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He pointed to the photograph I’d been studying earlier. “My baby sister, Bella, is a full-fledged Outlander fanatic. She’s five years younger than I am and a voracious reader. She knows the books inside and out and has seen every episode of the show half a dozen times. Her dearest wish is to move to Scotland and live with me.”
“So why doesn’t she?”
“Bella is a brainiac. She’s has two Master’s degrees in English Literature and Medieval Studies and is working on a PhD in European History.”
“So she can move here with you…”
“That’s the plan.” He shrugged. “We’re close now, but as a big brother I let her down a dozen ways growing up. She excelled, and I was the screw-up.”
“You don’t strike me as a miserable failure.” That was the closest he was going to get to a compliment from me tonight. He was the kind of man who drove women to make fools of themselves. Handsome and charming and bad to the bone. I knew instinctively to be on my guard around him, in the same way I knew that the German Shepherd down the block from my condo in Atlanta was to be given a wide berth.
Finley, oblivious to my soul searching, shook his head. “I was kicked out of a dozen prep schools in the northeast before Bella was eight years old. My father took a belt to me on a regular basis, but somehow, it never helped. When Bella was old enough, she would sneak into my bedroom at night and try to convince me to study. I was a lost cause. My counselor said my IQ was too high, and I wasn’t being challenged in school.” His laugh held little humor. “The truth is, I was a punk-ass adolescent who needed to be taken down several notches.”
“Did that happen eventually?”
“Not really. It finally occurred to me that if I didn’t get into a good school and make something of myself, I’d be living under my father’s roof forever. That was too dismal a prospect to endure. I eventually graduated from the last of the prep academies, got accepted at the university of my choice, and spent the next six years turning my life around. I finished with an engineering degree and an MBA. Bella cried her eyes out when I was done.”
“She sounds like a very special person.”
“Aye, she is. Enough about Bella. Why the Outlander question?”
It was my turn to wince. “My two best friends and I are much like your sister in our Outlander obsession. We came to the Highlands together for a month, but split up so we could have our own adventures.”
“That seems odd…doesn’t it?”
“Not at all. We’re each staying at various places in the area. We’ll meet up again before going home. In the meantime, we wanted to immerse ourselves in Scotland…to become locals, if you will.”
“I see. And what does this grand scheme have to do with Outlander? Other than location.”
For half a second I searched for a believable lie. This man already held a poor opinion of me. No doubt, the idea of searching for true love would reinforce his notion that I was a lightweight. What the hell; I wasn’t going to apologize for who I was. I’d spent a lot of time with my shrink learning to step out of my parents’ shadows and expectations.
So I told him the truth.
