Highland Rogue (26 page)

“That last summer?” Even as he tried to prompt her memory, the flesh between his shoulders crinkled. “Remember—the night before ye sailed back home? Down by the dock?”

“Are you certain it was me?”

“It was dark … but ye wrote me a …” A note. An unsigned note that he’d assumed must have come from Tessa. How blind could one man be?

“Poor darling.” Tessa reached up to stroke his brow. “I didn’t pay you much mind back then, did I? I promise to make up for it once we’re married.”

So Tessa hadn’t cared for him, back then. She couldn’t have nursed a fallow desire for him all the years they’d been apart—the way he had for her. He would have a lot to think about before he boarded that train for Glasgow later today. He needed some accurate measure of Tessa’s present feelings for him, to help sort out the whole bewildering tangle.

“Married … aye. Let me just tell ye quickly what I was going to say about that. Then ye can sleep on it.”

“Oh, very well.” Tessa leaned back against her door. “Since you’re so determined to have it out. What is this important news of yours?”

When he heard the soft tap on his door a while later, Ewan assumed it must be the young footman, Alec, sent to help him pack. It had the deferential sound of a servant’s knock. The kind that said,
Pardon me for intruding, but would it be too much trouble if I come in, now, and do my job?

“Aye, come on in!” he called from the dressing room. “I could use yer help. Did some of my shirts get taken to be laundered? And have ye seen my silver cuff links?”

The footman did not answer. Claire did. “I’ll ask Mrs. Arbuthnot about your shirts. I expect the cuff links are somewhere about. When did you last have them on?”

What had brought her here?

Ewan emerged from the dressing room with a waistcoat folded over his arm. “Sorry, I thought ye were somebody else. What can I do for ye?”

It was the question of a servant, born and bred.

“What would I
like
you to do for me?” asked Claire. “Or what are you
able
to do for me?”

He’d intended to talk to her before he left Strathandrew, to make certain everything was out in the open and understood between them. But he wished she hadn’t come here. It was too potent a reminder of last night.

“Tell me the first of those,” he said, “then I’ll tell you the second.”

“Very well.” She inhaled a deep breath, then forged ahead. “What I want … what I wish, is that you could forget what happened last night and not hold my intolerable behavior against my sister. Drunk or sober, I should never have thrown myself at you that way. I cannot begin to tell you how much I regret the distress I must have caused you.”

Ewan could see the distress it caused
her
to speak of it. Her face looked pale and pinched. Her wary gaze flitted around the room, seldom daring to meet his. Her bearing suggested someone braced for a blow. She looked so ill at ease, his heart went out to her in spite of himself.

“I wouldn’t say ye
threw
yerself at me.” He tried to ease the tension between them with a little teasing. “Ye could hardly sit up.”

He immediately regretted his misplaced attempt at humor, for it appeared to fluster Claire even worse. Her lower lip quivered until she caught it between her teeth, and she blinked furiously in an effort to fight back tears. It wasn’t any hangover making her look like that. Nor had she mentioned him keeping quiet to Tessa about last night, but seemed to assume that he would behave with honor.

“I will never forgive myself if I have spoiled Tessa’s chances with such a fine man.” Her voice broke on those last two words, but before Ewan could reply, she rallied.

In spite of her obvious dismay at having to plead with him, she seemed determined to have her say. “I swear, if you marry my sister, I will never do anything to embarrass or insult you again. I won’t drink anything stronger than tea in your presence.”

If their positions had been reversed, would he have been able to master his pride to plead like this with
her?

Perhaps she glimpsed a softening of his expression that gave her hope. “Reconsider, Ewan, I beg you. Tessa is a dear girl. You’ve loved her all these years without any hope. Don’t lose her now because of my folly. You can live here at Strathandrew and run the business we talked about. You’ll hardly ever have to see your wife’s odious relations. Please? For Tessa’s sake and for your own?”

When she looked at him like that, he wanted to grant her anything she asked. But for his own sake and for Tessa’s, he must not let her persuade him.

He set the waistcoat he’d been holding on the bed. “If it helps, Claire, I don’t hold what happened last night against ye. I reckon we all have … needs we keep under control most of the time, like a big dog on a leash. One drink too many is like trying to walk the dog over slippery ground. It’s easy for the beast to run away with us.”

