The Gloaming Hour #3
That sexy brogue wrapped around her, enveloped her, and she grabbed the back of the chair to steady herself. Just the way he spoke to her set her insides afire.
You feel it, too. Dunna you, Kylie?
A breeze drifted in through the screen door, like warm breath against her skin. She closed her eyes and inhaled, exhaled. She didn’t want to feel it. But she did.
She opened her eyes and started unpacking the volumes. “I’d better get started on these, Rory. It’s a lot of material to read through.”
Several hours later, she’d managed to get through the first book.
With a heavy sigh, Kylie pushed her glasses on to her head and closed the volume.
“This is insane. It could take a year to go through all this information, and I’m not even sure what I’m looking for.
” The bones in her knees popped as she stood and stretched.
The blades of the ceiling fan sent a feathery breeze across her skin, and the scent of jasmine drifted in through the porch screen.
Come outside with me. The gloaming draws near, and I want every second o’ it wi’ you.
Kylie sucked in a breath. “I thought you wanted my help.”
It’s you I want.
She gulped. It was one thing to be with a ghost you couldn’t see. Quite a different story, though, when said ghost solidified, regaining all mortal senses.
Lifting the heavy volume, she moved to the cool shade of the verandah.
The sturdy rocking chair creaked as she sat down.
Stretching her legs out, she propped them on the railing and crossed them at the ankles.
The soft, gauzy sundress slipped above her knees as she rocked, but she barely noticed.
Memories of her childhood flooded back, and she welcomed the deluge.
What are you thinking aboot, girl?
He sat beside her, close. She sighed. “God, I spent hours shelling peas with Grandma and Grandpa on this very porch. It seems so . . . long ago. Another lifetime even.” Every scent, every sound encompassed a cherished memory.
When had she allowed them to fade? When had she forgotten the scent of lilac her granny used to wear?
Or how her grandpa’s hands were gnarled and calloused from a hard-working life at the railroad, and prior to that, having survived Omaha Beach?
Now, flashes of her as a child sitting on her grandpa’s lap, holding one of his large hands in two of hers, battered her. God, how she missed them.
Cicadas tweaked and chirped, and songbirds settled in for the night. The ever-present bubbling of the outgoing tide filled the air. And a barrage of high-pitched croaks emerged from the canopy of Georgia pines and magnolias.
Just as she moved to open the volume in her lap, a heavy hand rested on her bare shoulder. Her skin heated under it.
“Walk wi’ me.”
She lifted her gaze and met his light grey stare.
He looked so real, from the sun lines at the corners of his eyes to the muscle ticking at his jaw, to the dark auburn hair pulled into a queue.
Butterflies beat madly within her, setting her nerves on edge.
To think a Scotsman from the Revolutionary War, who had centuries before slipped through a crack in time, made her react in such a silly way.
Oh, how Granny would roar with laughter.
She stood and he took her hand, placing it in the crook of his arm. They walked and talked, he of his life and she of hers.
It was a comfortable walk with Rory; a familiar ease that Kylie admired in wonderment. To think he’d been at Granny’s on the Vernon River all these years, and she’d been . . . elsewhere. So much had happened in those years she’d been gone. God, how she regretted them all.
Rory’s gloved hand reached out, and a long finger traced the scar down her left arm. Reflexively, Kylie flinched.
“What happened?” Rory asked, his voice so quiet Kylie barely heard the question above the song of the cicadas.
Kylie’s stomach tightened at the jarring, unwanted memory, and without her permission, her breathing became rapid. She swallowed several times. “I . . . don’t like to talk about it,” she said quietly. “It’s something I’ve put behind me.”
Rory stopped, pulling her to a halt. Gently, he turned her to face him. Kylie refused to look at him.
“I dunna think you’ve put it behind you, lass.” He lifted her chin with his knuckle, traced the scar on her face. “Look at me.”
Kylie forced herself to meet his pewter gaze. Her insides shook.
“You can trust me.”
Kylie fought back tears, not wanting to relive the events that nearly ended her life. But when she looked into the kind, trusting eyes of Rory MacMillan, her fears began to fade. Then, a feeling of certainty washed over her, and suddenly it felt right to trust him.
She’d never trusted anyone else before now.
