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All in all, it had been a trying day.
She tugged the edges of Mr. Farrington’s coat tighter around her shoulders and cast him a cautious glance. His brief scrap with the beak-nosed Mr. Gibbs hadn’t even tousled his sandy hair, she noted, though he’d lost his hat in the innyard fisticuffs. She’d have to compensate him. How much did a fine beaver hat cost? At least a pound or two, likely. More than he paid her in a week.
“Well, we cannae have a wedding without a ring,” Mrs. MacGillivray declared.
Euphemia recalled the antique silver band she’d purchased in Dornoch before venturing north to Wick. At the time, she’d anticipated wedding Mr. Gibbs. “Won’t you reconsider?” she begged. “Perhaps a small p-payment—”
“For God’s sake,” Mr. Farrington gritted before grasping a handful of his own coat—currently engulfing Euphemia—and thrusting his hand inside.
His wrist skimmed her breast.
His knuckles strummed her nipple.
She might have yelped were her face less frozen. Instead, she blinked up at her handsome employer in bewilderment. His eyes were typically warm—a sort of bronze-brown that danced when he was amused, glowed when he was excited about a new discovery, and smiled when she poured his tea.
Now? They were blasting cold fire.
She winced. “I—I am profoundly sorry, Mr. Farring—”
“Quiet.”
“You really shouldn’t have come—”
“But I did. Now, hush.”
His knuckles brushed her a third time, making her squirm. What the deuce was he searching for?
He withdrew a dainty, gold and garnet ring and presented it to Mrs. MacGillivray. “Will this do?”
“Oh, aye.”
Euphemia frowned. “That’s my mother’s ring.”
The old woman held the bauble up to the firelight. “We’ll begin the proceedings when Mary returns with the blacksmith.”
“Fine,” he said.
Euphemia frowned harder, attempting to straighten her spectacles. They remained crooked. “You claimed you couldn’t find it.”
“I lied.”
She looked around the rustic cottage’s front room, hoping to answer any of the dozen questions racing through her mind.
Why had he lied? And why had he brought the ring with him?
Why was he pretending to cooperate with Mrs. MacGillivray’s absurd demands?
Why was he behaving like an outraged husband retrieving a wayward bride?
What in the blazes had made her think stepping between him and Mr. Gibbs had been a good idea?
How did one return sensation to one’s backside after tumbling down a snowy slope into a slush-filled burn?
Was there anyone in this remote fishing village capable of repairing spectacles that had been crushed by the aforementioned backside?
So many questions. Even one answer would ease her mind. The room offered none. All she saw was a blurry hearth, a wooden chest with fantastical carvings, her employer grinding his teeth, and Henny MacGillivray drinking beer from a chipped pitcher.
How had she come to this pass?
