To remain calm, she took a deep breath then exhaled.
“Sit down and tell me everything.”
“Weel, ye took a wee tumble down the stairs.”
His conciliatory tone aggravated her. She was not a half-wit to be pacified with mediocre explanations. If she kept exhaling to maintain control, she’d pass out again, and at the moment, she didn’t have the patience to pander to his manly ego. Annoyed, she waved her hand in the air in a dismissive gesture.
“You have told me that. Start at the beginning. When did you meet Margaret?”
He ceased pacing. Eyebrows lowered, he frowned at her. After a moment of sullen silence, he yanked the chair over next to the bed and flopped down.
“Ye be a Campbell, and we met when yer father raised the ransom to exchange fer yer younger brother’s release.”
Her eyes widened. “You kidnapped Margaret’s brother and held him for ransom?”
Mrs. Bixby had told her of the Scottish tradition of kidnapping someone from another clan for profit. She thought the stories were folklore, an embellishment to make the old tales more intriguing. But who was she to criticize their customs? Guess they had to have some way to supplement their income. Sort of like a second job.
He scowled at her. “Nae, I dinnae kidnap yer brother.” The disgust in his voice raked over her like hot coals. “Yer father ask for me help when part of the conditions be that I deliver the ransom. The McGregor’s be the ones who took young Ian. It took days to finalize the arrangements, and ye and I spent most of that time together. Ye seemed a sweet biddable lass.”
She thought she heard a ‘then’ under his breath.
“We married with yer family to witness our vows. The church waved the reading of the banns so we could marry quickly. We traveled to me home the same day. I needed to return since I’d taken most of me warriors and left the castle unprotected.”
He leaned forward, his dark eyes glittered, and his lips twisted into that heart-tugging half-smile.
“Ye accepted the reason we traveled so soon after the priest announced us wed, lass. And said ye understood why we had to wait for our wedding night.” Voice low and husky, the implication left nothing to the imagination as to what he referred.
His words sent an intoxicating haze of desire soaring through her. Her bones melted. Heat pooled low in her belly. Her heart thudded in her chest before it nose-dived to her stomach then shot back up to lodge in her throat. Long fingers reached out and slowly meandered up her bare arm. She tingled at the trail of fire his touch left behind.
The story reminded her of the romantic fairy tales Mrs. Bixby read to her. Stories about ladies in distress, rescued by knights in shiny armor; stories that offered people’s romantic hearts an optimistic view of their life of drudgery.
She loved it.
“Go on.” Her voice sounded thready, wispy.
“That evening after we arrived home, we retired to the master’s chamber. Since ye were a mite nervous, I went down to get ye a wee dab of wine. Ye had yer accident while I be gone.”
Why had a slight tint of red fused his high cheekbones? He didn’t strike her as a man given to blushes. When she realized why a groom would want his new bride pliant and calm, she felt twin spots of color wash over her own cheeks.
“Aye,” he said then picked up the thread of his explanation. “No one kenned how ye fell. Me aunt discovered ye at the bottom of the stairs. Ursula did what she could, and we’ve waited for ye to mend. Today, be the first day ye’ve been awake.”
“That is all?” In four short sentences, he told of meeting, courting, marrying, and losing Margaret. No longer than she knew him, she realized he was a man of few words, but surely his acquaintance with the woman he married deserved more than these few meager words.
“Aye.”
She eyed him suspiciously. “How long did you know Margaret before you married her?”
The scowl on his face indicated he didn’t care for the way she referred to Margaret in the third person, but she wasn’t going to admit to being someone she wasn’t, no matter how it displeased him.
“A sennight.”
A what? Oh yes, Mrs. Bixby used the word to signify one week. A week! No wonder it took only a few short sentences to explain his and Margaret’s acquaintance. They hadn’t known each other at all. This debacle could easily be construed as a case of mistaken identity.
“You knew Margaret for a week before you married her?” Curious, she wondered if his and Margaret’s marriage had been arranged.
