Chapter 18
Abby didn’t want him to regret kissing her, but she knew he was right; there was no way they could be together. She studied his lowered profile, his jaw was set hard and his lips were tight and thin. He couldn’t look unhappier with his situation.
“Don’t you like your girlfriend?”
“Girlfriend? I have many friends, both young and old lasses.”
“The girl you’re supposed to marry.”
“She is beautiful.”
Abby had to stop herself from wincing at that proclamation.
“And she is a highborn Scot.”
Of course, she was. Another strike against Abby.
“Then what’s the problem?”
He looked at her, hurt and disappointment in his eyes. “I dinnae love her.”
“Oh.”
What else could she say? Arranged marriages were the norm in Iain’s time, and she was sure they couldn’t back out of one once they were announced. It was probably for the best. She had to go home, and he had to get married . . . To someone else. She gnawed at her bottom lip.
“Well, I’m sure you will learn to love her once you get to know her.”
“I already know her. She is young and braw, aye, but has a mean streak I dinnae think I can live with.” He slapped his knees and stood up. “I willna marry Fiona.”
Elation coursed through Abigail but she immediately grimaced. What was she thinking? He needed to continue with his life the way he was doing before he met her.
She swallowed, hoping she wasn’t the cause for his change of heart. “Did you just come to that decision right now?”
“Nay, I’ve been thinking on it for some time. Fiona would be as miserable with me as I would be with her. It isna right to make people marry.”
“What about her father?”
Iain let out a sigh. “Laird MacKinnon might have a different point of view, but mayhap we can come to an arrangement.”
Abby frowned. Wars were fought for much less in these times. Clans were always squabbling with one another over land, animals, and whatever else they could come up with. She smiled again. “I hope things will work out for you.”
“Aye, now tell me yer secret.” He squatted in front of her, piercing her with his gaze. “Where are ye really from? And tell me about the strange fashion ye were wearing when ye rescued me.”
It was Abby’s turn to stand up. She moved closer to the dwindling fire and stared into the flames. How was she to tell him the truth? He wouldn’t believe her. It would be too much for him.
“You won’t believe me,” she said.
He stood up beside her. “I’ll know if yer not telling the truth.”
Wringing her hands, Abby swallowed, but her mouth had gone dry.
Maybe she could come up with a better story.
No, she had to tell him the truth. He already knew she was too different from her choice of words, and he’d seen her modern clothes, though, at the time, she’d hoped he was too sick to notice.
“I think you’d better sit down again before I tell you.”
He regarded her for a moment and, with a shrug, sat down on the rock. He regally waved his hand as if showing her a room at an open house. “Ye have my attention, lass.”
She gave him a wry look and sighed. “You’re not going to believe me, but what I’m going to tell you is the truth.”
Rubbing her sweaty palms on her skirt, she tried to find the right way of telling him something that was still bizarre to her, let alone what it would be to him.
She widened her arms to show him her clothes.
“You’ve noticed this isn’t my normal style of dress.
The ones I was wearing when you woke up in that first cabin were my real clothes. ”
He nodded. Something lit his gaze as his eyes roamed from her head to her feet and back again. Was it admiration?
“I know you didn’t approve of my attire, but where I come from, it is quite tame, really. Professional, even.”
“Where do ye come from?” He snorted. “Even I know women in the Americas dinnae dress like that. They are as modest, more so even, than the lasses here.”
“Look, just open your mind, will you?” She rubbed her face and, letting her arms drop, she decided to just come out with it. “I am not from here. I’m not supposed to be here. I’m supposed to be in another time.” She stopped and looked directly into his eyes. “I am from the future.”
“The future?” He doubled over laughing.
“Don’t laugh at me, buster. You wanted the truth and that’s what I’m telling you so you could at least listen.”
His brows shot up then drew together in a scowl, but humor still sparked in his dark eyes.
“Trust me. If I could, I’d go back right now, but I can’t.” She massaged her temples. “That Thomas jerk has my time device.”
He jumped up and clasped her forearm, his eyes widened in confusion. “Ye expect me to believe ye are no’ of this world?”
“I . . .” She stepped back. “You’re hurting me.”
He gawked at his hand and dropped her arm.
“My apologies.” His jaw tightened, and his eyes narrowed, piercing her with his gaze. “Thomas has yer ti-ime device?”
She knew instantly he didn’t believe her.
His eyes were hard and cold. Judging her. If she was any good at reading body language, he had just labeled her mad.
She sighed. “Yes, and you said you’d help me get it back.”
Turning abruptly, Iain strode into the dark. Abby stayed rooted to the spot, staring at his back. He tipped his head back and raised his arms above his head as if he was beseeching God for something.
He stayed like that for a long moment, spun on his heels and returned to the light of the fire.
“I am obliged to listen to more of yer story. After all, ye being there at the exact time I needed help must have been God’s doing. For that, I thank God.”
“I’m good with that.” Abby sometimes wished she could have that sort of faith in a heavenly being.
She had often thought it would make life easier, but then she would wonder if all the carrying on about sins would fill her with guilt.
What she saw as everyday feelings and actions, the religious thought sinful.
One came to mind immediately. Having sex before marriage.
She bit the inside of her cheek. Maybe she should have followed that edict.
She had been intimate with her last boyfriend, and after he ran off, she’d wished she hadn’t given Peter that part of herself. If she was honest, it wasn’t as earth-shatteringly amazing as she’d thought it would be.
She glanced at Iain. People of his time expected the women they married to be virgins. She gave a silent snort. Of course, no one expected the men to be virginal.
***
Iain spoke little to Abigail that night.
He was thankful she hadn’t tried to convince him what she said was the truth and instead left him to think about her proclamation.
He couldn’t believe she was from the future, of course.
How could she be? But he could believe she was confused or mayhap she’d had a head injury, and mayhap she’d lost her memory.
If she did not know who she was or where she came from that would explain her befuddlement, and seeing how different she was from the Scots, she’d conceived she was not of their time.
As he drifted to sleep, his father’s strange friends came to mind.
At six years of age, he could tell they were different.
It occurred to him in that fuzzy time before sleep took him, they could have been related to Abigail.
She was similar in appearance to the man.
With her oblong face, her straight nose and narrow nostrils, and pointed chin.
Although her eyes were blue-gray like his father’s female friend.
He decided to ask her about them, but still couldn’t remember their names.
The next morning, Iain got up before Abigail and was just about to restart the fire when muffled voices sounded on the other side of a small hill. He ducked and scrambled to Abigail, shaking her to awaken her.
She moaned, and Iain quickly put his hand over her mouth. Her eyes snapped open. “Shh,” he whispered, and pointed to the hill. “Someone is on the other side of that knoll.”
Abigail nodded, and he let his hand go. He nodded to the boulders they huddled beside. “Hide behind there.”
Abigail scooped up the bedding and scampered behind the rocks, and Iain crept up the hill, dropping to his stomach just before he reached the top and peeking over the rise.
Thomas, with a bandaged head, followed the road west. Three English soldiers rode to his rear.
Iain smiled. Only four. He could handle them. Once they were around the bend, Iain quietly followed but kept to the side of the road. The road forked ahead, and Iain was delighted they turned to the left fork that led to Uram.
Abigail’s confession sparked in his mind. He would retrieve her treasure as he had promised, but then they would part company, she to Inverness and her family, and once he found a boat, he would sail to Rum.