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“Um,” I say because there is no way I’m going to tell him yes now. Not if it means him taking that hand away. “Oh, gosh. It all happened so fast, didn’t it?”
That’s what people say in these kinds of situations in the movies. Yep. That sounds about right.
“I’m sorry,” Finlay says, shaking his head. “If I’d known they were out here, I would never have put you in danger. And it was stupid of me to leave you unguarded in the car.”
Finlay’s worry and regret are written all over his face. “Something like that has never happened before, but it’s no excuse. I’m usually up here on my own, so it didn’t really occur to me. Please, accept my apologies for the fright.”
“It’s alright,” I tell him softly, but I focus on something else he said. “You’re normally alone? So you confront those kinds of people all the time? And you don’t even have a loaded gun?”
Finlay gives a sheepish half-laugh. “Well, as you can see, I’m fit and whole,” he says, lifting his arms and holding them as far to the sides as he can in the small space.
I immediately mourn the loss of contact with his hand.
“I’ve survived every encounter yet. Poachers don’t tend to be particularly smart. Especially if they’re coming on these lands and going after my deer, this place has enough of a reputation that anyone with half a brain cell would know to steer clear.”
“It’s so dangerous, though!” I exclaim. “Don’t you have a – what was it? A Ghillie, to help?”
“Aye,” Finlay nods, starting the buggy back up again and reaching over to strap on his seatbelt. “Aye, I do. Old Hamish. He’s not so good at getting around these days, but I keep him on. Not many men around here with his kind of knowledge, so we both patrol. He makes up for his age and the fact that he relies on the vehicles these days because he’s terrifying, and his gun is actually loaded.”
I shake my head in amusement at the description. Finlay starts the car going at a slower pace this time, taking it easy over the bumps and ridges of the hills and the stones that littered them.
The tough, tall tires of the car, which bring to mind monster trucks from home, make short work of the route, though we’re still jostled around constantly.
“It sounds like you really need that fence,” I say thoughtfully. It isn’t the most insightful comment, but I hope it counts for something. It might show him I’m really taking all of this in.
God, not that it mattered. Just because I was hot for him after he saved my life didn’t mean he felt anything for me.
He was probably anxious not to have a foreign tourist murdered on his lands.
“You’re not joking,” Finlay says seriously. “I’ve been trying to negotiate for it around the entire estate. We’re trying to get official conservation status from the government, which would give us more protection than we have now. And a fence.”
Finlay continues, “It’s not like we want the wildlife wandering off, anyway – if our deer leave their traditional grazing lands and head off somewhere else, they’re likely to clash with other alpha stags, and we’ll all lose out. The neighboring estates run hunts for their stags, so they want to keep their most impressive heads for as long as possible.”
“That’s terrible,” I say, shaking my head. “Keeping animals alive just so someone can pay you to kill them later.”
“You won’t find any disagreement here,” Finlay says grimly, taking a turn to the left onto a smoother part of the land, a flatter area that seems to lead right up to the hills I walked over earlier.
“Speaking of the stags, I should spend a few hours tracking down all of mine. I need to check on the herd that ran, make sure none of them have gunshot wounds, and then search the hills to see if we have any dead animals left behind by those poachers. I wouldn’t expect them to own up to it if they’ve already made a successful shot, so you never know.”
“Okay,” I say, easily enough.
It isn’t what I had planned for my evening, but this whole day has been one surprise after another.
I wouldn’t say no to spending the rest of the night with him, that was for sure. I loved what I’d seen of the estate so far, too, and I wouldn’t mind….
“So, I’ll take you to your hotel now and drop you off,” Finlay says, immediately dashing all of my hopes.
I had misinterpreted – a mistake that made my cheeks burn.
I was glad he was focused on the car and not looking at me.
“I’m sorry about all this, again. I swear, it’s not normally this bad. We don’t often have that much trouble.”
“It’s fine,” I mutter, trying not to let the disappointment show in my voice. Finally, the buggy crests the ridge of the hill, and there it is in front of me – my hotel.
“I’ll get you to the door,” Finlay says as if that’s a consolation, and I can only nod. Disappointment burning a hole deep in my chest.
The rest of the journey is swift, completing what had been a good amount of walking for me earlier in the day in a matter of a minute or two.
