McAlistair's Fortune (13 page)

“Do you know this place?” she asked.

“Belongs to Mr. Hunter.”

“Oh.” She eyed the building thoughtfully. “Why would Mr. Hunter have a box here and a cottage only a few hours away?”

“How far is Haldon from your London townhouse?”

“Not far at all,” she admitted. “They’re for two very different purposes.”

“This is a hunting box. The other’s a coastal cottage.”

“One can’t hunt on the coast?”

“One fishes on the coast.”

“Yes, but…” She trailed off, shaking her head. What did it matter if Mr. Hunter owned half the buildings in England?

McAlistair led them around the side of the house, passing a half wall in need of repair and a small garden long since gone to seed.

“Doesn’t look as if he’s been here recently,” Evie commented.

“He’s never been here. He just owns it.”

“Why would anyone purchase a hunting box and never visit?”

“Have you been to every property owned by your family?”

She hadn’t the foggiest idea how many properties Whit owned. “I can say, with complete confidence, that I have never failed to visit a property I personally own.”

“
Do
you own any property?”

“Not a square inch.”

He smiled at her and led them along a small trail through the stand of trees at the back of the house. It opened immediately onto a large pond surrounded by tall reeds and rimmed green with algae. A short, boatless dock jutted out from the muddy shore.

McAlistair turned to her. “Are you hungry?”

“I could eat.” Her stomach was a little jittery yet, but it was well past noon, and she’d had only the tea and apple from that morning.

“Lunch, then.”

They spread a blanket out on the soft ground a little way from the shore and dined on bread, cheese, and fruit. McAlistair had brought more than enough, and Evie found her appetite satisfied before finishing half the portion he’d given her.

Her eyes and mind turned toward the pond. With its green, murky water, it was less appealing than the clear bubbling stream they’d been following, but it would do for a quick, cooling soak of the feet…or hands. An intriguing idea came to her.

“McAlistair?”

He made some sort of masculine grunting noise to indicate he was listening, but didn’t look up from his meal.

“Do you suppose that dock is sound?”

He spared it a brief glance. “Looks it.”

“Are there fish in the pond, do you think?”

“Fair bet.”

“Can you fish with your hands from a pond?”

This time he looked up and smiled at her. “Harder, but I imagine so. You want me to teach you.”

“If we haven’t time, I understand—”

“We’ve time.” He finished the last of his apple, stood, and crumbled the remainder of the bread in his hand. “Not likely to catch anything this time of day, not in a pond, but I can show you the basics.”

She bounded up. “Excellent.”

“You’re very interested in this,” he commented.

She shrugged and followed him toward the dock. “I’m interested in anything that lends itself to self-sufficiency.”

“You’d like to be self-sufficient?”

“I should like to know I could be.”

He glanced at her. “Why?”

“Well, there’s a freedom to it, isn’t there? I imagine you experienced it as a hermit. Your existence relied only upon yourself.”

“It also relied on your family allowing me to stay.”

“You managed to go years without being seen by almost anyone. You could have kept hidden from Whit and Lady Thurston.”

“Perhaps.” He reached the dock first and put a hand out to hold her back while he tested its safety with his own weight. “Sturdy,” he declared after walking to the end and back.

Though she didn’t need it for the six-inch step up, she accepted the assistance he offered and followed him onto the dock. “Is that why you came, why you’re helping me?”

“Because Mr. Hunter has a sturdy dock?”

She made a face at him. “Because you feel indebted to my family.”

He stopped to look at her. “I
am
indebted to your family,” he said quietly.

Well, it wasn’t the answer she’d most like to have heard, but she couldn’t fault him for his honesty, or sincerity.

“But I would have come,” he added. “With or without the debt.”

That was much better. “Oh?”

She rolled her eyes when he did nothing more than give that lopsided smile. “There you go again, rattling on and on. You’re quite determined to talk my ear off, aren’t you?”

“Does it matter why I came? You don’t believe in the purpose.”

It did matter, more than she cared to think about, and because of that, she steered the conversation into more comfortable territory. “Would you rather I believed wholeheartedly and spent the trip being hysterical?”

“No.” He gave her a curious look. “Would you be?”

“No.” At least, she hoped not, but having never been in such a situation, it was impossible to say for certain.

He turned to the water, looking from one side of the dock to the other as if searching for the perfect spot. “What would you do differently?” he asked casually.

“If there really was a madman determined to do me in?” She shrugged. “I hadn’t thought about it, really. I’d certainly have argued against Mrs. Summers coming along.”

“Why?”

