Cate relaxed. “Ah, you are probably right. Has he invited many of the neighboring clans?”
“I believe so.”
“He’s been so secretive about it. Almost as if he’s planning a surprise of some kind.”
Strangely, John didn’t seem to be avoiding her gaze. “I’m sure it will be quite a surprise.”
“What?”
He shook her off. “Nothing, just…” His voice fell off as if he’d changed his mind about what he was going to say. “There are going to be some changes around here when my brother leaves, and I do not want to see you get hurt.”
The blood drained from her cheeks. “Then hehasbeen called back?” Gregor had told her he’d be home until the first week of January.
John shook his head. “Nay. Not yet. But it will come in the new year, and I want you to be prepared.”
Clearly, he was trying to tell her something. “Prepared for what?” Suddenly, her heart dropped. “Has Gregor said something about the children? Does he mean to send them away?”
John immediately put a hand on her arm to calm her. “Gregor has said nothing to me about the children, although I warned you that I do not think he will allow them to stay.”
“You should have more faith in him,” Cate admonished. “He is not as uncaring as he wants everyone to believe.”
John studied her. “Perhaps not, but that does not mean he will be the man you want him to be, Cate. There is such a thing as blind faith, and I do not wish to see you get hurt.”
“I won’t,” she said, believing it. “You don’t need to worry—I know what I am doing.”
John didn’t look convinced. “Promise me you will be careful, Caty.” She stiffened at the endearment, although he didn’t notice. “You deserve someone who will make you happy.”
It was clear he didn’t think Gregor was that man.
She caught the direction of his gaze and frowned. “I wonder what Farquhar is doing here so early this morning? He has been around Dunlyon quite a bit of late.”
Indeed, after he’d escorted her from church that day, he seemed to make a point of exchanging a few words with her before seeking out John. This time, however, he appeared distracted and didn’t even nod in her direction as he passed through the Hall, apparently on the way to the laird’s solar.
“He’s a good man,” John said.
She frowned at the odd way he was looking at her. “He is. Does he have business with Gregor?”
“Aye, I believe he does.”
If his tone was slightly ominous, Cate told herself it had nothing to do with her. It turned out she was wrong.
“I will be able to provide for the lass,” Farquhar said, looking Gregor squarely in the eye from his seat opposite the table. Despite his youth and Gregor’s black stare, the reeve’s son didn’t look nervous or show any sign of backing down. Gregor might have admired that if it wasn’t annoying him so much. “More than provide,” he continued. “I have been offered a position as clerk in the Earl of Lennox’s household with the steward, who is a distant kinsman of my mother’s. As the steward has no son, he will be training me to take over after him.”
Gregor should be ecstatic. The wife of the future steward of the Earl of Lennox was far beyond anything he might have hoped for Cate. That the reeve’s son had been able to secure such a position was testament in itself to his ambition, acumen, and promise. Even with the family connection, he must have impressed someone greatly to have so distinguished himself. So why wasn’t Gregor impressed? And why did his jaw hurt from being clamped down so hard while the other man presented his offer?
Because the entire time Farquhar was speaking, it was Cate’s voice he was hearing.“I have nothing to compare it to.”Would Farquhar be the next man to kiss her? Gregor’s hand closed around the pewter goblet he was holding, until his fingers turned white.“I’m also rather curious as to what comes next.”
He bit back a curse and slammed back the contents of the cup, barely tasting the fine and expensive claret that he and Hawk had intercepted on its way to Berwick Castle last summer for King Edward. The second English king by that name might not be half the king his “Hammer of the Scots” father was, but he did have outstanding taste in wine.
Realizing that the other man was staring at him, waiting for him to say something, Gregor forced back the instinctive refusal that sprang to his lips. “Why Caitrina?” Gregor said instead. “You can barely know her.”
Farquhar must have heard something in Gregor’s voice. His brows drew together and his gaze intensified. “Everyone in this village knows Caitrina. I have been away a few years, but she has not changed.”
“Some would not consider that a good thing.”
Farquhar’s mouth hardened. “Then some would be fools. Caitrina is everything I admire in a woman—she’s strong, smart, straightforward, loyal, kind, and without an ounce of pretension. Both my parents adore her, and they do not think there is a lass in all of Perthshire who would make me a better wife. There is something real about her. She’s confident and at ease with all walks of people—laird, merchant, peasant. She will be at home in a cottage or in a castle.”
Gregor’s mouth fell in a thin line. It was all true, although why it bothered him that Farquhar so easily identified her finer points, he didn’t know. “And what of your temperaments?”
