Chapter 14
Cameron scored a final point on John, put the hilt of his sword to his chin, then dropped his sword point down and called peace.
He mopped his sweaty brow with the hem of his shirt, then took a deep breath.
He’d been down at John’s studio for most of the day, looking for a distraction.
Actually, he’d been at John’s for an unwholesome amount of time over the past two days, looking for the same thing.
He couldn’t say he’d been completely successful at finding it.
John took off his mask and tucked it under his arm. “When are you going to tell me where it was you learned to use a sword?”
Cameron suppressed the urge to shift uncomfortably. He’d been dodging that question for years, but perhaps it had been just a matter of time before John grew weary of the evasion. He shrugged. “I just picked it up here and there.”
“Rubbish,” John said seriously. “You walked into my studio seven and a half years ago—”
“Crawled in,” Cameron corrected.
“Crawled in,” John conceded. “You crawled in all those years ago, never asked me to teach you anything, never asked for aught but someone to beat on. Don’t you think by now you can trust me with the truth?”
Cameron rested his rapier against his shoulder. It was none of John’s business, of course, but perhaps politeness demanded that he give some sort of answer. “My father taught me,” he conceded. “There, that is some truth.”
John studied him. “But the weapon wasn’t a rapier, was it? I know that’s what you settled for when you first came here, but I imagine it was only because that was all you could lift. It isn’t your weapon of choice, is it?”
Cameron shot him a look of irritation. “Is there any other kind of sword?”
“We’re in Scotland. I’ve seen—and used—all kinds. Something else I think is odd,” he continued without hesitation, “is how similarly you and Ian MacLeod fight—especially given that you just said you didn’t learn your swordplay from him.”
Cameron forced himself to snort dismissively. “A pint down at the pub, mate, will answer all your questions. Thank you for the workout. I needed it today.”
“I have a couple of Claymores in the back,” John continued relentlessly. “If you’re interested.”
Cameron forced himself to maintain a neutral expression. “When you think I’m equal to the challenge, you let me know and I’ll think about it.”
John only stood there, watching him silently.
Cameron nodded briskly, grabbed his keys and sunglasses, and strode as casually as he could to his car.
He didn’t like those sorts of speculations.
He tossed his rapier onto the passenger seat, rolled down the window, and made his way home. He checked his watch and swore. He was running very late.
Trying to distract oneself from a woman one didn’t know and shouldn’t want took time.
He probably should have put his foot down on the gas, but he found himself, not for the first time in the past two months, not overly anxious to return home whilst Penelope was there.
Being engaged to a woman one did know and didn’t want did that.
He sighed and hung his arm out the window as he drove. Even though he didn’t particularly want Penelope, he had a very compelling reason to stay engaged to her, so perhaps it didn’t matter whether or not he loved her. It was a certainty she didn’t love him.
But since thinking on that gave him a sharp pain between his eyes, he decided that for the safety of all those he might encounter on the road, he just wouldn’t. He wasn’t being cowardly by avoiding those thoughts, he was being practical.
He was a Scot, after all.
Forty-five virtuous minutes later, he pulled into his garage, shut off his Range Rover, and got out.
He walked into the house, but kept his shirt on instead of stripping it off as he so desperately wanted to do.
Taking off his shirt outside the privacy of his own bedchamber was unthinkable.
Penelope had looked at him with revulsion the first and only time he’d done so in front of her, so he’d stopped—at least whilst she was gracing his hall with her enchanting self.
“You’re late.”
Cameron looked up to find her standing in the middle of his great hall with her arms folded over her chest, tapping her foot impatiently.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m running a little behind today.”
“A little?” she echoed incredulously. “Mac, we have guests arriving in an hour!”
He took a deep breath and walked away. “I’ll be ready.”
“I want to go back to London tomorrow,” she said curtly. “I want you to come with me.”
“If you like,” he said over his shoulder.
“I insist on it. And don’t be so stubborn about being prompt next time.”
Cameron jogged up the stairs, walked into his bedchamber and slammed the door behind him.
Stubborn, his arse. What Penelope wanted was a man she could control, which he most certainly was not.
He could hardly believe he’d allowed himself to be maneuvered into a place where the only honorable thing to do had been to agree to marry her.
