Evidently, women are capable of experiencing rational thought and sexual arousal simultaneously, because I appeared to be doing precisely that.
My brain was engaged in indignant rebuttal of all kinds of things, including at least half of everything he’d said in the course of the last few minutes.
At the same time, the other end of my spinal cord was not merely shamefully aroused at the thought of physical possession; it was bloody deliriously weak-kneed with desire at the notion, and was causing my hips to sway outward, brushing his.
He was still ignoring the dig of my nails. His other hand came up and took my free hand before I could do anything violent with it; he folded his fingers around mine and held them captive, down at my side.
“If ye asked me, Sassenach, to free ye—” he whispered, “d’ye think I’d do so?”
I took a deep breath; deep enough that my br**sts brushed his chest, he stood so close, and realization welled up in me. I stood still, breathing, watching his eyes, and felt my agitation fade slowly away, mutating into a sense of conviction, heavy and warm in the pit of my belly.
I had thought my body swayed in answer to his—and it did. But his moved unconsciously with mine; the rhythm of the pulse I saw in his throat was the pounding of the heartbeat that echoed in my wrist, and the sway of his body followed mine, barely touching, moving scarcely more than the leaves above, sighing on the breeze.
“I wouldn’t ask,” I whispered. “I’d tell you. And you’d do it. You’d do as I said.”
“Would I?” His grip on my wrist was still firm, and his face so close to mine that I felt his smile, rather than saw it.
“Yes,” I said. I had stopped pulling at my trapped wrist; instead, I pulled my other hand from his—he made no move to stop me—and brushed a thumb from the lobe of his ear down the side of his neck. He took a short, sharp breath, and a tiny shudder ran through him, stippling his skin with goosebumps in the wake of my touch.
“Yes, you would,” I said again very softly. “Because I own you, too . . . man. Don’t I?”
His hand released its grip abruptly and slid upward, long fingers intertwining with mine, his palm large and warm and hard against my own.
“Oh, aye,” he said, just as softly. “Ye do.” He lowered his head the last half-inch and his lips brushed mine, whispering, so that I felt the words as much as heard them.
“And I ken that verra well indeed, mo nighean donn.”
48
WOODEARS
DESPITE HIS DISMISSAL of her worries, Jamie had promised his wife to look into the matter, and found opportunity to speak with Malva Christie a few days later.
Coming back from Kenny Lindsay’s place, he met a snake curled up in the dust of the path before him. It was a largish creature, but gaily striped—not one of the venomous vipers. Still, he couldn’t help it; snakes gave him the grue, and he did not wish to pick it up with his hands, nor yet to step over it. It might not be disposed to lunge up his kilt—but then again, it might. For its part, the snake remained stubbornly curled among the leaves, not budging in response to his “Shoo!” or the stamping of his foot.
He took a step to the side, found an alder, and cut a good stick from it, with which he firmly escorted the wee beastie off the path and into the wood. Affronted, the snake writhed off at a good rate of speed into a hobble-bush, and next thing, a loud shriek came from the other side of the bush.
He darted round it to find Malva Christie, making an urgent, though unsuccessful, effort to squash the agitated snake with a large basket.
“It’s all right, lass, let him go.” He seized her arm, causing a number of mushrooms to cascade out of her basket, and the snake decamped indignantly in search of quieter surroundings.
He crouched and scooped up the mushrooms for her, while she gasped and fanned herself with the end of her apron.
“Oh, thank ye, sir,” she said, bosom heaving. “I’m that terrified o’ snakes.”
“Och, well, that’s no but a wee king snake,” he said, affecting nonchalance. “Great ratters—or so I’m told.”
“Maybe so, but they’ve a wicked bite.” She shuddered briefly.
“Ye’ve no been bitten, have ye?” He stood up and dumped a final handful of fungus into her basket, and she curtsied in thanks.
“No, sir.” She straightened her cap “But Mr. Crombie was. Gully Dornan brought one of those things in a box, to Sunday meeting last, just for mischief, for he kent the text was For they shall take up poisonous serpents and suffer no harm. I think he meant to let it out in the midst of the prayin’.” She grinned at the telling, clearly reliving the event.
“But Mr. Crombie saw him with the box, and took it from him, not knowing what was in it. Well, so—Gully was shaking of the box, to keep the snake awake, and when Mr. Crombie opened it, the snake came out like a jack-i’-the-box and bit Mr. Crombie on the lip.”
Jamie couldn’t help smiling in turn.
“Did it, then? I dinna recall hearing about that.”
“Well, Mr. Crombie was that furious,” she said, trying for tact. “I imagine no one wanted to spread the story, sir, for fear he’d maybe pop with rage.”
“Aye, I see,” he said dryly. “And that’s why he wouldna come to have my wife see to the wound, I suppose.”
“Oh, he wouldna do that, sir,” she assured him, shaking her head. “Not if he was to have cut off his nose by mistake.”
“No?”
She picked up the basket, glancing shyly up at him.
