She swallowed, forcing her legs to climb, her hand pressing against her chest. The way he’d watched her in the carriage… Heavens, he made her ache. How could a gaze make her skin tingle like a physical caress? Even now, the memory of his voice, rough with worried anger, plucked at her body.
She climbed the stone steps, finally alighting on the fourth floor. She walked down and stopped before his closed door. Evelyn smoothed her hands down the front of her bodice, over her peaked breasts. Blast. Maybe it was the danger that had brought about this heat. Backing up, she opened her own door and froze, for the connecting door to Grey’s room was wide open.
Grey stood on his side, naked from the waist up, his thick arms braced above the doorframe. His hair draped forward to graze his solid jaw, lightly bristled by a day’s growth. He looked upward from lowered eyes, his gaze connecting with hers, yet he remained silent. Evelyn quickly closed and barred the door to the corridor and leaned her back against it. They stared at each other.
Love or lust? The words played through her mind, but at that very moment, seeing him there with such desire in his stance, she didn’t care. Once more. Evelyn dropped her shawl and walked directly to him, her ache to touch him unbearable. He drew her in, his lips finding hers in nothing short of a ravishment. Heat, frantic and fierce, roared up in her. She rubbed her palms along the muscles of his chest. Across and down, her fingers licked small caresses against the skin of his hips where his kilt hung low, exposing the indents on either side that led to the rigid member she felt.
Grey’s fingers stroked the curls around her face, his hands cupping the back of her head. Together, they slanted their faces, wild kisses with open, panting mouths. Grey grabbed the sides of her face, speaking against her lips. “Dammit, Evelyn,” he whispered, breaking the kiss, yet keeping their foreheads touching. “The bastard could have killed ye.”
Her hands came up to hold the sides of his head, too. “He had no reason.”
“He or Burdock could have attacked ye, raped ye, with no one there to jump to your defense. If I hadn’t seen your carriage roll away—”
She pulled back. “It all went well,” she said, searching his gaze, his face, feeling his jaw harden under her touch. Gray eyes, under drawn brows, peered into her own. His lips shut, and he inhaled through his nose as if he were trying to rein in anger. At her? At Cross and Burdock? Or could it be anger at the helpless feeling that came with imagining the worst and knowing that it could have occurred? Was this the look of love or a well-concocted farce?
“You’re angry?” she asked.
He pulled back, dropping his hands. “Bloody ballocks, aye,” he said, his voice rising. He ran a hand down his face, turned to pace to the door between their rooms and then turned back, crossing his arms over his chest. “Ye don’t know what went through my mind. Burdock ripping open your clothing. Him striking ye, taking ye.” He shook his head, torture in the tightness of his face.
She squeezed her hands together. Her heart pattered as if the muscles that had squeezed it so tightly with her worry had relaxed, letting it run wild, and she inhaled fully. Her stomach quivered with hope. Maybe if she made him realize how he felt about her first…
A slight smile turned up the corners of her mouth. “You were worried like I had been, imagining you being shot as you rode into their encampment,” she murmured.
“Aye,” he said and frowned, stepping into his room. He pointed at her smile. “Ye are pleased?” Although it was a question, it was also an accusation.
“Aye,” she said, repeating his answer. She walked closer so that they stood across from each other at the threshold. Could he see the slight tremble in her arms? What if she was wrong about his reaction? But it was so raw, so real.
“Ye are pleased about this?” he said, spreading his arms wide, which made the muscles of his chest tighten. “Izzy being taken, and everyone at risk getting her back.”
“No,” Evelyn said, shaking her head, letting her grin fade to seriousness.
He squinted, his frown changing to show confusion. “What then about today has made ye smile?”
Evelyn placed her hand on the open door between their rooms. “Finding out that…you are falling in love with me.” His mouth opened slowly as if confusion changed to surprise, and Evelyn slowly closed the door.
