No Chris to be seen.
Mmmm.
He knew where he would find her.
THE MEN HAD been busy in the week since her injury.
Chrissi stood in the center of the chambered cairn, a flickering candle in her hand. Her ankle had loudly protested the crawl through the long entrance tunnel, but she simply could not remain in the castle a moment longer.
Not with Alis hovering so solicitously.
Not with her own heart slowly cracking in her chest.
Not with the pain of their past racing toward her like a runaway locomotive.
Losing herself in work seemed the wisest course.
Lifting her lantern, she studied what Alis had uncovered.
Corbel-vaulted, the chamber rose to well over fifteen feet in the center, but the sides were sloped and low. Square holes were cut into the perimeter at regular intervals, suggesting niches or side chambers. The weight of the turf overhead and the tight fit of the stones ensured that, unlike the entrance tunnel, this part of the cairn remained free of mud and debris.
Setting the lantern atop a jutting stone, she bent to brush dirt from one of the possible niches, regretting that she had not thought to place her trowel in her pocket.
A noise and dimming of the daylight from the tunnel had her turning her head.
Alis emerged from the entrance, stooped and crouching.
Of course he would run her to ground. Alistair Maclagan watched over those in his care.
The cracks in her heart trembled.
“I thought I might find ye here, lass,” his voice reverberated around the small chamber.
He stood, crossing to join her, rimmed in sunlight from behind and flickering lamplight in front.
How odd, Chrissi mused. The chamber had felt large enough just moments before. But now...it suffocated her, the walls too close and confining. Alis saturated the space, the potency of his large body setting hers to vibrating.
Enough.
How could she continue to play this doomed dance?
“You have been hard at work here,” she said. “The space appears—”
“Ye shouldn’t be venturing so far afield.” He frowned. “Your wee ankle won’t heal if ye abuse it so.”
“I had to see the progress myself. Surely, you know that no twinge in my foot would stop me.” She pivoted away as she spoke, needing to avoid his gaze. To prevent him from seeing the anguish in her eyes.
But she turned too quickly, and her ankle faltered. She teetered to the left, but his strong hand around her waist quickly righted her, pulling her spine against his hard chest.
“A minor twinge,” he groused in her ear from behind. “Ye be barely mobile, Chris.”
Chrissi closed her eyes, trying to swallow past the delectable feeling of him wrapped around her. The press of his pectorals to her shoulder blades. The heat of his palm branding her stomach.
I will not survive this, a dry part of her mused.
Helpless to resist, she sagged into his strength. His grip tightened around her, feeling her capitulation.
“I...uhm...” she began, voice far too breathless for her liking. “I was contemplating the purpose of this chambered cairn.”
