“I’ve enough money to put that into question with the courts,” he commented. “And ye’re assuming Dunncraigh would be alive to disapprove.” He stopped his pursuit as her back came up against the window, and instead placed his hands on her shoulders. He didn’t want to touch her, but he needed to know. “Swear someaught to me, lass. Swear ye had nothing to do with Ian’s death, and look me in the eyes when ye do it.”
He’d given her that challenge before, over the years, and she’d always risen to the occasion. This time, for the first time, he wasn’t so certain. But she lifted her chinto gaze straight at him. “I had nothing to do with Ian’s death. I swear it.” Rebecca swallowed. “And I’ll do you one better, Callum. If you’re able to convince me that he didn’t drown by accident, I will help you prove it in court.”
That, he hadn’t expected at all. Tilting his head, he studied her face, her expression, the straight, tense line of her shoulders. She might have a secret or two after all this time, and questionable taste in men, but she wasn’t lying.
Yesterday he’d sailed into the harbor at Inverness ready to burn to the ground anything and everyone who stood in his path. Then he’d discovered Margaret and altered his plans accordingly. And now it seemed he might—might—need to alter them again. Removing Rebecca from his enemies list wouldn’t make her an ally, but it could change some things. And since he had no intention of waiting for a court to decide anything before he acted, she could be useful.
“Do you agree?” she prompted after a moment.
“Aye. I agree.”
Her shoulders rose and fell. “Splendid. Then let me go.”
“And if I dunnae let ye go?” His gaze lowered to her mouth. As they’d grown out of childhood together he’d had a few good chances to kiss her and had missed every opportunity to do so, and then ten years to think about what he hadn’t done, why he hadn’t even seen it until it was too late. But she didn’t belong to Ian now. She didn’t belong to anyone.
“Then I’ll accuse you of being drunk and irresponsible again,” she muttered, her voice still not quite steady.
For the devil’s sake, he’d meant to hate her. He’d fairly well managed to do that for ten years. But for most of the ten years previous, they’d been friends and companions, nearly inseparable until he’d discovered sex and whisky. Callum bent his head, brushing his lips against hers. Liking the sensation, he took her mouth in a warm, slow kiss. She tasted of tea and annoyance, and something else that he couldn’t quite name, but that made his cock sit up and take notice. This, her, was something he’d wondered about for a very long time. She put her palms against his chest, but before she could decide to push him away he took her wrists and drew them behind her back.
Could he trust her? He had no idea. All he knew at the moment was that after ten years of waiting and speculating and imagining something he’d never thought would come to pass, he felt that damned kiss all the way down his spine and everywhere in between.
Callum straightened, releasing her hands at the same time. “I’m nae drunk,” he murmured, and with a short whistle calling Waya to his side, left the room.
***
“My lady, shouldn’t you be dressing?” Mary asked, as the maid swooped into the wardrobe to place some freshly laundered clothes.
Rebecca started, lifting her head from the book she hadn’t been reading. “Hm?”
“You’re to go to the theater tonight, aren’t you?” the maid returned, her cheeks darkening. “Unless Lord Stapp has canceled. I… Well, it’s none of my business, I’m certain.”
The theater. She’d completely forgotten. Judging by the condition of Callum’s hand after it had gone through the window, she didn’t imagine Donnach would be willing—or able—to show himself in public tonight. Heavens, she hadn’t even leaned out the window to inquire after him, though her concern likely wouldn’t have been well received.
“I have no idea,” she said, setting the book aside. Robert Burns had never sat well with her; he felt far too many wild emotions for her taste, and felt far too comfortable discussing them. But this afternoon she’d been drawn to the poetry despite not being able to concentrate enough to make any sense of it.
“I suppose you couldn’t send over a note to inquire, either?” Mary suggested, a trace of humor in her voice.
“No, I don’t suppose I could,” she returned.
She should be appalled, horrified, or at the least furious at what had happened this morning. Aside from her beau being thrown through a window, her brother-in-law had kissed her—and not in a friendly, brotherly manner. He’d always been a disruptive force, and that had clearly not changed. That didn’t explain, however, why she hadn’t been more outraged at his treatment of Donnach, or at his attempts to command who she wouldn’t be allowed to see.
Lord Stapp had always been kind to her, from the moment Ian had announced their engagement. He’d always had a friendly word or two for her whenever he and his father met with her husband or her father for business, and after Ian’s death he’d been the first one to appear and assure her that she wasn’t alone. When her father had passed away, he’d helped her make the funeral arrangements and had brought Maggie a doll. Only gradually had his friendship become more romantic, and he hadn’t begun pressing the issue at all until her official year of mourning ended two months ago.
And while lately he’d begun to make mention of a future that assumed they would be married, she’d made the same assumptions herself. Today at the breakfast table he’d seemed somewhat… intense, but then he’d just learned that the position Ian had held in their mutual business had been taken over by Callum—a man with whom he’d never dealt well.
“My lady?”
Rebecca took a breath. “I seem to have drifted away for a moment, Mary. What is it?”
“What do you wish to do about this evening?”
“Ah. Well, I’d hate to dress and not have him call, but I’d dislike even more if he called and I wasn’t dressed.”
“I thought Lord Geiry forbade him to call here,” Mary noted, selecting a pretty red silk and lace gown from the wardrobe and lifting it.
Yes, there was that. If she had been more certain of her footing where Callum was concerned, the way he’d taken over her life would be very annoying. Itwasstill annoying, since now people—certain people—couldn’t even call on her at the house where she was being forced to stay.
And he’d only kissed her to shock her, to demonstrate how little power or control she had. As if she wasn’t already aware of precisely that. It didn’t matter, then, that he knew how to kiss, that he’d for a moment reminded her of what young girls had dreamed of when they imagined princes and heroes coming to call. No, not princes and heroes. Rogues and pirates. Even more delicious, those.
