“And you look miserable.” Taran leaned against the island, features strained. “I’m officially worried.”
“Are you miserable?” Nee seemed panicked she’d missed something. “Why are you miserable? Is Murray not being?—”
“Murray is a complete gentleman.” I put any suggestion otherwise to bed with a bite to my words.
Cammie’s grin was sly and slow. “So that’s why you’re miserable. Is Mr. Shaw beingtoomuch of a gentleman?”
Both Taran and Nee’s eyes widened comically as I spluttered at Cammie’s perceptive dig.
“N-No. No, no, no. No!”
“I think the lady doth protest too much.” Cammie cackled, delighted she was right. “Don’t be embarrassed. If I was shacked up in that big, fancy house with Murray Shaw, I’d find it hard to keep my hands to myself.”
“Since when?” Taran huffed.
“Since forever. We all had a crush on Murray growing up. Except you, because you couldn’t see past my brother. But the rest of us were obsessed with Murray Shaw and his beautiful green eyes and broad, broad shoulders.”
“Have you and him ever …” A twinge of jealousy seared across my chest again. Cammie was strikingly pretty. Tall with long blond hair. She dyed the two strands that framed her face a different color every few weeks. Today they were fuchsia pink. Her style was kind of boho—she wore lots of silver rings on her fingers, necklaces, and many piercings in her ears. She had a slender figure with curves in all the right places that meant she could wear anything and make it look good. Her and Murray would make an attractive and very tall couple.
“No.” Cammie reached over the island to pat my hand in reassurance. “Goodness, no. One of the reasons we were all so obsessed was because he wasn’t a shagbag. Total devoted monogamist, that one. He was five years older than me, but I do remember he dated a girl all through high school called Brigid.She was in the same year as Murray, so I don’t think me or Taran knew her that well.”
“Aye, I think I vaguely recall her. Pretty redhead?”
“That’s the one. Her family left the island when she was seventeen. Then Murray dated a girl from Oban for five years before they split up. Then he had a long-distance thing with a woman from Glasgow. When they split, he started dating Jill. Rumor has it he married her because she fell pregnant with Kelly. So, there you have it. Mr. Monogamist.”
I’d just discovered more about my husband’s dating history in the last minute than I had in the eighteen months I’d lived here and in the week we’d been married.
“Shona has a thing for him,” I murmured.
“Shona and every woman with a pulse who aren’t these two besotted lovebirds has a thing for him.” Cammie gestured to Taran and Nee. “Oh, and me. I don’t have a crush on Murray anymore, but I wouldn’t have kicked him out of bed if he’d offered.NowI would, of course, since I’m all about chicks before dicks and you clearly have a big, fat crush on your own husband.”
My cheeks flushed. “Even if I do, nothing is going to happen between us. Trust me.”
“What do you mean? Murray has been pining—” Cammie was cut off by Taran throwing a bread roll at her face. “What the hell?”
“Stop meddling.” Taran gave her a stern look. “Now.”
“It’s not meddling when a friend asks for advice.”
I harrumphed. “I didn’t ask for advice. I … I won’t lie and say I don’t find Murray attractive, but this is already complicated, and I’m not sure I’m ready to feel any kind of way about a man. My feelings are all over the place and that’s the last thing Murray needs. I just … I just wish things weren’t so awkward between us.”
“Awkward how?” Nee slid onto the stool next to me.
“I thought it was going okay. He made me dinner, we talked, but then he got weird about it and … the last few nights … it’s like we’re two strangers sharing a home.”
“Well, you kind of are.” Nee smiled to soften her words. “I know you guys have interacted while we all hung out over the past year and a half, but you don’t really know each other that well. It’ll take time.”
“I’m telling you, it’s the unspoken sexual tension.” Cammie popped a bite of pastry into her mouth.
“There’s no sexual tension on Murray’s part. Trust me.”
“You’ve met you, right?” Cammie quirked a brow. “You’re multiple levels of hot. You’ve got thatsexy without trying to be sexything going on.”
I snorted, shaking my head. “Maybe I’m not his kind of hot.”
“Don’t be …” She trailed off at Taran’s quick shake of her head. “Maybeyou’re right about not complicating things, though. But if you’re going to co-exist, you need to find some ease with each other.”
“I know.” I shrugged glumly. “I just don’t know how to do that.”
