36. Piper on the Grounds #2
“Those are not opposites.”
His gaze meets mine. For a moment, the chapel feels smaller. Intimate. A place that remembers the worst nights of his life.
“Did Ewan know what you were?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“And he pushed his arm through the grate anyway. He must have trusted you.”
“No.” Tristan looks toward the stairs. “He trusted the man I had been. He demanded I become that man again.”
“And you did.” My ribs tighten.
The need to make this moment lighter dominates before it hurts too much.
“Well, your manners are excellent.”
“I’m relieved you’ve found one redeeming quality in me.”
“And your scones are decent.”
“Mrs. MacLeod makes the scones.”
“Then we’re back to manners.”
His smile is faint, but it stays.
I step away from the gate. Near the altar, a patch of mortar has fallen from the wall, revealing something darker beneath it. Wood, perhaps? A narrow panel.
“Has that always been there?”
Tristan follows my gaze. His expression sharpens.
“No, it hasn’t.”
Murphy walks toward it. The hair along his back rises.
“Murphy?” He growls, a low sound I rarely hear.
Tristan crosses the chapel in an instant. One moment he’s beside me. The next, he stands between Murphy and the wall. I couldn’t even see how fast he moved.
He presses his palm against the exposed panel and seems to listen.
“What is it?” I ask.
“I don’t know.”
He looks at the cracked mortar, then at the symbol carved above it. The circle with nine lines.
“We should leave.” The urgency in his voice makes my skin prickle.
“Is something behind there?”
“Possibly.”
“Alive?”
“Possibly.”
He takes my hand and leads me from the chapel with Murphy close at our heels. Outside, sunlight has broken through the clouds. The sudden brightness feels unreal.
Tristan locks the door of the chapel.
“You didn’t know about that panel.”
“No.”
“Truth?”
He turns to face me. “Truth … I’ll have it investigated.”
I believe him. Which is becoming dangerous in ways that have nothing to do with vampires.
He helps me mount Fern. This time, when he lifts me, my fingers slide along the back of his neck. His eyes darken into something sensual and warm.
I settle into the saddle. He remains close, one hand resting against my boot, assured I’m in the saddle.
He then mounts Bramble and we leave the chapel beneath the yew trees and follow the stream deeper on the Glenhaven grounds.
The land brightens as we ride. The trees thin. Sunlight spills over the grass. Murphy races ahead, all memory of growling forgotten in favor of discovering every rabbit in Scotland.
We ride on several miles. A brook appears beyond a slope, running fast and clear over pale stones. Beside it stands an enormous oak. Its branches stretch wide enough to shelter a house. It’s beautiful.
Tristan dismounts.
“This is where I thought we might stop for our picnic.”
I look at the stream, the green bank, the hills and flowers rising around us. The old oak.
“It’s terrible.”
“I feared you might think so.”
“No potential at all.”
“A tragedy.”
He helps me down with a smile. Again, his hands find my waist. Again, I place mine on his shoulders. This time, neither of us pretends it’s necessary. My body slides slowly against his as my feet reach the grass.
His breath changes. So does mine.
We stand beneath the oak with the brook moving beside us and sunlight flickering through the leaves. His hands remain at my waist.
“Piper.”
There’s too much in the way he says it.
Apology. Want. Fear. Hope.
I should step back. Yesterday I ran from him. This morning I told him I needed truth. An hour ago I stood above the place where he nearly starved himself to protect everyone around him.
Now…
“I’m still angry with you,” I say. “And I still don’t understand half of this.”
“I know.”
His thumb moves once against my side. Barely. The smallest touch. My whole body notices.
I lift one hand from his shoulder and touch his face.
Tristan goes perfectly still. His skin is cool beneath my palm. His eyes close for one brief second. When they open, they’re dark and unguarded.
“I’m not ready to forgive you,” I whisper. “But I missed you. Us.”
The words are hardly out before his control breaks. His hand slides to the back of my neck, and his mouth finds mine. The kiss is not like the others.
His lips move over mine with six hundred years of restraint and truth finally given somewhere to go. I grip his coat. He pulls me closer.
The world is only his mouth, his hands, the rough bark at my back when he guides me against the tree.
He stops instantly.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No.”
“Piper—”
“Do not apologize during this.”
A sound leaves him. Half laugh. Half something else. Then he kisses me again, slow and deep. My tongue teases his.
His thumb traces my jaw. His body presses against mine as my fingers slide into his hair. He shudders. That small reaction sends heat through me. The ancient, impossible Lord Tristan Sinclair can be undone by my hand in his hair.
Good to know.
His mouth moves along my cheek, then lower, to the place beneath my ear. My breath catches. I feel the exact moment he becomes aware of my pulse. His lips hover over it. His hands tighten my waist.
The air changes. Seduction and hunger and need are there.
Tristan draws back. His eyes are black. My heart pounds.
Then he takes one deliberate step away from me.
The brook rushes beside us. His eyes slowly begin to lighten. I lean toward him again but he steps back.
“Stop,” he whispers.
“Why, Tristan?”
“Because I’m trying to behave honorably.”
“You’re being extremely inconvenient about it.”
I close the distance and take his hand. He stares at our joined fingers.
“I’m not offering you blood,” I say. “I’m holding your hand. I want to kiss you. And maybe … more. You are not being dishonorable.”
His gaze lifts to mine. He raises my hand to his lips and presses a kiss to my knuckles. Old-fashioned. Tender. Devastating.
“I think we should have lunch,” he says.
“That sounds like a retreat.”
“It’s strategic.”
We spread the blanket beneath the oak as my body tingles.
Mrs. MacLeod packed sandwiches, cheese, fruit, pastries, two bottles of sparkling water, a flask of coffee, white wine for me, what I discover is blood wine for Tristan and enough biscuits to bribe Murphy into betraying every secret in the castle.
Tristan sits beside me.
The chapel waits somewhere behind us beneath the yew trees.
The Convocation waits seven weeks away.
Sebastian Ashcroft and the other Houses wait with elegant invitations and polite threats.
But beside the brook, under the oak, none of them owns us.
Tristan hands me an apple. Our fingers touch.
Neither of us pulls away.