The Great Scot (4 page)

What wasn't it about him?
her little voice offered. He stood there scowling in his T-shirt and jeans, but he might as well have been wearing the plaid with a clay-more strapped to his hip for all he exuded the whole rogue highlander thing. She really had to get a grip. She turned her head and focused exclusively on Kat, who, she belatedly noticed, hadn't missed a thing in Erin's momentary little distraction. Even scarier, she smiled. Broadly.

“Okay, do-over it is,” she announced, quite jovially. She turned her laser beam smile on Erin. “But you'll stay.” She nudged her a step or two closer to Dylan. “Right there.” She smiled very prettily up at Dylan, but only a fool would take that as a sign of friendship and goodwill. “You don't mind, do ye now?”

It was as if the entire room took a breath and held it. Only when Dylan nodded, once, did the tension ebb, if only for a moment. “Ladies first,” he announced.

And just the sound of that voice sent a little tingle of awareness through Erin that only served to keep her body on point. Two of them, to be exact. She folded her arms across her chest, then realized she was still holding her ale. She impulsively chugged the rest of it and set the empty glass down on one of the tall tables lining the wall behind them. She tried to shrink back slightly, out of the center-of-attention spot, but Kat was having none of it.

“It was all quite amusing when you thought to distract me with my charming husband here. Well, two can play at that. Erin, be a darling and stay directly in Dylan's line of vision for me.”

From the instant reaction of the crowd, it was easy to understand what kind of distraction they wanted her to provide. Completely nonplussed, Erin automatically pointed at herself. “Me?” Had they not actually looked at her? She was hardly eye candy material. Her gaze tracked to Dylan, completely without her authority, but he looked neither nonplussed nor repulsed. In fact, it was hard to tell what he was thinking. So what else was new?

The crowd was chanting her name now and she saw her entire career taking a fast nosedive in the middle of Nowhere, Scotland. Why hadn't she stayed in London? Why?

Seemingly satisfied with the situation, Kat took her darts, very lovingly handed to her by her husband, who then proceeded to hold her around the waist, dip her back over his arm and kiss her deeply, much to the delight of the villagers. Kat swatted him when he set her upright again, but the pink in her cheeks and the twinkle in her eye belied her annoyance. Erin sighed a little inside. They were wonderful together.

Then, very swiftly, and with deadly precision, Kat buried both of her darts dead center on the board. She curtsied to Dylan, then snagged her husband, pushed him back against the nearest pool table and returned his earlier favor. Of course, it ended with her smacking his hands away as he tried to pull her up onto the table. Everyone was laughing, tankards were raised and more rounds of ale poured.

And then it was Dylan's turn.

She was jostled closer to him, brushing up against his arm before moving back. She looked up at him and mouthed, “I'm sorry,” hoping he understood it was for all of it, not just the inadvertent contact. He held her gaze for what seemed like an eternity. Erin spent the next couple seconds being partly terrified and mostly ridiculously turned on, wondering if they were supposed to somehow match Brodie and Kat's antics. But just when another hush was starting to descend over the crowd, Dylan merely stepped past her and planted himself on the hash mark branded into the wooden pub flooring. Part of the crowd began chanting her name, the other half tried to shush them. Apparently they weren't sure how far to push their fearless leader, either.

All she knew was that she should have stayed in her hotel room.

She watched as Dylan, with absolutely steady hands, tossed both darts in quick succession, knocking one of Kat's darts to the floor and pinning the board right next to the other one. A cheer went up as both Dylan and Kat looked to Brodie, who, in turn, looked at Erin. Who took the coward's way out and shrugged. It was smart business, she told herself.

“Where did you learn to throw like that, anyway?” Brodie wanted to know from Dylan.

“They do have pubs in Edinburgh, you know.”

“Of course, I do. I just never thought you spent time in any of them.”

There was a slight gathering of breath amongst the natives, and Erin wondered why that would be a touchy subject. Certainly Brodie didn't really think it was a betrayal for his brother to patronize other pubs. Clearly he was kidding, anyway. Every word out of Brodie's mouth was accompanied by that charming smile of his. She found her gaze drawn back to Dylan, much like a tennis match. Ball in his court.

“You'd have been surprised then.” He glanced at the dartboard and, if she wasn't mistaken, a rather mischievous light entered his eyes, if only briefly. “Clearly.”

Laughter filled the warm room and some halfhearted calls for Brodie to claim a winner resumed.

Brodie and Kat began to debate the rules, encouraging the villagers to good-naturedly chant for more, but before it could go any further, Dylan raised his hand and said, “I think I've caused enough of a stir.” He sketched a short bow. “I appreciate your support, especially against such an engaging and worthy opponent.”

Kat struck an exaggerated curtsy, which looked all the more incongruous given that she was still in her mechanic's overalls, and tankards of ale were lifted all around once again amidst continued chatter.

“Surely somebody has a fiddle.” This from Alastair. “I say we work off this collective energy with some dancing!”

Erin instinctively took a step toward the door. She knew she should stay, her mission was far from complete, but she was happy at the moment to end the evening with a chance to continue her pursuit another day. She didn't understand the politics at play here and it would be wise to step back and regroup before making another move. She still had every intention of leasing Glenshire, but she was smart enough to know she had, at best, one more shot at it, then it was game over. And there had been enough game playing tonight as it was.

She turned, looking for Alastair, thinking it was only polite to let him know she was leaving, as their chat earlier had been aborted by the dart game, only to find herself swung around by the arm as music filled the warm, yeasty-smelling air. “Come on, lass!”

“But I don't know how—”

The rest of her protest was swallowed up, as was she, by the sea of bodies she was tugged into. She had no idea who her partner was, other than he was middle-aged, nice enough looking, hopefully patient. And wearing solid shoes.

