Chapter Twenty-one #2
They ate supper in a small cave beneath a rocky outcropping, all sitting around the fire on beds of fur that covered the cold, earthen floor, and would later provide a soft place to sleep for Lady Catherine.
Lachlan announced that the clansmen would sleep just outside, guarding the entrance, but when he spoke the words, he experienced an ache of discomfort at the thought of Catherine sleeping alone in this cold hole in the mountain while he was outside, also sleeping alone.
Well, not alone exactly. With the others. But they were invisible to him. Everyone and everything was invisible when Catherine was near.
He hated the fact that they had argued that day. Hated that she was so lovely in the firelight and was glancing at him frequently, but looking away whenever their eyes met.
She was punishing him, he knew, for how he had pushed her away after the river crossing. But what else could he do? Treat her the way he treated other women? Smile and flirt, and flatter her?
God help him, he couldn’t even look at her without wanting to hold her.
Everyone sat down to eat, and he was pleased at least that Gawyn MacLean had put together such a tasty meat stew, which he’d boiled in an iron pot over the fire and served with crusty rye bread and a full-bodied wine in fine pewter goblets.
Lachlan would have to thank Angus for sending such a functional fellow.
He would not thank him, however, for sending Alexander, for the lad had pushed his way into the circle to sit beside Catherine on the fur, and now they were eating their suppers together, laughing and engaging in light conversation while the others looked on and listened.
Alexander told her, in painful detail, about his schooling in Glasgow, and now he was asking her questions about her own upbringing, trying to help her remember things.
He was too polite. And helpful. And wholesome looking.
Lachlan didn’t like him.
Catherine, on the other hand, seemed to have taken a fancy to him. They had ridden together across the moor for near a quarter of an hour that evening.
Ach! Lachlan tossed his plate aside, for he had suddenly lost his appetite. He had made a noble effort that afternoon to do the right thing and put some distance between them, and the very next minute this boyish upstart was slinking up beside her, working a little too hard to charm and impress.
The lad reminded Lachlan of himself in his younger days, and that did not sit well in his stomach.
Downing the last of his wine in a single gulp, he tossed the goblet into a bucket and stood. “Alex! I need you outside to help groom the horses before it gets too dark.”
The young Highlander looked up in surprise, leaped to his feet, and tripped over the corner of the fur as he dropped his plate into the water bucket.
“Aye, sir.” He strode purposefully out of the cave.
Catherine frowned up at Lachlan. “It could not wait?” she said. “Poor Alex wasn’t finished his supper.”
“He looked done to me.”
They stared at each other for a tense moment while the others shoveled stew faster into their mouths. A starving bunch they were, apparently.
Catherine shook her head at him in a somewhat scolding manner, and he wanted very much to ask her what was so special about Alex MacEwen that she couldn’t bear to see him go.
But that would reveal to everyone that he was jealous and that this woman was getting under his skin, so he simply walked out.
* * *
After supper, Catherine lounged back on the soft fur with a second goblet of wine and looked toward the mouth of the cave.
Alex and Lachlan had not returned since they went outside to tend to the horses, and she was beginning to worry that Lachlan had sent the young clansman on a fool’s errand in the dark—to scale and scout the mountaintops on the other side of the moor or to measure the depth of the next raging river they might need to cross.
She stood and excused herself from the others. Outside, away from the warmth of the fire, the air was cold and damp on her cheeks. It smelled of winter.
The chill penetrated the fabric of her gown.
Gathering her shawl more tightly about her shoulders, she peered through the darkness but could see nothing through the shifting mist, which hovered in brooding silence over the moor.
If not for the sound of the horses nearby, munching on grass, she might have thought she was alone and that the rest of the world—mountains and all—had been swallowed up by the fog.
“You should go back inside,” a voice said, husky and low and oh, so familiar.
She spun around and spotted Lachlan. He was a shadowy figure leaning against the outside wall of the cave. His tartan was pulled up over his head and wrapped around his shoulders like a cloak.
“Where is Alexander?” she asked, feeling some concern for the young clansman, who had been very kind to her and was only trying to help pass the time by striking up conversations.