Claire let out a quivering sigh. “Then you’ll stay? If you’d rather wait and have a proper wedding, I promise I’ll intervene with Lady Lydiard so she won’t give you any trouble over it.”

He hated to squash her fragile sense of relief. “Ye don’t understand, lass. I haven’t changed my mind about marrying Tessa, though that has nothing to do with …”

He’d been going to say it had nothing to do with her or last night, but that wasn’t true. “Ye said I’ve loved Tessa all these years. After giving it some hard thought. I see that’s not true. I only wish I’d realized it before I barged back into all yer lives and turned everything upside down. But I’m glad I had the sense to see it before we rushed into something that would have been bad for both of us.”

Did he owe Lady Lydiard his thanks for giving him a few days to come to his senses? It galled Ewan to think so.

“You can’t mean that!” All Claire’s distress seemed to vaporize into passionate anger. Eyes that had once held mournful mist now flashed with silver lightning. “Feelings like those don’t flourish for ten years, then disappear in a few days!”

As it had when they were young, her antagonism rubbed against his pride to kindle an answering spark. “Maybe not, if the feelings are true to begin with and if neither of the folks have changed in the meantime.”

“Are you saying you didn’t love my sister when we were young?” she demanded. “You gave a very fine imitation of it.”

“I’m sure I did, for I was convinced that was what I felt.” Ewan looked back on his behavior with hard-won perception. “Mooning about … watching her from afar … showing off for her … dreaming of her—that’s the way a lad goes on about any bonny lass. And for me, I reckon it was all mixed up with wanting something better for myself.”

“Ate you saying you only cared for my sister as a—a symbol of your ambition?” Could she look that indignant on Tessa’s behalf, if she had any true feelings for him?

“Look, I’m not proud of it. No more than ye are of getting drunk and offering me money to share yer bed. I was young then. I don’t know if it’s the same for lasses, but for lads it’s like three or four years of being drunk on a brew of all the bloody queer feelings raging inside ye. Ye make a damn fool of yerself as often as not, and ye aren’t responsible for a lot of the daft things ye do.”

Again Claire caught her lip in her teeth. But this time, Ewan guessed she might be trying to curb a wayward grin. “It is no different with girls.”

“Well, there ye go.” It did not give him nearly the satisfaction to score that point off her than it would have once upon a time.

“Tessa may not realize it yet, but she never loved me, either. Not the way it should be between a grown man and woman. I’m some kind of forbidden fruit to her. If I’d never been a servant, if I was some toplofty blueblood with her ma nagging her to marry me, she’d throw me over as quick as she did that poor Stanton chap. Quicker, maybe.”

He thought for a moment. “I reckon she cares more for Stanton than she knows, if she’s stayed with him this long in spite of her ma’s approval.”

Again Claire looked as if she wanted to laugh. Then she grew sober again. “That’s a great deal for you to have figured out in such a short time.”

Ewan shrugged. “I’m smarter than I look.”

“I’ve never underestimated your brains, Ewan Geddes.”

She deserved a less flippant answer. “The truth is, maybe I’m
not
as smart as I look. I’ve had clues over the years about my own feelings, I just never tallied them all up before and made myself take a good hard look at the sum. It’s not easy letting go of something ye’ve hung on to for a long while.”

Was that what she had done? Claire wondered. Clung to her old feelings for Ewan Geddes long after she should have let them go? Had she truly loved him, or had her feelings been tainted by something else—perhaps the need to compete with her beautiful sister for attention and love?

“Must you go right away?” she asked. “Could you not stay a few days and break the news to Tessa more gradually?”

Ewan considered her request, then slowly shook his head. “I reckon a quick break will be kinder in the long run.”

Part of her wanted him gone. He posed too grave a threat to her self-control. Another part could not abide the prospect of losing him from her life again.

“If you would like to stay … or go away for a while, then come back later, I meant what I said about you running a business here at Strathandrew. I still believe it’s a worthwhile idea and I’m convinced you’re the perfect man for the job.”

