“Thank ye, the taste of home is wonderful,” I sigh happily, pulling a luscious morsel of prawn from its shell. The rare Scottish sun is shining through the big windows and the skylight and the room feels like an oasis from the chilly wind outside. A place of protection and comfort, wrapping around me, just like Lucas.
“Your mother sounds like a ‘food is love’ kind of Ma. I’ll bet your sisters, Emily and Ainsley, love her doting on their bairns.”
“Aye. My father died when I was twelve, it was up to me to look after them. Getting selected for the SRR meant higher combat pay. Then workingfor MacTavish security tripled that. Mum dinnae have to work long hours any more, I paid for the girl’s weddings, moved Mum into a new house.”
“I’m so sorry about your father. I knew you’d lost him, but not at such a young age.” I can picture a young Lucas, skinny and tall, standing next to his mother at his father’s gravesite, probably holding his little sisters’ hands. Of course he would immediately assume responsibility.
“You’ve always been a caretaker, haven’t ye? Your family is lucky to have such a good brother and son.”
He hums noncommittally, though I see it. His duty to his family engrained in his soul, his duty to mine as well. To me.
“It’s a lot to process, aye?” He’s watching me, settled back in his chair with his arms crossed over his chest. Utterly calm and composed again. Bodyguard mode. Not sharing any more of his stories, making it about me again. “Ye were kidnapped. Poisoned.” A surge of rage sweeps over his face that makes me drop my fork. “The hike through a beautiful and deeply inhospitable mountain range. Suffering so much pain with your back. And this wedding…”
“Just when we thought we were out, they pull us back in.” I enjoy his chuckle. “Oh, aye.The Godfather Part Three. I’ve been cheating on ye,” I flutter my lashes at him. “I watched the wholeseries.”
It was one of his few vices I’d found when Lucas was my bodyguard. He’d occasionally take that stick out of his arse enough to sit on the couch with me. We’d eat popcorn and apples and watchThe GodfatherorScarface, both of us snickering at the most ridiculous inaccuracies.
“We both know thatGoodfellaswas the only film even within a stone’s throw of accuracy,” he says. “If you’re back to being cheeky, the shock has subsided. We must talk about this.”
I take a gulp of wine to delay the inevitable.
“I did make my intentions known last night after the celebration. In bed.” There’s the slightest curve on one corner of his mouth. “The terrace. The bathtub.”
Turning a delightful shade of red, I cover my face with my hands, laughing helplessly. The huge Moroccan bathtubwasa highlight.
“I dinnae, however,” he says wryly, “expect it to happen like this.”
“Aye, that wily old gent,” I agree. “Why would he do that?” I think of Imane and her little talk. “When Imane was giving me that grand makeover, she said something a wee bit pointed, at least in hindsight.”
“What did she say?” He’s leaning forward and his wide shoulders are stretching the hell out of thatdress shirt and I would really like to take it off him.
What is wrong with me? Concentrate!
“She said that, ‘We find our way back to the one meant for us at the right time, rather than the time we expect.’” I cross my legs, leaning back. “It certainly seems likethosetwo had decided for us that it was the right time.”
“I researched the sect that Marabout Badis presides over as we were flying home,” he says. “It’s an ancient one, revered, very much steeped in the traditions of the Berbers. It does follow dictates that are quite specific to the sect. His wedding blessingsarebinding in both a religious and legal sense. Had he started with the traditional wedding rituals, I’d have caught it.”
There’s a question hovering in the air between us, unspoken and thick with meaning. We’ve just come back together after so long. A week or so. A handful of days to remember who we were together. Is that enough?
Lucas rubs his neck and says the question. “Cat. This was not how I wanted to propose, not the wedding I’m sure you’d planned in your head.”
I snort inelegantly. “Ach, you’re wrong there. I dinnae need the huge wedding and the white dress, though I’m sure you’re aware of The Lady Elspeth’s dictate that all the hasty, ill-advisedmarriages in the MacTavish family must be tidied up into something grand and regal at the ancestral estate.”
He puts his mug to his mouth, trying to hide his amusement. Lucas has been forced to attend more than one of these monstrosities as my cousins were all required to be married again “properly” and I’m thinking he found it all oot the noo, extravagant and excessive.
“What I dinnae expect was to be married in Morocco with no idea that it was happening. That said, it was a beautiful night, aye? The dancing, the food, and the music. All those wee bairns racing around like someone just slipped them six shots of espresso.”
“It was,” he says huskily, drawing his thumb along his full lower lip. I watch it drag along the red surface of his lip and I want nothing more than to climb over this table and latch on to his mouth and bite his lip. Bite it and-
“-quite clear.”
“Huh?” Brilliant comeback there.
“I said, that according to the laws of this sect’s marriage covenant, the couple does have to live together as husband and wife for one year before the wily old rascal would consider ending the union.”
Something cold settles in the pit of my stomach. “Do ye want to divorce me, then? All a bit sudden for ye?”
“Ach, you’re getting all gallus on me, then?” He dinnae seem upset about it. “What Ithinkis that men - some of them men who mean well - have been spending too much time controlling you. You’re a smart, capable, adult woman, and I want to know what you want. As for me, what I wish? I would stay married to you, no matter how it happened.”
