sodden. It was cold in the hut, but better than outside. “Did you mean it about feeding me?”
When she smiled and bent to squeeze the worst of the water from her hem, he was glad that he’d ignored his baser urges. For the first time, her expression held a hint of trust. Wading through all that mud suddenly seemed worthwhile.
Which didn’t stop his heart from leaping with excitement when she began to fiddle with her skirts. His rocketing pulse settled when he watched her untangle two leather pouches from the belt and set them on the rough deal table.
“I’ve got ham sandwiches and fruitcake. They’re a bit squashed.”
“Charlotte, you’re magnificent,” he said lightly. “Will you marry me?”
Her eyes glinted with amusement. Somewhere today while they’d been herding recalcitrant cattle, a miracle had occurred. Before, whenever he mentioned marriage, she’d stiffened up like a startled cat. Now she looked flustered, but not entirely displeased.
“No.” She passed him a thick sandwich. “And I haven’t given you permission to use my Christian name.”
“Thank you.” He settled on the wooden bench set against the wall, the hut’s only seating. “Etiquette decrees that when a man has pulled a lady from the mud three times, he’s permitted to address her in intimate terms.”
Charlotte joined him on the bench, biting into her sandwich. Her nearness warmed his side. Convenience or progress? “I must have missed that one.”
“One of Beau Brummell’s strictures,” he said, starting his lunch.
She was right. The food was squashed, but at least it was dry. Right now, he was hungry enough to gnaw the leg off the table, and this simple fare was delicious.
“And once the lady has returned the favor by assisting the gentleman after he’s fallen flat on his rump, she’s required to call him Ewan.”
“Even if that’s not his name?”
“Even so,” he said solemnly.
She snickered and bumped him with her elbow. “You talk such nonsense.”
“Och, you turn my brain to porridge, lassie. I lost all sense the moment I looked into your lovely eyes.”
“More nonsense.”
Silly chit thought he was joking.
She studied him through the gloom. “Tell me about…Selvain.”
Her curiosity pleased him. Yesterday even if she’d wanted to know, she wouldn’t have unbent enough to ask. If hauling a few heifers out of a bog inspired this amity, he couldn’t regret the morning’s discomfort. “Silvaig.”
“Yes.”
“It’s a wee island near Colonsay in the Hebrides. The Macraes have been lairds there since Viking days.”
She rose to pass him the last sandwich. “How romantic that sounds.”
“Aye. It is. When it’s not blowing a gale fit for Hampshire.”
She smiled. “I’m sure, even then, it has a certain charm.”
“Only if you’re a wee duck,” he said, dividing the sandwich and offering her half. “Here.”
She shook her head. “No, I’ve had enough. Thank you.”
“I’d hate it to go to waste.” A couple of bites and the sandwich was gone.
“So I see.” She unpacked a flask from the food pouch and held it toward him. “It’s ale.”
This lassie would make a wife in a million. “Bless you.”
The cool, bitter drink refreshed him and made him forget his aches. With a readiness that pleased his longing heart, Charlotte sat beside him again. Yesterday, even her friendlier moments had bristled. Well, except for when she’d kissed him.
“Tell me more about your home. I can hear in your voice how you love it.”
He smiled. “You’d love it, too, mo chridhe.”
“What do you call me?”
He wasn’t quite ready to tell her, so he pretended not to hear the question. “It’s a green jewel in an opal sea. White beaches. Heather hills. Deer and eagles and otters, and salmon for the taking, in water like crystal. There’s nowhere more beautiful.”
And Charlotte Warren would adorn his beautiful home like a jewel set within a jewel.
She watched him with an oddly intent stare, as though she listened with heart as well as ears. “So how could you bring yourself to leave it? Or do you love London just as much?”
He gave a short, derisive laugh. “Good God, no. You can’t hear yourself think there.” He paused. “But London’s interesting and full of things we don’t have on Silvaig. Sometimes a man needs to leave home to discover why he wants to go back.”
A frown drew her delicate brows together. But even now, she didn’t move away. “That’s a dig at me.”
He shrugged. “Dig is putting it too strongly.”
Her eyes sharpened. “I suppose on your island, potential wives are thin on the ground.”
His gaze was just as pointed. “I didn’t find the woman I want to marry in London. I found her in a soggy corner of Hampshire.”
He waited for Charlotte to dismiss his statement, but instead an unreadable emotion flickered across her face.
When she spoke, her voice was so small that he had to lean closer to hear. “I was engaged to be married once.”
Chapter Eight
* * *
Charlotte waited for Lyle to express surprise or sympathy, but he remained quiet. His lordship was a good listener, she’d already noted, with a talent for making the speaker feel like they received his complete attention. It was infernally appealing.
