Devil in Tartan (Highland Grooms #4)(35)

“What happened?”

She returned one hand to his lap, dipped her fingers into the jar. “Why did you kiss me? ’Twas only yesterday that you wished to see me hang.”

“I still do,” he said. “I can admire a woman, can want her, and still believe she deserves to hang.” He smiled a little.

One corner of her mouth tipped up and she rolled her eyes, then started to attend his second wrist, her touch so damnably soft that it sent a sparkling little jolt up his arm.

“You deserve better, Lottie,” he said. “You deserve a man who will treat you well, aye?”

She suddenly stopped what she was doing and sighed heavenward. “Do you think me a fool, Captain? Do you think I donna know what you’re about?”

Surprised, he asked, “What?”

“Flattery.” She said it as if she was accusing him of violent assault. “I’ve heard quite a lot of it in my life, that I have, and I know its purpose.” She turned her attention to his wrist once more.

“For the life of me, I donna flatter you, lass, no’ now, no’ ever, aye? But I donna think you deserve to be treated ill.”

She shook her head.

He impulsively touched her face, and that stillness came over her again. “What happened?”

She moved her head from his touch. “Are you married, Captain Mackenzie?”

“Aye. To a ship.”

“Verra touching. But a ship canna keep you warm at night. Why have you no’ taken a wife?”

“I beg your pardon.”

“Ooh,” she said, her brows rising with amusement. “You must believe that as captain, you’re the only one who is allowed to ask questions of a highly intimate nature.”

He shrugged at the truth in that statement. “I believe I have a right to know who holds me captive and why.”

She puffed a thick strand of hair from her eyes and continued with her attention to his wrist. “Mr. Iversen has no bearing on why I am holding you captive, does he? Why have you no one here to keep your cabin tidy, then? Scores of captains are married and away at sea.”

“Scores,” he scoffed. “Most of the captains I know are as married to the sea as I.”

“You seem lonely, that’s all. A man as accomplished and capable as you, painting views of the sea with no one in it. Have you never longed for a wife? For children who will bear your name?” A smile shone in her eyes. “You obviously long for the sort of company only a woman can provide, aye?”

“You are bloody well brazen,” he said, a wee bit stung by her observation.

“Obviously so,” she said, and shrugged, still smiling. “I only wonder why there are no lassies about for the handsome captain.”

Why did he feel so defensive about her remarks? There was a time when he was a young man that it seemed every time he stepped off a ship, someone was inquiring about his intentions to wed. In the last few years, no one bothered to inquire at all. The only person who had thought there was even the slightest chance of it was the fragile little English flower, Avaline Kent, whom his brother Rabbie once had been engaged to wed. That lass had, inexplicably, fallen in love with Aulay while engaged to his brother, and had truly believed there was some chance he would return her affection. Ridiculous creature, she was.

He realized Lottie had finished tending to his wrists and was wiping her fingers, studying him. “You have a curious way of turning conversation around,” he said.

“Did I offend you, then? I beg your pardon. I only meant it’s odd that a man of forty years would no’ have sought the companionship—”

“Forty years! I’ve no’ reached my fortieth year,” he huffed. He had three years before that momentous occasion and planned to cling to every one of them. “And I have sought the companionship of women, but not in the prim way you undoubtedly imagine.”

She laughed, and the sound of it was like morning birds, cheerful and gay. “You might verra well be astonished by the things I imagine,” she said silkily. “Look at you, then—one moment you’re full of flattery for your captor, the next, you’re fuming over some slight. Fickle, you are.” She stood up.

Fickle? Aulay had been called many things in his life, but never fickle. “Now you must think me the fool, Lottie. Do you think I donna know that you are avoiding the subject of Mr. Iversen? Is the subject of him so verra painful, then, that you will avoid your answer by needling me?”

She lifted her head, looked him directly in the eye and said without emotion, “Aye, I suppose it is.” She shifted as if she meant to move away. But Aulay caught her wrist, his fingers sliding across her skin, then lacing his fingers with hers.

“What are you doing?”

“You’re no’ the only one who understands,” he said quietly.

She tried to yank her hand free.

“I understand you’re as brazen as a red buck. You’ve been disappointed, and you’ll no’ allow anyone close because you fear it will happen again.”

“You’re as absurd as you are lonely,” she said, and attempted to yank her hand free again. “I donna fear it—I know it will happen again. Men are, by their nature, disappointing.”

But Aulay held on. And he smiled. Her eyelids fluttered as if she’d seen something she couldn’t quite make out. Her hand relaxed in his, giving into him, and when she did, he released his grip of her. She slid her hand away, her fingers trailing over his palm and sending that alarming bit of sparkle up to his chest again. She took a step backward, tucked a bit of hair behind her braid. “Morven says I’m to let the unguent sit for an hour, then apply more,” she said to the wall. She turned around and walked back to the table, moved some things around without purpose, then dropped her hand. “I best go and...and...”