“I didn’t lie well enough,” he muttered. He was truly losing his touch. Lying to Emma Tate was work. It didn’t come naturally. Didn’t sit well when he did it. Who would have ever thought?
Dair put that concern aside and pondered the likelihoods and possibilities as he dressed. He’d suffered a headache every damned day since arriving in Edinburgh. Either the thing in his head was growing faster than predicted or something about this town made his symptoms worse.
Perhaps he should consider offering her a version of the truth. Now
there
would be a novel approach. Emma was an intelligent woman. He’d need to be extra careful about just what he said and how he said it. The absolute truth was his enemy. He’d rather die here and now than have her gaze at him with pity.
He continued to mull over the situation as he knocked on Emma’s door a few moments later. “I’m off to visit with Robbie Potter. If you wish to come along, be downstairs in ten minutes.”
He expected her to play games and make him wait because of course, he couldn’t go without her. Robbie needed to see the necklace. But again, the lady surprised him, joining him almost immediately. She flounced downstairs, her head held high, her shoulders squared, a woman ready for battle.
“You look beautiful, Emma,” he told her, sucking some of the wind from her sails.
She narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “Thank you.”
He opened the front door. “It’s a lovely day and the bookshop isn’t far. I thought we’d walk.”
He needed to see if he’d picked up another tail. The fact he hadn’t left that problem behind in England bothered him more than he cared to admit, and he’d spent part of the past week investigating the situation. The possibility that this was Riever related was becoming stronger all the time. While he’d gained no hard evidence, instincts told him he needed to leave Scotland—for that matter, leave Great Britain—as quickly as possible. While he’d originally planned to return to Scotland to die, he wasn’t quite ready for that yet.
He wasn’t quite finished with Emma Tate.
“Hmm,” the lady said as she swept past him. “A walk suits me fine, although I’ve a stop I wish to make on the way. I’d like to pay a quick visit to a brothel.”
Dair tripped over the welcome mat. “Pardon me?”
“Take me to a whorehouse, MacRae. I’m sure you know where to find one or twelve.”
For a long moment he simply stared at her. Damn it, she still thought he had the blue balls. His temper flared. “Fine. Any particular peccadillo you’re interested in? Bondage, perhaps? I must say I find the idea quite appealing in your case.”
She wrinkled her nose with disdain. “Do we need transportation or is a brothel within walking distance?”
He shoved his hands into his pockets and took off at a brisk pace, not bothering to narrow his strides or calm his temper. If she wanted to keep up, she could damn well run. Then he stopped short and whirled on her. “Aren’t you the least bit concerned about your reputation, Mrs. Tate?”
She beamed a brilliant smile his way. “Not at all. I’m a stranger in town. I’m anonymous. It offers a certain freedom.”
She was insane, that’s what she was.
“That’s a poor argument, anyway, MacRae. After all, I’m living in your house. I traveled with you from England. If I worried about my reputation, do you think I’d have done that?”
“I don’t know what to think. First this morning’s peep show, now a brothel visit. Are you running out of funds, Mrs. Tate? Are you hoping to secure a job?”
She gasped. Wounded eyes revealed her hurt. “That was uncalled for.”
Yes, it was. Guilt poked at Dair which only added to his frustration. At wits’ end, he demanded, “Why do you want to visit a whorehouse?”
“Because prostitutes will have the information I need, and I can trust them to tell me the truth!”
Aha! His brain might be rotting, but he hadn’t lost all his faculties. Dair braced his hands on his lips and leaned over her. “I. Don’t. Have. The. Clap.”
“Then what’s wrong with you?” she demanded, throwing both arms wide. Her voice was tight, her eyes brimming with emotion, with concern. “Something is wrong with you, and I’m not going to stop hounding you until you tell me what it is!”
She cared. Not for herself and for her own health concerns, but for him. She was worried about him. The realization knocked Dair back a step.
Oh, Emma. Don’t let me break your heart.
He wasn’t ready for this. He wasn’t ready to let her go. He sure as hell wasn’t ready to—“I’m dying…to tell you, Emma. But not on a public street.”
She twisted her head, looking up and down the street, then she grabbed his hand and tugged him half a block to a shop bearing the sign Beal’s Women’s Wear. “What th—?” he began.