Was this just another way of buying his presence in her life? In part, perhaps, she conceded after a ruthless scrutiny of her motives. But there was more to it. She had promised him the job offer was for business reasons, independent of personal considerations. She owed it to him to keep her word about that.

Ewan considered her offer for a few moments. “Ye don’t think the whole thing would be too awkward between ye and me?”

Devilishly so, and more on her part. All the same, if he wanted the job and was willing to take it, she must not let her apprehension stand in his way.

“I expect it
will
be awkward between us for a time. But we aren’t sixteen anymore, Ewan. We’ve both knocked about the world enough to know that everyone makes mistakes now and then. We all do things we wish we could undo.”

“Oh, aye.” He seemed to sigh the words more than speak them. “I reckon we both made mistakes last night. Ye’ve had the character to own up to yers and make an apology. Ye put me to shame.”

What on earth was he talking about?

Her puzzlement must have shown on her face, for Ewan asked, “Do ye remember what ye said to me last night?”

A blistering blush suffused her face. It surprised Claire to discover she had any embarrassment left after last evening. “I’d prefer it if we could both forget everything I said and did.”

“Aye, there’s some things I’d like to forget, as well. But there are other parts I want to remember always. Like dancing with ye at the ceilidh, and hearing ye confess ye fancied me once upon a time.”

It had been so much more than a fancy, and by no means confined to the past. If she emptied a keg of hard cider, she might find the reckless nerve to tell him so. Or perhaps not. All the cider in the world could not sweeten the bitterness of humiliation she had tasted last night.

Tasted? Nay—drained to its vilest dregs.

“Why didn’t ye tell me it was ye I kissed that night by the dock, not Tessa?”

His words staggered Claire. “What? And give you reason to hate me more than you did already? I’m sorry for what it cost you, Ewan, but I swear I had no idea until you told me a few days ago. And what good would it have done to tell you? The truth wouldn’t have changed anything.”

“It might have made me realize yer sister didn’t care anything for me, back then. It might have helped me not feel so bloody guilty about the fancy I found myself taking to ye.”

Ewan took a step toward her. “I should never have kissed ye, Claire. Not last night. Not that night on the
Marlet.
And for sure not that night ten years ago.”

He took another step.

Claire pressed herself back against the door, as if his words were weapons and he were threatening her with them. What had possessed her to come here?

“Please …” She fumbled with the doorknob. “… you made your feelings abundantly clear last night. I don’t need to hear any more.”

Berating herself for being a coward, but unable to dredge up the courage to face him a moment longer, she turned to flee.

But the door would not budge.

She grappled with the knob, twisting and pulling in a frenzy to escape.

“I won’t hurt ye, Claire.” He stood so close, she could feel the warmth of his breath on her ear. “At least, no more than I have already.”

Reluctantly she lifted her gaze to see Ewan’s strong brown hand resting high on the door, holding it shut.

“Ye may not want to listen to me, lass, but I reckon ye need to, for ye’re not really
hearing
what I’m trying to say.”

Perhaps this was what she needed. To purge any foolish wisp of hope from her heart. And to atone for her behavior last night.

“Go ahead and speak your piece, then.” It took every scrap of nerve she possessed to turn and face him. “I assure you, I understand better than you think.”

One glimpse at his face and she wished she’d had the sense to keep her back to him. He looked tired and troubled. But that only made her yearn for him all the more. Whatever her feelings had once been for him, they had since ripened into love.

“I hope that’s not true, Claire, or I’m wasting my breath.” He shrugged his broad shoulders and flashed a grin that held more wariness than mirth. “I’ve got nothing to lose by trying, now … except my pride. And I reckon I’d be better off with less of that.”

“Perhaps we both would.”

He gave a slow nod. “Ye and me may be more alike than either of us would care to admit. I hope ye’ll pay better mind to what I have to say than I pay to myself sometimes.”

Thrusting out his lower lip, he blew a puff of breath that stirred the lock of hair hanging over his brow. “I’m sorry I kissed ye because I had no right while I was still claiming to care for yer sister. Last night, ye accused me of leading ye on, but I swear I wasn’t trying to do that. I was just so confused by my own feelings.”