It was a time of year that always sat heavy on Seraphina’s shoulders. She had moved her sisters here knowing it was far enough removed from their old lives that they could stay hidden, and yet with the hope that the busyness of such a place could keep her mind occupied. And in the summer months she was quite thoroughly occupied, the circulating library flourishing, demanding every bit of attention and focus from her that she could muster up.
The off-season, however, was another matter entirely. While the Quayside was never without patronage, there was nevertheless a lull that dragged on Seraphina. Perhaps that was the reason for her sudden increase in nightmares. She was all too aware that in a week or so she would be without that crutch of constant work she counted on. Mayhap she should begin to look at branching out. They already offered an assortment of stationery and perfumes and fans for purchase, and they provided tea to their patrons in the reading room. But perhaps she could pair up with her dear friend Adelaide, owner of the Beakhead Tea Room, to provide an assortment of baked goods as well. Or maybe she might convince Bronwyn, another of her good friends and now the Duchess of Buckley, to host several intellectual salons at the Quayside.
Mind humming, finally pleasantly occupied by something other than her troubling nightmares, she turned onto the Promenade and entered the Master-at-Arms. Mrs. Juniper was behind the front desk, laughing uproariously with her husband. When she spied Seraphina, her laughter died, to be replaced with a self-satisfied smirk.
“Is that my book then, Miss Athwart?” she asked, motioning to the volume in Seraphina’s hands.
“Indeed it is,” Seraphina replied in a carefully neutral tone, placing it on the front desk. “Please let us know if you need anything else.”
“Oh, I will,” the woman drawled, pointedly turning away without a word of thanks.
Breathing slowly through her nose to control her temper, Seraphina turned about and stormed for the door. But her path was quickly barred when a very tall, very wide, very male presence stepped into it. Strange, that; she was uncommonly tall, after all, and did not often meet men who made her feel small. In truth, only one man had ever made her feel thus, a man who had worn the same green-and-blue plaid kilt as this man was, who’d had identical overlong light brown hair, the same piercing gray eyes, strong jaw, chiseled lips…
Good God.
She stared at him, certain she must be imagining things. She had dreamed of him just last night after all, and so this must simply be a figment of her overactive imagination. Or perhaps a ghost, a spirit, come back to haunt her.
As if he had not done enough damage to her.
But then that figment of her imagination smiled, a slow, cruel thing, proof that she would not be so lucky to have him vanish in a puff of mist. And then he spoke, in that rumbling, deep brogue that had once made her insides melt but that now only caused them to freeze into painful ice.
“Hello, mo bhean. Fancy seeing you here.”
Chapter 3
Seraphina’s mouth dropped open, gaping like a trout’s. And though she knew she must look a fool—especially as it was all too obvious from the satisfied look in his eyes that he had been expecting to see her, giving him a clear advantage in this encounter—there seemed to be nothing she could do to snap herself out of her shock. She had not seen Iain MacInnes since that day nearly thirteen years ago when she had parted from him at that crossroads, fully expecting to be reunited with him within the hour, her heart full of the promise of their future together.
How wrong she had been.
His lips, those firm, chiseled lips that had kissed her senseless on more than one occasion, kicked up at one corner. But where they used to be deliciously full and smile easily, there was no softness to them now. No, now they carried a certain cruelty.
“What, no kiss for your husband?”
That one question, said so quietly yet with a bite, broke her from her shocked stupor. She hastily stepped back, fighting the urge to wrap her arms about her middle. But Phineas chose that moment to dig his claws in tighter on her shoulder, making a low, agitated trilling sound, and she knew she could not let this man cow her. She was not the same innocent, naïve girl she had been. She was strong now, in both body and mind, having been to hell and back—quite literally—and survived.
Planting her hands on her hips in defiance, she glared at him. “What are you doing here?” she hissed.
A bark of derisive laughter passed his lips, so different from the warm honey sound his laugh used to have when they were younger. Now it sounded unused, rough, a mockery of what it used to be.
“That is quite the greeting,” he said, the words as sharp as a freshly honed blade despite how quiet they were, “considering all you’ve done.”
“AllI’vedone?” The man was outrageous, rude, horrible. To think she had loved him once, had promised herself to him, had lain with him. The very remembrance made her ill. “I have done nothing to you,” she continued, her voice dripping with disdain. “What of whatyou’vedone? Or has your ego erased the truth of the past?”
His eyes flared wide with shock. Before he could answer—God knew what rubbish he might have spewed—Mrs. Juniper approached. She eyed both of them with blatant interest.
“Is there a problem here, Miss Athwart?”
Damn it all to hell. That was all she needed, for the woman to begin making up scenarios in her head about her and Iain.Though any scenario she might make up could not be more outrageous than the actual truth.
Even so, Seraphina had a reputation to protect, all connected to her sisters and the business they needed for their livelihoods.Ah, God, her sisters.Pasting a tight smile to her face despite the panic that surged in her breast, she said in as conciliatory a tone as she was able, “Not at all, Mrs. Juniper.”
But the woman did not look the least convinced. She narrowed her eyes as she considered them. “Do you know Mr. MacInnes here then?”
Before Seraphina could answer, Iain spoke up, his voice a veritable purr. “Yes,Miss Athwart, do you know me?”
Seraphina ground her back teeth together until she was certain they would crumble to a fine dust. The cur. But she would not be coaxed into revealing more than was necessary to Mrs. Juniper—and thereby revealing to the entire Isle, as that woman would make any slip-up well known before nightfall. Could she hide the fact that she knew Iain? No; she had been foolish enough to violently react to his presence upon seeing him and could not now call it back.
But she certainly would not—could not—reveal the true nature of their past acquaintance.
