“I was eleven when she had her accident. She was a wee bit, only five. I was supposed to be watching her as we played by the loch’s edge. Da had warned us about not going out on the loch, as the ice had thinned. Chrissa and I were building a fort out of the new snow. She got bored and wanted to go inside, but I made her stay with me. Mum and Da were busy with the wool mill. I became so entranced with my work of building the fort that I forgot all about her. Until I heard the ice cracking.” He winced like he was experiencing it all over again. “I looked up just in time to see her fall through.”
“Oh, Hugh.” Sophie laid her head on his shoulder, trying to comfort him.
“I didn’t even think—I ran out after her. I weighed much more, and the ice gave way underneath me sooner. As I fell in, I kept my eyes on where she’d gone in, but she never came back up, not even once. I was determined to save her and ignored the cold. I put my head in the water and opened my eyes. I thought if I could see her, I could get to her. But I only saw black. No Chrissa, only murky, dark water.” He shifted away. “I failed. I was going to join her. Lethargy had set in, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get myself out either.”
He paused for a long moment. “My da had seen me from the window, the cook told me later. He hadn’t seen Chrissa. He yanked me from the loch, giving me a bluidy lecture the whole time for going out on the loch when told not to. When I finally said Chrissa’s name and pointed, the lecture stopped. It was as if my da died, too. Mum, also. The life left them, and I became afraid of the dark.”
Hugh’s breathing had become shallow. Sophie bit her lower lip to keep herself from sobbing.
He went on as if he had no choice. “At night, when I shut my eyes, I see Chrissa lost in the murky black waters of the loch. When I sleep, the dark waters haunt me. Did I tell ye I have nightmares, every night?” He looked in her eyes for the answer. “No, of course not. I’m cursed with the bluidy things, but I have taught myself to rein in my fear of the dark. Ye asked me why I dinna turn on the light when coming to bed…it’s what I do to show myself that my fear hasn’t owned me. I can’t stop the nightmares. But I am managing the dark.” He raised Sophie’s hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “Now ye know my darkest secret. Ye see, lass, ye’re not alone in yere pain.”
She shifted toward him and laid her free hand on his cheek, looking into his eyes with her misty ones. “And ye’re not alone in yeres.”
“I’ve never talked about it with another soul. Not Amy and not my aunt either.”
To have lost a loved one in such a way and to be so tortured tore at Sophie’s heart. In a moment of compassion and bravery, she pulled him to her for a tender kiss, giving the light within her to comfort him. She held him tight, willing his pain to be eased. After a moment, she could feel his burden lift a little, and something shifted between them. The kiss became heated—a veritable fire had broken out—and Sophie was comforting Hugh no longer.
She was doing this for herself. She needed Hugh, and she kissed him passionately to let him know how she felt.
So what if her parents said that she’d never find a man? So what if she never had one that would be hers for always? She didn’t want to be a virgin for always either. Maybe—just maybe—she could have this man for tonight.
Chapter Four
* * *
Hugh lost himself in Sophie’s kiss—in her goodness, in her light, in her comfort. She handed it all to him with the touch of her lips…he was overwhelmed. Until he realized what she was doing—unbuttoning his shirt. And what he was doing—trying to unzip her jeans.
“Enough,” he growled more to himself than to her. He pulled away. He hadn’t told her his story so he could get down to her intriguing underthings!
“I’m sorry.” She looked stricken.
Oh, God! He wrapped his arms around her, speaking into her hair. “Ye’re not the kind of lass who would let a bastard like me seduce ye,” he said thickly. “Let me hold ye, and let’s see if we both can get through this night undamaged.”
The dogs came over and plopped themselves close to the bed in a show of solidarity.
“Okay,” she said on a sniffle.
Dammit. He rubbed her arms, and she shivered. “I’m sorry I made ye cry.”
“Ye didn’t,” she said. “It’s just talking about making it through the night undamaged…it’s too late. I’m already damaged, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”
“What are ye talking about, lass?” Had someone physically hurt her?
“It’s this disorder. I’ll never have the life that I dreamed of. I’ll never be like the other women in the village.”
