Wonderful…just wonderful. I had to go send him wanting to run for the hills with my foolish talk of love.
“Um, dinner’s ready,” her voice was so quiet she wondered if it had traveled over to him. Apparently, by his quick look over, it had. She took his bowl and utensil over to him, then she turned to get hers when his hand, grabbing hers, stopped her.
“Emma…”
She did not dare look at him while her heart took sudden residence in her throat. Slowly, she was pulled back to him and then she allowed herself to turn. The look in his gray eyes was frankly…tortured. Guilt and shame warred within the smoky depths and she wondered what had put them there.
“William?”
He did not let go of her while he set the bowl on the nearest flat surface and with both hands took both of hers. Instead of her stepping closer, he did.
“I cannae take it anymore, lass, last night when you said—”
“It was the biggest mistake of my life,” Emma interrupted him. “I am sorry, William. I knew that you said you would protect and care for me in the ways you can but I had to go and muck it up by telling you I love you. I should not have said it and I hate, absolutely hate, this distance between us because of my foolish mistake. I promise I will never say those words again if you will forget they were even uttered.”
Her throat was rough and raw by the end of her spiel and her heart was now pounding in her ears. Fear at his upcoming rejection—done rather gently, she imagined—was coming. She could see it in his eyes that had gone from smoky gray to warm silver.
“Just say it,” she whispered with her eyes on the floor.
This was it. In the next moment, her heart was going to be shattered from the hope of love. His words would pull her lofty heart from the unrealistic heights she had thrown it, only to crash to the ground. She braced herself for the splintering crash.
“Well, since ye already ken…” William’s voice was soft and placating. Here it was. Her eyes clenched tight and her breath caught to cushion the blow as it came, “….I love you, too.”
At first, Emma did not hear it. When he leaned in, placed his lips on her ear and repeated it, her heart doing a silly little hiccup, Emma forced her eyes apart and blinked them open. William’s lips brushed against her cheek, while he looked her in her eyes. His look was tender.
“You mean it…” she asked hesitatingly. “Truly?”
“Truly,” William assured her. “Took me a while to reconcile with what I had told ye that night outside the library but …” he shrugged. “… I find it a bit undeniable noo. Ye was brave enough to rebel against yer brother, ye held up on his long ride to this cabin, I dinnae see you fussing aboot soft sheets or warmed water. I feared that ye, being thrown into this rough place with no comforts ye were used to would have affected ye but I was wrong. Yer beautiful an’ kind with a good heart an’ a mind fer seeing justice prevail. What is there not to love aboot ye?”
Blinking, Emma slowly digested his words and when they all settled into her soul she smiled, leaned forward and kissed his cheek. “And here I thought you were all gruff. Where have you been hiding that sensitivity?”
“Not hiding, really,” William’s lips twisted. “I dinnae lean to expressing me feeling much. I never had to but when they come, its more of a sudden slap to me head than deep thinkin’. Somethin’ like a flash of lightning than anything else, as quick an’ burnin’ too.”
There was a growing heat in his eyes and Emma felt a warm sensation running over her skin. Perhaps she was playing with fire but she felt tempted to get burned, “It that all that is burning?”
“Don’t press me, lass,” William growled under his breath as his hand became possessive and his eyes predatory. “Me control is hanging on a thread. Every night we sleep on the same bed ye tempt me. Every time ye move, or breathe or groan in yer sleep me mind goes blank and me instinct wants to take over.”
Emma tried to move away but William hung onto her, “D’ye ken how much self-preservation it takes me to not spin ye on yer back an’ give ye an experience ye’d never felt before? D’ye ken how long I wanted to bar all yer pale skin to me, kiss every inch of yer body, and pleasure ye for hours?”
William’s body heat was infectious and heat began to crawl up Emma’s neck to redden her ears. His warmth was taunting her temperature to rise and remembering when William had touched her before she felt that what he was describing would be three times more pleasurable.
“I wouldnae be just givin’ ye pleasure fer pleasure’s sake, Emma,” he said. “With every touch, in every gasping breath, every kiss an’ every moan, I would be making love ta’ ye. Yer worth love, Emma, nothin’ less.”
Instantly, she craved that. She craved feeling the love he assured her she would have. Emma knew his promises were true, she could see his assurance in his eyes and feel it in the solid grasp he had on her hips. She knew she would get love from him, the one she had been dreaming of since she was a child.
His look was too intense, to the point it was stealing her breath away and she had to look away and breathe. “I am…let us—Christ—please stop doing this to me. My heart feels like standing in the middle of my throat every time you look at me like that.”
Emma dared to look at him to find his eyes lowered to her lips. “And you keep making it worse.” Laughing she titled her head up, and tipping on her toes, Emma kissed him but broke it off quickly. “We better eat before it goes cold.”