“Because it would be ridiculous—endangering herself to guard my virtue.” She blew a loose lock of hair from her face. “Given our current situation, it
was
ridiculous, ruse or not.”

“But you’d have left Haldon willingly?”

“Of course. Why would I stay and risk the people I love?”

“If there is a madman, Christian, Mr. Hunter, and I are also at risk,” he pointed out.

When he turned to look at her, she gifted him with a sweet smile. “Yes, but I barely know the three of you.”

“Point taken.”

She laughed and turned to look out thoughtfully across at the water as he crouched down to peer over the edge of the dock. “I don’t know what I’d have done, to be honest. Probably, I’d have kept the letter to myself and found a way to leave Haldon.”

“Handle things on your own?”

“Why should anyone else suffer?”

“They’d suffer a great deal if something happened to you. You’re not invincible, Evie.”

“No one is.”

“Some individuals are more fragile than others.”

She rocked back on her heels to glare at his back. “Are you calling me fragile?”

“No. I’d say you were more delicate.” He brushed his fingers along the water.

“Delicate,” she repeated slowly. “Really.”

Evie figured it was a testament to how long McAlistair had been secluded from members of the opposite sex that he didn’t show the slightest reaction to her annoyed tone. Not so much as a wince.

“There’s a gentleness to you,” he said absently. He stood up and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully at the water below his feet. “It’s too deep here.”

Gentle and delicate. Though she wouldn’t have gone so far as to call herself rough and indestructible, she rather thought she at least merited strong or, heaven forbid, clever.

“I do believe you’ve a mistaken impression of me.”

He spared a look over his shoulder, one infuriatingly condescending look. “I don’t think so. You’re a lady, through and through. You’re…good,” he decided.

“Good.” What a dreadfully bland description.

He returned his attention to the pond. “Hmm, and a bit naive with it. Dock might not work.”

“Naive?” There was nothing bland about naive. It was thoroughly insulting.

“A bit. It’s tied up with the delicacy, I suppose. Far shore looks promising.”

Gentle, delicate, good, and
naive?

Well, every good woman had her limits.

E
ven in the years to come, Evie would never be able to look back at what happened next without laughing and wondering what in the world had possessed her to do something so childish, so petty, so
ill-advised
as pitch the dark and dangerous James McAlistair into a dirty pond.

But that’s exactly what she did. She just reached out, planted the flat of her hand against his back, and gave one mighty shove to send him toppling headfirst into the green, slimy water.

Despite not knowing exactly
why
she’d done it—aside from feeling rather put out over being called naive—Evie was certain, even then, that she’d never regret it. Not for a single minute.

He went in with a loud splash, and for a split second he disappeared beneath the murky water. Then he broke free of the surface. He didn’t come up gasping or swearing or any of the things she rather suspected she’d be doing if she’d been tossed into the water. He rose smoothly, almost gracefully. Then he just stood there, staring at her.

Aside from his less-than-ideal reaction, Evie thought it priceless, absolutely priceless, to see the extraordinarily unflappable McAlistair standing chest deep in a pond, sopping wet from head to toe. Water ran in steady rivulets from his dark hair. A long strip of plant matter draped his shoulder. Something black and gooey marred his right cheek. Still staring at her, his dark eyes slitted, he wiped it away slowly with the back of his hand.

“Care to rethink your opinion of me?” she asked sweetly, and wisely began to quickly back away toward the shore.

“Come here, Evie.”

She swallowed down a laugh and took the last step off the dock. “Would you add simpleminded to your list of compliments?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he kept his gazed fixed on hers and began an unhurried but determined walk toward the shore—toward
her.

She danced farther away from the water’s edge as the first bubble of laughter slipped out. “You’ve no right to anger, you know. You insulted me.”

“I said you were delicate.” He reached the muddy beach.

She pointed an accusing finger at him. “Exactly.”

He came at her in long, deliberate strides. She yelped, dropped her hand, and made a somewhat belated dash for it.

She didn’t get far.

He caught her from behind. Wrapping his arms around her, he pulled her back and up against his chest, lifting her off her feet. Then he headed toward the water.

“No! Stop!” She squirmed and kicked, but protests were rarely taken seriously when laughter was involved, and she was laughing so hard she could barely get the words out.

He walked to the end of the dock and let her feet dangle over the edge. “Can you swim?”

She hesitated before answering. “No.”

“Liar.”

He grinned and stepped off the dock.

There was just sufficient time to either scream or take a deep breath. She took the breath.

Then she was underwater. It wasn’t quite cold enough to hit her as a shock, but it was a very near thing, and when he brought them back up to the surface, she was gasping, laughing, and swearing.

