“I haven’t had time to finish it.”
“I should like to know how it ends,” she said. “Does he come back to her?” She bit her lip when he raised his brows, his mouth rippling. Heavens, was he thinking the same thing she was? Her body tingled, burned. Only the width of the desk separated them. Her mouth watered for another kiss. She should say something sensible . . .
“I’m sorry about your father. He was a fine man,” she said. “Would you prefer that Meggie and I leave? ’Tis hardly a time to have the burden of visitors,” she said, though she didn’t want to leave him now—or ever.
“No,” he said quickly. “I cannot send a suitable tail of men to escort you. I need them here. For the moment, you’re safer at Carraig Brigh than on the road.”
With him.Physically, yes, she was as safe as could be. But her heart was in terrible peril. She looked at the shadows under his eyes, the lines of grief around his mouth, noted the fact that his lean body had grown leaner still. She curled her hand into her skirt.
“I have not thanked you. You did your best to save him,” he said.
“You will be a fine chief, Dair.”
Something dark passed through his eyes. “Will I? Many clan chiefs have sobriquets—your own father, for example, is the Fearsome MacLeod. I suppose I will be known as the Mad Sinclair.” She frowned at the jest. “No?” he said, half smiling.
“I saw you, the night your father died, and after—you’re a fine leader.” She held his gaze, tried to make him believe it, but he looked away.
“It will be the choice of the clan, of course. Despite my father’s wishes, they will vote.”
“They would be fools to choose someone else,” she said. “You are strong, clever, brave . . .”
He was looking at her with amusement. “One kiss and you know all that? Oh, mistress, how wrong you may prove to be.”
She raised her chin.It was two kisses, or a hundred, perhaps, one on top of the other. . .Sparks of lust turned to ire. “All my life I have stood in the shadows. One learns to observe, to read people, to understand when it’s safe to come out and show yourself. You are not mad. And as I recall, I kissed you first.”
“So you did.” He came around the desk, stood before her. “Do you know why I was at the bonfire?”
The barrier between them was gone. He was standing right in front of her, close enough to touch. She tilted her head back to look at him and shook her head. He put his hand against her cheek, and stared at her mouth. “I went because I wanted to kiss you again. In fact, it might have gone beyond kisses, if not for—” He met her gaze again, his eyes tormented. “Things happen for a reason, Fia.”
She stepped back, put her hands on her hips. “Do you really believe that Father Alphonse’s God, or Moire’s goddess, or fate itself, intervened and killed your father to keep you from kissing me?” He didn’t reply. “I have never heard anything so daft in all my days!” She turned away from him and began to pace the rug. “If not for Jeannie’s death, I would never have come here, we would not have kissed at all, or likely ever set eyes on each other, Dair Sinclair. Do you think I should regret coming, just because you kissed me?” She thrust the sheet of poetry back into his hand and tossed her head. “I liked it. I very well might haveletyou do more than kiss me on Midsummer’s Eve.”
He gaped at her in surprise.
Her unruly tongue hurried on. “I don’t care a whit if I’ve shocked you. I’m not likely to get many kisses in this life, and—” She closed her mouth. She only wanted the kind of kisses she would remember always—Dair’s kisses.
He leaned on the desk and looked at her, amused. “And what?”
She stomped her foot, nearly toppled. He let her right herself. “And you are the most irritating man I’ve ever met!”
He grinned. “But you like my kisses.”
“Yes! No!” She was entirely muddled, unused to playing flirtatious games. What would Meggie do, or Jennet, or Aileen? They’d flirt right back. She boldly tipped her chin to a saucy angle. “I think I liked your kisses just fine, but not having anything to compare them with, I cannot say for certain. Perhaps I should do more of it with someone else before I render an opinion.”
The amused look folded into a frown. “You do, and I’ll send you home at once, Fia MacLeod.”
“You won’t let me kiss anyone else?”
“Not while I’m chief here. Your lips are off limits.”
She paused. “Is this—flirting?”
“Don’t you know?” She shook her head. “That’s why you’ll not be kissing anyone else while you’re at Carraig Brigh, Mistress MacLeod.”
“Only you?” she asked, breathless.
He shut his eyes. “No, Fia. Not me. Especially not me.”
She stood still for a moment, considered the possibility of never kissing him again. It wouldn’t do. Even now, her lips tingled, and her body remembered the way it felt to be pressed against the hardness of him, the sweetness of being held in his arms.
