Like walking inside a cloud must feel, as Clara described it.
The clouds were low in the sky above them and thick. Shades of grey almost alive and swirling over their heads as the storm tried to decide if it would be a thorough drenching or just a quickly moving mist. But, by midday, it was much the same as it had been all morning.
Several days had passed since Alan had kissed her hand and yet she found herself lost in reverie over it even now. Oh, her hand had been kissed before, out of respect and in greeting when various nobles and important men visited her father and were introduced to her. A few times the polite gesture turned into something else, something...possessive. Ill at ease over such presumptuous intimacies, she’d look to her father for guidance and he’d ignored her and the action. So she did.
But when Alan had touched his lips on her skin, it had sent waves of pleasure through her. His gesture had been intimate and possessive and yet not threatening. A sense of anticipation grew within her and the sinful part of her wanted him to continue. To move his mouth over her skin, to kiss her mouth and more. Even now, remembering it brought a trembling heat to the deepest place in her body.
Which was wrong. So wrong for so many reasons.
To be honest, she felt unsure of how to act after his gesture. Sorcha made certain she went to the keep earlier rather than later on that first day. Though they’d not spoken in private since that kiss, she’d watched him more than she wished to admit.
No matter that she yearned for more. No matter what she wanted. Even if she decided not to enter the convent, this could never be the place she remained. If her identity was discovered, too many would pay for her deception.
As The Cameron’s nephew, Alan was absolutely the worst man to pay her heed or for her to get close to. And his tracking skills made it more dangerous. If anything should prick his curiosity about her, she had no doubt he would seek her truth and discover it. So, instead of thinking on him, she should be planning ways to avoid his company and his scrutiny.
And not about that kiss at all.
Once the bairns were down to sleep after their noon meal, Sorcha knew she needed to get out of the cottage. She had not planned to visit Father Diarmid until the next day, so she had no excuse to walk to the keep. If she walked around the village, she would, no doubt, get lost even while meeting Dougal or one of the other men who seemed to appear on the road when she did. Sorcha would not have believed they were there for her but for Jamie’s explanation.
If they knew her true identity, none would be worthy of her. If they knew how unprepared and ill suited she was for marriage, none would want her. She could not cook or clean or care for a household or bairns—skills these men would need in a wife. Clara had tried and Sorcha had given it her best effort and yet she still burned the food, left soap in the clothing and lost at least one of the bairns every time they set foot out of the cottage.
No one seemed worse for it though. The children kenned their way home or were helped by villagers back to the right place. Clara managed to save most of the meals Sorcha attempted and to remove the soap before anyone itched or scratched because of it.
She was about to tell Clara of her plan to walk when the deep masculine voices drifted through the misting rain to her. As she followed the sound to the back of the cottage, she recognised both voices. Jamie and Alan Cameron. Staying in the shadows of the corner of the croft, Sorcha watched as they worked there. It was a failing, for certain, but she found the sight of him to be alluring. As long as she kept in mind the dangers he presented to her and her plan, Sorcha was sure it would all work out well.
Glancing over, she caught sight of the two men who were oblivious to her gawping there. Both men were tall and fit and strong. They matched each other in ability and rhythm as they hammered the iron horseshoes to the shapes and size they needed. This was a usual practice of theirs, she could tell, and she took advantage of it now.
They worked in silence and occasionally they would pause and laugh at some jest or comment from the other. Sorcha could not turn away or keep herself from staring. Both men laboured bare-chested, as though they did not feel or pay heed to the rain and the coolness of breezes carried by the storm. When Alan turned away, she stared at his body, enjoying the view of his powerful back and shoulders as he toiled at the demanding work.
Why did he do this? He was cousin to the lady and nephew to the chieftain of the mighty Camerons. He did not have to work as a common villager. And yet he did. In good spirit and in willingness. This was a strange way of living and so different from the way her father ruled over his kin.
‘Well,’ Jamie called out a short while after she began observing them work, ‘have you had enough yet?’
Jamie put down the hammer he held and wiped his hands on the plaid that hung around his waist. Alan stopped then, breathing hard, and shrugged. Walking to the bucket, Jamie dipped the battered cup into it and drank it down. Dipping again, he held it out to Alan.
‘I can tell how upset you are by how many days you show up here willing to work with me,’ Jamie said, once Alan had taken the cup. ‘Three days in a row means you are very upset.’ Jamie laughed and Alan replied with the darkest frown she’d seen in a long time. The crude movement of his hand just made Jamie laughed louder. ‘You told me a bit, but I would guess there is more to tell?’
Alan tossed the cup into the bucket and used his hands to smooth his hair back away from his face. With his arms raised like that, it made his chest seem even larger than she’d thought it. The muscles of his stomach rippled and tightened as he replaced the leather strip holding his long hair back. Sorcha could not breathe as she watched the display of muscles and masculinity continue.
Heat unlike anything she’d ever felt poured over her. Not even sitting close to the huge hearth in her father’s hall had made her anxious and restless. She struggled against the urge to walk to him and to reach out and touch him. To slide her fingers over the defined pattern in the muscles of his stomach and to feel the rippling as he moved under her touch.
Instead of giving in to the compelling need that flooded her, Sorcha stepped back and leaned against the cool surface of the cottage. Her breathing was shallow and quick, she tried to slow it down and understand the torrent of sensations that were now attempting to control her body.
This was desire!
She’d felt stirrings of it before—when he held her hand, when he stared in that intense way at her and when he pressed his mouth to her hand and her wrist. Her body had responded when she’d sat behind him on his horse, somehow heating and loosening and aching all at the same time. Sorcha closed her eyes and waited for it to ease. His words brought it to an abrupt halt.
‘My uncle and The MacMillan reached an agreement.’ She sucked in a breath as she heard his reference to her father.
‘Your uncle was to marry that one’s daughter. The one you searched for and found dead?’ Jamie asked.
Ice now froze her in place. As though the rain had changed to sleet and coated her, Sorcha could not move. Alan had searched forher? He’d been there? Worse, Jamie knew of his involvement?
‘Aye, that one,’ Alan said. ‘And I searched for her but never found the body. The river was so swollen and the storms so intense, she could not, she did not, survive her fall into it that night. God rest her soul.’
There was a mix of profound sadness and pity in his voice that it made her chest tighten. For a young woman he’d not met, well, not truly met. Yet something else swirled around that pity in his voice. A pain that was very personal. As though the thought of Sorcha MacMillan’s death was tied to something else. Otherwise, how could he feel so much for a complete stranger?
‘So, who is your uncle marrying now?’ Jamie asked, moving their topic off the dead heiress. So, the Cameron’s penchant for marrying and marrying again was known. Did they also know of the rumours of his implication in his previous wives’ deaths?
