The Sweetest Hours (Harlequin Superromance)

by Parry, Cathryn

  She was keeping their secret.

  He glanced down at his hands in his lap, feeling sick for what he had to do. At some point soon, he would have to betray her.

  He felt thoroughly ashamed.

  “Now?” the urchin shouted to her mom. “Can I dance now?”

  “No!” her mother answered. “Not yet.” Then she marched into the kitchen and returned carrying a platter filled with hamburgers, each containing lettuce, tomato, cucumbers and, instead of a commercial bun, assembled with that same bread that he had eaten at lunch.

  He nudged Kristin. “This looks familiar,” he murmured.

  She nodded, smiling. “Our sandwiches today came from Stephanie’s diner. She runs Cookie’s Place.”

  “Who is Cookie?”

  “The lady who owned the restaurant before Stephanie. When she passed away, Stephanie bought it. First thing she did was choose a new name, and everyone in town got mad and refused to patronize the diner, so Stephanie switched the sign back. The diner is, and shall remain for all time, Cookie’s Place.”

  “People just do not like change,” her father said. “It’s a fact.”

  “Attention!” Stephanie announced. “I’m offering a substitution for those of you who are not adventurous with the new food that will be forthcoming.”

  She waggled her finger at Malcolm, indicating he restrain himself and wait for the joy of the pending haggis.

  Everyone except for him, Stephanie and Kristin lunged for a hamburger.

  Stephanie shook her head at them. “Your forebears would be shamed.”

  “Our forebears would be thankful we’d left the sheep behind in Scotland,” her father-in-law answered.

  Malcolm silently agreed, watching longingly as they ate. “How is business at your diner?” he politely asked Stephanie.

  “Truthfully, there are two factions keeping my operation afloat. Aura Botanicals employees, and my in-laws.”

  “Yeah, and this is why we come to dinner at your house,” one brother remarked to PJ as he sank his teeth into the bun. “Your wife knows how to cook.”

  Malcolm’s mouth watered. A sane response. And it would also be a sane response to reach forward and grab a hamburger along with the other men at the table. He knew what awaited them.

  Stephanie left the room and returned with her iPod stand. “Now,” she said to her daughter. “Now it’s time for your part.”

  Then she addressed the table: “Technically, I was also supposed to serve a Cock-a-leekie soup course, but since you people don’t like soup in general, I didn’t want to hear the bitching and moaning.”

  Only silence answered her. With the exception of him, Kristin and the urchin seated beside him, the rest of them were munching and chewing happily.

  “In any event, no matter, because it is time for the parade of the haggis. I’ll start the music, and Lily will dance the Highland Fling. Everyone will show the traditional respect.”

  Malcolm had never heard of the Highland Fling being combined with the presentation of the haggis. He bit his tongue. Do not laugh.

  The strains of a lone bagpiper playing a Scottish reel exploded over the small iPod speakers centered on the dining table. It was like nothing Malcolm had ever heard, and it struck him as uproariously funny. He wished his sister was here; she would appreciate the humor in this.

  Don’t laugh. Don’t make a sound.

  Stephanie planted her hands on her hips and scowled. Malcolm followed her gaze to Lily, cowering and doing her best to hide under the tablecloth.

  “What?” Stephanie asked her daughter. “What is the problem now?”

  “I need Aunty to dance with me!” Lily wailed. “I can’t remember the steps without her!”

  Malcolm glanced to Kristin on his left.

  “Of course I’ll help you, honey. Excuse me, George,” Kristin said as she attempted to edge backward from the tight circle.

  Malcolm stood and assisted, pulling back her chair for her.

  “Oh, Kristin, really?” her mom admonished. “You have a guest.” She glanced apologetically to Malcolm.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m greatly interested in seeing this.”

  “It’s for Lily,” Kristin mouthed to him, blushing further. But she held her niece’s hand and smiled at her.

  “Please start the music again,” Kristin said to Stephanie, and took a position beside the girl. Kristin nodded at her, and they both turned out their toes like ballerinas, with hands on their hips.

  Kristin looked down at Lily, nodding in encouragement. When they had eye contact, in a low voice, she said, “Step, bow, up on your toes... Go.”

  Malcolm couldn’t keep his eyes off Kristin. Gracefully, like a dancer, she lifted her arms above her head and leaped in the stationary dance, said to have been traditionally performed on the face of a warrior’s shield before battle. Her legs pointing and kicking, she looked like a true Highland dancer. “One-two-three-four, one-two-three-four, one-two-three-four, turn-two-three-four,” she instructed her niece.

  And, God love her, as his aunt would say, the little girl kicked and twirled right along with her aunt. It was thoroughly charming.

  After they’d finished their short duet and he’d risen to help them both into their seats, he asked Kristin, “You took Highland dance lessons?”

  “Not really.” Her face still flushed, she smiled. “My grandmother thought she was paying for ballet classes, but unbeknownst to her, the dance instructor also taught us the Highland Fling and the Sword Dance so that we could compete at the Highland Games up in Quechee.”

  “Quechee?”