“I was very young,” she went on, before she’d even decided to share the story.
Lyle’s lips curved upward, and he settled his back against the wall as if he was in no hurry to go anywhere. “So this all happened eons ago.”
When had she started to enjoy his teasing? The affectionate humor in his deep voice warmed her better than a blazing fire. “I was eighteen. Ronald was twenty. We grew up together. His family’s estate is only a couple of miles away. Everyone always expected
that we’d make a match.”
“I assume Ronald is the fellow responsible for the nice kisses. I almost pity the poor sod.” Lyle’s hand curled around hers where it pleated her skirt. More warmth. Just as irresistible as the soft Scottish voice.
“He’s a good man. Smart. Honest. Conscientious. Sporting.” She made a halfhearted attempt to pull away, but wasn’t sorry when she didn’t succeed. “You’d like him if you met him.”
“As long as he keeps his nice wee kisses to himself, I might.”
She cast Lyle a quick glance. If she didn’t want to marry him, she had no right to bask in his jealousy. But she did. Heaven help her, she did. “I think these days he’s keeping them for his wife Frances and his five children.”
“That’s all right, then.” Lyle looked less like a grumpy bear. “I might restrain myself from punching his handsome nose.” He paused. “I assume he’s handsome.”
“Breathtaking,” Charlotte said, wondering why this confession of a wound that had always smarted became almost enjoyable. “Fair hair, an angelic face, and a graceful form. He’s a marvelous dancer, too.”
“Sounds like a complete popinjay.”
“A perfect gentleman.”
“A nonentity.”
She realized she was smiling. Which was odd. She’d never before managed to find any amusement in her disastrous engagement. “Compared to a volatile Celt, perhaps he is.”
“What happened?”
Thank goodness Lyle didn’t follow up on her betraying remark. The last thing she needed was him guessing how much she found about him to admire.
And he hadn’t even kissed her today.
“Ronald and I and our families established a private understanding at Easter, with the official announcement to take place at the Christmas ball. The wedding was set for the next Easter.” Her voice lowered, and Lyle’s grip on her hand tightened. She’d never spoken of these awful events. “But the engagement ended before autumn.”
“Did the numbskull jilt you?”
“He’s not a numbskull.”
“He must be if he had the chance to marry you and he botched it.”
She liked that Lyle was on her side. She wondered if once he heard the rest of the sorry tale, he’d remain so partisan. “I jilted him. There was a lot of local ill will as a result, as I’m sure you can imagine. Ronald’s mother hasn’t spoken to me since—and she was my mother’s best friend.”
“Did you love him?”
She shrugged. She picked up Lyle’s bad habits. “I thought I did. We had a lot in common. I certainly liked him, and I believe he liked me.”
“He must have.”
Guilt rose to choke her. It always did when she thought of how shamefully she’d treated Ronald. This was why she hated revisiting her brief engagement. Unable to sit still any longer, she surged to her feet, breaking Lyle’s hold.
“At least he liked me when I agreed to marry him. Once he decided to make me his wife, he also decided that I needed remodeling.”
“Did he, the devil?”
Staring down into Lyle’s glittering blue eyes, she had the strangest feeling that she didn’t need to tell him the rest. He already guessed what had happened. Somehow that made it easier to relate the string of woes that followed her acceptance of Ronald’s proposal. “I’m a headstrong, stubborn creature.”
Another flash of that fond, wry smile. “You don’t say.”
“Shocking, isn’t it?” This newfound ability to laugh at her broken betrothal was astonishing. “In many ways, my father brought me up as he’d bring up a son. Ronald knew my independent nature, even appreciated it in a childhood chum.”
“But not so much in a bride.”
“No, not so much in a bride,” she said in a subdued tone.
“And you say he’s not a numbskull? He found a lassie with brains and spirit, and tried to turn her into a cipher.”
“It wasn’t quite that bad,” she said, although looking back with more mature eyes, it had been that bad. She twisted her hands together. “And I did try to be what he wanted.”
“But you couldn’t sustain the act.”
She cast Lyle a grateful look. He did understand. “Before we were engaged, we never fought, but afterward, life was one constant quarrel. In his eyes, I could do nothing right.”
“Yet you broke it off, not him.”
“Yes. And nobody could see why. Papa accepted my decision—I have a funny feeling he never approved, although Ronald was frightfully eligible and the catch of the county. Ronald’s family never forgave me. The neighbors might accept my eccentricities with some good grace now, but back then, I was a pariah.”
“The blockhead would have taken you back, if you showed suitable contrition and promised lifelong obedience, I imagine.”
Surprised, she met his eyes. “How did you know?”