…
Grey stared at the wood grain in the door until he heard Evelyn leave her room. Falling in love with her? “Bloody hell,” he said to the door and turned to find a shirt free of Izzy’s muddy footprints.
Love? He was falling in love with Evelyn? “Bloody hell,” he repeated, his voice rising. Was she serious? Or had she just thrown the accusation out to confuse him?
Admittedly, they couldn’t keep their hands off each other nor their clothes on when alone. But she’d stolen his castle, for fok’s sake. And she was bloody English! Love? Aiden would slice him in two, and Gram would poison his ale.
Grey paced before the cold hearth. Love? It was a dangerous emotion, which led intelligent people to do stupid things. His mother had loved his father and had apparently followed him to her death. Nay. Love was for fools, not Highland chiefs, even ones without control of their castles.
Grey tied his shirt at the neck. He needed to talk to the lass. Maybe he should give her a dram of whisky first. Would Evelyn take it badly if he said that she was so incredibly wrong? He tucked in his tunic and strode out into the corridor. She would be teaching in the library. Blast. The library now made his blood run hot every time he walked in through the door. Evelyn boils my blood. His mouth twisted with a hard frown. Maybe she was a witch. That would be a bloody good reason for not being able to get her out of his head, except that he didn’t believe in witches and spells. Ballocks.
Steeling himself against the vision of her spread naked across the chair near the hearth, Grey knocked on the frame of the open door. The room was full of females. Alana, the two new students, Scarlet, and Izzy with her sister. They all stood around Evelyn, who held a folded letter before her, reading. He cleared his throat. “Evelyn. We have something to discuss.”
Slowly her gaze lifted from the paper. She leaned forward to squeeze Izzy’s hand. “We certainly do,” she said and turned her gaze to his, her face open with happiness. Och. He didn’t want to wash it all away.
But before he could say anything else, she raised the paper in her hand, flapping it like a flag. “We need to discuss how Isabel just saved Finlarig for you.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
For the worthy Captain William Cross alone
Plans are in motion. Remove the Campbell Covenanter from Finlarig. The castle will become our outpost in the north for our rebellion. I will travel to you as things are settled this spring. When the Merry Bird lands to the north, we will be ready to pluck his head from his neck. This kingdom will be ruled by a new parliament and God.
The XIII of December MDCLXXXIII
The Surgeon of London
Evelyn pointed at the letter that Grey studied on the table. “See the date. That is thirteen December of 1683, last year. The Covenanter at Finlarig must be your father. He was tricked into going to meet with others, to remove him from the castle.” Her voice raised with each word. “He did not lose his clan’s castle, Grey,” she said, her voice lower, even though the students had left. Only Alana and Scarlet remained. “It truly was stolen from him.”
“She found this on Cross’s desk?” Grey asked.
Grey had come in to talk to her, probably about her risky suggestion about him loving her. But now all focus was on the short letter that Izzy had taken. “Yes. When Burdock brought her in, she saw Cross slide something under another paper on his desk. Cross tied her next to it when we arrived.” She couldn’t help the proud smile on her face. “Isabel had learned enough about deciphering letters to know it spoke of Finlarig, and she took it with her when she escaped.
“I�
�m almost certain that the Merry Bird is King Charles. People call him the Merry Monarch. This letter proves that Captain Cross is plotting an assassination with this Surgeon of London. If we show this to Charles, Cross will be arrested.”
Grey turned his head while still leaning over, so that he met her gaze, his brow cocked. “And Finlarig will be returned to the Campbells of Breadalbane?” His voice was flat, so that it came as a question. Not about the transfer of the castle but about whether she’d deciphered that the school would be evicted.
Evelyn straightened, her smile thinning into a line. “Killin needs a school, Grey. If Isabel hadn’t read Finlarig on the letter, she would not have taken it.” Would Grey stop everything she’d begun? Would Nathaniel ask her to wed Philip if she couldn’t become an independent woman, able to survive without an inheritance? “Being able to read can protect your clan,” she said. “Knowing the basics of how the world works can only help you all survive.” She leaned closer to him. “Determination can only save a person so far. One must also be knowledgeable and clever.”
