Chapter Twenty #3
“His lands border Kildonan, and he is a natural-born Highland laird, which is in his favor. He will not care if he cannot get oranges or newspapers. I could offer him more land now that Wetherstone has withdrawn his interest.”
She did not want to talk about Grant. It cut too close to other truths. “Stay here and be a Highland laird yourself. You could resolve the debts, whatever they are, with the profits from sheep and wool and so on.”
He frowned. She saw a snap and spark in his eyes. “It would take a long time for that to happen. And the people of Glen Shee are not too fond of the new earl, remember.”
“They could be. Prove your good intentions to them.”
He huffed a laugh. “How?”
“Fix the bridge.” Her heart thumped as a new thought occurred. “And give them back their homes. Restore the glen as it was.”
“Noble but impossible. I must sell to resolve the financial problem. Profits from sheep and wool will happen in time, though not soon. But I will fix that blasted bridge soon,” he growled. “I will not tolerate a broken bridge on my land.”
“Tell me more about the problems you face. A wife should know these things, if she is to stay a wife.”
“Would she stay if she knew more, that this grand castle is falling apart in places and in need of costly repair, and that the coffers are near empty due to foolish decisions inherited from previous earls?” He set his hands on her shoulders, drawing her close.
Despite layered clothing between them, she could feel his warmth and solidity.
“Which way does the wind blow, Catriona Bhàn?”
He remembered that he had called her bhàn, fair, when others only called her mòr, big or tall. That respect, and the warmth of him against her, enhanced the melting sense that so easily defeated her resolve near him.
“Catriona, what will it be?” He lowered his head to nudge his nose to hers, then soothed his lips over her cheek.
She sighed, about to turn to a willing puddle of desire in his arms. He slid his lips softly over her cheek, and then kissed her, and she dissolved, knees weakening.
His lips took hers tenderly, then more roughly.
She tasted the clean pungency of whisky on his breath, his lips, now his tongue.
Circling her arms around his neck, she savored a chain of deepening kisses, her heart thundering in time with his.
Then she gathered her will, sucked in a breath, and pushed at his chest to be free. She knew how intensely he wanted her, and she wanted him that way, too, her need growing desperate and in need of release or restraint. But she could not give in. Not yet.
He let go easily, which broke her heart a little. She stood isolated, breathing hard.
“So the Highland winds change again, do they?” He raised his hands and moved back. She felt an almost physical tug in the emptiness between them.
“There are some knotty questions. How can I be the Highland wife of a Highland man if he will not live in the Highlands?”
“Are you my wife? That is another knotty question.”
She lifted her chin. “Perhaps we both need more time.”
“I do not need more time,” he growled. “I know what I want. That is you, lass. I do not need to study it up and down, question it in and out. I just know. But God save me, I do not know why I feel that way—especially in this moment.”
She folded her arms, chin wobbling. He gave her hope, made her want to swing out into the risk of it. But she had to keep to the safer path for her brother’s sake and because of Grant’s threat. And she could not let Evan know.
“Would you sell my home out from under me? The glen, all of it?”
“Not all. Very well,” he said, shaking his head.
“You say my father was a very wealthy man. In some ways he was. But after his death, I was left with a considerable debt. He put a good deal of his fortune into thousands of sheep and trade enterprises, but when he was gone, the debts remained. I put my immediate funds toward the deficit, but it was not enough. And I have…my own debts. Selling the estate would satisfy what Father owed, and what I owe as well.”
“I am not surprised about your father, but that you have debt does surprise me.”
“And it will be paid, no matter what I must do. I gave my word.”
His stubbornness was legion, she knew that now, and she could tell he would not share more even if pressed. Some secret weighed on him. With sudden clarity, she knew he would handle it with the same integrity and privacy that he applied to other matters.
In that instant, she felt a heated pulse grow in the space between them, like a subtle magnetic pull. She wanted him, wanted to be his wife, his lover, his everything. Wanted him to be hers in all that as well.
But she could not leave Glen Shee. It would tear her apart. And she could not endanger her family.
“Even if we start again, if you must sell, then we would part. I will not leave.”
“Stubborn lass,” he growled. “We can make a marriage here or anywhere.”
She squared her shoulders. “But this glen is part of me. I must stay.”
“What if you had been evicted with the rest, years ago?”
“I would have withered. I would have faded.”
He sighed and looked toward the window. Through it, she saw the nearly full moon hanging over the dark profile of the mountains. “We cannot go back before we were married, and we cannot leap forward to its end. We have tasted each other, and we want more. I do. You do.”
She kept her head high. “Aye.”
“Then make your decision, Catriona Bhàn. We do not know where this marriage will lead us. No one can know that. It is rather like climbing, aye?” He nodded toward the moonlit mountains.
“We go up because the peak is enticing, alluring, beautiful. We climb because we must see it, be there with it. There is bright promise in that peak, though it is unknown in a way. That desire pulls you along.”
She felt lured in too. “Like hope or dreams, when there is something you desire.”
“Oh, aye. So you go up that height, and then you go farther. You commit to the climb though you do not know how it will go. Often it is not as easy as you hoped. There are challenges but there is exhilaration too. It takes faith and trust to go into the unknown. There is danger, risk. But there is reward, infinitely so, with each step you take.”
“I might do that. I could.” Listening to him, understanding, she felt more courage, less concern about what might come. She would face it. They would face it.