Huffing under his breath, William kissed her cheek before taking his bowl, and began to eat. Sitting beside him, Emma ate in silence, too, and when they were both finished took the bowls and rinsed them out.
Her hair was getting longer, nearly trailing to her waist and was a bit wild and the ends tickled her elbows but she did not worry about it.
Drying her hands, Emma went back to William. The sky was dark but the rains had dried up and Emma saw a contemplative look on his face. She edged up to him and softly shouldered his side, “What are you thinking about?”
“That I might have to go check the Inn me an’ Goraidh talked aboot. I am noo kenning that the mayhap he isnae coming any further because he is afraid of being followed,” William said. “But if I go, I am afraid—deathly afraid—because ye’ll be unprotected for as long as it might take.”
Soberly, Emma asked, “How long would it take?”
His brow furrowed, “Mayhap half a day or longer if I leave out at dawn. I can get there an’ back in that time if I ride hard but I hate the thought to leaving ye here alone. Taking ye along would probably take a long time an’ doing so might gain us unwanted attention. I am conflicted lass, very conflicted.”
His concern was understandable but on the other hand, Emma noted, they were in the middle of a forest and as far as she knew, the only person who knew where she and William were, was Goraidh. Thomas did not know—because if he had, he would have tried to kill William and recapture her already. And neither did her Uncle Henry, as she had not mentioned that to Bhaltair.
Sensibly, Emma pointed those facts out and ended her argument with, “You should go. I will be fine here.”
He still looked uncertain, to which Emma concluded, “You said you will only be gone most of the day. I will be fine here. To make you more assured, I won't even go outside while you are gone. But you need to find out what is happening to Goraidh, nonetheless. We have been here for over three weeks and nothing has happened. I do not think that a few hours alone would make much of a difference.”
“And that is where yer wrong, Emma,” William shook his head in worry. “Five minutes, five seconds, even a bluidy moment of inattention can cause tha’ loss of a war an’ worse, a life.”
“I’ll be fine, William,” Emma assured him. “We need to get Goraidh’s information to know who the real killer is.”
He was in a hard place and they both knew it. William’s anxiety was shown by the continuous rubbing of his hand over his face. Emma sat quietly as he sighed and looked her straight in her eye
s, “Ye’ll stay inside fer as long as I am gone.”
“I promise,” Emma replied.
Still, he did not look comforted. “C’mere.”
Sidling close to him, Emma tucked herself into his side and rested her head on his shoulder. William began dropping soft, closed-mouth kisses on her hairline. “Be safe, Emma, I wunnae ever forgive meself if anything happens to ye.”
The smell of his skin and the secure hold William had around her gave Emma the temporary assurance that all would be all right. They stayed that way all evening and fell asleep in the same position. It was only when William tugged the sheet over them somewhere near midnight that Emma roused a little. She woke completely after he had slipped out of the bed at dawn the next morning.
While he was making the horse ready, Emma busied herself with making his coffee. When he came back, shaking his head that was damp with morning dew, Emma handed him the cup and smiled, “I will be safe, William.”
Still, his eyes betrayed his concerns but he did not voice them and nodded. He cleaned up with a bucket and a rag and dressed. After another cup of coffee, he kissed her softly and told her to lock the door after him with the large door-length latch he had cobbled together from a plank of wood and nails.
Watching him ride away gave Emma a twinge of concern and closing the door, she looked around and felt the concern grow to anxiety. The house felt emptier, much emptier with him gone and he would be gone for most of the day.
It was different from when William went hunting because she knew he was nearby. But for him to go far, to the Inn that was somewhere alongside the River Tweed, she felt an acute sense of loneliness. Perhaps she could try her hand again at baking but the ingredients for any meal were slim.
She had no books, nothing to sew, no drawing or painting materials, nothing to keep her mind occupied. She shied away from worrying about William or Thomas or Goraidh and mostly, her mother. She hoped that Uncle Henry had made it to the Marston home and rescued the Countess. She was assured that if he had, there was no way he could have clued Thomas in on where she was.
Looking around, Emma began to despair at what she could do but found nothing. Fleetingly, she considered taking a nap but knew that would not do. Sleeping when she should be awake and aware, was the height of carelessness. She had to do something and went back to the idea of cooking. There were some berries left from a day or two ago… maybe she could make a pie or even caramelize some of the fruits.
* * *
With every clop of the horse’s cantering hooves, William felt his anxiety rise at leaving Emma behind. He needed to find out if Goraidh had returned so their uncertainty about who had conspired to kill the Earl could finally be resolved.
He did not know what to hope for concerning the uncertain guiltiness of Thomas Marston. If the man was guilty, he would be executed for killing his own father and if not, if Thomas was innocent, William would have no grounds for taking Emma as his wife.
That scared him even more.
With a hard set to his jaw and increased pace of his horse, William rode through the forest until he met the main road some two hours or so after setting out at dawn. The roads were empty and hemmed in with tall grass and overarching trees while the spring sun grew warmer.
