The Marquess's Scottish Bride: A Sweet & Clean Historical Romance (The Chase Brides Book 2) (24 page)

CAITHREN POPPED
an orange section into her mouth and licked her sticky fingers before rolling the dice.

“Double sixes!” she crowed. Removing four white markers from the backgammon board, she added them to her stack with a gleeful
clink
.

Looking wary and distracted, Jason shook the dice as he scanned the large, plush common room at the George of Stamford.

Cait separated another section of the orange. “What are you looking for?”

“Not what. Who.” The leather dice cup stilled in his hand. “The Gothard brothers.”

“You think they’re here in Stamford?” She hoped not. “Have you seen any sign of them?”

“No.” He rubbed the back of his neck, still glancing around. “It’s just a feeling. I know they could be far ahead or behind us, but something tells me they’re near.”

She made her own survey, seeing nothing alarming. People conversed in pairs and groups. They went in and out of the taproom or through the double doors into the more formal dining room. Two men played cards in one corner. A couple made their way up the stairs, laughing, their arms full of purchases from the fair.

“Well,” she said, “I’m thinking those brothers cannot afford a coaching inn as nice as this one. Or any of the other inns you’ve chosen along the way.” The patrons in the common room looked well-heeled and groomed, not rumpled like she remembered the Gothards. “Is that why you’ve been choosing as you have? In order to avoid them?”

A ghost of a smile curved his lips as he rattled the dice. After a moment it became obvious he wasn’t going to answer. But she’d bet he was attempting to steer clear of them.

To keep her from getting the reward?

She’d never understand him.

He rolled a one and a two. With an exaggerated groan, he advanced one of his black markers a paltry three pips. “Why did I buy this backgammon set?”

“I don’t know, but I’m glad you did. Though heaven knows how we’ll manage to carry it.”

She rolled again, a three and a five. Two more white markers came off her side. She held out a piece of orange. “Would you like some?”

He tossed the section into his mouth and rolled the dice. Double fours, and he was finally able to remove three of his black markers. But three rolls later the orange was finished and the match was over.

Two up on him now, Caithren celebrated her victory with naught more than a yawn. “What time is it?” she asked sleepily.

The watch he dug from his coat pocket brought her wide awake. The mere sight of it made her jaw drop. Solid gold, the thing was, with blue jewels stuck on the lid.

“Eight o’clock,” he said and snapped it shut.

“May I see?”

“I know it’s early.” He handed the pocket watch over. “But if you’re wanting that bath I promised, you’d best head up and take it now. We’ll have to get an early start tomorrow if we want to be sure of catching the Gothards.”

She stared at the watch, turning it gingerly in her hands, then flipped it open. “Eight o’clock,” she murmured. That wasn’t why she’d asked to see it—she’d believed it was eight o’clock. She’d just wanted to feel it, to touch such a wonderfully beautiful thing.

Maybe there was no cause for concern on Jason’s behalf. Maybe he had more money than she’d imagined.

But he was a miller.

“Where did you get this?” she couldn’t help asking.

Taking the watch from her, he pocketed it with a smile. “It was a gift from a lovely young woman.”

“Oh.” A gift from a lovely young woman. Why should that matter to her? Three days from now they’d reach London, and then they’d part company. It was what she’d wanted all along, wasn’t it?

“My sister-in-law,” he added.

“Pardon?”

His grin widened. “The watch. It was a gift from my sister-in-law. You do know what a sister-in-law is? The woman who married my brother.”

“I know what a sister-in-law is, Jase.” She rose and snatched up the backgammon set. “I simply cannot imagine you having one, let alone her being fond enough of you to gift you with a watch like that.”

“Oh?”

“Oh, yes,” she said, heading for the stairs. “You’re too ornery by half.”

His laughter followed her up all the way up.

AN HOUR LATER
Jason knocked on the door and entered to find Emerald sitting by the fire, swishing her new comb through her silky, bath-damp hair.

He’d never seen anything quite like Emerald’s hair. The women in Cainewood’s village always bound up their hair or hid it beneath a cap. And the court ladies of his acquaintance were always fussing with theirs, cutting it and curling it and crimping it and twisting it into all sorts of unnatural creations.

But Emerald’s hair was straight and thick and shining.
Swish.
The ivory comb he’d bought her ran along its gleaming length.
Swish. Swish.

Her eyes were downcast, but he remembered them lighting up at each of the small things he’d bought her. He pictured them sparkling with delight when she tasted the syllabub, crinkling when she laughed at the ropedancers, and flashing when she tsked at the mountebank.

Swish.

Jason didn’t think he could stand it a moment longer. His hands itched to bury themselves in that silky hair.

He’d never experienced such strong, strange impulses in his life. He couldn’t seem to stop himself from flirting with Emerald, and he could barely keep his hands off her. It was as if the normal, polite fellow he used to be had suddenly vanished, replaced by a feral animal wearing his skin—and its gentleman disguise was wearing thin.

More than anything else, he wanted to kiss her.

He’d dreamt of kissing her last night and hadn’t wanted to wake. The real experience couldn’t possibly be as good as the dream, but hang it if he didn’t want to find out.

Stiffly he crossed the chamber and began loosening his cuffs. It didn’t help that, thanks to the crush of fairgoers, the only room he could get had naught but one bed. Neither did it help that Emerald wore nothing but Mrs. Twentyman’s night rail. Her own clothes and the red gown were wet, draped over the backs of two chairs to dry.

