She looked up at him, throat tight and treacherous.
“I don’t believe in symbols,” she managed, “or ancestral totems, or the sociopolitical potency of metal objects…”
Her voice thinned, but she forced the words out anyway.
“…but I believe in you.”
The world paused. Even the fire seemed to stop mid-crackle, scandalized.
Oh, splendid. She had done it now. One moment of dignified restraint, and then—truth leakage everywhere.
He kept looking at her, this Highlander entirely too noble for her respiratory stability, and something fluttered traitorously beneath her stays.
Warm. Expansive. Alarming.
She dearly hoped it was poor digestion.
Was it possible to sprain one’s corset with infatuation?
"Oh, dear heavens,” she whispered, clutching her notebook to her chest. “I appear to be developing… feelings.”
He leaned in. His kiss approached with the velocity of a formula proven irresistible: mass × desire × utter Highland inevitability.
Wanton squeaked.
A tiny, mortifying, wholly unscientific squeak.
She shot to her feet so fast the settee protested. Her skirts twisted, her boots skidded, and the Hammer of Ancestry caught her toe with a thunk of ancestral betrayal.
Tavish rose too, brows lifted. “Ye’ll face caber-throwin’ giants and armed thieves without a blink,” he murmured, stepping toward her, “but ye’re scared o’ yer own heart?”
She swallowed. “Statistically speaking,” she said with manic dignity, “the human heart is six times more likely to fail under emotional stress than under blunt-force trauma.”
His mouth twitched. “That so?”
“Yes,” she said, backing toward the corridor with the solemnity of a woman citing her own impending doom. “I read it in—well, I wrote it in my notebook just now, but the data is compelling.”
Her heel snagged her hem. She wobbled, windmilled, and righted herself with heroic futility.
“And on that note,” she declared, lifting her chin, “I must retreat before cardiac catastrophe ensues.”
Then she spun, tripped over nothing and everything, and fled down the corridor in a flurry of plaid, petticoats, and rising panic.
Field Observation 27.0 (added hastily as she ran): Emotional variables severely compromise locomotion.
Chapter nine
In Which Sabotage Leads to Science, Science to Sin, and Sin to Smoke
The games had resumed, the glen buzzing with noise, pipes, and testosterone. Wanton watched from what she called a professional observational distance.
As a precautionary measure, she had positioned a large wooden shield (technically a discarded cheese wheel board) between herself and Tavish. She had verified through field work that the proximity of a kilted male introduces unpredictable emotional turbulence. Thus, interposing a cheese board may stabilize inner variables and delay heart combustion.
Field Note 20.1: Physical barriers reduce emotional vulnerability by approximately seven percent. Unless the subject smiles. Then all protective measures fail catastrophically.
The hammer-throw was next. Tavish stood by the throwing field—bare-armed, resolute, and unassassinated (for now). He stepped into the ring with easy confidence.
Wanton dragged the shield two inches farther in front of her. A woman could not be too careful around biceps that violated several ethical guidelines.