“Well . . . no. Some say may be as your wife’s a witch, did ye ken that?”
He felt an unpleasant tightness in his wame, though he was not surprised to hear it.
“She is a Sassenach,” he answered, calm. “Folk will always say such things of a stranger, especially a woman.” He glanced sideways at her, but her eyes were modestly cast down to the contents of her basket. “Think so yourself, do ye?”
She looked up at that, gray eyes wide.
“Oh, no, sir! Never!”
She spoke with such earnestness that he smiled, despite the seriousness of his errand.
“Well, I suppose ye’d have noticed, so much time as ye spend in her surgery.”
“Oh, I should wish nothing but to be just like her, sir!” she assured him, clutching the handle of her basket in worshipful enthusiasm. “She is so kind and lovely, and she kens so much! I want to know all she can teach me, sir.”
“Aye, well. She’s said often how good it is to have such a pupil as yourself, lass. Ye’re a great help to her.” He cleared his throat, wondering how best to work round from these cordialities to a rude inquiry as to whether her father was interfering with her. “Ah . . . your Da doesna mind that ye spend so much time with my wife?”
A cloud fell upon her countenance at that, and her long black lashes swept down, hiding the dove-gray eyes.
“Oh. Well. He . . . he doesna say I mustna go.”
Jamie made a noncommittal sound in his throat, and gestured her ahead of him back to the path, where he strode along for a bit without further question, allowing her to regain her composure.
“What d’ye think your father will do,” he inquired, swishing his stick casually through a patch of toadflax, “once ye’ve wed and left his house? Is there a woman he might consider? He’d need someone to do for him, I expect.”
Her lips tightened at that, to his interest, and a faint flush rose in her cheeks.
“I dinna mean to be wed anytime soon, sir. We’ll manage well enough.”
Her answer was short enough to cause him to probe a bit.
“No? Surely ye’ve suitors, lass—the lads swoon after ye in droves; I’ve seen them.”
The flush on her skin bloomed brighter.
“Please, sir, ye’ll say no such thing to my faither!”
That rang a small alarm bell in him—but then, she might mean only that Tom Christie was a strict parent, vigilant of his daughter’s virtue. And he would have been astonished to the marrow to learn that Christie was soft, indulgent, or in any way delinquent in such responsibilities.
“I shall not,” he said mildly. “I was only teasin’, lass. Is your father sae fierce, then?”
She did look at him then, very direct.
“Thought ye kent him, sir.”
He burst out laughing at that, and after a moment’s hesitation, she joined him, with a small titter like the sound of the wee birds in the trees above.
“I do,” he said, recovering. “He’s a good man, Tom—if a bit dour.”
He looked to see the effect of this. Her face was still flushed, but there was a tiny residual smile on her lips. That was good.
“Well, so,” he resumed casually, “have ye enough of the woodears there?” He nodded at her basket. “I saw a good many yesterday, up near the Green Spring.”
“Oh, did ye?” She glanced up, interested. “Where?”
“I’m headed that way,” he said “Come if ye like, I’ll show ye.”
They made their way along the Ridge, talking of inconsequent things. He led her now and then back to the subject of her father, and noted that she seemed to have no reservations concerning him—only a prudent regard for his foibles and temper.
“Your brother, then,” he said thoughtfully, at one point. “Is he content, d’ye think? Or will he be wanting to leave, maybe go down to the coast? I ken he’s no really a farmer at heart, is he?”
She snorted a bit, but shook her head.
“No, sir, that he’s not.”
“What did he do, then? I mean, he grew up on a plantation, did he not?”
“Oh, no, sir.” She looked up at him, surprised. “He grew up in Edinburgh. We both did.”
He was taken back a bit at that. It was true, both she and Allan had an educated accent, but he had thought it only that Christie was a schoolmaster, and strict of such things.
“How is that, lass? Tom said he’d married here, in the Colonies.”
“Oh, so he did, sir,” she assured him hastily. “But his wife was not a bond servant; she went back to Scotland.”
“I see,” he said mildly, seeing her face grow much pinker and her lips press tight. Tom had said his wife had died—well, and he supposed she had, but in Scotland, after she’d left him. Proud as Christie was, he could hardly wonder that the man hadn’t confessed to his wife’s desertion. But—
“Is it true, sir, that your grandsire was Lord Lovat? Him they called the Old Fox?”
“Oh, aye,” he said, smiling. “I come from a long line of traitors, thieves, and bastards, ken?”
She laughed at that, and very prettily urged him to tell her more of his sordid family history—quite obviously, as a means of avoiding his asking more questions regarding hers.
The “but” lingered in his mind, though, even as they talked, with increasing desultoriness as they climbed through the dark, scented forest.
But. Tom Christie had been arrested two or three days after the Battle of Culloden, and imprisoned for the next ten years, before being transported to America. He did not know Malva’s exact age, but he thought she must be eighteen or so—though she often seemed older, her manner was so poised.