  “Vermont. They host a Scottish Festival there every August.”

  “And did you compete?”

  “No.” She grimaced. “Nanny ran out of money to pay for the classes.”

  “Then what happened?” he asked.

  “She passed away,” her mother interrupted. “And that was that.”

  Blunt. Practical. Cautious. All words that could describe his own family, too. He sat back, watching as Stephanie strolled the perimeter of the room carrying her pride and joy on a platter: the perfectly composed haggis. It looked like a bloated rugby ball, exactly as it should. Stephanie set it on the table, to sniggers and wry jokes from the brothers and the brothers’ friends.

  There was a gap in the banter, a long, drawn-out, uncomfortable moment when it appeared that the night had failed. That the ceremony itself was patently ridiculous, and that other than Kristin and quite possibly her niece, no one else bought into the fun. Even Stephanie seemed peaked, tired of swimming against the current of everyone’s bad opinion.

  The platter just sat there. No one even bothered to cut into the haggis.

  “I am not eating that,” Lily said flatly.

  “Me, neither,” came a chorus of voices.

  Kristin blinked silently. He couldn’t be sure, but her eyes looked moist.

  Malcolm edged the platter with the haggis on it toward his plate. His stomach was clenching and threatened to revolt. But he forced himself to do it. Maybe it was penance...but he said it.

  “I’ll be the first to taste the haggis.”

  All eyes were upon him. No one moved. He picked up the carving knife. He might have been the only one who even knew there was a ceremony to go along with the slicing, plus another poem to be read—“Address to a Haggis,” by Rabbie Burns himself—but the verses were long, with many stanzas, and Stephanie was likely abandoning the readings due to lack of interest.

  The more the tradition was being given up, the lower Kristin seemed to droop. Malcolm wanted that sadness in her to go away, even if just for tonight. He loved it when she smiled. He needed it. Worse, only he foresaw the sadness that he would soon bring to everyone around this table. It was the only way to explain
what he was doing.

  He sliced into the haggis, through the thin skin of intestine, releasing the mass of sheep’s innards mixed with other assorted flotsam and jetsam—bits and pieces of spices and chopped vegetables—onto his plate. Somehow, he resisted the urge to plug his nose and instead, he picked up his fork....

  Stephanie hurried to his side. “I’m told it needs a wee dram of whisky on the top.” Without asking his permission, she opened a bottle and drizzled some whisky generously on, as if adding Vermont maple syrup to her pancakes.

  Bless her. Diving in before it got cold or he lost his nerve, he shoveled some of the dark, steaming specks of sheep onto his fork. If Kristin could dance a Highland Fling before an unsupportive audience, then he could take one bite of Scotland’s national dish.

  Tentatively, he tasted it. Everyone stared at him. “It’s...not bad.” Actually, it wasn’t. “It tastes like chicken,” he pronounced. “Whisky-flavored chicken.”

  The father—Rich—held out his hamburger plate. “I’d like some whisky with mine, please.”

  “Is that haggis?” Stephanie demanded. “Because only the haggis gets the whisky.”

  Immediately, one of the other brothers pulled the haggis platter toward him.

  The haggis got passed around—a teaspoon of ground meat plopped onto each plate, along with a drizzle from the bottle.

  And afterward, Stephanie piled on some tatties and neeps. The tatties were mixed with liberal amounts of butter, and the neeps had brown sugar and maple syrup added. Maybe she’d figured it couldn’t hurt.

  “All right.” One of the brothers stood at last, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “That was great, Steph, thanks for inviting us. But Dad and I need to get going.”

  “Wait!” Stephanie said. “We haven’t sung ‘Auld Lang Syne’ or read a Burns poem yet.”

  “Sorry, sis. We just don’t have time.”

  Just then, Malcolm’s phone buzzed. He glanced at the incoming text message. It was his driver, waiting for him. Malcolm looked at Kristin. She knew what the text was for.

  “Actually, Steph, it’s okay,” Kristin said brightly. “It was a great dinner. Thank you for organizing it and for inviting us.”

  And with a light smile on her face that he knew was fake, she pushed her chair back. “Besides, George has to leave, too. His ride is here.”

  She turned to him. “Thank you for coming. We appreciate it. I hope you liked the dinner.”

  He felt even worse now. Pocketing the phone, he stood. “I, er, would like to read a Burns poem as my thanks to you all, and I’d like to have everyone’s indulgence while I do so.”

  Kristin stared at him.

  He smiled at her mother. She was the one person besides Kristin who seemed predisposed to like him, so he played that for all he could. “I don’t know if I told you, Evelyn, but I went to prep school with a fearsome English professor, one who drilled poetry into our heads, and he made us stand and recite verses until we knew them by rote.”

  Evelyn nodded. “I had teachers like that, as well. They don’t exist anymore.”

  “No,” Malcolm agreed, “they probably don’t.”

  A brother was putting on his coat, and Malcolm turned to shoot a look at him. “Please, sit down. This will only take twenty seconds.”

  The brother sat.

  “Thank you, George,” Kristin said softly. “What will the poem be?”