“You bloody fool! I cannot believe—!
Cannot
believe you—”

She cut off, astonished, as she realized her laughter wasn’t the only one sounding across the water.

McAlistair’s was, as well.

He was laughing. And it was no mere chuckle either. It was a loud, rolling, straight from the belly sort of sound that stunned her far more than her sudden immersion in the pond.

“You’re laughing,” she said softly.

Because he
stopped
laughing at her comment, she added, “I rather like it…even if it does sound like two boards being struck together.”

His laughter didn’t return, but he did grin at her. She smiled in return and wondered which of them would make the first move to draw away. It wouldn’t be her, she decided. She liked the feel of his strong arms around her waist, his broad shoulders under her hands, and the sensation of being held up so easily, as if she were weightless. She liked it very much.

He let go with one arm, but kept the other holding her weight. “You’ve a bit of…” He chuckled and wiped a smear of algae from her shoulder.

She looked at it a moment, then threw her head back and laughed. “You’ve a bit of…” She wiped her finger across his algae-covered coat and held it up. “Everywhere.”

He glanced down at himself. “I do seem to have taken the worst of it.”

“No more than what you deserved.”

“For being shoved into a pond?”

“For speaking of me in a manner that required shoving.” She sniffed primly. “And for enacting an unjustified revenge.”

“Unjustified, was it?”

“And ungentlemanly,” she pointed out.

“Never said I was a gentleman.”

“You rarely say anything,” she teased.

“You speak enough for the both of us.”

“And now I’m a babbling ninny. Name-calling is no way to begin an apology, you know.”

“Evie?”

“Yes?”

“Hold your breath.”

“Hold my—?” She saw the glint in his eye just in time to gulp in air before he dunked her.

When she came up, spluttering and splashing, he was already halfway to shore.

“You’re deuced lucky I
can
swim,” she called out after him, pushing aside sopping hanks of hair.

“Not really,” he called over his shoulder. “Water’s no more than four feet deep.”

Which put it halfway up her neck when her feet hit the muddy bottom.

And when her feet sank into the muck, it put it nearly to her chin.

“Oh, ick.”

Thinking it might be better to swim rather than walk her way out of the pond, she tried pushing off the bottom, which only served to push her toes deeper into the pond floor.

Attempting to kick free, she discovered, only served to create enough space for mud to slide, thick and heavy, into her boots.

“Oh, damn.”

Disgusted, she twisted, jerked, paddled, and yanked, and accomplished absolutely nothing beyond further churning up the already murky water.

“Um, McAlistair?” She looked to him, and found him calmly watching her from the shore.

“Having a bit of trouble?” he inquired.

“Yes, I…” She trailed off, noticing for the first time that his tone was condescending, his hands were gripped behind his back in the manner of a man patiently waiting, and he was grinning like an utter loon. He
knew.
“You
knew
the bottom was muddy.”

“I might have noticed.”

“You knew I’d be stuck.”

“I might have considered the possibility.”

“You…I…” A thousand ugly names and a thousand more dire threats occurred to her, but not one of them would sound anything short of ridiculous coming from a head floating in the water. She tilted her face back to avoid getting water up her nose, then sniffed with all the haughtiness and dignity she could rally, which was really none at all.

“Are you going to help me, or not?”

“Wouldn’t you prefer to be self-sufficient?”

She glowered at him. Likely the impression wasn’t any more impressive than the name-calling and threats, but it made her feel a tad better.

She sniffed again, because that too made her feel better. “Very well.”

Unable to think of any other way, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and dunked herself back under.

It was impossible to see through the murk, but vision wasn’t necessary for what Evie had in mind. She intended to undo her boots and slip out of them with the hope that without her weight pushing them down, she could pull them from the mud. She ran the very real risk of losing track of them once she was free, which was the
only
reason she’d asked for help initially, but it was a gamble she was now willing to take. Better she go barefoot for the rest of the day than suffer McAlistair’s condescension.

It was no easy feat to unknot wet laces, but she managed to loosen the first before needing to come up for air. Straightening, she broke the surface and took another deep breath. She heard McAlistair call her name, but she ignored him and went back under.

It took three successive rounds of dunking herself, but eventually she succeeded in slipping out of one boot and pulling it free from the mud. She broke the surface for the fourth time with a triumphant, “Aha!” And came within an inch of smacking McAlistair in the chin with her boot—would have, in fact, if he hadn’t caught her wrist at the last second.

“What the devil are you doing?” he demanded.

She blinked water out of her eyes. “I should have thought that fairly obvious. I’m taking off my boots.”

