****
Before dark came down, he carried Danny up to the loft like a sack over his shoulder. The maid had jumped to offer her own bed and now fussed around it, adjusting the pillow and blankets.
“I will just make sure he is comfortable, shall I?” she asked as Finnan and Jeannie went back downstairs.
“You will no’ let her sleep up there with him?” Finnan asked, only half concerned. In some matters, Danny must look after himself.
“Certainly not. There will be no impropriety here.”
Was she sure?
“Aggie will bed down in my room.”
He took up his plaid, against the rain that now crashed down, along with his sword and leather pouch.
Jeannie reached out and touched his arm, her fingers immediately skittering away again. “Are you sure you should not stay?”
“Never say you are worried for me?” He raised his hand and touched her cheek very gently. “No need, Jeannie. I am a survivor, me.”
She shivered beneath his touch. “I do not doubt that. Yet the night is filthy wet.”
“I will stop by some time tomorrow when I think it safe, to see how Danny fares. I hope I will be able to move him then.”
Her eyes searched his. “And should he take a turn for the worse, instead?”
“Then signal me. Wave a white cloth in the air from your back garden. I will keep an eye on the place and come should you need me.”
She nodded but did not look happy about it. Finnan smiled to himself. Aye, he had already half won, but best not to press her too soon. Make her want it; make her beg.
“Until tomorrow, then,” she said.
“Aye, and thank you. How could I ha’ been so mistaken in the woman Geordie wed? Clearly, you are an angel.”
He bent his head then to kiss her cheek, an intended mark of gratitude. His lips skittered along the warm velvet of her skin as she turned to catch his mouth with hers. For an instant, Finnan went still, both breath and heartbeat arrested, as her sweetness flooded upon him.
Hot, blinding, lips parted slightly beneath his, her mouth lured him in. He dove into her without further invitation, his tongue a sword meant to wound her mortally.
But swords, as he should know full well, were two-sided, and he felt the backlash of the passion that pierced her.
Danger,his mind screamed at him.Do not lose yourself in punishing this minx.
Failing to heed his own advice, he captured her face between his hands so he might kiss her still more deeply. Her fingers came up and curled around his wrists, but not in an effort to prevent the embrace. Instead, it felt as if she grounded him, clung the way her legs might around his waist in a still more intimate situation.
He broke the kiss only because he needed to breathe. His heart pounded up in his ears, and every impulse demanded he take her to her bed.
She withdrew from him, but not far; her lips whispered against his when she said, “Be safe.”
“I will.”
“Come back soon.”
Haste ye back. The old highland words of parting. But this was no highland woman—he had to remember who, and what, she was.
He straightened. “Aye.”
She released his wrists and he felt the loss, deep. With a supreme act of will he left her and stepped out into the rain.
Chapter Nineteen
