Kissing the Countess (34 page)

"Then we'll both be there. I'll tell the others we'll meet them at the kirk."

"Thank you." She smiled, grateful for his willingness to respect her family and relieved that he had not brought up the subject of Finlay or the tenants.

"Are you rewriting some of the songs we had to burn," he said, glancing at her pages, "to keep each other warm?" She saw a gleam in his eyes and felt an answering swirl within herself.

She nodded. "I'm nearly done with those, and I'm also writing down a few that Morag MacLeod taught me this week."

"How many do you have in total?"

"With these, a hundred and thirty-four songs, all done in Gaelic and English, with musical scale and whatever interesting annotations I've learned about the songs."

He stood, and she did, too. "That's quite an admirable task you've taken on. I'm proud of you. Is it nearly done?"

"A collection of the old Gaelic songs could never be complete. I suspect there are literally thousands of songs all over the Highlands and Islands—no one knows for sure. It would take a lifetime to discover them all. I've set out to learn the songs of the northwest Highlands. In the last few years, I've visited every croft house in this glen and many in the neighboring glens," she said. "And I've traveled as far beyond that as my father would allow me, to meet with the singers who were said to know the music."

He slid an arm around her waist. "No wonder you are adamant about staying in the Highlands."

"I must, Evan," she said. "For the songs and for other reasons—I simply cannot leave here."

"But once you've gathered the songs, you can refine the collection anywhere. And in Edinburgh, there are publishers who would no doubt be very interested in your work."

She pulled away a little. "Still thinking about selling?"

He pressed her to him. "Last night," he murmured, "we agreed on peace for a while on this subject—at least until our guests are gone and we can discuss this more freely."

"Aye," she said, frowning. "We did. But I will not leave here, and I'm not interested in publishing the songs."

"No? Scottish ballads are very popular now."

"And prettified for the public," she pointed out. "I could not do that to these songs. The songs are part of the soul of the Celtic Highlands. I began to collect them when I realized, after so many people left this glen and took the old songs with them, that I could help save the music as our culture disappeared from the Highlands."

"You love this place, and its heritage." He paused, and in his expression she saw understanding and respect. With his arm still around her, he turned and they crossed the room to the fireplace, where a large portrait was hung over the mantel.

"This was painted a few years before his death," Evan said.

The oil painting was a half-length portrait of the previous earl, Evan's father. She had never met him in person—had never wanted to—yet now she felt curious about him.

Tilting her head, she studied the picture. Despite the gray hair, bullish build, and broad waistline, he resembled his son in the handsome, chiseled planes of his face and the brilliant hazel-green eyes, but in the puckered brow and downturned mouth she saw discontent and the unforgiving expression of a lonely, angry man.

"What made your mother leave him, Evan?" she asked softly.

He sighed. "My mother is a strong-willed person, as he was," he said. "She loves the Highlands as deeply as you, I think—and is still active in ladies' charities to benefit the Highlanders. She will approve of you quite heartily, I think." He squeezed her shoulder a little. "But when I was a lad, she disagreed with my father's decision to expand the estate and fill it with sheep runs and hunting reserves to expand his fortune. And she hated his cold treatment of his tenants but could do nothing to stop him. He could be harsh," he went on, "but he loved her in his way. I think he grew worse when she left. He might have changed for the better if he could have given up that unbreakable pride of his. He could never admit that he was wrong. She might have stayed, otherwise."

She leaned her head on his shoulder. "His son did not inherit those qualities, so far as I can see."

"Thank you," he murmured. "I hope not. Though I hope I have some of his intellect and his determination."

She wrapped her arm around his waist. Remembering last night's passion and gentleness in his arms, a delicate thrill of pleasure went through her. She felt safe and wanted. Loved, she thought.

Yet she knew that Evan still had secrets, and she wondered if she would ever learn the truth of those.

Evan tipped his head. "Catriona, I have been meaning to ask you something."

"Aye?" She waited, heart pounding, considering the track of her thoughts.

"Years ago, on the last day my father evicted people," he said, so low it was nearly a growl, "I was there."

"I know," she said softly. "I saw you with him."

"When I left the glen that day," he went on, "I was angry. My father and I fought bitterly about his actions. I thought I would never return here again."

She looked up, felt a wash of sympathy for him and for what he must have endured as the son and heir of an arrogant, selfish man. She waited, listening.

"I knew what he was doing was wrong. But," he said, resting his hands on her shoulders, "as I rode off that day, I heard a young woman singing. She stood on a hill, her hair bright as copper,"—he brushed his hand over her red-gold hair under its net—"and the song she sang went deep into my heart. I shared her grief, though she could not have known that."

"She knows it now," Catriona said softly.

"So it was you that day. And I heard you singing the day I fell down the mountainside. I was lost in the fog, and heard the voice—your voice—through the mist and that helped me find the drover's path."

"I was coming back from walking out with Morag," she said, her voice hushed with awe. "I was practicing the song she had just taught me. I never knew that you heard it."

"Your song saved me." He wrapped in his embrace, and she rested her head on his shoulder, breathing in his scent. "So let me help you in return, again. What can I can do?"

She looked up at him in surprise. "Help me how, Evan?"

"My father's actions caused a lot of grief in this glen. I know that. And I know you are doing your best to try to save that heritage. Is there some way I can help you?"