Grey stood upright, crossing his arms over his chest. “Ye would wish to stay on at Finlarig?”
Her stomach flipped, and she swallowed, hope billowing up in her. “You would share it with me?”
The corner of his mouth twitched until it became a half grin. “I have need of a groundskeeper,” he said, her words from their first meeting coming back to her.
She released a breath, her tight mouth relaxing as her stomach flipped about with excitement that she worked hard to hide. “I have always said I would share Finlarig with you. If you would do the same…” She let the sentence hang, a smile turning up her lips. “We can sort out the particulars after we send word about Cross to my brother to take to Charles.”
Grey’s smile faded. “Your brother?”
She nodded. “He has the king’s ear. If the king reinstates parliament, my brother is sure to be one of his advisors, taking the place of my father. I…I trust him with my life.” She breathed deeply, hoping she hadn’t misplaced her faith. The printed banns in the London Gazette made the words stick to her tongue. Why hadn’t Nathaniel stopped Philip from printing them?
Grey straightened without breaking their connected gaze. “When did he purchase Finlarig?”
“This past winter, right after the new year,” she said, her words coming slowly.
A small muscle in the side of Grey’s jaw ticked. He rubbed it. “Right after my parents were killed.”
“You don’t think—”
“How did he find out that Finlarig was for sale?”
“I…I am not certain,” she said. “Scarlet and I came home to Hollings from court in London after Charles’s Saint Valentine’s Ball, and within the week, Nathaniel told me of the purchase. I made plans to come as soon as the roads were passable.” Evelyn’s throat felt tight, and she swallowed, shaking her head under Grey’s silent stare. She glanced toward the far wall where Scarlet shelved books and Alana disentangled Robert from her skirts. Her voice came in a whisper. “Nathaniel may not be fond of Charles or a dictatorial state, but he would never plan treason or mix the two of his sisters into it.”
“Ye have faith in him, but I’ve never met the man who owns my family home,” Grey answered, not hiding his suspicion.
The tightness in her throat seemed to migrate to her shoulders and up the back of her neck, making her head ache. “He should be visiting soon,” Evelyn said, reaching her nape to press her fingers into the base of her skull. “He planned to come up promptly after we were settled.”
“I would have Kerrick take the letter directly to Whitehall,” Grey said.
Defensive anger sprouted in Evelyn’s middle, but Grey didn’t know Nathaniel at all. The way he had saved her in the pond when she was a child or brought her a lemon ice when she’d been stung in the field. He didn’t know how angry her brother had been when reading their father’s will outlining whom she must marry to inherit any of the estate money, how he’d let her set her forehead on his shoulder until she’d collected herself. Grey knew only that Nathaniel was an Englishman who’d unfairly bought his family estate, which had led to the burning of it and eviction of his family.
Evelyn nodded, swallowing. She breathed deeply and handed him the letter. “It is yours, to do with as you please.”
His fingers grasped it, but his other hand came up to clasp her hand. “And we,” he said, pulling her gaze again, “will talk about your accusation abovestairs.”
Accusation? She cleared her throat. “I would certainly hope so,” she said, keeping her face neutral. He couldn’t possibly feel the quick thudding of her heart through the top of her hand.
…
“Once you remember the sounds which the letters make, you can start to put them together into blends like shhhh and trrrrr,” Evelyn said, her finger smoothing down the page to point to each set of consonants as Rebecca imitated the sounds they made. “Very good,” Evelyn said as Rebecca finished the repetitions. She’d gone to visit Rebecca with the hornbook after Martha and Fiona had left for the day.
Rebecca smiled. “I remember some of this from my ma. She knew how to cipher words.”
“She taught me,” Aiden said from his seat on the bed. “And I can teach ye, Rebecca.”
