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I blink. “What?”

“A walk. A ride. A picnic, if that makes it sound more respectable.” The faintest thread of humour returns to his voice, though it can’t quite conceal the earnestness beneath. “Somewhere quiet. Somewhere we might step out of our own heads for a while. Jus…” His gaze holds mine. “Jus you and me, if ye’ll have it.”

My heart gives one hard, unruly beat.

I tip my head and say, with as much composure as I can gather, “We’re already alone.”

A look of quiet, irresistible warmth comes over him. “Not enough to suit me.”

Come away with me.

Maybe I should agree. Give us what we both want. The answer rises to the back of my tongue and waits there, perilously.

But something wilful in me lifts its head.

Perhaps because a small part of me knows that if I hand him an easy answer, he’ll spend the rest of the evening wondering whether I truly meant it, or whether all that passed between us at that table carried me along.

So I tip my head and say, with as much composure as I can gather, “That was not a proper invitation.”

His brow draws in. “It wasnae?”

“Nae.” I lace my fingers together before me, though it does nothing to steady the quickening in my chest. “It sounded an awful lot like a man sayin’ the first thing that came to him before he could lose his nerve.”

To my deep satisfaction, that startles a laugh out of him. Brief. Disbelieving. But real.

“And if that’s true?” he asks.

“Then,” I say, and allow the smallest hint of mischief to touch my mouth, “ye’ll have to ask me again when ye’ve had sense to do it properly.”

He stares at me as though he can’t decide whether I jest.

The trouble is, I am—and I’m not.

Resolve is written plainly in his face.

“Fine,” he says quietly.

I lift a brow. “Fine?”

“Aye, fine.” His gaze doesn’t leave mine. “Then I’ll ask ye proper.”

“Well,” I say, praying my voice sounds cooler than I feel, “I suppose we’ll see what sort of effort ye make of it.”

A warmth, slow and dangerous, moves through his expression.

“You will.”

The sheer certainty of him makes my stomach flutter.

Then his gaze drifts over my face once, and the wickedness in him eases into something sweeter. “Go back to the castle.”

I blink. “What?”

“Go on,” he says, gentler now. “Ye came to see after me. Ye’ve done that.” His mouth tilts, faintly, though the weariness in him hasn’t vanished. “And if it eases yer mind any, I swear I’ll come back and do as I’m told. I’ll rest. Properly.”

I narrow my eyes. “Ye say that now.”

“I say it meanin’ it.”