“Thank you for coordinating with him, and for keeping me informed,” she said. “I want this to be the best presentation we can possibly give.”
He shrugged. “I’m working here in the castle tomorrow anyway. You’re welcome to drop in and out as you please.”
“Sure. Thank you.” She bit her lip, feeling as if she wanted to smooth things over. Everything was suddenly too formal between them.
“Malcolm,” she blurted, “just because I don’t want to work at the Sage plant doesn’t mean that I don’t want to work with you.”
He dug his hands more deeply into his coat pockets. “Okay.”
“So...can you accept that and still support me?”
He sighed heavily. “Kristy, it’s my fault. I shouldn’t have brought you to Byrne Glennie like I did.” He withdrew an envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. “I saved this for you. It’s sort of an apology.”
Curious, she opened the envelope. Inside was a photograph of her and Laura Astley, walking the factory floor at Aura. Kristin had never seen the picture before, but from her short hair and baggier dress, it looked to have been taken the year that Kristin had first come to Aura. “Where did you get this?”
“It was tucked inside a box of files with the formulas that Jay shipped over. I found it by accident.”
Kristin smiled to herself. Yes, Laura was a surprising pack rat that way. She was also quite old-school. Very few of her formula notes had been kept on the computer.
Kristin ran her finger over the photo. She was glad to have a picture of her old mentor. “This is the only picture I have of us together like that.”
“Who is she?”
“Right, I forgot. You never knew Jay’s wife.”
“Ah.” Malcolm sat cautiously at the end of her bed. The only other chair in the room held Rhiannon’s tablet computer. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t keep the photo for myself. I was tempted, you see.”
“Why? This is a six-year-old picture of me. I look nothing like that anymore.”
Such a screwup, she had thought herself back then. She had been terrified all the time.
“I think you look beautiful,” Malcolm said quietly. “Both then and now.” His Adam’s apple moved up and down. He just looked so vulnerable saying that to her that she couldn’t stop staring at him.
“You do?” she whispered.
“Aye,” he said, in that deep Scottish burr. “I do, Kristy.”
Kristin put the photo down, a lump in her throat. From the way he gazed at her, she felt as if she was blushing all over.
He was sitting before her, so solid, so strong—all male. He was the one man who never seemed to take her exuberance or her quirkiness the wrong way. And he’d never made an unsolicited move on her, or even tried to kiss her when she didn’t want it.
He did not scare her in the least, or even make her feel uncomfortable, and that was remarkable for her. She hadn’t realized it until she’d seen this old photo of herself.
She moved the tablet computer aside and pulled the chair forward, facing Malcolm. Their knees were just barely touching, and it felt...nice.
Something inside her seemed to be melting. Was it her fear that was leaving her? Or the worry that often followed her around? Or her cautiousness that always kept her from taking chances? She put her hand over her mouth, trying to figure this out.
Malcolm was good to her. Kind. Handsome. And his kiss...
He smiled at her, that crooked smile she loved so much. “Am I forgiven for springing Byrne Glennie on you?”
“Y-y-yes.”
His smile turned sad. “I can’t promise you everything you want, Kristy. I don’t know what will happen with Born in Vermont. It’s not my call anymore.”
“I know. But we can be a team, and make a great presentation together. That’s all I can ask for.”
On impulse, she jumped up and rummaged in a drawer. She’d unloaded her suitcase and put her clothes inside the dresser—it had made her feel more grounded.
She found her Born in Vermont kit and pulled out the bottle she was looking for. Then she pressed it into Malcolm’s hand. “This is for you. Rhiannon asked me for more today, but I’d really been saving my last bottle for you. It’s made from birch and a hint of pine—okay, that’s proprietary, but we’re both part of the same team now, right? Anyway, the point is, it’s made for men as well as women....”
He unscrewed the cap and held it to his nose. A look of pleasure overtook him. “Kristy, that’s your smell.” He grinned at her. “It drives me wild.”
“It... Really?”
“Oh, love.” He threw back his head and laughed. “I’ll have to finance the damn plant myself, just so I can have more to remember you after you’re gone.”
He looked sad all of a sudden.
She swallowed. She was pretty sure she’d miss him, too.
It was hard to know. She just was so different from other women when it came to relationships. She wished she could fall in love easily, relax and find her soul mate. Be like...Stephanie. See the man she wanted, go after him and then, bam, live happily ever after—whether he came from Vermont or Scotland.
But for her, allowing love in wasn’t merely a quest, like finding her castle had been. There was so much more to it. It was a mystery to her....
“What did you do today?” he asked. “I noticed that your white car is parked closer to the house than it was earlier.”
“I spent some time with your sister.” Kristin couldn’t tell him about the driving lessons and Colin, because that would be a betrayal of the confidence she’d promised Rhiannon. She glanced at her hands.
She didn’t particularly like keeping knowledge about Rhiannon from Malcolm. She didn’t want there to be any more barriers, secrets between them. She wouldn’t put herself in that position again.
“Anyway,” she continued, “I took the car and went into town after that.”
“What did you do there?” He seemed genuinely interested.