Evelyn glanced at the large man, who was doing much better after four days with snails crawling across his back. He had wheat-colored, closely cropped hair, broad shoulders, and was devilishly handsome when he wasn’t glaring at her.
“There’s no need for outsiders to teach ye,” he said, bracing himself on the bed so his back did not touch the wall.
Evelyn cleared her throat. “Why did your mother teach only Aiden?” she asked.
The siblings glanced at each other before Rebecca turned a stiff smile her way. “I’m sure Ma would have gotten around to it, I was still a wee lass when she left.”
“Left?”
Rebecca opened her mouth, but Aiden interrupted her. “We don’t discuss family with outsiders. And I said that I can teach her.” Rebecca tipped her head back to the hornbook and continued to sound out the letter blends.
Evelyn came to sit in the chair beside Aiden’s bed. “You’ve been too busy defending Finlarig and Killin to teach her, and without being able to read my medical book, we’d never have known to place snails upon your back.”
“Cat knew about the snails,” he said and gingerly leaned his poultice-covered back against the wall.
“Cat may not have arrived in time. It would be best if resources like medical books and atlases and current gazettes were available to all the people of Killin, not just the men who were fortunate enough to learn as youths.”
Aiden’s eyes remained narrowed as he met her stare, his jaw set. “I hear that your brother bought Finlarig directly after Grey’s parents were murdered for some mysterious traitor to set up a trap to kill your king.”
Was that how Grey had presented the information to Aiden, or had the suspicious man twisted his words? “Someone informed my brother of the castle being put up for auction. Nathaniel had talked of sheep farming for the last year, so it seemed like a wise investment. When he arrives, I will find out exactly who told him about the sale, although that alone won’t prove anyone’s guilt.”
Evelyn’s spine remained straight, her chin high, even though her stomach churned, and she fought a blush. Nathaniel was a good man, an honorable man. He sought reform through civilized ways, not by plotting an assassination. If Grey had already decided Nathaniel’s guilt, she must change his mind. She still needed to speak with him about Philip and what she’d said earlier.
She stood and smiled at Rebecca. “I will leave the hornbook with you tonight, and we can meet again day after tomorrow.”
“Thank ye,” Rebecca said, and Evelyn caught a hint of sincerity in her voice.
Evelyn smiled. “You are most welcome.”
She nodded to Aiden, who kept his frown, and stepped out into the evening light. Maybe if she were able to remain at Finlarig, the villagers would begin to accept her enough to learn from her. She let out a long sigh as she traipsed through the woods, where the buds had erupted into leaves on nearly every tree. Stopping at the edge of the village, Evelyn rested her hand on the rough bark of a slender oak.
“Nathaniel,” she whispered. She needed to talk to him. Who had told him about Finlarig? Had he known how the Campbells would be treated? Why had he allowed the wedding banns to be posted? Everyone in London and Lincolnshire would be expecting a wedding between the houses of Worthington and Sotheby sometime in the next month. She had to tell Nathaniel that wedding Philip was impossible. Not only was she no longer a maid, but she could be with child. The thought sent a shudder of joy and worry through her, the two emotions tangled together. Good God, she needed to sort things out with Grey.
Pushing away from the tree, she strode into the lane that wound through the village. She waved to Craig, the blacksmith, without waiting to see if the grumpy man would return her greeting. She spied Kirstin ahead, hanging out some wool that dripped water.
“You are missed at the school,” Evelyn said, pausing on the lane.
Kirstin peeked around the fluffy, wet mass. “Doubtful,” she said, her face hard.
Evelyn exhaled through her nose. She stepped to the side so that Kirstin could see her. “Learning is more important than petty squabbles.”
“I threw fish water on ye,” she said without taking her eyes off stretching the wool.
“And made me a sack for a dress and tried to make me into a man with a set of trousers. I know Grey asked people to make things difficult here for me. Perhaps you were just following orders.” Evelyn folded her hands before her.
A Rose in the Highlands (Highland Roses School) Page 25