He gave her a gentle squeeze. “I don’t believe that for a second. Now come, let’s see if we can find the cards I stowed here. We could play a game to while away the time.”
Her hand drifted over his chest in an absent-minded caress, threatening his few remaining wits.
“What if I told you, Hugh, that kissing you makes me happy? That yere kisses are as good as lying under a thousand suns?”
Sophie Munro was a minx. No two ways about it.
He pushed her up from the bed, swatting her bottom gently in the process. “I’d say, I think ye’re testing me, lass. Play some cards with me. I promise, if I see ye’re succumbing to sadness, I’ll kiss ye.” And the devil take him, too.
While they sat at the table, playing high-stakes poker with matchsticks, Hugh entertained Sophie with stories of the shenanigans that he and Amy had gotten up to as children. He admitted that he’d had a hard time at first being taken from his home to Aunt Davinia’s, because her house had been so lively. Amy was legendary for her nonstop talking. He’d soon settled in at his aunt’s, deciding he had the better of it to be away from Kilheath Castle and the constant reminder of the loss of his sister.
After a while, the dogs needed to go outside. Hugh took them, but when he returned, Sophie didn’t seem as cheerful as when he’d left.
“How are ye feeling?”
She shrugged.
“Come here, lass.”
She stepped into his arms, and he held her.
“Will ye kiss me, Hugh? For the sake of releasing some endorphins?”
“Ye’re such a romantic, Sophie Munro.”
“Will ye?”
“I promised, didn’t I?” He leaned down and kissed her. He meant to be tender and gentle, but she felt so damn good that he let himself go. When her knees buckled, he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bed. He wouldn’t make love to her, but he would do his best to make her feel better.
Before he laid her on the mattress, though, the door flew open. Belatedly, the hounds barked. Sophie squeaked. She tried to wiggle out of his arms, but Hugh held her tighter. Three people rushed in, shaking the snow off their coats and stomping their snow-covered boots all over the cabin floor.
The shorter and oldest of them moved forward, while pushing back the hood of her mackinaw.
“Aunt Davinia?” Hugh gently set Sophie on her feet. “What in the deuce are ye doing here?”
“I thought we were here to save you. We brought both ATVs.”
Donal and Fergus, his gardener and his ghillie, stood behind the matriarch, not making eye contact and looking ruddy in the face. Hugh didn’t care—they were both fired!
Sophie tiptoed behind him to the hearth and busied herself with bolstering the fire.
“Who said that I needed saving?” Hugh asked his meddling aunt.
She raised an eyebrow at him, something she’d perfected when he was a boy. “From what I’m seeing, I’ve seriously misjudged the situation.” She frowned like she wanted to back out of the door and let them get back to it.
“Oh, good grief! Nothing inappropriate happened.” Except if they’d arrived five minutes later, it might have. “Sophie got lost in the woods,” Hugh explained. “The Wallace and the Bruce led me here to find her. We thought the weather was too bad to make a go of it on foot tonight.”
“Nicely reca
pped,” Auntie said, taking his arm. “Leaving out all the best parts, I see.” She leaned in, whispering conspiratorially, “If ye’d only let me know where ye were and what ye’re doing, I would’ve given ye my blessing.” She smiled over at Sophie, then put her focus back on him. “She’s a dear.” She shook his arm then. “But ye didn’t, and ye weren’t answering yere mobile. I assumed the worst.”
“Then how did you find me?”
“I GPS’ed your phone, darling,” making it sound innocent and normal that an elderly aunt knew how to hack a computer.
“I had my phone silenced for church,” Hugh explained, wishing he’d remembered to unmute it. What he didn’t explain was that since Sophie had stepped into his life…he’d become distracted.
He ran a hand through his hair, deciding his aunt’s arrival was for the best. “Sophie, get yere coat. Ye’re going home.”
Sophie gasped as if he’d jabbed her with a hot poker.
“To Kilheath. Home to Kilheath Castle,” he clarified.
“Oh.” She frowned at the roaring fire. “But I just stoked it.”
