“What do you intend to do with me?”she asked, a hint of steel in her tone.
“Teach ye to not ignore me when I give ye advice ye should heed.”
“Doubtful.Next option on your list?”
While he was glad her fight had returned, he was not in the mood to battle.He hadn’t the stamina for it—at least not this morning.“I have summoned Mairwen.”
“Good.I have a few choice words for that lady.”She took another sip of her coffee and this time didn’t grimace.
“Better?”
“What?”
“That vile tonic ye like.”
The faintest smile tugged at the corner of her lovely mouth.A mouth he had already decided was made for kissing—slowly and as often as she would allow.
“I take it you don’t like coffee?”she said.
“I do not.”
“That brings us back to my original question that you failed to answer.”She drew herself up as if calling on every ounce of courage she possessed.“What do you intend to do with me?”
There were many things he would like to do with her, but even with the numbing weariness of over a day and a half of no sleep, he had enough sense to know better than to tell her about them.“What do ye wish done with ye?”
“You already know the answer to that.”
“Aye, and I already told ye that was not possible.I dinna have the ability to return ye to yer time.”
She took another sip of coffee, a longer one this time, then set her cup on the table and stared down at it.“I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye to Emily.”Her voice quivered with emotion.
Gads alive, dinna let her cry again.Her teariness broke his heart.“Who is Emily?”he hurried to ask, hoping it would distract her.
With her focus still trained on her cup, she barely smiled, then tipped the slightest shrug.“The only person in this world who has ever understood me.Sister.Friend.Confidante.Emily is just—Emily.”
“So ye do have family, then?”
“She is my sister by choice, not by blood.”She jerked another shrug, but this time, it revealed anger instead of nonchalance or uncertainty.“I was taken from my biological mother because she preferred drugs and alcohol over motherhood.The people who fostered and then adopted me did it for thelook-at-what-a-wonderful-thing-we-didperks rather than because they wanted to help a child.”She finally lifted her gaze and leveled it with his.“Emily and her family always loved me no matter what.They’ve also done everything they could to help me.I owe my sanity to them.They are my family—and I have no earthly idea why I am telling you all this.You didn’t exactly request a life history, did you?”
At least she was talking.He would hear whatever she had to say.“Yer family with Emily.They helped ye survive in yer time?”
Her jaw tightened.“I am an adult.I should be able to take care of myself with no one’s charity.”
Such a proud woman.Maybe there was a wee bit of Scotland running through her veins after all.“And ye had no husband?No man to help ye?”He had to know, even if his asking angered her even more.
“Yeah, well, that didn’t work out either.He stuck a pin in that a couple of weeks before I left for this trip to Scotland.”
“I dinna ken what that means, lass.”
“It means he dumped me before I had the chance to dump him.I should’ve beat him to the punch, but I kept thinking things would get better.”
Dumped.Grant had a pretty good idea of what she meant.“That man was obviously a fool.”
She snorted a bitter laugh.“Once you get to know me better, you might agree with him.That’s the way my luck’s been running lately.Then I’ll really be up an eighteenth century creek without a paddle.”She rubbed her eyes while shaking her head.“Sorry.This situation has made me ridiculous.I’m better than this.At least—I used to think I was.”She dropped her hands back to her lap, then leaned forward, refilled her cup, and drank it without adding any more milk.
He shook his head, understanding everything except for the eighteenth century creek part.“No matter what happens, no matter what the witch says, ye’ll not be without protection or refuge in this time.Mairwen brought ye here on account of me.I consider myself responsible for ye.”
“You make me sound like a puppy she left on your doorstep.”
