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“You stayed for the wedding? Why in Christ’s name—”
“Mr. Kendrick!”
“Why in the name of all that’s holy,” he corrected, “would you put yourself through that sort of public humiliation?”
“It wasn’t so bad.”
“Really?”
She scrunched up her nose. “It seemed the right thing to do. Eden is an extremely nice person, and I wanted to show my support for her.”
He rested a hand on her ankle. “You’re a bonny lass, Donella Haddon. I hope you know that.”
She blushed. “Thank you, but don’t forget that I truly had no wish to marry Alasdair. I just didn’t know how to get out of it.”
“But why run off to a convent? Surely there were legions of other handsome fellows sniffing about.”
“That is an exceedingly improper observation, and I didnotrun off to a convent. I’d been thinking about it for a long time and was finally free to act on my wishes.” She held out an imperious hand. “My sock, please.”
He handed it over. “Shall I put it on for you?”
“Certainly not.”
Her chippy tone suggested he’d been more than successful in distracting her.
“How about that cup of tea?”
“That would be lovely.”
She gingerly rolled on her sock and then wriggled her foot. “It hardly hurts at all,” she said in a pleased tone.
“It will hurt once you put that boot on.”
She pulled a comically exaggerated face. With her mussed curls, boy’s clothing, and dirt-smudged nose, she looked like an adorable urchin.
“But it should be much better by tomorrow, don’t you think?” she hopefully asked.
Not if she had to walk on it. But with any luck, Alec would show up and their ordeal would be over.
As he prepared the tea, it dawned on him that he hadn’t been bored once in the last two days or been fashed about the problems in his life. He’d always been the cheerful one in the Kendrick family, but a rain of punishing blows had knocked the joy out of him years ago. Oh, he put on a good show for the sake of his brothers and the family. Yet it had been a very long time since he’d had what anyone would call fun.
Despite the risk and danger, he’d found this little adventure tremendously interesting, if not downright entertaining. True, he always missed his son with an ever-present ache. But these last few days, on the road and back in the mountains again, he’d felt more like his old self. It would seem he’d needed a challenge and, in some improbable way, he’d needed Donella Haddon.
When he returned to her with the tea, she was not looking as well as she’d been only minutes ago.
He set the teapot on the table and tipped up her chin. “What’s wrong?”
She forced an artificial smile. “Nothing that a cup of tea won’t fix.”
“Donella—”
“I’m a little cold, that’s all.”
In fact, she was shivering.
Logan wrapped her coat and then his own around her shoulders, before pouring a mug of hot tea for her.
“Do you think I could have a bit more whisky?” she asked. “It did seem to warm me up.”
