“Mac?” She touched his arm. He resisted the urge to shake her off and roar at her to leave him alone. He had just enough awareness to check that wild reaction. With difficulty he said quietly, “Ye’d best go to bed, lass.”
“Mac?”
“Go, please!” he said, fighting to keep his voice level.
Another moment and then she obeyed him. He felt her move away, a cold puff of air that sent a shiver down his back, but that was probably just the sweat under his shirt congealing. He heard the door open and then close quietly. And he slumped forward, his forehead on his hands, gripping the edge of the mantelpiece.
He stood like that for some time, lost in a kind of anguished haze. Finally, he straightened and looked up at Cat’s portrait through a haze of tears. “I’m sorry, mo ghràdh.”My love.
He turned away and made his way upstairs to his bedchamber, where he stripped, washed, and crawled into bed. Closing his eyes, he forgot to say his usual prayer to Cat, his thoughts a jumbled mess. He fell asleep in the midst of trying to work out what he was going to do.
Aihan, retreating to her room, was conscious of a heaviness of heart in the wake of the joyful pleasure she had experienced in his arms. For a few precious moments, she had felt that the differences in language were overcome by a more primal language that they both understood. But in the aftermath, his withdrawal and rejection destroyed that communion of souls and made her feel cheap and tawdry. It hurt.
She tried to shrug off the stab in her heart, but as she stripped off the foreign clothes and gave herself a quick wash, the tears came anyway, tightening her throat and clouding her eyes. The ache in her chest squeezed, and she suddenly missed her brother fiercely.
Ah Liang, where are you? I should just leave, but I don’t have the information I need yet, for where would I go?
She climbed into the big soft bed with its rustling mattress and snugged herself under the covers, Curling her feet up to keep them warm.
I must find out where you went, Liang. I shall come to you wherever you are, my brother. I need you.
Sleep took her before she could formulate a plan of any kind, but thoughts of Liang were a bittersweet comfort. Yet as she slipped into sleep it was Mac’s face that teased her, his head thrown back, eyes closed, expression twisted, as his bodyconvulsed with their shared ecstasy. She had felt the flood of heat and dampness through her dress. He had come as hard as she did. His arms, tight round her at the end, had felt so good. So big and warm and safe . . .
Chapter Ten
When Aihan appeared at breakfast for the fourth morning in a row in the same gown, Col realised he needed to give her some more dresses to wear. So, after breakfast, he went up to the attic and fetched down one of the trunks he had packed Cat’s things in. He took it to the Daffodil Room and left it on the floor at the foot of the bed. He salved his conscience with the thought that Cat wouldn’t want her things mouldering away in the attic if they could be used. She was very practical like that. A trait she and Aihan seemed to share.
He had expected there to be awkwardness at breakfast after what happened between them last night, but when he entered the dining room, Rory and Callum were having a fight. How it started he wasn’t sure, but by the time he arrived they were tussling on the floor, and Rory had Callum pinned down with a hand to his throat.
He was about to intervene when Aihan rushed past him, setting the tray of food she was carrying on the table, and applied a swift kick to Rory’s ribs, which sent him sprawling. Callum scrambled to his feet, his face red and tear-streaked as he got the table between himself and his brother, and Aihan grabbed Roryand threw him with a blindingly quick twist so that he landed on his back. Then she put a booted foot lightly on his throat.
“How ye like it, huh?” she asked, bending over him.
Rory blinked, staring up at her, stunned and winded.
“Ye leave him alone.” She indicated Callum. “I teach ye to fight, Chinese style. You like?”
Rory nodded, and she lifted her foot and gave him a hand up.
The boys took their seats at the table as Fergus and Willy came in with the rest of the breakfast things.
Helping himself to parritch, Callum said shyly, “Will ye teach me to fight too?”
“Sure,” said Aihan with a broad smile. She nodded at Willy, “Ye too?”
Willy nodded enthusiastically, as his mouth was full of bread.
Taking his seat at the table, Col wondered what just happened. Peace seemed restored, at any rate. He leaned towards her and murmured, “Thank ye.”
“No problem, I need to train every day. This just kill two birds with one rock.” She smiled. “I get that right?”
“Generally, we use stone instead of rock, but aye, ye used the expression correctly.” She was a very fast learner. There was so much more he wanted to know about her. She was intelligent and strong and fierce and brave. No highland warrior had more courage, he thought. And she was unabashedly passionate. He winced internally at that. He needed to keep his distance on that front. It would be difficult. He would be careful not to be alone with her again.
Aihan arranged to meet the boys in the courtyard mid-morning for their first lesson. All three of them were there ahead of her, waiting.
She bowed to them, placing her clenched fist against her flat palm and bending at the waist.
They all three blinked at her, then Callum imitated her, and she smiled. “Good.”