“Wait,” Emma snapped. She dragged him past a startled customer and a scandalized clerk saying, “Your dressing rooms?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. You can’t—”
But then Emma saw them, and she did. Heedless of feminine squeaks and squeals from a second dressing room, she shoved him into the first. Flinging the curtain closed, she whirled on him. “Now. We’re private. Talk to me, Dair.”
Dair’s notice snagged on a filmy nightgown in transparent, garnet-colored silk. For a moment, he had trouble thinking.
“Now, MacRae!”
His stomach rolled. He didn’t want to do this. He searched his mind for another way…any other way…to no avail. Hell. Pitching his voice low, barely above a whisper, he said, “I have a…swelling…in my head. It causes me headaches that can be quite severe, as you have seen. My doctor has prescribed these…” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small brown bottle containing small white pills “…to reduce the swelling. It will take some months, but I will be fine.”
From the other side of the curtain, the clerk’s shrill voice exclaimed, “Sir! Sir! Excuse me. You’re not allowed in here.”
Dair and Emma both ignored the interruption. “What causes this swelling?” she asked.
He shrugged. “My physician believes it is the result of a blow to the head I recently received.”
“Then why the Malaysian foolishness? Why would you lie?”
“It’s…embarrassing.”
Emma snorted. “Being stranded naked on a balcony is embarrassing. Having an illness is not.”
“Sir!” called the clerk. “I must insist!”
“We need a moment of privacy,” Dair snapped back. Turning to Emma, he spoke with an honesty he hadn’t anticipated or intended. “I’m a man who prefers to be in control. When the headaches begin…I’m not. You’ve seen me. It isn’t pretty, and it’s not something I wanted to subject you to.”
It was as close to the truth as he was going to give her. Being an invalid, being dependent on someone else appalled him. Having her see him as such disgusted him. He wanted to give in to the urge to give the dressing-room chair a good hard kick.
“Men and their sacred pride.” She folded her arms, tapped her foot and studied him for a long tense minute. “So rather than subject me to your illness, you’d prefer that I—your lover—believe you’ve a case of Venus’s Curse instead of knowing that the headaches result from an injury?”
“I don’t know why you—” He pinned her with an intense stare. “So you still consider yourself my lover?”
“Don’t try to change the subject, MacRae.”
“I didn’t want you to know, all right?” He raked his fingers through his hair. “I haven’t told anyone. Not even Jake. You’re the only one. I don’t want people knowing!”
“Why not?” When he didn’t answer, she answered for him. “Pride, right? Foolish male pride.”
Her toe continued to tap, her stare continued to measure. Finally, she nodded. “My father would be just the same way. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I believe you.”
He started to touch her, but ended up shoving his hands in his pockets. “I didn’t give you a disease, Texas. I swear on my mother’s grave.”
She nodded.
“Speaking of giving…I wondered…well…” He stared pointedly at her stomach. “That night at Chatham Park I was careless.”
“Oh. No, Dair, you didn’t give me a baby, either.”
“Good. That’s good.” He felt a twist, a sharp pang of regret, but he firmly shut the door on that. He studied Emma’s expression, trying to read it. Was that regret in her eyes, too? Damn. “So then, do you still wish to visit Madame LaRue’s or are you ready to continue on to the bookshop?”
“I guess I can skip Madame LaRue’s. Just don’t lie to me again, MacRae. I deserve better than that.”
True, lass. But we don’t always get what we deserve.
Dair shoved back the dressing room curtain to discover one clerk wringing her hands and the other holding the broom as if it were a club. Ever so much the gentleman, he put his hand against the small of Emma’s back and escorted her out. To placate the clerks and please himself, he snagged the red nightgown and said, “We’ll take this.”
Emma observed the purchase without comment, her thoughts obviously somewhere other than the dress shop. Taking advantage of her inattention, Dair added a couple more provocative items to his transaction, then quickly ushered her from the store. They were halfway to the bookshop before she spoke again.
“MacRae? Just what are the symptoms of Venus’s Curse?”
Dair scowled, his mouth opening, then closing like a fish out of water. Amazingly, what being caught on a balcony naked as a babe couldn’t accomplish, the prospect of answering that particular question did. The back of his neck went warm with an embarrassed flush. “Emma…I…how about we stop by Madame LaRue’s on the way back home?”
B
ELLS JANGLED AS
D
AIR OPENED
the door of Robbie Potter’s bookshop and motioned for Emma to precede him inside. The expected musty smell of old books greeted her along with the more surprising fragrance of bayberry and jasmine. “Robbie’s latest hobby is perfumes,” Dair explained.
