The MacGregor's Lady (34 page)

“They sound better in Gaelic. Allow me to demonstrate my most fatuous look.” He drew her to a halt on their climb and set both hands on her shoulders. “Look at me, Hannah.”

Her smile died. What he saw in her eyes tore at his heart. She was worried, weary, and dreading the next twenty-three days. “I wish I could hold you, right this moment, I wish I could put my arms around you.”

She scooted out from under his hands and resumed walking. “If wishes were horses…”

“There wouldn’t be a blade of grass left, and we’d have to watch where we stepped much more closely.” He took her hand again, feeling the welling helplessness of a man who did not know how to turn love into appropriate action. The feeling was old and immensely frustrating. “My name is being put forth for the Scottish delegation to Parliament.”

“That’s an honor, isn’t it?”

“It… is. I supposedly have a well-rounded view on relations with Canada and the United States. In truth, somebody is thinking I won’t know enough of British politics to cause much trouble, possibly Spathfoy’s dear papa, the very English Marquess of Quinworth.”

They would soon gain the summit, spread their picnic, and have what privacy Asher could manage atop one of the most popular walking destinations in the realm.

“This a positive sign, though, isn’t it?” Hannah’s gaze flicked over him. “An acknowledgement of your worldly sophistication compared to the insular lords and squires responsible for managing the empire.”

“Possibly. More likely it’s Victoria meddling in the neighbors’ business. The Lords does little anymore but debate and bluster and rattle sabers.”

And yet, Hannah had a point too. Victoria, for reasons of her own, had taken more than a passing interest in the MacGregor family situation. She was also quite fond of Mary Fran’s husband, Matthew, though nobody could explain that either. To refuse the opportunity to serve in the parliamentary delegation would not be… prudent.

“You should accept this,” Hannah said, pausing as they rounded the bend onto the top of the hill. “You should wade in among the blustering fools and speak your truth, not because you understand the New World better than any of your peers, though you do, but because you understand it might be important that epidemics do not come from foul miasmas.”

The view was magnificent, and Asher knew it well. Edinburgh and the sea lay stretched out in one direction; the interior of Scotland lay in the other. Both had beauty and heart, though the fairer view lay to the west.

And yet, what Asher saw was not sweeping vistas and dramatic Scottish skies, but the woman who understood him, who recognized what motivated him, and what would sustain him when parliamentary rules of order were threatening his sanity.

He saw the only woman he would ever propose to. “Let’s choose our spot.”

She smiled again, the curving of her lips a little softer this time. “You don’t want to dwell on the parliamentary honor, but you’ll go back and read your monographs, then consider your obligation to your queen with all her little princes and princesses. You’ll mention this to your brothers. Then you’ll think of little John, thriving in his parents’ care now, but so small and helpless, and the decision will already be made.”

Yes.
Unbidden, the sensation of John, a wee scrap of a lad bundled against Asher’s chest, hit him like the slap of the heather-scented wind whipping across the summit.

“I had intended to buy myself a few weeks of dithering before committing one way or the other. Where shall we enjoy our meal?”

She brushed another glance his way and hooked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. “A few weeks of dithering won’t change the outcome. Let’s find a place where we won’t be blown into the sea by a strong gust of fresh Scottish air.”

They chose a spot well back from the precipice, in the lee of a small, stony black bluff and well away from paths few were treading on a weekday afternoon. When the footmen arrived with the hamper, Asher waved them away to eat their own meals in some other sunny spot.

Hannah dropped to the tartans spread on the sparse grass. “I do like the absence of a chaperone, or the almost-absence. My guess is we’re supposed to conclude, given enough latitude, that the blessings of marriage outweigh our misgivings.”

He settled himself beside her, prepared to argue with a lady. “They are not
our
misgivings, Boston.”

She opened the hamper and peered inside as if a crystal ball or magic carpet might be found therein. “So you’ll move to Boston with me, spend the rest of your days as an earl in absentia? Leave wee John to the epidemics, and have the next earl raised in complete ignorance of his birthright? I am vastly relieved to hear this.”

Had her voice not held a slight catch, had she not been rummaging blindly in the hamper, Asher might have accused her of meanness.