Hugh had to agree. She had stoked the flame between them as well, and it would take some time to douse what she’d started.
“Donal, take Miss Munro back with you.” Donal seemed the better choice—married to a lovely woman and in his fifties. Fergus, though, was known as somewhat of a ladies’ man. “Then come back to get me. I’ll stay and put out the fire.”
Donal nodded. “Miss, if ye’re ready.”
Sophie grabbed her coat, not looking at Hugh as she slipped it on. But Hugh saw her red cheeks, which had nothing to do with the fire in the hearth. She looked hell-bent to get out of there.
But he was a bastard.
“Wait up a minute,” he said. He retrieved her hat from the table and went to her, leaning over, speaking so quietly that only she could hear. “We’ll talk when I get home. There’s still the matter of where ye’re going to sleep tonight.”
Sophie didn’t need her coat on her way back to Kilheath Castle. Aye, it was still snowing out. Aye, she should’ve been a Sophie Popsicle riding on the back of the ATV with Donal. But she was so heated up by Hugh’s closeness back at the cottage, not to mention his double entendre that she was downright smoldering. And she should be ashamed of herself for not feeling bad about it.
She was quite flattered by Hugh’s attention, but she couldn’t possibly think it meant anything. To be stuck out in the countryside with so few prospects of female companionship had to be awful for him. Before moving back to Lalkanbroch village, Hugh had lived in Edinburgh, a different girl every night, according to Amy. He was simply hard up…which explained his attention to Sophie tonight. Lucky for her, the wool mill was out in the middle of nowhere.
Donal pulled the ATV to the back door and stopped.
“Thank you for the ride back.” Sophie climbed off the vehicle, looking toward the woods as if Hugh might magically appear.
“Don’t worry, miss, I’ll get the Laird now.”
She started to argue with Donal that she wasn’t worried about anyone, but the man had taken off already.
Sophie hurried into the mudroom, stripping off her snow-covered coat and kicking off her boots. She wanted to be changed into dry clothes and her things cleared from his room before the Laird returned.
She hustled her way through the house, hearing Aunt Davinia come in the back door as well. Sophie didn’t stop, climbing the two flights of stairs quickly. She knew she was being ridiculous, but she wanted to be back in the kitchen sipping tea when the master arrived home.
And she wanted to be composed…which she wasn’t sure she could pull off just yet.
She peeled off her clothes and put on dry ones, a delayed chill setting in. Or was it nerves? As she opened Hugh’s top dresser drawer to unload it, there was a knock at the door.
He can’t be home already!
“Let me in, dear.” Only Aunt Davinia.
Before Sophie answered the door, she closed Hugh’s drawer, not wanting Davinia to glimpse her underthings.
Aunt Davinia pulled her out into the hallway. “Come downstairs and have a cuppa with me.”
“No, thank you.” Sophie’s things were strewn about Hugh’s bedroom. “I best clean this up.”
Aunt Davinia shuffled her farther into the hall, reaching in to close the door. “You can take care of that later.”
“But—”
The older woman looped her arm through hers. “Don’t argue with Aunt Davinia. You need to warm yere bones.”
Sophie allowed herself to be led down the stairs and back to the kitchen. Just as they got settled at the table, the door opened and the dogs rushed in, shaking snow from their massive bodies. Hugh appeared next, windblown, his cheeks alive from the brutal weather, and looking absolutely gorgeous.
Aunt Davinia grabbed another mug, filled it with tea, and thrust it into his hands. “Take Sophie into the parlor, Hugh-boy, and warm her up in front of the fire.”
Hugh gave his aunt a pointed look.
“Run along now,” the old woman said, while blowing on her tea. “When Auntie is around, ye have to do as she bids.”
He sighed as if Sophie was a burden. Was it so terrible that he should sit in the parlor with her? He hadn’t thought she was such an inconvenience when they’d been kissing awhile ago.
Sophie picked up her mug, hugging it to her body, and huffed from the room.
Hugh was right behind her.
She should go back to his room, pack up her things, and find a corner of the house to call her own tonight. Then tomorrow, she would check around to see if she could stay anyplace other than Kilheath Castle. She certainly didn’t want to put the Laird out!