Duty was a bloody inconvenient thing.
He shot his locked closet a dark look, dropped his gear on a chair, then went to the bathroom.
He shaved, though he had to force himself to be careful.
It was his own face, after all, and it didn’t serve him to take out his frustrations there.
He turned on the shower and stood under its spray for far longer than he should have.
He rested his hands against the wall and let the water run down his back.
It was hard to avoid looking at the scars that were spread over his body or to skirt the memory of how he’d gotten them.
His chest bore many. His left forearm sported a long slash that hadn’t healed very well.
He honestly couldn’t remember how he’d gotten that one.
He actually couldn’t remember quite a few things, truth be told.
But one thing he could remember with perfect clarity was the other dinner party he’d endured with Penelope in Scotland. Her friends were snobs, every last one of them, interested only in money and how much of it he had. He couldn’t bear it again.
Ten minutes later he was bounding down the stairs, dressed in jeans and a denim shirt, fully prepared to lie through his teeth.
“What are you wearing?” Penelope demanded in astonishment. “Go back up and change!”
Cameron grabbed his favorite leather jacket off the hook near the front door. “I’ve a meeting I just learned about,” he said as convincingly as possible. “I might lose the castle if I don’t at least make an appearance. You’ll be fine without me, darling.”
Penelope spluttered in fury. Cameron slipped out the front door whilst she was otherwise occupied and ran around the keep to his garage.
She didn’t chase after him. Perhaps the thought of not having Cameron Hall to potentially sell after she’d killed him off with too many London brunches had made her decide he wasn’t worth following.
He jumped in his Range Rover and bolted down the road to the village before she could rethink that—though perhaps there was little danger of it.
Penelope would think he was making money, she would have a marginally satisfactory dinner with things and people imported at great cost from somewhere besides the village, and he would be off doing what he wanted to do. Everyone won.
He drove through the village and continued on. He turned up the way that led to Jamie’s keep, then came to a fork in the road. The left led to the MacLeod keep. The right led somewhere else. He took the right without hesitation.
After all, he had no intention of seeing James MacLeod that evening.
He wondered, briefly, if he might be making an enormous mistake by presenting himself at Sunshine Phillips’s door. It was obvious she couldn’t stand the sight of him. Either she was fainting or she was running away—or she was slamming doors in his face. It wasn’t promising.
But there was something about her, something that tugged at him in a way he hadn’t felt in years.
Eight years, to be exact.
He suppressed a shiver, then continued on. He passed Patrick MacLeod’s keep on the right, which he’d seen the day before on his way to deliver Sunshine’s bag to her. The castle was a rather lovely place, actually, but he wasn’t interested in a visit there.
But apparently he was quite interested in a visit to the morgue, for he almost ran Sunshine over before he realized she was walking down the far side of the road toward him and he had drifted quite a bit to the left.
He hit the brakes so hard, he sent his Range Rover skidding sideways. Sunshine dove out of his line of sight.
He threw open the door and leapt out, praying he hadn’t hit her.
“Mistress Phillips?” he said anxiously, hurrying around the front of his car to look for her in the grass. “Are you hurt?”
She sat there for a moment, breathing hard, then scrambled to her feet. She swayed for a moment, avoided the hands he extended to help her, then brushed herself off with brisk strokes.
Then she turned and walked away from him.
He looked after her in surprise. By the saints, what was it with that irascible wench? Was it his looks? His dress? The fact that he’d almost run her over not a handful of moments ago?
Was it that he was engaged?
He supposed the last would be enough to put her off, but he wasn’t one to give up at the first sign of a good skirmish. He followed her back across the road, then caught her by the elbow.
“I wasn’t trying to run you over.”
She stopped, then looked down pointedly at his hand on her arm. “Excuse me,” she said stiffly.
He supposed he should have taken that personally, but he wasn’t so thin-skinned—and she was so damned familiar, it almost knocked him flat. He released her, but continued to walk beside her.
“Where are you going?”
“My sister’s for supper,” she said shortly.
“Is there any extra?”
“No.”
He clasped his hands behind his back. “Might I come along and see for myself?”
“No. There’s a pub in the village. Go eat there.”
“The food’s terrible.”