Must Love Highlanders (22 page)

“Ye’re not the only one who is well acquainted with the darker side of life.”

“Really?” she said sarcastically.

He gave her shoulders a firm shake. “Do you know what it feels like to be afraid to go to sleep at night? To be so afraid of the dark that ye want to howl at the moon?” He shook her again.

“But ye’re so successful.” So together. So Hugh.

“Come.” He pulled the quilt from the chair back as he tugged her toward the bed.

“Whoa. I’m not that kind of girl—I’m not easy.” Though she was pretty sure that it wouldn’t take many more of his sweltering kisses to change her mind.

“Sit.”

The Wallace and the Bruce looked like the master had lost it.

She pulled free. “Do I look like one of yere pets?”

“Sorry. I’ve been alone with the dogs for too long. Please sit beside me.”

Hugh spread the quilt on the bed. “It’s all dry now.” He glanced at his dogs. “No thanks to you two.”

He positioned himself with his back against the wall and patted the spot next to him. “Take a load off, Sophie.”

She looked at him skeptically.

“I promise—hands to myself.”

“Fine. I’ll sit, but only if ye talk to me. I mean, really talk to me. Why would ye ever want to howl at the moon?”

He shook his head.

She folded her arms over her chest, prepared to stand there for the long haul. “Fair’s fair, Hugh. I told ye all about me. Now it’s your turn.”

He sighed resignedly. “I’ll only tell ye so you won’t feel like ye’re the only one who’s experienced misery.”

She slid in beside him.

He sat silent for so long that she began to wonder if he would speak at all. Finally, he took her hand and looked off into the distance—beyond the wall where the dishes were stacked on the shelf. “As I said…I’m afraid of the dark.”

He wore an expression of complete sincerity and seriousness.

He shrugged. “I know it’s ridiculous, but it’s true. It all started after my sister, well, after her accident.”

As encouragement, she rested her other hand over his. “Go on.”

“I was eleven when she had her accident. She was a wee bit, only five. I was supposed to be watching her as we played by the loch’s edge. Da had warned us about not going out on the loch, as the ice had thinned. Chrissa and I were building a fort out of the new snow. She got bored and wanted to go inside, but I made her stay with me. Mum and Da were busy with the wool mill. I became so entranced with my work of building the fort that I forgot all about her. Until I heard the ice cracking.” He winced like he was experiencing it all over again. “I looked up just in time to see her fall through.”

“Oh, Hugh.” Sophie laid her head on his shoulder, trying to comfort him.

“I didn’t even think—I ran out after her. I weighed much more, and the ice gave way underneath me sooner. As I fell in, I kept my eyes on where she’d gone in, but she never came back up, not even once. I was determined to save her and ignored the cold. I put my head in the water and opened my eyes. I thought if I could see her, I could get to her. But I only saw black. No Chrissa, only murky, dark water.” He shifted away. “I failed. I was going to join her. Lethargy had set in, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get myself out either.”

He paused for a long moment. “My da had seen me from the window, the cook told me later. He hadn’t seen Chrissa. He yanked me from the loch, giving me a bluidy lecture the whole time for going out on the loch when told not to. When I finally said Chrissa’s name and pointed, the lecture stopped. It was as if my da died, too. Mum, also. The life left them, and I became afraid of the dark.”

Hugh’s breathing had become shallow. Sophie bit her lower lip to keep herself from sobbing.

He went on as if he had no choice. “At night, when I shut my eyes, I see Chrissa lost in the murky black waters of the loch. When I sleep, the dark waters haunt me. Did I tell ye I have nightmares, every night?” He looked in her eyes for the answer. “No, of course not. I’m cursed with the bluidy things, but I have taught myself to rein in my fear of the dark. Ye asked me why I dinna turn on the light when coming to bed…it’s what I do to show myself that my fear hasn’t owned me. I can’t stop the nightmares. But I am managing the dark.” He raised Sophie’s hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “Now ye know my darkest secret. Ye see, lass, ye’re not alone in yere pain.”

She shifted toward him and laid her free hand on his cheek, looking into his eyes with her misty ones. “And ye’re not alone in yeres.”

