Page 52 of Ghost of the Ton

“Thank you, that would be most kind,” Mia said.

He nodded, then linked his arm through Maisie’s. “Och, Maisie love, ye know my tongue runs away with me sometimes. What say I give ye a kiss to make up for it?”

“What say I give ye a kick up the arse?” Maisie said, though there was laughter in her voice again.

“My arse is not half so fine as yers, hen,” Rory said, patting Maisie’s behind. Then he disappeared into the kitchen, whistling.

Maisie folded her arms. “A great big fool, is Rory,” she said, but Mia could hear the longing in her voice—the yearning of one who battled with herself not to love another because she believed that she could never be worthy of him.

When Rory returned, Maisie’s bright demeanor had resumed and the three of them set about cleaning the rest of the cottage, Rory fetching water from the river while Mia and Maisie washed the rest of the windows, swept the floors, and brushed away the cobwebs. When Mia took the rug from the parlor outside to beat it, a thick cloud of dust exploded at the first stroke, and they dissolved into a coughing fit that ended up in peals of laughter, their mirth echoing across the landscape. Mia paused, mid-laughter, and glanced about the place she’d be calling home for a short while.

She stiffened as she saw a shape moving between the trees. Then she blinked and it disappeared. A deer, perhaps? Rory had pointed out the different footprints in the earth, identifying each animal that had made them, and said that deer in fawn often ventured down from the hillside in the late spring and summer. It would be something to look forward to next year…

Provided she’d not left Glenblath by then.

As the sun slipped toward the horizon, casting a soft pink haze across the sky, they retired inside to eat the fish that Rory had shown Mia how to gut and roast on a spit. Mia sat with her new companions, eating the freshly roasted fish with her fingers, the fire casting a warm orange glow on their faces, and listening to Rory’s tales of the spirits and pagan gods who lived on the mountain—Beinn Blath.

When had she ever been so free as she was today? Not beholden to a father, or a husband, or social convention—but simply living, enjoying the fruits of a day’s work with companions whom she could laugh with, who did not recoil in horror at her appearance, but took pleasure from her company.

She blinked and cast her gaze over Rory’s features—the strong forehead, and the wide, square jaw…and the eyes that reflected the firelight and flared with longing as he looked at Maisie. It was not the base desire that a man showed toward a woman, but a deeper connection, a call of the soul.

Rory loved Maisie, though he couldn’t admit it, even to himself.

What might it be like to be loved by such a man? To indulge in the simple pleasure of sharing a meal they’d cooked together? And to think, the ladies of London Society—an institution that Mia’s father had tried desperately to ingratiate himself with—would call these people savages. Far better to be a happy savage than a miserable Society wife.

And to be the wife of a Highlander…

I am the wife of a Highlander.

Mia shushed the little voice in her mind. She would soon be wife to no one.

Perhaps she and Maisie weren’t so different. No matter how they might wish for a loving partnership with another, they would never be accepted and loved, openly, for what, and who, they were.

Chapter Fifteen

“I dinnae understand why ye’ve not been to see yer wife. She’s been at Riverview Cottage almost a fortnight, and she’s had few visitors. The poor lass must be lonely.”

Hamish glanced up from his ledgers and eyed his mother. She sat, in her usual chair, her knitting on her lap. Monarch lay on the hearthrug at her feet and lifted his head at the sound of her voice, before yawning, stretching out his front legs, then tucking them in again with a satisfied grunt.

So, this was why Ma had insisted he spend the morning in her chambers—not to keep a lonely widow company, but to be lectured. She’d not even offered him a glass of whisky—he could smell it as soon as he’d entered the chamber, though there was no sign of the bottle.

“Ye’ve invited her to dine with us every day,” Hamish replied. “If she disnae wish to come, ye cannae expect me to drag her here by the hair.”

For a moment, the image crossed his mind—him, the pagan beast, catching his woman and tossing her over his shoulder to claim her in his cave. His cock hardened almost instantly, and he drew in a sharp breath.

Devil’s ballocks, where had that notion come from?

Perhaps Murdoch was right—he needed a good, hard rutting to ease the lust simmering in his body. Fisting himself at night could never completely rid him of the itch that lay deep in his center. But though he’d enjoyed women before, particularly Maisie with her skillful touch and welcoming curves, he couldn’t bring himself to touch another since he’d pledged to be faithful to her.

Ye’re a weak fool, son.

His father’s ghost whispered in Hamish’s mind, but he need only look at his mother to understand the consequences of infidelity. Ma had loved and been betrayed. Hamish would be damned if he’d ever be responsible for the slow erosion of a woman’s soul.

“Perhaps ye should look to yerself when asking why Mia’s not accepted my invitations,” Ma said. “I understand ye’ll be turning the lass out as soon as ye can afford it, but there’s no need to pretend she disnae exist.”

There was no danger of that, seeing as she was always in his mind, simmering away during the day, and coming forth at night to admonish him with her soulful hazel eyes.

“I daresay ye’ve even forgotten what she looks like,” Ma continued.