Hearing that rocked her to her soul. “No,” she said, her voice a barely audible rasp as she shook her hands loose and cupped his face in her fingers. “Something evil happened,” she whispered, willing him with all her heart to listen. “I refuse to feel guilt because I—we—have found something new and unexpected. I would never wish anything bad for Ian, and I know you wouldn’t, either. I had nothing to do with what did happen, and neither did you. Everything after that… It’s good, what we found. I wouldn’t trade it, or you, for anything. ‘What if’ has no place in our lives. We only have ‘now’ remaining. And you are not to sacrifice yourself out of some misplaced sense of loyalty. Do you understand that?”
“I understand I’m nae accustomed to having a lass dictate terms to me,” he murmured. “And aye, I ken. But ye’re wrong about one thing, Becca.”
“And what might that be?”
“It’s nae only now we have to think on. Ye left out tomorrow, and all the tomorrows after that.”
Oh, she wanted to tell him that she loved him, that part of her always had, but it seemed like something he needed to say first, if and when he felt ready to do that. She understood it, of course. He was feeling his way through this just as much as she was. Claiming something—claimingher,desiring her, as he clearly did—was one thing. Saying the rest meant having to reconcile a very difficult relationship with his brother first.
As long as he continued to look at her the way he was now, as if he found her rare and precious, she could be patient. And she could be very happy with the way things were, if not for two very large problems—the Duke of Dunncraigh and his son. They weren’t finished with this, and neither were she and Callum.
***
“This one has the date of signing on it.”
They made for an unlikely group, Callum decided, shoving another of the contracts across the cleared breakfast table. Michael Crosby, of Crosby and Hallifax, let out a breath in order to extricate himself enough from the chair to reach the pages. The way he’d wedged himself in there, Callum doubted the piece of furniture would survive his removal.
Dennis Kimes sat beside his employer, making notesand filling the large man’s cup of tea every few minutes. He himself sat at the head of the table, his interest snagged by Ian’s ledger and the story it told about his dealings with Sanderson’s, while at his right elbow Rebecca read her father’s journal.
Another tear slid down her cheek, and she whisked it away with a handkerchief as if such a motion had become second nature to her, never even pausing in her reading. He hoped that wasn’t true, that she hadn’t been so deep in sorrow and acceptance of broken dreams that she expected it around every turn. Lately she’d laughed more often in his company, and in bed she came at him with a voraciousness that thrilled him, so hopefully reading about sad memories and missed opportunities would anger her rather than lower her spirits again.
Waya had joined them as well, sprawled out in a patch of sunlight beneath the nearest window. She’d declined to go for a run again this morning, which he put to a certain young lass feeding the wolf far too much ham at breakfast, until the mop bounced into the room, licked Waya’s nose, and settled atop her front paws for a snore. The sleek, midnight-black wolf resting her head on the much smaller fluffy, white-haired terrier’s back looked… quaint, he supposed, frowning, except for the ramifications of their abrupt affection.
Was that him, now? A wild soul lured into domesticity by a pretty face and promises of large breakfasts? He sent Rebecca another glance. In between tears she’d been making notes on a separate page as well, a litany of accusations against Dunncraigh and Stapp for which they needed the contracts and ledgers to prove culpability. Except that he’d known for weeks that they were fucking guilty.
But she’d smiled and kissed him and told him that she wanted him about, and that seeing them tried for murder and theft would be just as satisfying as seeing them bleeding in the street—and had the additional bonus of leaving him alive and not in jail or transported for killing them.
The oddest part of it had been the realization that she was correct. When he’d first arrived he’d had nothing to lose, nothing precious to protect or to keep him bound to life. On that first day in Scotland he’d discovered Mags, a lithe, hilarious translation of her staid, unimaginative father, and keeping her safe and happy had become his everything. Or so he’d thought.
His everything had expanded to include one more being in the days and weeks that followed. He thought he’d convinced himself that she was a sister to him, until the night Ian had claimed her, taken her away from him. She’d called him a foolish boy, and by God she’d been correct.
For the next ten years her words, her face, her voice, had haunted him, even when he’d thought himself free of her. Everything he did had been in part to prove her wrong, to prove to himself that she’d been wrong about him. The man he’d become between his twentieth and his thirtieth years had learned a great deal from his mistakes. In returning and attempting to prove to her how wrong she was, he’d merely proved that she’d been utterly correct in throwing him aside. And he’d never been more proud to realize that he’d finally met her expectations, even if it had taken a figurative trip through the desert of his soul for him to do so.
“What are you looking at?” she asked quietly, lifting her face to meet his gaze.
His mouth curved. “A summer’s day. A winter’s night, and all the times in between.”
She smiled back at him, the expression lighting her blue eyes. “Oh, good. I thought I had ink on my nose.”
He damned well hadn’t expected to laugh today, but amusement burst from his chest. It felt like hope, light and bubbling and warm. She felt like hope. “Ye have a way of cutting to the heart of a matter, lass.”
Crosby cleared his throat. “We need to bring in a solicitor, m’laird. I can make note of what appears to be irregular, of numbers that dunnae balance and purchases that werenae approved by Mr. Sanderson or the previous Lord Geiry, or by Lady Geiry or yerself. I can show how those purchases are tied to profits—and potential profits—larger than those to which he’s supposed to be entitled. But a solicitor could tell ye what laws are being broken and what charges ye could bring against him.”
“My brother’s wife’s da’ is a judge,” Dennis said. “A ‘right honorable.’”
Callum didn’t want to bring anyone else into their circle. Another mouth that could spill secrets and carry tales to Dunncraigh. “What clan is he?”
“Clan MacDonald. But dunnae hold that against him. He’s a good man, I reckon.”
Frowning, fighting to balance risk against expediency, Callum took a deep breath. “Send for him then, if ye would.” They needed someone; none of them in the breakfast room had ever brought charges against a duke or a marquis, and they had evidence against both.
“Aye. I’ll be discreet on paper, just on the chance someone comes across my note.”
“Ye do that.” Closing Ian’s meticulous ledger, he pushed it down the table to Mr. Crosby. “I’m going for a breath of air.”
“I wish ye would,” the accountant said with a grimace. “Ye make me nervous, glowering over there.”
“Well, we cannae have that.” Callum nodded at Rebecca as he stood and left the room. Waya barely bothered opening one eye before she went back to her nap. Hewanted a run; missing the one with Waya and Jupiter this morning had left him restless and irritable to begin with. But he also knew better than to go roaming today without the wolf by his side. Dunncraigh or Stapp, or both of them, had already tried to have him shot once that he knew of.
