The horse glanced over, his eyes sleepy, obviously taking advantage of the respite to doze.
“As do I,” Rhiannon said in an impression of the horse.
“Is that what he sounds like?”
She laughed. “Mayhap. But let us not discuss George’s language when it is yours that I aim to learn a few words in.”
“Ah, then, a Gaelic lesson ye shall receive. But fair warning, I will expect more George interpretations along our journey.”
Rhiannon crisscrossed her legs and shifted so she could lean back against the tree and see him better from this angle. “I am eager and prepared to learn, sir.”
“Laird,” he said.
“Laird,” she repeated.
“Aye, I am Laird Sinclair, no’ sir.”
Rhiannon lowered her voice, mimicking him, “I am Laird Sinclair, no’ a sir in sight here, my lady.”
“Plàigh.”
Rhiannon repeated the word and frowned, focusing on his face. “What does it mean?”
Ian grinned at her, though there was something teasing in the pull of his lips. “Lovely.”
“Ah, that is lovely.” She smiled, filing away the word to remember for later and thinking how their word for lovely sounded an awful lot like “plague”—ironically, a not-so-lovely word with terrible disease and pain etched into the vowels. “Another.”
“A' buaireadh.”
Rhiannon repeated the word several times with his prompts for emphasis on certain vowels until she had it right. “And the meaning for that?”
Ian chuckled slightly. “Fascinating.”
“What is so funny?” She narrowed her eyes at him. What was Laird Sinclair up to?
“Funny is èibhinn.” He winked, and for a moment, she was lost in his gaze. The smiles and laughter, the wink, the proximity. For a split second, all of it made her forget where they were and why they were there together. She rather liked not knowing better than remembering.
“Are you laughing at me?” she asked.
“A bheil thu a ' gàire orm,” Ian said in a high-pitched voice.
“Was that your imitation of a woman? Of me?” She gasped in mock outrage.
When he started to laugh harder, she smacked his arm—which was far too muscled. Well, to be truthful, it was perfectly muscled, and she wanted to grab hold and squeeze. Instead, she returned to her irritation. Focused on that. If she’d not been wrapped up in his plaid and shivering from the cold, wet rain, she might have tossed it aside and stood up to give him a piece of her mind.
“I think you’re mocking me.” She crossed her arms over her chest and gave him a glare her nursemaid had issued often.
“I might be,” he said with an exaggerated shrug. “’Tis true.”
Suddenly, she found herself quite irritated. More so than she was a moment ago. He was teasing her, aye, but perhaps she wasn’t in a teasing mood. Perhaps she’d been running for her life and still was and didn’t deserve it. “Do you know what else is true?” Rhiannon asked, leaning forward to make certain their eyes were locked.
“What’s that?” The teasing dropped from the curl of his lips.
“It is true that I don’t tolerate insults well.” She leaned back, pursing her lips as she studied him.
“Have I insulted ye?” He appeared genuinely concerned.
“I do believe you have insulted my intelligence and certainly attempted to accost my feelings.”