He needed to get his trip done as soon as possible without any delays. He kept reflecting on Emma. He feared that he would come back to see an empty cabin, the few things they had there upturned or even seeing the cabin burnt to a husk. God’s teeth. The horse was spurred on to a gallop.
His breeches and shirt could only camouflage him so much when it came to appearances but knew that his thick, raspy Scottish brogue would give him away in a heartbeat. He prayed to God that no one who saw him or heard him would go back to Marston. Then again, he hoped that what Emma had said about no one knowing about them would hold true.
The rhythmic thudding of the horse’s gallop on packed earth was as familiar to William as the long rides over Clan MacNair’s wide lands to the nearest clans, or to the shores, or even longer to Glasgow—they did not pressure him and neither did this one. He stopped briefly to relieve himself and pick gooseberries that had survived the lingering spring frost.
Fruits did not satiate him but he needed something in his stomach nevertheless. Another hour or so, and his anxiety nearly at the edge of brimming over, William entered the main town and sought the Inn Goraidh had told him about. It was not hard to find as it was the only Inn in the river town.
The nearby river gave the air a light, heady smell, almost as intoxicating as the air the lochs of Clan MacNair used to give him. Traveling through the town, William spotted fisher-folk with their traps and baskets of fish, scaling and stringing them up where William suspected was a market.
He got a few curious looks but none lingered and he passed through the main road without any interruption. The Inn, Mary’s Stable, was an inauspicious building with a swinging sign, two stories, and whitewash on the walls. William hesitated, and his pause was aptly explainable as he did not know what to expect inside. Many Scots, he thought, could be trusted but there were some who would turncoat swifter than Judas without the thirty pieces of silver.
My inquiry must be quick and quiet.
Jumping off the horse, William led the horse up to the door and looped the lead over a hitching post and took the flat stairs up the entrance. The inside was cool and breezy with the wind coming from the river nearby. The inner room he stepped in was small but he could see an anteroom with a dining room.
A man came out and his dark eyes ran him up and down with noted surprise, “Can I help you?”
“Has a man named Goraidh McKenna been here lately?” William asked quickly, while dropping his voice as a man passed through the room and then went outside.
“Nae,” the man—the proprietor William assumed—shook his head. “Cannae say I’ve seen a man of that name.”
He barely stopped from cursing under his breath but thumped his hand on the desk there. Damn it, his trip had been for nothing. Goraidh was not there and he did not know when he would be. He was getting a bit stifled of the cabin—not that he would ever tell Emma—but he wanted the wide plains of Clan MacNair before him. If Goraidh was not there, he feared another few weeks in the cabin.
William snapped back to reality when he felt the man staring at him, “Er, thank ye,” before turning away.
“Care to tell me who’s asking?” the man said.
“William,” he replied unthinkingly as he was more focused on trying to figure out what to do after telling Emma that they probably had a few more days—weeks possibly—at the cabin. They were already running out of supplies and were going be forced to scavenge for food. He could buy a few things with the silver he had but after that, he was not even sure what to do.
Releasing the reins from the post, he did not notice the man who had left the Inn, smoking a pipe. He plucked the pipe out and smirked, “William eh…William MacNair, I’d bet. So, tha’ missing MacNair has resurfaced. A few people are lookin’ oot fer ye boy… now they will be so happy to ken where ye are. Me pockets, too.”
Chapter 25
Thank God she had the foresight of making a sample pie before cooking the whole thing. Emma sighed and prodded at the little circle she had pried from the pan. The pie was a bit burnt on the top, the filling was too sweet, a bit cloying, the cinnamon was too faint, the salt was a touch too high, and overall it was a failure.
Rome was not built in a day, she mused.
Her eyes glanced up at the sky and she noted the slowly drifting clouds. It was past noon, she decided, and from the cooling air, the time was moving towards evening. Had William found Goraidh? Was he coming back with good news? Was this hell of uncertainty over with?
The questions kept coming, one after the other, and Emma felt miserable as there was no way she could answer even one. Everything rested on William now and the best she could do was to wait. She hated waiting by herself. The only company she had were the birds from the ne
arby trees and the whistling wind coming through the window. And then there was the baking.
Knowing what she needed to correct it, Emma went to the table and began adjusting the makeshift recipe. She was working on the crust and smiled at her flour-flecked hands. How far had she come from a lady who was waited on and provided for. She was now cooking and cleaning for the man she loved.
Her heart leaped into her throat when the door was knocked on and her name was spoken in William’s deep voice. She went and lifted the latch from the door. William stepped in with a bungling sack in his hand and a stiff set of lines around his mouth. Emma feared the worst but did not ask him right away.
“Welcome home.”
Disciplined by the Highlander: A Scottish Historical Romance Novel Page 22
