“No,” she sighed and changed the direction of her gaze northward, orienting herself by the hulking comfort of the Pennine Hills. “I can’t let my gaze reach quite that far.”
“Or your ambitions?” he asked casually, shading his eyes from the sun, as if he had no vested interest in the answer. As if it were not the whole of the reason he had come to find her.
“Perhaps,” she answered truthfully, for once not trying to evade the real subject that lay between them like a fish on the bank of a burn, gasping for water. The truth was she wanted both worlds—she wanted to be able to take care of the Aunts, to repay in kind the sacrifices they had made for her. But she also wanted to be with Hamish, and talk to him of books and lessons in kissing, and feel beautiful and clever and brilliant and capable of genius again. “I have been writing,” she confessed. “Or rather rewriting A Memoir of a Game Girl—secretly, of course.”
She had stuffed rags beneath her attic door so the Aunts couldn’t hear the telltale scratch of the pen against the foolscap or see the light from her candlestubs as she worked into the night.
Hamish rolled toward her, onto his side, so he could search her face. “I am glad, but you look tired.”
“I am. But not so tired or awful as I would if they found out.”
“What would happen if they did?”
“They’d be horrified.” She was sure of it. And she was just as sure that she didn’t want to horrify them. The Aunts might be strict and fussy and not nearly as much fun as Aunt Augusta, but they were her family. And they needed her now, the same way she had needed them as a child. Her absence had more than discommoded them—Isla had made herself ill with worry.
“Elspeth? Elspeth!”
It was as if the mere mention of the Aunts had conjured them out of the cottage. Elspeth knew she ought to call down and tell them where she was. But she didn’t. Because that would be the end of contentment and ease. So she raised her finger to her lips to signal Hamish to silence, flattened herself against the thatch, and waited until the Aunts’ fussy murmurings faded slowly into the morning’s silence.
“I’m trying to understand.” He reached idly for her work-roughened hand. “Clearly you’re not entirely happy and easy here—why would you not want to be free to return to Edinburgh with me?”
Nay, it would not, because as much as she wanted to go, she could not bear to leave the Aunts behind. And Elspeth was sure he did not mean the invitation in the same way her foolish heart had instantly taken it—literally. It was like a fever dream, the idea that she could go back to Edinburgh with him, and be with him always. In real life, earls’ sons did not marry scandalous writers’ bastard daughters.
For despite Aunt Augusta’s kind claim to the contrary, the sisters Murray had explained that there was simply no evidence—no documents or witnesses—to prove that her parents had ever been married. Elspeth was as she had always been, illegitimate. And that, more than the caps or the quiet life in a forgotten village, was what made her an unmarriageable spinster.
For her foolish heart’s sake, it were best if she kept her distance. “Hamish—”
“But what about our lessons in kissing?” He drew her hand to his mouth, and suited words to deed, brushing her knuckles against his lips. “I, for one, was rather looking forward to more tuition.”
Elspeth felt the scorching heat burn up her cheeks and sweep to the roots of her hair. Oh, to kiss him again. To feel wanted and desirable. To feel such pleasure. But then where would she be? Rolling about a roof with a man who could not marry her.
It was an exquisite torture to have him so near—and yet so very, very far. “I am sorry, Hamish. Really I am. I wish I could be different, really I do.”
He let go of her hand, and looked away into the middle distance. “If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride, isn’t that what they say?”
The quiet regret in his voice made her own throat hot and dry. “They say a lot of things.”
“They say you should meet me tonight.” His tone was urgent, more determinedly charming. “One last time. A walk, a cup of tea, a chance to talk privately. At nightfall, when your Aunts seek their beds. They won’t even know you’re gone,” he promised. “Live a little, Elspeth Otis, just this once, before you pack yourself away on the shelf.”
He saw too much, and not enough, her Hamish. “And then will you go home to Edinburgh, and leave me in peace?”
“I will.”
The relief she ought to have felt was hollow—empty and unhappy. As if she’d made a bad bargain.
Hamish pressed his advantage. “Tonight.” He stroked the backs of his fingers along the high arc of her cheekbones, and slowly but purposefully pulled her to him for a long, lingering, incendiary kiss that filled her to the brim with longing. “At nightfall. Meet me in the orchard for one last lesson in kissing.”
Yes, she would meet him. Yes, she wanted one last lesson in kissing. And by nightfall she might want something more. “Aye, I—”
That was when she heard it—the distant toll of the church bell calling the village to worship.
“Oh, no.” Elspeth felt all the last of her comfort and ease drain away, to be replaced with cold, sickening dread. “Oh, Hamish, I’d completely forgotten it was Sunday.”
Chapter 17
Never having been much of a churchgoing sort of fellow, Hamish didn’t share her dread, but he did understand family obligations. “I shouldn’t have kept you. But I won’t regret it. Not for a moment. In fact, why don’t we make the most of the moment—why wait until tonight? It is a perfect morning for fishing, and we can make up for the sin of missing kirk by getting fresh fish for breakfast.”
“Oh, I don’t know, Hamish,” she havered. “This is already a disaster.”
“Only if you let it be.” He did not wait for her to agree, but seized the day, and took her by the hand. “Come. We’ll head down to the burn. I brought my gear from Cathcart Lodge, and I saw some old fishing tackle in your shed that I’m sure will do the trick.”
“Is there a trick to catching fish?”
“Oh, aye. Fear not, I’ll teach you everything you need to know,” he promised, lest she be put off. “You won’t even have to get your feet wet.”
She held on to whatever objections she might have had, allowed him the pleasure of taking her by the hand and leading her down the ladder, and followed him along the rocky burn to a still pool, from whence he might instruct her.
“We’ll start with the grip. Thumb on top, like so.” He moved nearer, all but embracing her from behind, to demonstrate the motion of casting. It was all just an excuse to get close to her, to inhale the soothing scent of her skin, and a fishing lesson provided a practical excuse.
He positioned himself as close against her back as instruction, if not good sense, allowed. She smelled of the garden she tended so meticulously—of lemon, verbena, and mint. Of sunshine and warmth on such a blessedly bright summer morning. “You’ll want to hold it thusly, Elspeth.”
Her smile was as shy and luminous as it had been the first time he had seen her in Fowl’s Close. “Thank you, Hamish. I’ll see if I can muster…”
“A firm wrist,” he advised, “you’ll want to bend the rod, and sling the line like…”—he demonstrated proper motion—“this.”
The line cast somewhat heavily into the pool on the far side of the burn, but he accomplished his goal—she was nodding, looking suitably impressed with his casting prowess. Which allowed him to move on to the next lesson.
His first kiss he placed at the side of her neck, just above the collarbone where her skin was soft and fine and sensitive. He nipped lightly, kissing his way up to her jaw. Her head fell gently to the side, silently acquiescing to his plans for a different sort of demonstration than mere fishing.