Emma nodded and glanced around the shop at the intriguing items hanging on the walls and stacked atop bookshelves. Outside of Bernard Kimball’s collections at Chatham Park, she’d never seen such an eclectic assembly of items. A Comanche war bonnet, a pair of wooden shoes. One leg to a suit of armor.
“Interesting place,” she observed, watching dust motes dance in a beam of sunlight shining through the plate glass window.
“Robbie is an interesting man.” Dair led her toward the back of the shop through a labyrinth of narrow passages framed by tall bookshelves that all but blocked out the light.
Emma took pride in the fact she managed to swallow her scream when she turned a corner to face a human skeleton hanging from an iron pole.
“Welcome home, Robbie,” Dair greeted the burly, bespectacled man seated behind the counter.
Robbie Potter glanced up from the book he was studying and delight lit his brilliant blue eyes. “MacRae! I suspected you might be back in town when I caught up on my newspapers last night. Sounds like you’ve enjoyed a profitable couple of weeks.”
Emma shot her companion a curious look. What was that about?
Dair gave her no opportunity to enquire. “Has anyone been by asking for me since I left Edinburgh last winter?”
Potter scratched behind his ear and frowned. “Anyone?”
“Anyone out of the ordinary.”
“Hmm…nae. I dinna think so. Just Mrs. Holl—”
“May I introduce Mrs. Emma Tate,” Dair interrupted. “Emma, Robbie Potter, scholar, perfumer, and displaced Highlander.”
“A terrible fate we share, MacRae.” Potter winked at Emma. “Pleased to meet ye, pretty lass. The boy here has left out some of me more interesting pursuits, but we’ll leave that be until I get to know ye better.”
“Excellent choice,” Dair drawled. “Mrs. Tate and I are in need of some information, Robbie. Put on your scholar’s hat and see what you can tell us about this. Emma? The ruby?”
Emma’s heart began to pound as she reached to pull the pendant from her bodice. She was probably being silly, but this felt like such a…moment of import. It was as if she stood at a crossroads about to take a step that would change her life.
Clasping the ruby in her hand, she slipped the chain from around her neck. She placed the back of her hand against the counter, drew a deep breath, then slowly opened her fist. The necklace spilled out onto the counter and Robbie Potter’s eyes went wide. “Quite a stone ye have there.”
“It’s big,” Dair agreed. “But that’s not all. Look.” He switched on the lamp on the counter and pointed out the engraving.
Robbie Potter stared at it for a long moment, then his eyes went round with shock. “I knew it,” Dair murmured with satisfaction. “Tell us what you know about this stone.”
“I dinna…I think…oh bide awee.” The Scotsman dragged a hand down his whiskered jaw and he started mumbling to himself. “Lost…legend…never existed. Treasure. Hmm.”
Abruptly, he moved from behind the counter, clucking his tongue as he began searching the stacks. “A woman. Women. Tis it. A journal. Aye. Still have it. Leather bound. Hmm…”
Emma glanced at Dair to see him staring out into space, his own thoughts obviously churning. “Dair? Are you following this?”
“Actually, I think…there’s something. It’s just beyond my reach. He said a…journal. That’s—” He broke off, grimaced fiercely. Emma saw his hand make a fist, his knuckles turn white.
It took her a moment to recognize the problem, then she touched his arm. “Headache? Do they always come on this fast?”
He spat a particularly foul expletive beneath his breath. “Can’t do this now…”
“Where are your pills?” She felt his jacket pocket.
“Pants. Don’t…hell…forget the pills.” He closed his eyes, swayed on his feet, and Emma feared he’d fall.
“Mr. Potter?” Emma dug in Dair’s pants pocket for the brown bottle. “Dair is ill. Do you have somewhere he could lie down?”
The bookseller didn’t respond, and when a faint moan escaped Dair’s lips, Emma lost patience. “Potter!” she screamed.
Still, he didn’t answer.
“For goodness’ sake,” she muttered. She hurried behind the counter and grabbed Potter’s chair, then set it beside Dair. She pushed on his shoulders, trying to get him to sit down but the stubborn man kept his knees locked.
“Sit down before you fall down!” She shoved again, and this time he sank into the seat. She forced a pill into his mouth, then went looking for Robbie Potter.