“Well...” She opened the closet and took out the satiny mauve blouse she’d purchased. It was clingier and lower cut than she usually wore for clothing, but...she’d liked it and it had called to her. And maybe she’d been ready for a change. “I went shopping and bought this blouse, for one thing.”
She stood back and assessed it, pretty on its hanger. With the black skirt she’d brought from home—the one she’d worn to Sage the first day she’d landed in Edinburgh—it would make a great impromptu wedding outfit. She hadn’t realized that until now.
“Also, Rhiannon invited me to stay for your cousin’s wedding.” She glanced at him, gauging his reaction. “What do you think about that? Are you going, too?”
“I think...you will look brilliant in that sexy blouse. And I think I’d be an idiot to miss seeing you in it.”
She sat back down, but on the arm of the chair this time. Just a tiny bit more distance between her knees and Malcolm’s than before.
“I’m told you’re a great dancer,” she said.
He smiled. “Me? Maybe I am.”
“I’m going to be at a disadvantage, aren’t I?”
“Ah, the country reels. But not to worry, I can take it slow with you, lass.”
She bit her lip, feeling the blush overtake her. They were no longer just talking about the wedding.... It made her a little nervous.
She stood. “Rhiannon already promised to teach me,” she said lightly. “In fact,” she babbled, “I guess I’ll need shoes, too. I’ll have to ask for her help with that.”
“Kristy, love,” he said patiently, “Rhiannon isn’t going to be able to help you with wedding shoes.”
“Why? Because she’s agoraphobic because of the kidnapping?”
Malcolm blinked, physically seeming to back away from her.
>
Oh, no. She hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that. “I’m sorry. Rhiannon told me today. I didn’t mean to...”
“She talked with you about it?” He stared at her.
“She...just said...that you think it’s your fault, but to her, it’s not your fault at all. She thinks you blame yourself for what happened to her, and she doesn’t want you to do that anymore.”
“Really?” He stood. His face looked stricken.
“Malcolm, I am sorry.”
He walked to the turreted window and looked outside to the darkening evening, the “gloaming,” they called it. He braced his hands on either side of the window, his head down, and for a moment, he just stood there, alone.
She waited. She had a feeling he was gathering himself and that he did not want her to leave him while he did so. She didn’t want to leave him now, either.
“Kristy,” he said, turning finally, “there is something I want you to know.”
She braced herself, waiting.
* * *
MALCOLM RAN HIS tongue over his broken tooth. He had never gotten his tooth fixed, because he’d never wanted to forget.
Protect the ones that you love at all costs. That had been the major lesson he’d learned that week in his childhood, courtesy of the murderers who’d shoved him and his younger sister into a white van when Malcolm had been in charge of escorting Rhiannon to her weekly dance lesson.
Because of his ineptitude, his lack of judgment, his baby sister had been terrorized for eleven days. He still couldn’t think about that time without wanting to destroy something—so he never thought about it.
He compensated, maybe. He knew that about himself. And he also took consolation in the fact that those three monsters had died a violent, bullet-ridden death, though not before they’d taken out two innocent police officers with them, one a mother with two young children.
Never, never, never was Malcolm letting anything like that happen again. Never would he allow his family or loved ones to fall in harm’s way. Not in any way. Not in any form.
“Malcolm?” Kristin touched his hand.
He blew out a breath and faced her. She was not fragile. She was as strong a woman as he’d ever known. And who was he to desire to get close to her? Especially knowing all that he possibly could about her, when he didn’t even have the guts to tell her the worst about himself?
“Kristy, I failed her.”
“You were ten years old.”
“I was responsible. When I should have grabbed her hand, pulled her out of there and run away with her, I engaged them instead. I thought that by talking, by reasoning honestly, that it would stop them from following us. When it was clear that it wouldn’t, and it was too late to run, I punched one of them, but all it did was get me knocked out. And that was the worst thing that could have happened. Because that’s when they terrorized her. And because I was out cold...” He raked his hand through his hair.
“I couldn’t stop it from happening.” His voice broke. “Kristy, she was just a little girl....”
“Malcolm, I’m sorry.”
“I talk to her almost every day on the phone. Even now, I still do. You heard me that morning in your factory. But still, it doesn’t help her, and it doesn’t change anything...she’s broken, and she got that way on my watch. Now, she doesn’t go out. She hides away here. She paints her beautiful pictures and disengages from the world....”
He turned to her. “Have you been inside her studio yet?”
She shook her head.
“We’ll go there tomorrow, you’ll see. It’s this fairy tale world that doesn’t exist in reality....”
Kristin was looking pained for him, so he stopped. But she wasn’t stopping him; she was letting him speak. She was just...listening to what came out of his mouth, without judgment, without telling him how he should be feeling. And he needed that, for once. It felt nice.
She was nice.
He was so hopelessly falling in love with her.
Maybe by telling her what had happened, he would drive her away. But he didn’t see how much further he could push her—that damage was already done, he supposed. She had already shut him down, told him no. She wasn’t going to move to Scotland. She wasn’t ever going to sleep with him, never mind fall in love with him, too, no matter how much he might want it.