“Aye.”
“So, you really do not know her?”
Dark eyebrows lowered, and the lines around his mouth deepened. Definitely not a man who took criticism well.
“I ken ye be her.”
A sigh of exasperation escaped her at his insistence that she was his wife. “I may resemble your Margaret, but I promise you I am not she.”
There was no way to prove it, but she doubted she’d ever been with a man sexually. At least she’d never had the desire to be with one since her accident, until now
except in her dreams and that wasn’t real.
Arms crossed over his chest, he looked down his off-kilter nose at her. “Who do ye think ye be?”
Shifting onto her side, she faced him and put as much confidence in her voice as she could. She knew she’d sound utterly ridiculous but she couldn’t think of another explanation. Looking him straight in the eye, she delivered the summation that had brought her to his century.
“I am a time traveler.”
“A what?” He reared back against the chair and uncrossed his arms. Hands braced on his thighs, his back stiff as a poker, he gaped at her.
“Yes. It is the only explanation. I lived in the twenty-first century, so I must have traveled back in time.”
His gaze darted around the room. “Ye’ll nae say that where someone could overhear ye. The village folk are superstitious, and I’ll nae have me wife gawked at and accused of witchery. Not many years ago, ye’d be burned at the stake for saying such.”
“But....”
The angry scowl that darkened his face and puckered the scar indicated he wouldn’t tolerate any arguments to his demand. Anxiety tightened her chest. Why wouldn’t he listen?
“All right, I promise, but only if you’ll listen to my story. Here, where there is no one else around.” With the cover tucked under her chin, she scooted further up on the pillows.
At her movement, he resembled a man on the verge of leaping from his chair and dashing toward the door. Was it her imagination or had he scooted the chair back several inches. Did he fear her, or think her crazy?
Did eighteenth century Scotland have a place where they kept people accused of insanity? If he put her in an institution for the insane, she’d never find her way home. Reason told her that if this was where she arrived, from here was where she would have to leave.
She held her breath for so long while he mulled over his decision dizziness swamped her.
At last, he nodded.
Her breath exhaled in a long sigh. “I told you how I lost my memory.”
“Aye.”
Couldn’t the man answer with more than “aye?” The habit was quiet annoying.
“I have lived in a therapy/rehab center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, since my accident. I had a broken leg”
—
he bobbed his head once in agreement
—
“and internal injuries. It took me nearly two months to recover. A therapist helped me overcome my speech problem.”
His brows scrunched into a frown. “Ye could nae speak?”
She glared her displeasure at him. “Yes, I spoke. I rolled my r’s, and I....”
No, no, that wasn’t right. Nurses claimed she garbled her words while under the affects of the anesthesia. They believed her head injury had caused the problem. A speech therapist had helped her speak slow and precise and instructed her how to stop using words like, I, you, and verbs incorrectly.
The mysterious grin lifted the uninjured side of his mouth.
“Anyway, I cannot be your wife if,” she lowered her voice to barely above a whisper, “I have traveled back through time.”
“Lass, if ye nae be me wife, where is she, and why do ye look just her? I ken ye think ye be telling the truth, but ye havenae left this bed. I saw ye every day these past two months. Ye cannae have left and me nae ken it. Aye, ye be me wife.” With a brisk nod, he leaned back and folded his arms across his chest as if to proclaim his statement irrefutable.
The stubborn line of his jaw suggested further explanations would be wasted on his granite attitude. He’d made up his mind, and nothing she said would change it.
She leaned back, crossed her arms over her chest, and glared at him. She could be just as obstinate as he was. Let him think what he wanted, she’d solve the problem herself. When the time came and she possessed the gown, ring, and brooch, she would go home where she belonged.
She didn’t know how long they would have sat there glaring at each other if Ursula hadn’t whispered his name from the doorway. He rose from the chair and in an unexpected gesture, brushed a finger down her cheek and across her lower lip, stirring those unfamiliar feelings in the pit of her stomach again. Her eyelashes fluttered closed at the simple pleasure.