“I’ve never talked about it with another soul. Not Amy and not my aunt either.”

To have lost a loved one in such a way and to be so tortured tore at Sophie’s heart. In a moment of compassion and bravery, she pulled him to her for a tender kiss, giving the light within her to comfort him. She held him tight, willing his pain to be eased. After a moment, she could feel his burden lift a little, and something shifted between them. The kiss became heated—a veritable fire had broken out—and Sophie was comforting Hugh no longer.

She was doing this for herself. She needed Hugh, and she kissed him passionately to let him know how she felt.

So what if her parents said that she’d never find a man? So what if she never had one that would be hers for always? She didn’t want to be a virgin for always either. Maybe—just maybe—she could have this man for tonight.

Hugh lost himself in Sophie’s kiss—in her goodness, in her light, in her comfort. She handed it all to him with the touch of her lips…he was overwhelmed. Until he realized what she was doing—unbuttoning his shirt. And what he was doing—trying to unzip her jeans.

“Enough,” he growled more to himself than to her. He pulled away. He hadn’t told her his story so he could get down to her intriguing underthings!

“I’m sorry.” She looked stricken.

Oh, God! He wrapped his arms around her, speaking into her hair. “Ye’re not the kind of lass who would let a bastard like me seduce ye,” he said thickly. “Let me hold ye, and let’s see if we both can get through this night undamaged.”

The dogs came over and plopped themselves close to the bed in a show of solidarity.

“Okay,” she said on a sniffle.

Dammit. He rubbed her arms, and she shivered. “I’m sorry I made ye cry.”

“Ye didn’t,” she said. “It’s just talking about making it through the night undamaged…it’s too late. I’m already damaged, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.”

“What are ye talking about, lass?” Had someone physically hurt her?

“It’s this disorder. I’ll never have the life that I dreamed of. I’ll never be like the other women in the village.”

He gave her a gentle squeeze. “I don’t believe that for a second. Now come, let’s see if we can find the cards I stowed here. We could play a game to while away the time.”

Her hand drifted over his chest in an absent-minded caress, threatening his few remaining wits.

“What if I told you, Hugh, that kissing you makes me happy? That yere kisses are as good as lying under a thousand suns?”

Sophie Munro was a minx. No two ways about it.

He pushed her up from the bed, swatting her bottom gently in the process. “I’d say, I think ye’re testing me, lass. Play some cards with me. I promise, if I see ye’re succumbing to sadness, I’ll kiss ye.” And the devil take him, too.

While they sat at the table, playing high-stakes poker with matchsticks, Hugh entertained Sophie with stories of the shenanigans that he and Amy had gotten up to as children. He admitted that he’d had a hard time at first being taken from his home to Aunt Davinia’s, because her house had been so lively. Amy was legendary for her nonstop talking. He’d soon settled in at his aunt’s, deciding he had the better of it to be away from Kilheath Castle and the constant reminder of the loss of his sister.

After a while, the dogs needed to go outside. Hugh took them, but when he returned, Sophie didn’t seem as cheerful as when he’d left.

“How are ye feeling?”

She shrugged.

“Come here, lass.”

She stepped into his arms, and he held her.

“Will ye kiss me, Hugh? For the sake of releasing some endorphins?”

“Ye’re such a romantic, Sophie Munro.”

“Will ye?”

“I promised, didn’t I?” He leaned down and kissed her. He meant to be tender and gentle, but she felt so damn good that he let himself go. When her knees buckled, he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bed. He wouldn’t make love to her, but he would do his best to make her feel better.

Before he laid her on the mattress, though, the door flew open. Belatedly, the hounds barked. Sophie squeaked. She tried to wiggle out of his arms, but Hugh held her tighter. Three people rushed in, shaking the snow off their coats and stomping their snow-covered boots all over the cabin floor.

The shorter and oldest of them moved forward, while pushing back the hood of her mackinaw.

“Aunt Davinia?” Hugh gently set Sophie on her feet. “What in the deuce are ye doing here?”

“I thought we were here to save you. We brought both ATVs.”