He looked at her again. She was still sitting on the bed. Waiting for him. Saying nothing. There was just understanding in her eyes. Empathy, as opposed to sympathy, and maybe that was the crucial difference that made him snap.
He just blurted it out. “I think she was molested.”
Kristin looked at him, sadness on her face. Her hands were clasped tightly in her lap. Her head tilted, her eyes full of compassion.
He swallowed. So much pain he kept inside. He’d never dared tell anyone his suspicions. He had never even dared ask Rhiannon. He always stopped himself from thinking about it, or he would be driven mad.
He got up and paced, tearing his hands through his hair, wishing he could cut out the thought from his mind and erase it forever.
When he glanced up, Kristin was studying him.
He expelled a breath. “I shouldn’t be talking to you about this. I don’t know why I am. Forget what I just said.”
* * *
“MALCOLM, I WAS attacked, too. One night when I was walking home to my apartment in New York City.”
He turned around. “Kristy?” he whispered.
“By a stranger. When I lived away from home those few months. He put a knife to my throat and robbed me—took my purse, phone, the watch I was wearing.”
Kristin swallowed, rubbing her arms up and down. “I wasn’t hurt physically. I never told anybody before, but if it helps you with your sister...I just want you to know that...well, to me...I feel like I understand her. After it happened, I retreated to my hometown, where it’s safe for me. Where everyone is my family, and where the risks are low. And that’s where I’ve stayed since.
“And just so you know,” she said, “I don’t think about it as often as I used to. It was so long ago. Maybe...Rhiannon keeps herself safe by drawing her beautiful pictures. I know that I have my scents and my shampoos I retreat to.” She laughed hoarsely. Kristin had made such a muck of it—really, comparing a twenty-two-year-old to an eight-year-old.
“Oh, Kristy,” Malcolm said in a low voice. He crossed the room to her. She could see, in the low light, that his eyes looked damp. Oh, she wished she had never said anything to compare a simple robbery to the horror of what Rhiannon had gone through. Why had she just said all that?
He cradled her cheeks with both hands. Just gazed into her eyes.
“I’m okay,” she insisted. “I never needed to tell anyone about it. Not even Stephanie knows. Please don’t make a big deal out of it. I’m just...well...scarred, I guess. That one experience has made me afraid of so many things—whether it be traveling to a strange country, or letting myself get close to people. Now you know.” She swallowed and looked down at her hands, feeling miserable.
“No.” Malcolm shook his head fiercely. His fingertips were gentle on her skin. “You are perfect,” he said, in that lovely Scottish accent.
“I’m not. I’m a grown woman who’s essentially afraid of the big, bad world.”
“You are perfect to me.”
Kristin looked up at him. Tears were stinging in the corner of her eyelids, and she needed to blink. She buried her head in his warm, broad shoulder.
“Kristy, you are the most perfect woman to me,” he said, and his voice echoed to her very bones.
She closed her hand around his muscled back, his crisply ironed shirt bunching in her palm.
“Your magic and your zest for living just infects me,” he murmured. “You say you’re afraid of so many things, but what
you’ve done to try to save your factory, your town, shows courage. I hope you see that.”
“So...what should we do?”
“We’ll do whatever you want, love.”
With that, Kristin flung her arms around his neck. “Will you stay with me tonight? I want you to stay.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“ARE YOU SURE?” Malcolm murmured, nuzzling aside her top and kissing the tender spot at the base of her neck.
Kristin tightened her arms around him. Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel it in her eardrums. “Yes,” she breathed. “Please.”
His palms skimmed up the sides of her hips, beneath her loose tunic and to the bare skin on her waist. She wanted to close her eyes and moan.
How lucky was she? Malcolm had just told her that he accepted her as she was. Within her, it was as if a dam of worry had broken and rushed away, leaving her free to be herself.
Malcolm had asked her what she wanted. And what Kristin most wanted was him—all of him. For weeks and days and hours—sweet hours—she’d been in his company, desiring him. Even now, her nipples felt tight and her breasts full. She stretched upward on her toes, across his chest, longing for no layer of clothing between them. Just skin.
His hands slid over her backside. She wanted him inside her, so badly. And when he lowered his head and pressed a soft kiss to her throat, she almost lost it.
“Kristy,” he whispered. “We...should find a condom.”
“Yes. Um...inside my cosmetic case, I think.” She was throbbing, all over. But somehow, her brain was managing to work again. “Do condoms go bad?”
“Show me it,” he murmured. “I’ll check.”
“Don’t you have any?” she asked, turning her head to look into his tender blue eyes.
“Er...no. Not here.”
Scampering into the small bathroom, she left him on the bed, feet on the floor, back stretched out. When she returned, he looked dazed. He pulled her down to him with one hand and accepted the condom with the other.
He squinted at it, holding it to the light. Maybe the printing on the wrapper was a bit faded. It had been inside a pocket of her makeup bag for quite a while.
The Sweetest Hours (Harlequin Superromance) Page 22