“I’m up here, my lady,” he keenly replied from an overhanging rock above.
Catherine lifted her gaze. The lad’s legs were swinging back and forth over the edge.
“Oh, there you are.” She felt rather foolish all of a sudden.
Lachlan lowered his hood. “Do you need something, Lady Catherine?”
Even through the darkness, she could feel the heat of their shared awareness of each other. The silky cadence of his voice sent a tremor of longing through her veins. It also revealed the desire he could not hide. At least not from her.
He wanted to keep her at bay, of course. He had made that abundantly clear. He wanted to behave properly in front of the others, but she could sense, deep in the workings of her body, that he was not pleased about it.
“Yes, I do need something,” she replied. “I wish to speak with you privately, Lachlan. Alex, would you excuse us?”
It was a bold request. Lachlan was probably gritting his teeth at her blatant disregard for his earlier command—to hide what existed between them—but she didn’t care if the others knew. She felt no need to hide the truth. Why should she?
She realized suddenly that her memory loss had erased any inhibitions she might have felt if she’d had a real life and a reputation worth caring about.
But she did not. As far as she was concerned, anything before six months ago simply did not exist; therefore, her persona had no genuine value to her.
In that way, she was perhaps a bit reckless.
Alex hopped down from the ledge. “I’ll join the others by the fire.”
As soon as he was gone, Catherine spoke in an angry whisper. “You didn’t have to treat him like that.”
“Like what? I didn’t say a word just now.”
“He’s intimidated by you.”
Lachlan merely shrugged. “He’s just young, that’s all.”
“And how old are you? You’ve never told me.”
His eyes lifted briefly, as if he was surprised by the question. “Three-and-thirty.”
In her mind, she worked out the details of his life. If he had been cursed for three years and the curse had begun on the tenth anniversary of his wife’s death, he would have been less than twenty when he married.
“Will you walk with me?” she asked. “I want to speak with you, and I don’t want the others to hear.”
“It’s dark,” he replied. “The moor is rocky. You’ll fall and hurt yourself.”
“Or you will.”
Lachlan let out a breath of annoyance and pushed away from the wall. “You don’t give up, do you, lass? Pick up your skirts. We’ll stay close to the hillside, and we’ll just go far enough away that we won’t be heard. Will that suffice?”
“I suppose it will have to.”
He took her by the hand and led her away from the cave entrance, past the horses. He sat down on a big boulder and raked his fingers through his hair.
“Is it that much of a chore just to talk to me?” she asked, wishing she did not feel so hurt by his frosty demeanor, but there it was.
He looked up. “Aye. It’s the worst chore imaginable.
You know how I feel, Catherine. You know all the things I want to do to you, but this curse prevents me from doing anything, so I just wish you would let me be and let me get through this trip to Edinburgh without making things harder than they already are. ”
Oh.
Her breath sailed out of her lungs. She had been so absorbed in her own need to be close to him—to feel the way she had felt the night before, when he kissed her up against the stable wall—that she had ignored the fact that he was not actually rejecting her.
It was quite the opposite, in fact. She understood it logically, she supposed, but her heart only felt one thing: the agony of being apart.
She sat down. “This is difficult,” she said. “To be honest, I wish the others hadn’t come. We would have been fine on our own, just as we were before, and I would have been happier, not having to hide how I truly feel.”
“Do not say it,” he growled. “I’ve been in hell all day.
I want to touch you and hold you—but I can’t.
And tonight that young MacEwen…” He flung a hand through the air.
“All I wanted to do was drag him out of the cave by the ear, toss him up onto his horse, smack the animal’s rear flank, and send him galloping back to Kinloch—just for talking to you. ”
It was not quite a vow of everlasting love, but it was enough to make Catherine smile, for he had just confessed that he was jealous.
“Do not shut me out,” she implored, trying to move past all of that.
“You are the only person with whom I feel I can be myself. Even if we do not kiss or touch each other like lovers, I still need you. Please ride with me tomorrow. That is all I ask. I am alone, and lonely, and you were hurtful today.”
She wished she could see his expression, but his face was shrouded in the murky gloom of the night.