Chapter 22
The following week
“My goodness.” Freya stopped in the castle’s entryway, staring through the window at the pony and cart waiting in the drive. “What’s all this?”
Callum had appeared outside her bedchamber door this morning—she was sufficiently recovered from her injury that Aila had put a stop to his coming and going as he pleased—with an air of suppressed excitement she’d never seen in him before.
His gray eyes were shining, and the worried furrow in his forehead had vanished. Even his eyebrows weren’t the stern slashes they usually were.
“This, Miss MacLeod, is your conveyance for today’s outing.”
“Conveyance? Where are we going?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.” He took her arm and led her out the door and onto the drive. “This is Clover,” he added, pausing to give the pony’s nose a gentle pat.
“Good morning, Clover. She’s lovely.”
Clover was a sturdy chestnut pony with a thick white mane and tail, and a jaunty white star between a pair of soft brown eyes.
Freya offered her hand, laughing as Clover nipped gently at her fingers, her mouth as soft as velvet.
“But Aila said we were going to take a walk in the garden. Surely we don’t need a cart and pony for that? ”
Aila had refused to permit her more than a sedate walk up and down the corridor outside her bedchamber until the gash in her head healed, and her bouts of dizziness had passed. Which was all very well, but there was only so much a lady could do while lying in her bed.
But finally, at long last, Aila had agreed to permit her to take a short walk around the garden pathways, and not a moment too soon. If she was obliged to spend another day in that bed, she was going to start climbing the walls, just for something to do.
“I have another destination in mind.” Callum handed her into the cart, which was an exceedingly smart one, with a smooth, glossy wooden seat and shiny black wheels.
“It’s not too far, I hope, or your mother will be furious with us both.”
“As long as you can keep a secret, my mother never has to know.” He joined her on the seat, his thigh resting against hers. He took up the reins and bent his head toward her, his lips twitching with a grin. “So, Freya. Can you keep a secret?”
Goodness, that smile, and the low pitch of his voice made every inch of her tingle with forbidden pleasure. “I—I’ll do my best.”
“Very good. Shall we go, then?”
“Indeed, although I can’t imagine where you’re taking me with such fanfare.”
Although if the truth were told, she truly didn’t care where he took her. He was so handsome in his navy-blue coat, with the breeze ruffling his dark hair and that mischievous smile on his lips, that she would have gone anywhere with him.
It was dreadfully foolish of her, of course, but she’d been trapped in that stale bedchamber for an age, and it was a lovely morning, despite the winter chill. The pale sunlight shone down on their heads, and the scent of fresh air and damp earth tickled her nose.
It was such a pretty day she could scarcely believe only days earlier a violent storm had sent the world crashing down around them.
Literally, in her case.
Even now, a week later, the remnants of the storm were everywhere she looked.
Most of the fallen branches had been removed, but the heavier tree limbs the wind had tossed about were still half buried in pools of mud, and the little gray dovecote near the stables had been torn loose from its foundations.
“Here. Tuck this around you.” Callum took up a thick rug from behind the seat and draped it over her legs. “If you catch a chill, I’ll never hear the end of it from my mother.”
“Nonsense. I’ve never felt better.” But she did as he asked and wrapped herself in the rug, tucking it under her thighs to keep it in place.
He glanced at her, and there was that breathtaking smile again, right at the corners of his lips. The urge to press her fingertip into the fetching dimple on the right side of his mouth was so overwhelming her fingers twitched, but she kept them buried safely under the rug.
What would he do if she dared to reach out and touch him? If she traced the tempting line of his lower lip from one corner to the other, so she could feel the curve of his smile for herself?
It was a mystery, and one not likely to ever be revealed, given how missish she’d become. It wasn’t cowardice, exactly, but more a bashfulness over the proper way to behave toward Callum.
Because it felt almost as if he were … courting her?
Not that she knew what was meant to happen during a courtship. She hadn’t the vaguest idea. She’d never had a proper suitor before, but no gentleman could be more attentive than Callum had been during her convalescence.
He never failed to come and see her. He was outside her bedchamber every morning, and he spent hours on the chair beside her bed.
Even when she’d slept through most of the day, she’d often awake to find him there, keeping watch over her, then when her strength returned he read to her, and brought her treats from the kitchen to tempt her struggling appetite.
