"I had thought the same," Margaret said. Her voice carried a smooth, silky weight. "For the hall. For when the clan gathers."
"Aye," the seamstress agreed. "And the Lady has the perfect colorin' for it. The freckles, and those eyes."
Aye. She damn well does.
He kept the thought clamped behind his teeth where it belonged.
"Turn, if ye please," the seamstress directed.
As she turned, the unpinned side of the gown loosened. The heavy green velvet slipped away fully along her left side. It revealed a stark, devastating gap from her ribs to the gentle, pale curve of her waist. Her white shift was thin beneath it. The candlelight did little to hide the shadow of her skin.
It lasted perhaps five seconds.
The pin box tightened in Fergus's grip until the wood creaked. His knuckles went white against the bone.
Stop lookin'.
He looked anyway. His gaze traced the curve of her hip, following the exact spot where the fabric gave way and her bare skin emerged. A tight, hot ache erupted intensely in his gut, heavy and insistent. His blood heated into liquid fire.
The seamstress reached out, smoothing the velvet back into place and shattering the view.
Fergus snapped his eyes back to the water stain. His chest heaved.
"The neckline can come down another half inch," the seamstress noted, tapping the flat of her finger against Margaret's collarbone. "It will sit better with the shape of the bodice."
"Is it appropriate?" Margaret asked.
The seamstress shrugged. "For the Lady of the house? Modest enough. For a dinner gatherin', perfectly so." She paused, turning her head toward the doorway. "The Laird can say."
Fergus felt the weight of both women bearing down on him. He dragged his attention from the wall.
Margaret was watching him through lowered lashes. Her gaze was clear, patient, and entirely aware of the exact corner she had hemmed him into. She had kept him on a stool too small for him for ten minutes, and she had not smiled once. That was the most lethal part.
"It's fine," he said. His voice came out rougher, deeper than intended.
"Fine," she repeated, tasting the word.
"Aye."
"High praise," she murmured. She turned her back to him, but he caught the flare of her nostrils.
He stopped pretending to look at the wall. He looked at her.
She wasn't performing for him. That was what always pulled the ground from beneath his feet. She stood in the fading afternoon light, the unfinished gown clinging to the heavy curve of her hips, completely unarranged for his benefit. She was thinking, her eyes fixed on a point inward. Then she blinked, returning to the room. She told the seamstress she wanted shorter sleeves. Sleeves that didn't interfere with her movement. She wanted her hands to be useful, not decorative.
Of course she does.
He listened. He found, to his considerable irritation, that he understood her completely. It was the same practical logic he applied to his claymores, his warhorses, his men. He had not expected to find his own rugged nature reflected back at him in a conversation about a woman's sleeves. Not while he sat on a tiny stool, drowning in the scent of her.
"Two more," the seamstress said, holding out a gnarled hand.
He passed the pins over. His fingers brushed the old woman's, his hand steady only by sheer force of will.
"The blue one next," Margaret said. "If there is time."
The seamstress began unfastening the green gown. Margaret walked to the edge of the bed and sat down. She folded her hands in her lap, her spine a straight, rigid line. She looked across the room at nothing.
Then her hazel eyes shifted.