He took the boot with his free hand. “You looked as if you were drowning.”

“In four feet of water?” she scoffed. “I’m not quite that short. Although it would have served you right, abandoning me to the mire, as you did. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have another boot—No!” She held her hand out when he reached for her. “I can do this myself.”

“You’ve made your point.” He pushed aside her hand, wrapped an arm under her shoulders and hauled her up against him.

There was nothing else for Evie to do but slip her arms around his neck and grin at him. “And what point was that?” she inquired, eager to draw out her victory.

He hooked his other arm under her knees and carried her toward the shore. “That you’ve a clever mind.”

Not quite the same as admitting she was self-sufficient, but she’d take it. At any rate, she wasn’t capable of forming a coherent argument at present, not with his arms around her again.

Would he kiss her? she wondered as they neared the bank.

Did she want him to?

She studied his handsome face—the full lips that were too often serious, the hard jaw that was too often clenched, and those wonderful dark eyes that were quite obviously avoiding her.

He’d said she wasn’t meant for him, and—despite the fact that she’d told him she was meant for whoever she was meant for—Evie had always believed that, in truth, she hadn’t been meant for anyone. She was, and thought she’d always prefer to be, a woman of independence.

But she wasn’t so certain of that now. How could she be, when a mere touch, sometimes no more than a single look from the man, sent her heart racing?

How could she be after she had heard him laugh? The sound of it, that wondrous joyful sound, had unlocked something in her heart. And knowing she’d been the cause of that laughter—even if indirectly—had given her more pleasure than she would have ever imagined possible.

She wanted him to laugh for her again. She wanted him to look at her in the way that made her skin tingle. She wanted him to touch. She wanted
him.

No, she wasn’t at all certain she hadn’t been meant for someone.

And yes, she very much wanted him to kiss her.

Just in case he was considering the possibility, she wrapped her arms a little tighter around his neck, drawing their faces closer. His hair tickled her fingers and she had a strong urge to reach up and undo the tie that restrained it. It was wet now, turning the normally rich brown to nearly black. It looked rather dashing, really, like a pirate from one of Kate’s novels. She wondered again what it would feel like to run her hands through it. And wondered if it was strange that she couldn’t stop wondering.

Her fingers twitched of their own accord. It was the smallest of movements, just a brushing along the skin of his neck, but McAlistair clearly felt it. His gaze snapped to hers and for a moment she was certain, absolutely certain, she saw her own desire reflected in his eyes.

Surely, he would kiss her.

Without looking away, he set her down, letting her feet slowly slide to the muddy shore. It seemed only a single heartbeat passed while she stood in his arms, caught in his gaze, every nerve in her body dancing.

Suddenly, his jaw tightened, and his eyes snapped away. She thought perhaps he shuddered once, but it may well have been her and then he let her go.

“I’ll pack our things. Put your boot back on.” With that staggeringly unromantic comment, he handed her the boot, turned away, and headed for the blanket.

He wasn’t going to kiss her.

Because he couldn’t see her with his back turned, she indulged herself and mimed tossing the boot at his head.

I’ll pack our things? Put your boot back on?
Of all the wonderful, tender things he might have said or done in that moment,
that
was the very best he could do?

Hurt warred with irritation. It was only natural she found the irritation easier to swallow. She walked to the grass, sat down, and shoved her foot into the soggy boot.

She didn’t need tender, romantic moments from the likes of James McAlistair, she fumed. She certainly didn’t need him to kiss her. She’d been caught up in another fantastical moment, that was all. And hadn’t she berated herself once already for being too fanciful where he was concerned?

Apparently, she’d been in need of a reminder.

She scowled at his back and decided his hair didn’t look dashing in the least. It just looked wet. Maybe even a little mucky.

She returned her attention to the laces on her boots.

Running her hands through mucky hair didn’t sound at all appealing, now that she thought on it. Likely as not, she’d get her fingers caught in a snarl.

The image of that, of getting her hand hopelessly snagged in his hair, was just absurd enough to make her smile.

“Mood passing?” McAlistair asked in an off hand manner.

She glanced at him, and found him watching her. Her instinct was to sniff primly and turn away, but she pushed it aside. He hadn’t actually done something to merit her anger. It wasn’t required that he find her attractive, after all. And who could blame him for not, she thought with a rueful look at her muddy gown. She must look an absolute fright.

Also, she’d sniffed (primly, haughtily, or otherwise) at least three times in the last half hour. A fourth would probably be overdoing it.

She concentrated on wringing the water out of her hair. “I’m not in a mood,” she said carefully, and hoped he believed it.

He raised one brow, but refrained from comment.