Page 6 of Highland Spy

Connor nodded once.

James paused and Ariana dropped into an immediate curtsey.

He looked down at Ariana’s bowed head and nodded approvingly. “I can always count on you.”

Connor bowed low. When he rose, the king and his retinue had passed. Ariana watched his departure and closed her eyes as if shutting out something painful.

“Might I still keep my winnings from tonight?” She opened her eyes and looked at him with all the imploring hope of a hound begging a meal.

Her audacity surprised him.

First cheating in public, now asking for her winnings despite having been caught.

“My staff,” she said, and leaned closer into him. Unlike most noblewomen, she did not smell doused in perfume. Doubtless she could not afford such an expense. Her scent was light, like the taste of dew in the morning air. It was sweet and natural and enticingly feminine.

“They haven’t been paid last week’s wages,” Ariana continued. “And if I’m to be…detained, they’ll need coin to sustain them until they obtain new positions.”

In her nervous chatter, she’d provided him with extra incentive to encourage her participation.

She was, without a doubt, the very girl he sought. And she’d be only too easy to convince.

Connor stared down at her, taking in her wide blue eyes, her porcelain-smooth skin, her cheeks tinged with the color of her shame. “Perhaps it’s best we resume the conversation outside, aye?”

Ariana’s mouth fell open and her gaze shot around the room, as if she expected to find someone obviously eavesdropping. “Yes, of course.”

She allowed him to lead her toward the doorway to the gardens. A well-behaved lass, as most of true nobility were.

Lightning flashed silver-white against the windows and he knew it’d be miserably wet in addition to bitterly cold.

Ariana followed without protest despite the horrendous weather. He pushed open the door to the hissing shush of rain, and they stepped into the dark. The cold curled around him, but years in the Highlands left him immune to its bite.

He let the door slip closed. They were completely alone. Lightning flashed once more, illuminating her in a blaze of light. She was thin, aye, but the shadows further highlighted her narrow face and called attention to the hollows of her cheeks.

For all her winnings, the girl was practically starving.

“What’s to become of me?” Her breath puffed in a frozen cloud of steam in front of her.

Though they were alone, he stepped closer to ensure the privacy of their conversation. No one could be allowed to overhear. An eavesdropper would pay with their life, and he didn’t want any more death than was needed staining his hands.

He met her wide-eyed stare and spoke the necessary words he’d been dreading to say. “What if I told ye there was a way out?”

• • •

Ariana couldn’t breathe. The harder she tried to pull air into her lungs, the more breathless she became.

If only her heart would stop pounding so.

Her thoughts hammered in time with the unbridled beat, repeating over and over again.

Caught, caught, caught, caught.

Caught.

She stared at Connor in the darkness, a man who truly was a stranger. Light streamed from the windows and partially bathed him in a golden glow, leaving slanted jagged shadows over his face.

The garden was dark and cold and wet. Rain came in hard splats everywhere.

If she ran, he would catch her.