“I’m sure the poor bastard couldn’t help wanting your fire, even while it terrified the trousers off him. I bet he and…Frances, is it? I’ll wager every time he kisses Frances, he’s caught between gratitude for such a sweet wee wife, and regret that he lost his chance at claiming all your ardor.”
“You’re…you’re being kind.”
“No, mo chridhe, I’m feeling genuinely sorry for that idiot Ronald, even if I want to knock his block off.”
She blinked back tears. Stupid that Lyle’s praise moved her so powerfully. She fought to keep her voice steady. “I could never match what Ronald wanted.”
“And in the end, your soul rebelled, as it had to. You couldn’t sign up to living a lie for the rest of your days.”
“No.”
Lyle rose and placed his hands on her arms. Immediate strength flowed into her, and she stood straighter. “I’m glad that Ronald was such a clod.”
“Are you?” she said doubtfully.
“Aye. Imagine if I’d met you, and you were already married to a dunderhead who didn’t deserve you.”
She struggled to remember why it was a bad idea to fling herself against Lord Lyle’s broad chest and rest from her troubles. “And you think that you do?”
His tender smile made her wayward heart cramp with yearning. He looked tired and concerned, and unforgettably handsome. Why, oh, why did he have to be so beautiful? “I’ll do my best.”
“I swore then that I’d never let another man make me less than I was.”
His smile didn’t waver. “Very commendable, lassie.”
That wasn’t what she’d expected him to say. After all, her vow clashed with his matrimonial plans. “So that’s why I won’t marry.”
Lyle sighed. “It’s a wee bit unfair to tar all men with Ronald’s brush. A connoisseur appreciates a woman who’s an individual. Devil take it, anything else is a damned dull choice.”
“Ronald thought he wanted me, too, until he realized he faced a lifetime of people describing his wife as an original. And he didn’t want an original, he wanted a biddable little angel.”
His hands tightened on her arms. “Do you think I’d do that?”
“I didn’t think Ronald would.”
He hissed with impatience. “You were little more than a child. You know the world and your heart better now.”
She stared into his face, shadowy in the dim light. She’d come to recognize his ability to find joy in the everyday. She’d seen him retain his good humor through a sea of Hampshire mud. He was clever and perceptive about people. He was kind and capable of patience. Despite her determination to loathe the man her father had so summarily chosen for her, she’d learned to respect the Earl of Lyle. More, she liked him better than she could ever remember liking anyone else.
“How can I be sure that’s true? I knew Ronald all my life, and I was convinced I wanted to marry him.”
“And what do you think when you see him now?”
A reluctant laugh escaped. “That jilting Ronald was the smartest thing I ever did.” Poor Ronald, he’d become a self-satisfied bore, with his well-behaved wife and his perfect children.
“He acts as if he’s fifty instead of twenty-seven, and he’s already losing his hair.”
“My father had a full head of hair until the day he died,” Lyle said, with one of those appealing twitches of his lips.
Charlotte studied him, a mixture of fear and desire warring inside her. She wanted to believe that Lyle was a good man, someone she could trust, but she’d learned in a hard school that self-reliance was the safest route.
Fear won out. Just.
“Well, that seals it, then,” she said, shying away from the building intimacy. “We…we should go and check the sheep in the east paddock.”
He didn’t let her go. “Call me Ewan before we go.”
“I don’t see—” She faltered into awkward silence. Absurd that saying his Christian name seemed more of a concession than last night’s kisses.
“Please,” he said softly, no trace of a smile in his blue eyes.
She swallowed. The word clogged her throat. The two syllables felt as hard and immovable as huge, jagged rocks.
He waited. They both knew that speaking his name was an irrevocable step toward surrender. To think, only moments ago she’d counted his patience a positive quality.
Oh, this was stupid. It was a word. Nothing to get so worked up about. She licked her lips and angled her chin up.
Defiance faded when she met Lyle’s intent gaze. A strange, sizzling power surged between them. It should terrify her. Instead it filled her with sudden purpose.
She found herself smiling. “Thank you for all your help today…Ewan.”
His visible delight warmed her right to her toes. “My pleasure, Charlotte.”
She’d felt flustered before. Nothing to compare to now, when he watched her as if he thought her the most glorious creature in the world. She sought refuge in practical matters. “Do you want the fruitcake?”
“Aye, it’s gey hungry work, rescuing the Warren livestock.”
She squared her shoulders, feeling strong and powerful, and all the wonderful things Lord Lyle had called her. Instead of like the callous witch who had broken Ronald Dudley’s heart and created a rift in the neighborhood that had taken years to knit. “So shall we go and find some sheep?”
Stranded With The Scottish Earl Page 7