When she opened her eyes, all she saw was his retreating back.
The minute the door closed, she flipped back the covers and rose cautiously to her feet. Weakness assaulted her, and she had to clutch the corner post of the large bed to say vertical. Pain gripped her lower leg, and she preformed several exercises the therapist had shown her to relax the muscles. The pain receded.
She scanned the room. The gown still hung from a peg on the wall. Memory of how the gown had swirled around her and how the ring and brooch appeared to catch fire sent her skin into spasmodic ripples
like the surface of water on a windy day. If the items had propelled her back in time, then they should be able to send her in the opposite direction.
She took one-step to test her legs strength. When they didn’t collapse beneath her, she took another, then another. The gown was within her reach when the door swung open.
“What ye be doing, lass?” Ursula screeched from the doorway. She sat the tray she carried on the floor and hurried toward her. “Yer leg hasnae healed. Ye’ll be doing yerself more harm than good if ye fall. Come, let me help ye back to bed.”
Exhausted from her meager effort, she allowed Ursula to lead her away from her intended goal: the gown.
“I wanted to get dressed. I am bored to tears.” How could she find a way home confined to this room.
Her gaze dropped to her hand. The ring! It was gone. Someone had taken her ring. She glanced over her shoulder. Was the brooch still attached to the gown? They had to be here somewhere. Her gaze swept the room, searching for hiding places, while Ursula continued to fuss at her.
“Och, I leave ye alone for a wee while and ye get bored. I see we cannae leave ye to yerself afeared ye’ll do something foolish.”
With her arm around Maggie’s waist, Ursula hefted her closer to her side. “A messenger came fer the Laird, and he needed to speak to the mon,” she explained. “He’ll be back soon.”
“I do not need someone to watch over me.” She squirmed. Positive she’d have bruises where Ursula gripped her.
“Lass, ye ne’er been alone since ye fell. Liam ne’er abandoned hope that ye’d awaken. This chair has been his bed most nights. He dinnae stray from yer side for more than an hour this whole time. I had to force the lad to eat and drink.”
Drat, if he continued his constant vigil at her bedside she’d never find the ring and brooch.
Ursula managed to limp, drag, and haul her to bed. During the whole process, she kept up a litany of orders. Don’t get out of bed. Don’t overdo. Don’t refuse to ask for help. The list grew and grew. Her bottom had barely touched the bed when Liam barged in without any consideration for her privacy.
Of course, he wouldn’t knock you idiot, he thinks you’re his wife.
“What be the problem?”
“The lass be bored.”
Annoyed, she glared at the woman. Ursula ignored her, slid her arm from around Maggie’s waist, and tucked her under the covers.
“That be easily solved. I received a message that yer family will be traveling here for a visit. I’ve sent yer father word on yer progress each week.”
“You have found my family?” Relief washed over her, easing the hopelessness she’d lived with each day. Now she’d have answers about the night of her accident: her name, why she’d been out alone at night.
An indefinable look passed between Liam and Ursula. The old woman shook her head and turned away to retrieve the tray beside the door.
The edge of the bed sagged. Liam’s large hand engulfed hers. “Aye lass, they were here for o’er a week, but had to leave afore ye woke.”
Raw grief ripped through her heart. She jerked her hand back and stared at him. For a moment, her joy at the mention of her family had overshadowed everything else. She’d forgotten she wasn’t in the twenty-first century, that she was among strangers.
I be sorry, lass.”
“Go away,” she wanted to scream. “I don’t know you.”
Instead, she fought the helplessness that threatened to consume her. Nothing was familiar; the family coming to see her wasn’t hers, nor was this the room at the Therapy Center she’d grown accustomed to over the last few weeks. Abby wouldn’t be strolling in to check her vitals and laugh over her most recent harrowing escapade. Mrs. Bixby didn’t wait down the hall to fill her mind with fanciful stories of knights of old.