“I never thought I’d trust a McGregor,” I murmur.
“And I never thought a McKenzie would understand me,” she replies.
Her words linger in the dark, heavier than I’m ready to unpack.
“If I believed in fate, I’d say it’s trying to bring us together,” she adds quietly.
“What makes you say that?”
“Well… we keep literally falling into each other,” she says.
I laugh softly, thinking of all our mishaps.
“And then there’s the past few days—first forced to share a room, now a bed.”
“You think fate is trying to bring us together?”
A brief pause.
“I think we control our own paths,” she says finally.
“I think so too. Goodnight, Keira.”
“Goodnight, Alistair.”
As sleep finally starts to take me, I turn slightly, watching her silhouette in the dim glow of the fire. Her face is relaxed, peaceful—and I feel a strange urge to protect that moment.
It hits me then, with unsettling clarity?—
This arrangement is starting to feel like a lot more than a business deal.
Lying here, listening to her steady breathing and the storm raging outside, I can’t help but wonder if there’s a reason for all of this.
Cullen skink:a rich Scottish soup made with smoked haddock, potatoes, onions, and cream.
CHAPITRE 18
KEIRA
When a surprise guest crashes the moment
If someone had told me a month ago that I’d wake up in a king-size bed draped in red tartan next to Alistair, I would’ve suggested they see a psychiatrist. Or lay off Uncle Fergus’s bootleg whisky.
And yet… here I am, staring up at the exposed beams of our honeymoon suite while Alistair sleeps peacefully beside me. And by peacefully, I mean he’s softly snoring—which is both mildly irritating and, annoyingly, kind of comforting.
The storm died down sometime during the night, replaced by that particular early-morning Highland silence, broken only by birdsong and… yes, definitely snoring.
I roll onto my side to watch him. Asleep, Alistair loses that faint edge of arrogance he wears like armor. His dark hair is tousled, his features relaxed, and there’s something unexpectedly vulnerable about him like this.
My heart does that strange little thing again—the one it seems to love doing whenever he’s around lately. Like it’s waltzing while my brain is yelling at it to stick to a proper, disciplined march.
I slip out of bed with all the grace of a cat… or, judging by the creaking floorboards, an elephant in a china shop. Alistair mutters something unintelligible, rolls over, and keeps sleeping.
The ridiculously ornate bathroom—with its two-person tub practically begging for scandal—is completely ignored in favor of a quick shower. The hot water feels incredible after a night where I barely slept, hyper-aware of him just inches away.
When I step back out, dressed in jeans and a cozy sweater, Alistair is sitting on the edge of the bed, hair even more disheveled, scrolling through his phone.
“Morning,” I say, aiming for casual. “Sleep well?”
