If I had pearls, I’d be clutching them right now. “Excuse me, but whoareyou?”
“He’s Logan MacTavish, Wallace’s cousin and a complete arsehole.” Another enormous man steps into the room, setting the door carefully against the wall, examining the busted lock. “I’m this bampot’s brother, Kai.” He’s broad chested, covered in tattoos, dark hair and green eyes like his brother’s.
“Okay. Ordinarily, I’d be screaming my lungs outwhen a random dude kicks my door in.” I let out a half-hysterical giggle. “But it’s depressingly clear that youareWallace’s cousins. The MacTavish DNA with you people, it’s alarmingly dominant.” They’re standing together like two towering redwoods. “Your DNA overpowers all the other poor little DNAs, doesn’t it? Beats them up and steals their lunch money.” Yeah, I might be losing it.
They smile at me amiably, as if all MacTavish social calls begin by kicking the door down and bursting into the room with their gun drawn.
“Um… what are you doing here?” I ask.
“Oh, we’re here to watch over ye until Wallace is back,” Logan says cheerfully. “Let’s check the bar and see what you’ve got here, aye? Room service should be here soon with one of everything on the menu because I, for one, am fecking starving.”
“First, can ye do us a favor, lass?” Kai’s steadfastly looking in any direction but mine. He slaps Logan on the back of the head and he looks away, too. “Could ye go put something on that covers ye? Head to toe? A snowsuit, if ye have it?”
“Uh…” I look down at my camisole and sleep pants set. It’s hardly revealing. “Yeah, I’ll go put on a sweater.”
“Thank ye, lass,” Kai says gratefully. “Wallacewill gouge our eyes out with a soup spoon if he finds out we saw ye in that.”
“What, seriously?” I try to catch his gaze.
“Ach! Go put something on! I want to live!” Logan snaps.
These almost offensively gargantuan men are genuinely scared that Wallace might find out they saw me in acamisole?
Good lord.
“Go check the bar,” I sigh, “I’ll go see if there’s a hazmat suit or something I can change into.”
Bampot - Scottish slang for an extremely stupid or irritating person
Chapter Seventeen
In which Scarlett gets blootered with the cousins.
Wallace…
I have a fifth thing to add to my list of poor life choices: trusting my eejit cousins Kai and Logan to look after Scarlett.
Logan, I expect to be a complete and utter walloper. I thought that throwing Kai, “the responsible one” into the mix would make it work while I did some research about who’s looking for Scarlett.
That I was also keeping away from the luscious curves of my wife was a given.
It’s almost dawn as I walk up the stone steps to the suite, and I can hear the high, clear laughter of my wife from here. Almost as if the suite’s door is open.
Ach, the door is so open that it’s off the hinges and propped drunkenly against the wall. Leaning against the splintered doorway, I watch Scarlett pull the leg of my black joggers up to her knee..
“So, if I flash myshin, just the skin betweenmy ankle and my knee and you happen to see it, Wallace has permission to punch you in the throat?” She’s almost hiccupping, she’s laughing so hard.
“Ye dinnae get it, woman! It’s a code.” Kai sounds exhausted, as if they’ve been at this for a while.
“What about my forearm, is my forearm safe?” She waves her arm, splashing a little champagne on the floor. Her housekeeping instincts must have drowned under the amount she’s consumed because she dinnae seem to notice.
“I’ll let the forearm sighting go,” I step into the room. “Who’s getting a broken nose for kicking down the door?”
Logan’s head pops up over the back of the armchair like a ground squirrel. “Hey now, cousin, I thought your lass was in danger. I was inemergencymode. She was screaming something fierce.”
“Do ye think maybe she shrieked because you’re pounding on the door like you’re the Polis at a trap house?” Kai asks tiredly.
“Hey, Wallace!” My wife stands and makes her way to me, her gait a wee bit unsteady. For a moment, I think she’s going up on tiptoe to kiss me, instead, she leans in and whispers, “Your cousins are highly unstable but really fun, do you know that?”