He’d even brought her a new sketchbook, and with it half a dozen sharp pencils. When he’d offered them to her, it had been all she could do not to burst into tears.
But mostly, he simply sat with her. Sometimes he read to her.
They’d gone through all three volumes of Smollett’s Peregrine Pickle already and had just moved on to the first volume of Humphry Clinker this morning.
Smollett’s works were dreadfully scandalous, of course, which only made it more delicious.
But she liked it best when he talked to her. They talked for hours about everything, and about nothing at all. It seemed incredible now that she’d ever thought of him as taciturn.
When he wasn’t talking, he listened.
If anyone had told her that the Callum Ross who’d first appeared on the drive at Castle Cairncross would sit by her sickbed and listen while she rambled on about her sisters and her father, and the smugglers that haunted the shores of Loch Dunvegan, she would have said they were mad.
At first, she thought he’d changed. Nearly a week passed before she realized she was wrong. He hadn’t changed at all.
This was who Callum Ross had been all along.
The man who did all the different voices when he read to her.
The man who leafed through her sketchbook, studying her very poor sketches of the view outside her bedchamber window as if they were great works of art.
The man who cajoled the cook into making her Dundee cake, then served it to her in her bed with a generous dollop of cream, just the way she liked it.
The man who’d saved her.
He was … well, he was everything she’d ever wished for.
Yet at the same time, she couldn’t make sense of any of this.
Before her accident, he’d done his best to keep away from her, and despite his attentiveness now, he behaved like a perfect gentleman.
Even on the rare occasions when Aila was called out of the bedchamber and they were left alone, Callum never tried to kiss her again.
No, not once.
Weren’t suitors meant to try and steal kisses?
But it was just as well he hadn’t, of course. A kiss would only encourage her to indulge in girlish fancies. He was merely doing as he’d promised Lord Ballantyne he would. He’d given his word that no harm would come to her, and he was a man of his word.
That was all.
And if she dreamed every night about the way his lips had felt on hers the one time they’d kissed, the warmth of his breath on her cheek and his arms around her, well … that said a good deal more about her than it did him.
It said something else, as well.
The time was drawing near when she’d have to leave Balnagown Castle and return home, but she could no longer deny that she’d be leaving her heart behind her when she did.
It was Callum’s now. His to cherish, or his to break.
“The folly!” She turned to him, her green eyes shining. “You remembered.”
“You sound surprised.” Didn’t she know he remembered her every word, her every sigh, her every glance? “I’ve brought us a hamper, and some blankets and rugs.”
“You planned us a picnic?”
“Yes, I … is that acceptable?” His hand froze around the handle of the picnic basket, heat rushing into his cheeks. It was a bit ridiculous, a picnic in the middle of the winter, but—
“Acceptable? Callum, it’s the loveliest thing ever!”
She clapped her hands together, delighted, and his uncertainty drained away at the sight of her smile. “Is it, really?”
“Of course. Everyone adores a picnic, don’t they?”
She slid to the end of the bench, but he caught her hand before she could leap down from the cart. “No, indeed, Miss MacLeod. You stay as you are, and I’ll see to everything.”
“You won’t let me help?”
Her lower lip poked out in the most adorable pout he’d ever seen, and he couldn’t help but bring her hand to his mouth and brush his lips over her gloved knuckles. “No. You’re my guest, and I won’t allow you to lift a finger.”
He spread their blankets out on the grass on the south side of the folly to block the breeze, then made her a snug little nest from the rugs before arranging the picnic things and returning to the cart to hand Freya down.
“My goodness! Is this all for us?” Freya gazed down at the array of dishes spread out over the blanket, her eyes wide.
“Yes. Mrs. Doherty saw to the hamper herself.” He settled her amongst the rugs, then seated himself beside her. “She’s outdone herself, hasn’t she?”
“I’d say so, yes. There’s enough here for a week of picnics. Ooh, are those fruit turnovers?”
“I believe so, yes. Will you have one?”
“Yes, please.”
He offered her a plate with biscuits, cheese, and cold sliced meat, and one of the turnovers, then prepared her a cup of tea from the tea caddy.
She ate heartily, a sight that pleased him so much he himself forgot to eat and instead sat quietly and watched her, heat flaring in his lower belly at her dainty little bites.