Donal and Fergus, his gardener and his ghillie, stood behind the matriarch, not making eye contact and looking ruddy in the face. Hugh didn’t care—they were both fired!

Sophie tiptoed behind him to the hearth and busied herself with bolstering the fire.

“Who said that I needed saving?” Hugh asked his meddling aunt.

She raised an eyebrow at him, something she’d perfected when he was a boy. “From what I’m seeing, I’ve seriously misjudged the situation.” She frowned like she wanted to back out of the door and let them get back to it.

“Oh, good grief! Nothing inappropriate happened.” Except if they’d arrived five minutes later, it might have. “Sophie got lost in the woods,” Hugh explained. “The Wallace and the Bruce led me here to find her. We thought the weather was too bad to make a go of it on foot tonight.”

“Nicely recapped,” Auntie said, taking his arm. “Leaving out all the best parts, I see.” She leaned in, whispering conspiratorially, “If ye’d only let me know where ye were and what ye’re doing, I would’ve given ye my blessing.” She smiled over at Sophie, then put her focus back on him. “She’s a dear.” She shook his arm then. “But ye didn’t, and ye weren’t answering yere mobile. I assumed the worst.”

“Then how did you find me?”

“I GPS’ed your phone, darling,” making it sound innocent and normal that an elderly aunt knew how to hack a computer.

“I had my phone silenced for church,” Hugh explained, wishing he’d remembered to unmute it. What he didn’t explain was that since Sophie had stepped into his life…he’d become distracted.

He ran a hand through his hair, deciding his aunt’s arrival was for the best. “Sophie, get yere coat. Ye’re going home.”

Sophie gasped as if he’d jabbed her with a hot poker.

“To Kilheath. Home to Kilheath Castle,” he clarified.

“Oh.” She frowned at the roaring fire. “But I just stoked it.”

Hugh had to agree. She had stoked the flame between them as well, and it would take some time to douse what she’d started.

“Donal, take Miss Munro back with you.” Donal seemed the better choice—married to a lovely woman and in his fifties. Fergus, though, was known as somewhat of a ladies’ man. “Then come back to get me. I’ll stay and put out the fire.”

Donal nodded. “Miss, if ye’re ready.”

Sophie grabbed her coat, not looking at Hugh as she slipped it on. But Hugh saw her red cheeks, which had nothing to do with the fire in the hearth. She looked hell-bent to get out of there.

But he was a bastard.

“Wait up a minute,” he said. He retrieved her hat from the table and went to her, leaning over, speaking so quietly that only she could hear. “We’ll talk when I get home. There’s still the matter of where ye’re going to sleep tonight.”

Sophie didn’t need her coat on her way back to Kilheath Castle. Aye, it was still snowing out. Aye, she should’ve been a Sophie Popsicle riding on the back of the ATV with Donal. But she was so heated up by Hugh’s closeness back at the cottage, not to mention his double entendre that she was downright smoldering. And she should be ashamed of herself for not feeling bad about it.

She was quite flattered by Hugh’s attention, but she couldn’t possibly think it meant anything. To be stuck out in the countryside with so few prospects of female companionship had to be awful for him. Before moving back to Lalkanbroch village, Hugh had lived in Edinburgh, a different girl every night, according to Amy. He was simply hard up…which explained his attention to Sophie tonight. Lucky for her, the wool mill was out in the middle of nowhere.

Donal pulled the ATV to the back door and stopped.

“Thank you for the ride back.” Sophie climbed off the vehicle, looking toward the woods as if Hugh might magically appear.

“Don’t worry, miss, I’ll get the Laird now.”

She started to argue with Donal that she wasn’t worried about anyone, but the man had taken off already.

Sophie hurried into the mudroom, stripping off her snow-covered coat and kicking off her boots. She wanted to be changed into dry clothes and her things cleared from his room before the Laird returned.

She hustled her way through the house, hearing Aunt Davinia come in the back door as well. Sophie didn’t stop, climbing the two flights of stairs quickly. She knew she was being ridiculous, but she wanted to be back in the kitchen sipping tea when the master arrived home.