  If he were alone with her, he knew exactly what line he would recite to her: The sweetest hours, that ever I spend. Because his short time with her had been sweet, and he was sorry it had to end.

  But, they were not alone; he was sitting with her family. And, their hours together could not continue into the future.

  So, he turned to her niece and smiled at the wee one. “This verse is called ‘To a Mouse.’ It’s by Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns, and I will recite it in your honor.” He took a breath:

  “The best laid schemes of mice and men

  Go often awry,

  And leave us nothing but grief and pain,

  For promised joy.”

  And then he looked directly into Kristin’s eyes:

  “Still you are blessed, compared with me,

  The present only touches you.

  But oh! I backward cast my eye,

  On prospects dreary.

  And forward, though I cannot see,

  I guess and fear.”

  She stared at him. He swallowed, and knew he had to repeat it once more. This time, as it should be read.

  “That was the English version,” Malcolm explained. “And this is the proper recitation:

  “But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,

  In proving foresight may be vain:

  The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men

  Gang aft agley,

  An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,

  For promis’d joy!

  “Still thou are blest, compared wi’ me!

  The present only toucheth thee:

  But Och! I backward cast my e’e,

  On prospects drear!

  An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,

  I guess an’ fear.”

  The table erupted in applause.

  “That was my best Sir Sean Connery imitation,” he said lamely.

  Kristin beamed at him, a quiet, shared look.

  “Will you be back?” her mother asked him. “You’re certainly invited to our home, anytime you’d like.”

  He shook his head. “Unfortunately, I’m here for just the day.”

  “A one-day contract?” Kristin inquired.

  He nodded, finding himself unable to speak. A heavy sadness had descended over him. The night had been sweet. The sweetest hours. He was immensely sorry he could never see her again.

  * * *

  SHE’D KNOWN ALL along that George was leaving.

  Kristin put on her snow boots and followed him outside to the porch. A black car was waiting for him, idling at the end of the driveway.

  He stood still, staring at the car with his hands in his pockets and his coat open, seemingly unconcerned about the wintry weather that enveloped them.

  She sensed sadness coming from him, but it wasn’t her problem, not any of her business. He was off to some other faraway place, the black car on the corner set to whisk him away.

  She felt relieved that nothing had happened with George to risk her already shaky standing at Aura. But still, part of her wished she didn’t have to lose his companionship just yet.

  He’d been good to her at dinner tonight, standing up for her. He’d even played along, though she knew he hadn’t wanted to—encouraging the others into tasting the haggis and reciting the Burns poem.

  She’d seen what he’d done for her, and she’d appreciated him for it. With each secret glance he’d given her during the dinner, each reactive dimple in his cheek toward her, she’d felt herself drawing closer to him.

  She blew into her hands, so cold in the dark night. She couldn’t see George’s face clearly in the dim light from the porch bulb, only the outline of his tall, broad form, the flat plane of his sexy, razor-stubbled cheek—a cheek that she could too easily get used to gazing upon.

  How could she say goodbye to him? Instead, she fumbled for something to say. Something trivial—anything to prolong the moment.

  “I hope that everything went okay today,” she said, “and that you got all you need from us.”

  He turned, his expression illuminated, and smiled at her, descending two steps lower than her on the stairs. He was at exactly her height now, his eyes level to hers.

  “I did,” he said, staring at her, his gaze not breaking. “Thanks to you, of course.”

  Biting her lip, she looked
down. “I’m sorry about some of the comments in there.”

  “There’s no need to apologize.” His voice was gentle. “I understand families.”

  “Yes, you do.” He’d been so good with them, even Lily. She lifted her head, her eyes searching his again.

  His hand touched hers, warm from the dinner table inside. His fingers brushed her knuckles, just once. Kristin was glad she hadn’t put on mittens. She liked the feel of his skin against hers.

  “Kristin,” he said in a low voice.

  She waited, barely daring to breathe, his wool coat rough against her knuckles. She inhaled his unique smell, mixed with the earthiness of the whisky he’d consumed. Involuntarily, she shivered.

  He opened his coat, enveloping her in his warmth. It was a tender, protective response. A stolen moment in an evening that was turning out to be magical.

  Maybe she was a sheltered person...she supposed so. She’d only been away from Vermont for a short time, until life in the city had crushed and overwhelmed her. She’d been back home for years now, in this small town she knew and trusted, with people who—though they may sometimes tease or criticize her—on the whole loved her and cared for her, no matter what.

  Yes, they gave her trouble. Yes, she longed to break free. But in the end, she needed this safety. And by his actions tonight, it was clear to her that George understood that.

  She stepped closer to him, inside the shield of his heavy woolen coat. Tentatively she touched the solid wall of his broad chest, feeling his cotton shirt and the silk of his necktie beneath her fingertips.

  “Is it bad that I don’t want this day to end?” she whispered.

  “No, lass.” His voice was throaty. The gruff...Scottishness of it seeped into her, as if spilled from one of Laura’s potion bottles. “I won’t forget you, Kristin.”

  His eyes held hers. And as she swallowed, he angled his head and leaned toward her.