Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Next day
From her time spent here in youth, Juliet knew the Scottish sun to be a stingy one.
But not today.
Today it poured its light and warmth freely onto all who would venture beneath its yellow rays for a ramble about this wild, beautiful land.
As she took the two stairs up the stile gate, stepped over the top rail, and descended on the other side, moving from Dalhousie to Kilmuir land, a sort of freedom took hold of her.
Here, alone in a field of wild buttercups, thistle, poppies, and broom, she was free of obligation to anyone or anything but her own senses.
She was free to form her own impressions of field and sky.
Their colors filling her eyes. Their soft, sometimes rough, textures brushing along the tips of her fingers.
Their crisp, earthy scents filling her nose, her lungs.
The distant whistle of a lark or baa of a sheep providing a song for her ears.
These elements filled her heart and her soul, gave them width and depth and vastness. Nourishment. That was what Scotland gave her.
She topped a hill, and her feet had no choice but to stop, her hand held to her forehead. That view…
In the distance below stretched Baile ìm.
The manor house was composed of gray granite in the ornate style that had been popular in the last century.
With its pair of turrets flanking the front entrance, steep pitched roof, and dormer windows, it was a structure meant to impress.
Beyond it lay a narrow loch that ran into low hills that shone green, brown, and gold in the sun.
Figures bustled below—men, women, animals. Baile ìm was a working estate, lest she forget. She experienced a surge of appreciation for Kilmuir, and what he was seeking to accomplish here. A year ago, he’d left London to immerse himself in something that mattered…something that lasted.
Just as words on paper lasted, so, too, did this.
Kilmuir didn’t know it, but he was making a poetry of his own here.
She followed a trail that wound through a small copse of birches, their canopy verdant green against their slender silvery trunks, and opened onto the side of the manor house that led to its outbuildings.
The farmyard should have been mostly empty as everyone would’ve been tucked into their midday tea.
Instead, she found it a frenzied hive of workers shouting and charging about.
Even Clootie had joined in the ruckus, barking and racing to and fro.
A quick assessment revealed that a sow had escaped her pen with her piglets, who were presently squealing and streaking across the farmyard as everyone gave chase. It didn’t take long for her to pick out Kilmuir’s head of auburn hair amongst those scrambling about.
A little pink fellow with floppy black ears broke free from the group and began racing toward Juliet, his eyes wild at the prospect of freedom in the woods beyond.
“Oh, no you don’t,” she said as he attempted to streak past her.
She reached down and scooped up the naughty piglet who was writhing and squealing in her grasp as if she’d stuck him with a pin.
“I shall call you Shakespeare, as drama appears to be your forte,” she said on a laugh.
“I’ve been told not to name the animals,” came a deep familiar voice to her left.
Juliet pivoted to find Kilmuir striding toward her with an armful of squirmy piglets and a golden lock flopped across his forehead.
He was in quite the disheveled state, but entirely unbothered by it.
No dandy was Kilmuir. In fact, somehow, in plain wool working clothes he managed to look entirely himself.
Over the squealing, he continued. “Naming them makes it harder for what comes later.”
“Ah.” Juliet preferred not to think on that. Still, she might pass on the pork at supper.
Kilmuir jutted his chin toward the nearest barn.
Three of his men had managed to capture the sow with a noose around her neck, but she didn’t appear too inclined to follow the lead as she planted all four hooves and shifted her weight against her would-be captors.
With one worker to either side of her rump, they each dug a shoulder in and shoved with all their might, pushing and cajoling her into a stall, one laborious inch at a time.
At last, it was one final nudge, and she was inside.
Kilmuir and Juliet bent over the pen gate and returned her piglets—the happy family reunited and free to plot their next escape.
Outside the barn, Kilmuir dusted his hands off on his trousers, his head shaking with bemusement. “That was completely unanticipated.”
“Life on a farm, I suppose.”
He gave a wry laugh of agreement. “I might need to change my clothes, or risk smelling of piglet on our ramble this afternoon.”
“I don’t mind,” said Juliet. And strangely—surprisingly—she didn’t.
His brow gathered for an instant and released. She’d surprised him, too. “Even so,” he said, “a quick wash at the yard pump wouldn’t go amiss.”
Juliet glanced at her own hands coated in piglet grime. “You’re likely right about that.”
Kilmuir took hold of the handle and said, “You’ll want to stand back a few more feet. When the water comes, it’s a gusher.”