At last she stood and set the comb on a bedside table, beside the violets he’d given her, which she’d stuck into a pewter cup filled with water. The sight of them, bedraggled but saved, made his heart lurch.

He turned away and sat on the bed to pull off his boots, chucking them across the floor.

Her hair waterfalled when she bent to retrieve them and set them side by side against the wall. “You really should try to be tidier.”

He loosened his shirt collar and lay back, crossing his hands behind his head and staring up at the beamed ceiling.

Her head swam into view. “May I have one of the ribbons?”

“Of course. Bring me my pouch.”

She disappeared, only to return holding the brown leather pouch. He couldn’t help noticing how beautiful she was, standing over him with her thick hair bunched in one hand, the firelight revealing hints of her slender form beneath the white night rail. He could barely tear his gaze away long enough to fish in the pouch and pull out the blue ribbon.

It was much too long to simply tie back her hair, but she used it anyway, leaving the long ends to dangle down her back. He’d been right: the blue suited her perfectly.

He smoothed his missing mustache and closed his eyes, listening to her little sounds as she readied herself for sleep.

When Emerald crawled into bed next to him, he made no move to get under the covers. Even thinking the words
Emerald
and
bed
in the same sentence made his whole body feel hot. Hardly daring to breathe, he held himself still as death.

It was the dream. The dream had done this to him.

Well, he wouldn’t let the dream win.

He
couldn’t
let it win. Emerald MacCallum was not the sort of woman he was looking for—not that he was looking at all.

Emerald was deceitful and reckless. And Scottish, of all things! It didn’t matter that she felt soft and smelled sweet. That was only part of the deception.

His eyes flew open when she turned to him and levered up on an elbow. A true hazel now, her gaze was riveted to where his unlaced collar gaped open, revealing the angry puckered scar. “Does it still hurt?” she asked quietly.

“Sometimes,” he admitted. “But it’s healing. It’s been more than three weeks.”

“I should make a poultice for you.” She reached out, and he stopped breathing, but then her hand dropped away. “How did it happen?”

He couldn’t tear his gaze from her concerned face. And her wide mouth, with its plump lower lip. He was sure her mouth was soft. It had been soft in his dream.

“Geoffrey Gothard shot me,” he said.

“He shot you?” She sat up in bed and shook her head violently. The dark blond tail of her hair shimmered as it swayed back and forth. “You said he hurt, perhaps killed a wee lass. And attacked her mother—”

“That he did—all of that. And when I went after him to bring him in to the authorities, he shot me.”

Twisting to face him, she moved his shirt aside with gentle fingers and touched the pink, ridged tissue lightly.

Something inside him softened.

“It was dangerously close to your heart,” she said.

A choked laugh escaped his lips. “No, it’s only my shoulder. But I was already covered in another man’s blood, so Gothard figured he’d hit his mark.”

“It’s no wonder you’re after killing him, then.” Her fingers exploring, she leaned closer. Her hair fell forward, and the ends of the ribbon tickled his chest.

“No, I…” He couldn’t seem to think. “I don’t mean to kill him, I mean to stop him from hurting anyone else.” Absently he pulled one end of the blue ribbon until the bow came untied. Her eyes widened, but she didn’t back away. “And—confound it, I know this is weak of me—but I cannot forgive him for causing me to kill a man. It’s a burden I’ll carry the rest of my life. But that he shot me…no.
That
I blame on my own carelessness. I wasn’t fast enough; I was stunned.” His fingers combed through her hair as the words tumbled out. “And perhaps I shouldn’t have been taking the law into my own hands to begin with. It’s not…not the sort of person I am. Though you’ve seen no other, so I cannot fault you for believing so.”

“Nay, I believe you. I’ve seen who you are, Jason Chase.” Her fingertips brushed his jaw. “I’ve seen a man of honor and compassion, and sometimes, when you let it slip, even a wee bit of charm.”

Reversing their positions, he came up on an elbow and hovered over her. She fell back to the pillow, her lips curving into the sweetest smile, her eyes filling with blue light. Free from her customary plaits, her hair was a mass of colors shimmering against the sheets. She trembled beneath him, but her smile never wavered.

One of his traitorous hands moved to clasp her chin. That wide, soft-looking smile seemed to draw him in, until their faces were only an inch apart. “Emerald…”

The light in her eyes died, and she rolled away.

Bewildered, he gazed at her a moment longer, then flipped onto his back and stared at the ceiling, saying nothing. There was nothing he could possibly say. He ought not to be kissing her in the first place, so he could hardly fault her for putting a stop to it.

Not that he was worried for her reputation. With two little ones at home, she was no chaste maiden. She was a woman of…a woman of…

What was she, exactly?

A Scot, a mother, a daughter—and perhaps a sister, if that bit of her story proved true. And she was a…businesswoman? What did one call a female who made her living tracking outlaws?

Well, unconventional she might be, but that didn’t mean it was all right to kiss someone he had no intention of courting. It was very much not all right. If he had any scrap of the gentleman left in him, he’d keep his distance.

If only he could be a greater distance from her now.

He swore he could feel her warmth penetrating the bedclothes.

Cursing silently, he took the top quilt and slid off the bed. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d slept on the floor.

Assuming he could sleep at all.

“THE BIRDS ARE
singing,” Caithren said the next morning when they were back on the road.