He spun her expertly through the crowd and when she finally got her bearings, she realized it was an organized line dance of sorts. Then she noticed the looks everyone was giving each other, little smiles of anticipation or something. Almost like everyone was in on some secret except for—“Oh!”

She'd paused a beat too long when she spun through the last turn and found herself unexpectedly flat up against a very hard male chest. She knew who it was before she met his gaze. Or her body knew, anyway. “Sorry,” she choked out.

He'd already taken hold of her arms, but almost, it seemed to balance himself rather than her. “We seem to have a wee bit of a problem with this,” he said. If he'd been smiling, she could have assured herself he was teasing her. As it was, she wasn't quite sure. So what else was new?

Taking a quick glance around as the other dancers closed ranks behind them, subtly shifting them to the periphery of the makeshift dance floor, she noted their expressions hadn't changed much. Only now, in addition to the quick exchange of private smiles, there was a bit of elbowing going on and chins jerking meaningfully in their general direction as the dancers whirled by. And all Erin could think was, were they so hard up to find their clan chief a woman that they'd picked her? Surely she was reading this wrong.

“Don't mind them,” Dylan said, tipping his chin toward the passersby and their hopeful expressions. “They mean well.”

Okay, so maybe she wasn't. “Mean well about what, exactly?”

“They have it in their heads that I should socialize more. Dinnae worry, they're a harmless lot.”

Erin had no idea what to say to that. A first. “Uh, good.”
Make small talk,
she admonished herself. She really needed to take advantage of this portentous occasion.
Business, think business
. She wished she'd had a bit longer with Alastair. She needed something, anything, to use as an approach.

“You two going to stand about when there's music playing?” Alastair called out, an attractive older woman on his arm, who had nothing but stars in her eyes for him as they swung expertly by.

Erin tensed all over again, but Dylan merely nodded. She wasn't sure she could handle actual direct physical contact without being rendered a complete, drooling idiot. The idea of his hands intentionally making prolonged contact with any part of her body…She crossed her arms over her chest. Just as a precaution, of course. Although a quick glance down told her she'd perhaps been extra-prescient on the matter.

“Dinnae fash yerself, lass. I believe I've socialized enough for one evening,” Dylan said, his tone a bit tight. “I'll be taking my leave now.” He sketched a quick bow and started to turn away.

Seeing her one and only opportunity slip from her grasp before she'd even made a stab at it, Erin acted impulsively and grabbed at his arm. “Surely you can manage one dance?”
What on earth was she doing?
By some miracle she managed to pull off a semi-natural looking smile. “Keep the natives happy and keep me from being abandoned to the wolves.” Which was a joke. If the men here had looked twice at her, it was because they'd heard why she was in town. “Maybe you can manage to work us closer to the door and we can both make our escape.” She told herself that would give her more time, just the two of them, away from the noise and prying eyes of the villagers, to talk business.

Tell that to her nipples though.

Dylan, being a gentleman, and confronted with an audience that somehow managed to dance wildly about the crowded floor while paying almost rapt attention to their leader, could do little but comply with her request.

“I'm not very good,” she told him, having to raise her voice to be heard as they edged into the crowd.

“No'a problem, neither am I,” he replied, and for a second there, she thought she caught a hint of a dry smile.

But then his hands were on her and all rational thought took flight.

 

What the bloody hell did he think he was doing?
Dylan stared down into Erin's moss green eyes and wondered when, exactly, he'd lost complete control of his life. He wasn't entirely certain, but it seemed to coincide with her arrival in town.

He'd hardly gotten any work done all day for thinking about the disruptive Yank. So he'd let Letitia's guilt trip send him into town. Anything for a distraction, he'd told himself. He'd foolishly challenged Brodie's wife, known far and wide as a dart shark, to a match, and had succeeded in diverting the entire village's attention. Then he'd surprised himself by almost having a good time. But just when he'd thought maybe he could mix and mingle and be one of the crowd after all, she'd shown up.

And within minutes, the crowd had shifted, en masse, back into matchmaking mode. Although, to be fair, he wasn't entirely certain if their interest in matching him up with Erin was for his personal gain, or for the betterment of the village. He'd been surprised to hear how enthusiastic everyone seemed to be about her little mission.

So, he'd dance with her. Once. Make everyone happy. Then he was going home. He'd come back to town after she'd moved on to scouting her next location. Looking at her, he told himself he couldn't remember why he'd been so distracted by her anyway.

Then he put his hands on her, and she immediately tripped over her own feet, then over his, and looked up at him with laughter in her eyes and a quick apology on her lips…and he found his own lips curving. And his hold on her tightening. And his body responded when she tightened her own as well.

Good thing she really was a remarkably bad dancer.

More for his own safety and that of his toes than anything else, he maneuvered them closer to the pub door. Of course, he was well aware that the village would be buzzing if they left together, but he thought that might work to his benefit. Maybe they'd back off a little if they saw him actually showing interest in the opposite sex. Maybe he could convince them he could take it from there, and they'd ease up a little, stop looking at him with that dread mix of determination and pity. Especially that last part.
Och, the puir widower Chisholm.
He felt like such a fraud.

Several people noticed his trajectory and tried to intercept, but fortunately Dylan was able to catch Alastair's eye. The auld mechanic was still pretty spry and managed to twirl himself and his partner expertly into the path of the interlopers. Now Dylan knew why he admired and respected his new sister-in-law. She got her smarts from a good man.

He didn't waste any time taking advantage of what little edge he had. He maneuvered Erin in front of him and they were out and closing the door behind them before the song came to an end.