He gave a forceful heave of the handle, and the water did, indeed, slosh out in a great wave, coating not only Juliet’s hands but her spencer nearly up to her armpits. She jumped back on a startled laugh. “Now, it’s your turn.”
She took hold of the handle and gave it her all, but only a trickle of water poured forth. “Hey!” she groused.
Kilmuir rubbed his hands together beneath the measly trickle of water. “It’s enough, lass.”
Something occurred inside Juliet.
Lass.
She liked being called lass.
By him.
“One more pump,” he said.
Juliet did as instructed. Another measly trickle of water.
Kilmuir removed his red kerchief and wet it before swiping it along the back of his neck. A few beads of water escaped down his clavicle, trailing down the open V of his shirt.
Oh.
Her eyes should lift. They should dart away and take in any number of the happenings around her—Clootie nuzzling her hand for a stroke, a maid hauling a bucket of milk from a barn…
She could even count the individual stones of Baile ìm.
But her eyes refused to tear themselves away from the man before her, and the bead of water that led the gaze down…
A hint of muscle—muscle whose solid steel she’d experienced yesterday when he’d caught her—a fuzz of golden hair…
As if the force of her gaze had the power to will his shirt away, she stared. A sudden and ferocious desire to see more—all—made the breath catch in her chest. Surely, the bead of water had reached his stomach…the waistband of his trousers…and below that…
Oh.
So, this was what lust felt like.
Her infatuation for this man seemed to have entered a new phase.
A throat cleared.
His throat.
Her gaze startled up.
“Are you ready for our afternoon explorations?” he asked, his gaze giving nothing away.
“Erm”—she cleared her throat—“yes.”
He grabbed a knapsack and tossed it over his shoulder. “Provisions.”
She nodded and gathered herself. She was known for her composure. She wouldn’t let it fail her now as she fell into step—not behind him, but not exactly beside him either—as he led her into the Scottish wilderness.
Well, not precisely the wilderness. Not yet, anyway. For now, they were cutting across fields of his land. Some fields were used for crops, and others for animals, mostly sheep. Yet others lay fallow. They’d made it to the middle of one such field when a loud moo sounded.
Kilmuir came to a sudden stop, causing Juliet to stumble over her feet. “What is it?” she asked, low, feeling the whisper warranted for some reason.
“It was a mistake to cross this field,” he said.
Juliet glanced about. All she saw was tall grass with a few poppies scattered about. “It’s a lovely field.”
But Kilmuir hadn’t taken his eyes off an object in the distance. He pointed, and Juliet looked to find a shaggy red, rather massive, Highland coo watching them. If an animal could wear a grumpy expression on its face, this one did.
“This wee fellow has gotten quarrelsome in his old age,” muttered Kilmuir.
The coo stamped a hoof as if to illustrate the point.
“See the kissing gate behind me?” Kilmuir asked in a level tone. The sort of tone that wouldn’t further irritate a grouchy Highland coo who was now shaking his head.
Juliet craned her neck and found the gate. “Aye.”
“Walk toward it slowly—no running—and don’t stop until you’re through and in the next field.”
“What about you?” Juliet wasn’t going anywhere until he explained that.
“Hamish’s grievance is with the world in general, not me in particular,” said Kilmuir. “He’s losing his sight, but he knows my voice. What he wants is a song.”
“A song?”
“Just do as I ask, if you will.” Kilmuir’s voice brooked no opposition. She’d never heard that tone of voice from him.
Commanding.
She rather liked it.
She’d entered the simple maze of the kissing gate when she heard it—a deep, masculine voice lifted in song.
She turned and found Kilmuir approaching Hamish, who had canted his head slightly to the side.
The coo had settled. She knew not the words Kilmuir sang, for they were in Gaelic, but she thought it was about the sweetest tune she’d ever heard.
Kilmuir ruffled the beast’s fur when he finished the song. Hamish then followed him to the kissing gate. Juliet stood back, while man and beast bid one another farewell.
Once they resumed their walk, Juliet said, “I haven’t any notion of what you were singing, but it was a lovely song. A lullaby, was it?”
“Aye, Cagaran Gaoloch. It’s his favorite song.”
“What does that translate to?”
“Beloved Little Darling,” said Kilmuir with a sheepish smile.
“I can see beloved, perhaps, but little…darling?” A laugh escaped Juliet. “That might be stretching the facts.”