Some response was needed from him.
He swallowed hard. “Seems I’ve picked up on your habit and started talking to myself.”
A watery smile formed on Lucy’s lips. “Your entire family has visited on numerous occasions.”
Your pathscrossed. He’d been so damned bloody close to Lucy.You just failed to see what—who—was in front of you, until it was too late.
“I don’t know how I did not notice you, Lucy,” he said, his voice breaking.
“I’m not offended. The inn was often crowded, and I was moving from table to table and baking and cooking in the back, and your family is something of a whirlwind. It’s hard to be seen amidst such noise.”
A wry grin creased his lips. “That I understand.”
They shared a smile.
Lucy shrugged. “Either way, I’d hardly expect you to recall a serving maid.”
With a flippant afterthought, she’d speared Arran inside.
“Don’t say that,” he said roughly. “Please do not say that, Lucy. The only thing I’ve cared about for so long is my work. It blinded me to all, not just…you.” He held her stare. “Do you hear me?”
Biting at her lip, Lucy nodded.
“My father loved his work in the same way. He’d tell me story after story of making the hard, cold Scottish earth his bed because the sky was so clear and the world so still. He loved to travel.” Lucy grew wistful. “I always wished to. He said I got that from him.”
“We are alike in that regard,” Arran said, regret ravaging his voice. “You and I.”
Her sad eyes lifted. “No, we aren’t. I’ve always been in the same place, with passersby and sailors going on to see other places I’ve never seen, while I remain stuck.”
A deep, crushing ache pulled at his core.
An even deeper sadness settled within her eyes…and in him.
“You don’t have to be stuck,” he said hoarsely. “Not anymore.”
I could’ve shown her those places.But would it even be safe for a woman in the life they lived? The question did not need answering.
There was no woman.
Not like her.
Campbell, on the other hand? Campbell could show Lucy places and sunsets she couldn’t even begin to imagine.
As part owners in their families’ shipping line, Arran and Campbell often sailed upon one another’s ships.
Never again.
“My da told me the only thing that mattered in his life was the freedom of being out there. Roaming the hills. Scaling mountains. Sleeping beside rivers and lochs. He never wanted to be tied to land.” Lucy picked up a twisted branch of heather, holding it close. “Is that how it is with you and the sea?”
Arran nodded. “Aye. It—” Was. Before you. He paused. “Is.”
“Same as my da, but…” She continued fiddling with the slender branches. While she worked, the sweet scent of apple blossom that clung to her skin filled his senses. Tempting as that fruit the first man had sinned for. “One day, he stepped inside my mum’s inn. And he said he knew in an instant…”
“That inn was the only place he wished to be,” Arran said softly.
Lucy nodded. “Aye.”
Arran was a cynical sort, but not when it came to matters of the heart. He’d seen love in his family. He’d just never found that gift for himself.