For a long moment, she stared at him, amazed. His sincerity was genuine, and she felt a surge of trust and gratitude.

But she could not tell him about Finlay and the tenants—not yet, though she was beginning to feel that she could confide in him one day soon and that he would understand. Remembering Kenneth Grant's threats, she knew she must wait a little longer, until she had spoken with Grant again—as much as she dreaded that—and persuaded him to leave it be.

Then she knew what she could ask of him. She had not told him about Flora and her fairy songs yet. Now she explained quickly about the oldest fairy tunes.

"The fairy music is said to be unique to Glen Shee," she went on, while he nodded his understanding. "They have a special magic of their own. If I leave Kildonan and Glen Shee, I can never learn those songs. And then who will? Flora will not share them with just anyone, and they will disappear. She is very old and very stubborn."

"She is willing to teach you?"

"She will, if I pass a test." She told him about the fairy stone that Flora wanted from her. "It is the price of those precious songs. I must do this."

He gave a dry laugh. "And I thought you took no risks!"

"I am learning," she said, "from you."

Leaning forward, he kissed her brow. "I would go up to the mountain and get the stone for you," he said, "but you need to do that yourself, I think, for her. But I can help you get up there safely. And judging by the enthusiastic planning I have heard around here in the last couple of days, that mountain will be very crowded. What do you say, Catriona Bhan?"

Half laughing, Catriona flowed back into his arms. He kissed her, then again, each one sweeter and newer than the last, while the rain drummed against the windows.

Then he drew back, catching her hips firmly against his, rocking with her a little. Not only did she know what he wanted, she wanted it, too, here and now, her heart pounding fast with the very thought.

"So, my love, you requested privacy in here," he murmured, leaning forward to nuzzle his nose to hers.

"I did," she whispered, and her body began to pulse and ache for him, knowing his secrets as he knew hers.

"Good," he said, and he drew her away from the fireplace and the overbearing portrait gallery. Tugging on her hand, he pulled her into a small book-lined alcove that held a single leather armchair. He drew her into that confined space and bent to touch his lips to hers in a swift, hard kiss that plunged through her like tender lightning.

Catching her breath, she leaned back in his embrace and wrapped her arms around him. As his hands loosened the buttons of her blouse and as she tugged at his jacket, she began to laugh softly, for a feeling bubbled up through her, a mix of joy and freedom, of passion and delight. Fumbling with his clothing as he fingered the buttons of hers, she kissed him and pressed against him, while he chuckled with her.

"I think we'd better hurry," she whispered, catching him in another fast, fresh, hungry kiss.

"This time," he said, lowering his head to nestle his lips upon her breast, nudging down her stays to allow the moist sweep of his tongue, so that she gasped aloud and arched back, "this time, I think haste would be lovely," he whispered, and took her mouth swiftly, so that she arched against him. His hand drifted under her skirts, shoving aside petticoats, finding the convenient opening in her knickers, and she gasped again, for the sensation of his hand, deft there, was divinely exciting.

Her heart pounded in a frenzy and she turned in his arms, kissing and being kissed, as he sank into the chair, pulling her with him. Willingly, laughing, she managed to straddle him in the generous chair, her skirts rucked up in a billowing cushion all around them as she freed his trousers just enough, found him thick and ready. She shifted, hearing his groan low in his throat, and within moments as they hid there in the alcove, with their silent, bursting passion concealed beneath her skirts, rhythmic, keen and burning sweet, she wrapped her arms around him—never wanting to let go, one thought repeating in her mind, settling deep in her heart—
here is heaven, love, with you.

Chapter 24

On Sunday mornings, it seemed to Evan—ever since he had been a small boy gripping his mother's hand in church—the light had a gentle quality, the air seemed calm, the weather always of a peaceful variety, and birdsong sounded more melodic.

Not so at Glenachan House, where the atmosphere seemed close and almost thunderous, the light dim and shadowed, and no birdsong was in evidence—none would have been allowed.

Evan sat beside Catriona at midday dinner in her father's house. He glanced around at the tense faces of her family—her father at the head of the table, his head leonine and shoulders large, his expression somewhere between a glower and puzzlement, her sour-faced and silent aunt, her brother uncharacteristically subdued and frowning. Catriona was quiet and lovely—she could seem nothing else to him now, Evan thought.

They ate quietly, with little conversation, sharing the good but plain fare of cold roast beef, vegetables, and thick buttered bread, all prepared the night before in keeping with the strict Sunday regimen of the household. He was surprised when Judith Rennie and Catriona got up from the table and returned from the kitchen with an excellent dessert of apple tarts and damson plum pudding, followed by strong, good coffee. He would have thought that sweets, and anything that could be excessively enjoyed, would not have been permitted at the reverend's table.

The meal followed a morning spent in prayer and the reading of the Bible, referred to simply as The Book. Upon arriving early, Evan and Catriona sat at the dining room table with the others while her father intoned verses from the Bible for an hour. Then they had gone to the nearby kirk to join a small gathering of Highlanders in the parish and guests from Kildonan Castle. Thomas MacConn delivered a sermon in Gaelic on the Good Samaritan, which was then repeated in English for the English-speaking guests from Kildonan Castle.