Sophie marched straight to the parlor’s fire, keeping her back to Hugh. She spun around when she heard the pocket doors being pulled closed.
“What are ye doing?”
He stalked toward her, stopping directly in front of her. “Remember? Our private chat?”
Did he mean to pick up where he’d left off with her lips? Her middle warmed, and it had nothing to do with the fire.
She turned around. “I won’t be a burden. I’ll only stay the night, then tomorrow I’ll find somewhere else to stay while I apprentice with Mr. Willoughby.”
“Masterson.”
“What?”
“Willoughby Masterson.” Hugh ran a lock of Sophie’s hair between his fingers.
“Oh,” she said breathlessly.
“Ye’re not a burden.”
Heat rolled off of him. Her insides were melting, and for a moment, she forgot to be mad at him for treating her like a liability. Instead, she wanted to stand closer to soak him in.
“What did ye want to talk about?” She was out of oxygen.
He looked ready to lean in and take possession of her lips, body, and soul. Sophie came to her senses just in time and moved away.
Hugh stepped closer. “Ye’ll sleep in my room tonight.”
She opened her mouth to protest, but he put his hand up.
“Don’t argue. I’m the Laird.”
“Aye. Ye’re the Laird,” she agreed. “But this isn’t some scene from Outlander. Ye can’t order me around.”
“Sophie, it’s the only thing to do. Ye were brought here under false pretenses. Let me fix it.”
She studied him for a long moment. He was a decent man who wanted to make things right. Perhaps he didn’t see her as a burden after all. She longed to cuddle up to him, to be a comfort. She had her bright-light therapy to help her. What did he have to help him? “What about you?”
“I’ll sleep elsewhere.” Though his eyes showed more than a hint of disappointment.
If they were still back at the cabin and Aunt Davinia hadn’t come to rescue them, Sophie would probably be in Hugh’s arms right now, naked, finding out what it was like to be with a man. She fanned herself.
Then she remembered the predicament of where he would bed down for the night. “Where ex
actly will you sleep?” The loveseat in front of the fire hadn’t been all that comfortable last night and she was much shorter than Hugh. “You yereself said that the other rooms weren’t made up.” That meant that, for tonight, Aunt Davinia wouldn’t be in the house either.
“I’ll take my sister’s room.”
“No, you can’t.”
“I can.” Hugh grabbed her hands. “After Chrissa died, I slept on her floor every night until Aunt Davinia came and took me away.”
Sophie got the feeling that occupying his sister’s room was something Hugh needed to do, and maybe he knew it subconsciously, too. Perhaps sleeping beside his dead sister’s bed would help heal him. She wondered what Emma would think about his plan. Would this be therapy for him, like her lamp was for her?
Either way, Sophie could do something for him now. She wrapped comforting arms around him and came to a decision…he wouldn’t have to do this alone. She would be there for him, no matter what. She would sleep on the floor beside him tonight.
Hugh liked Sophie’s arms around him—verra much. He liked that she rubbed circles into his back. He liked the warmth of her buried into his chest. He tipped her head back and kissed her, showing her how much he liked…her. She snaked her arms around his neck. She must like him a little, too.
As he laid her back on the sofa, she made a soft hmmm sound. When he tried to pull away to make sure everything was okay, she tightened her arms around his neck. He ran his hand down the length of her and found the hem of her sweater. Just as he was exploring under her top, searching for skin, the pocket doors opened.
Sophie tried to scramble away from underneath him. He stilled her with his gaze while removing his hands where they shouldn’t have been.
“Hugh? Darling?” Aunt Davinia walked farther into the room.
They both sat up—Hugh still held on to Sophie.
“Oh, yes.” His aunt pretended to be embarrassed by the debauchery in the parlor. “I see you were telling yere guest good night.”
Hugh sighed heavily. “Yes, Auntie? What do ye need?”
“Donal is going to run me back to the dower house for tonight. But, darling, please don’t forget to feed yere guest. I believe she’s going to need her strength.”
Must Love Highlanders Page 16