With a deep sigh, she again met Rory’s intense gaze and began.
“I’ve tried so hard to forget,” she said, and shook her head.
“I’d been in Atlanta, in my first real apartment, for almost two years.
I knew my neighbours. It was in Roswell, a safe suburb of Atlanta, and .
. . I guess I became complacent.” She focused on some point across the marsh.
“I’d gone out jogging – something I’d done daily for more than a year.
” Tears filled her eyes, and her voice dropped to a whisper on its own.
“We run for fun these days, and to keep our bodies fit. I loved it. And I didn’t even hear his footsteps behind me. ”
Rory’s body visibly tensed, and his voice, when he spoke, sounded barely controlled. “A man did this to you?” His accent was thicker, his tone deep and lethally steady.
“Yes,” she said. “He’d apparently watched me daily, watched the path I took, and then, he attacked.
” She again shook her head. “No rape, no robbery – just brutality. He taunted me with a knife—” she closed her eyes, opened them again “—then cut me. I fought back, and that seemed to anger him further.” She lifted her gaze to Rory’s once more.
“He would have killed me – he was so much stronger than me. But a passer-by happened upon us. A fellow jogger.” She concentrated on simply breathing.
“They fought, and he tried to hold my attacker, but the guy got away. The police never found him. I lived in so much fear – fear that he’d come after me again. Finally, I decided to come home.”
“Christ, lass,” Rory finally said, and anger tinged his voice. Then, he simply pulled her close. His lips brushed her temple. “I would have found him. And I would have killed him.”
Kylie leaned into Rory. He smelled of leather and the salt marsh and strangely enough, gunpowder. His words made her shudder, for she had no doubt in her mind that Rory would have done just that. “I don’t know why your embrace comforts me so much,” she said quietly. “You’re a stranger.”
Rory’s hand smoothed her hair, her neck, and pressed gently against the small of her back. “Mayhap ’tis because I’m really no stranger at all, lass.”
Kylie turned her face from Rory’s shoulder and studied his eyes. Such an odd shade of silver, she wondered if they had always shined such a colour. “I suppose you’re not, are you? You’ve been here all along. I’m the one who’s been missing.”
In the waning light of day, Rory’s teeth gleamed white as he smiled gently down at her. “But you’re home now, aye? And no one will ever harm you again. I vow it.”
Kylie had not felt such relief, such release, since the attack happened.
She’d stayed in the hospital, recovering, for nearly two weeks.
The gashes in her arms had been deep, the attacker’s knife dirty, and she’d fought infection for a long time.
Luck was with her though, and not only had her wounds healed without a terrible infection invading, but she’d needed no skin grafts.
But it had left her with scars – the sort of scars that people in general just couldn’t ignore.
She was stared at by children and adults alike, wherever she went.
Rory must have guessed what she was thinking, because he lifted a gloved hand, pulled at the fingers with his teeth, and then took it off.
With his hand bare, he used the tip of his finger to trace the long scar on the side of her face, gently, back and forth.
“Christ, Kylie, you’re powerfully soft,” he said.
“’Tis a battle scar, a part of you – a part of your life’s experiences.
’Tis what has made you such a strong lass.
” He smiled down at her, but his eyes were steady, intense, and they dropped a fraction, to her mouth, before returning to her eyes.
“A warrior.” He traced the scar again. “A beautiful warrior.”
Kylie felt the heat of a blush creep up her neck and settle into her cheeks, and was grateful for the fading light to cover it up.
She studied Rory’s profile in the hazy evening, and she had to wonder why it was that modern men had lost that certain something.
Was it chivalry? Rory had it by the bucket load, and the fact was .
. . he seriously meant what he said. “My grandmother is the only person who ever said I was beautiful.” She smiled. “Thank you.”
Rory stared, the muscles in his jaws flinched, and his eyes searched her face. The air around them became thick, heavy as the sultry summer night embracing them and, for a moment, Kylie thought he’d kiss her. Electricity all but snapped at the intensity.
She was completely amazed when she discovered how badly she wanted that kiss.
But instead of kissing her, Rory smiled, replaced his glove, and tucked her hand in the crook of his arm. “’Tis high tide now, and the moon is nearly full. Let’s walk to the river.”