She hadn’t a mean bone in her body, more’s the pity. He shifted across the blankets and knelt up so he could wrap his arms around her. “I know, Hannah, in the marrow of my bones and in my soul that you are the woman I should take to wife. I know I am the man whom you should wed. I have no misgivings on that score, and neither do you. We could spend a few years in Boston—”

Hannah shook her head, her suffering palpable even in so simple a gesture. “And what of my mother? When Grandmother dies and the boys grow up, what of my mother? She is far from elderly. Do we send our firstborn son to Ian and Augusta when he’s eleven years old, part him from all he knows to live with strangers across the sea?”

He wanted to stop her words, wanted to slip his hand over her mouth, but she would torture herself with these thoughts whether she shared them or not, and if this was all he could bear with her—the doubts and anxieties and regrets—then bear them he would.

“Asher, I’m sorry. Saying these things solves nothing, but I am so very sorry.”

Something like anger, though not as corrosive, gave him the strength to turn her loose. “I am
not
sorry. Not sorry we’ve met, not sorry we’ve had these few weeks, not sorry for any of it.”
Not
sorry
they’d been lovers.
He kept that last thought to himself, lest it cause her more torment.

She sank back on her heels and studied him. “You mean that.”

He did. Realizing this felt like a shift in the wind from one brisk, challenging direction to another, though the second direction bore the faint, welcome scent of home. Rather than let her see that far into his soul, he took his turn sorting through the hamper. “Would you rather I didn’t? Would you rather I shrugged and said our dealings were of no moment, Hannah?”

Her brows drew down in the manner that meant she was focusing on a topic inwardly. “No, I would not. You’re right—the things I regret are the factors we do not control. Had I not met you…”

Had she not met him, she might have ended up married to one of the Malcolms of the world. A man who would take her coin then leave her to fight her own battles. Or she might have been prey to one of her stepfather’s more determined schemes.

Asher shoved that thought off the edge of the precipice some distance up the path. “There’s cold chicken, fruit, scones, cheese, and—Cook was feeling generous—apple tarts in this hamper. Also a decent bottle of Riesling. Shall I open it?”

“Please, and let’s start with the apple tarts. I’m in the mood to enjoy my sweets first.”

The meal marked a turning point, with Asher sensing in Hannah a determination to appreciate the gifts they’d given each other, and to make the best of the time remaining. She had never intended to remain, after all, and he had not seriously intended to marry ever again.

“What do you make of that cloud?” Hannah had done her part to consume the wine. She lay on her back, Asher’s coat bundled under her head and one knee drawn up. Her posture was improper, but he’d paid good coin to ensure the footmen were waving away any who might stumble in this direction.

Asher glanced up from repacking the hamper. “It’s white. It’s fluffy. When the proper mood comes upon it, it will go carousing with a few of its mates and dump a cold rain on some undeserving village in the mountains.”

“Or a deserving village. A village where the gardens are all laid out and the winter stores depend on a good yield.” She held out a hand to him, so he arranged himself beside her on the blanket. “I’ll miss you, Asher MacGregor. I’ll look up at the clouds and wonder if they’ve blown in from Scotland. I’ll think of you.”

Ah.
He put a name to the shift in their dealings, to what had eased: they were to grieve together for what could not be. Nobody else could grieve with them, and when they parted, they’d have grieving confidences to treasure in memory.

And to torture themselves with in solitude.

He took her hand. “My favorite fruit is a nice crisp, juicy, sweet red apple. What’s your favorite fruit?”

The rest of the afternoon went like that, as if they were engaged in truth, sharing secrets, looking forward to a lifetime of intimacy not simply of the body. She favored apples and raspberries; he leaned toward oranges, in addition to apples, provided they were sweet. She much preferred Scott to Dickens, and she did not have a favorite poet, though Tennyson was worth a mention.

Asher had a fondness for the language of the Old Testament, and as a boy had thought it held some rousing stories. His favorite bird was the hummingbird, for its exotic color, its agility, its ability to draw sweetness from a flower without harming it. Peacocks should be outlawed for the racket they created.

Hannah had watched his mouth as he delivered that last flight of nonsense, and then she had gone quiet for as long as it took for a cloud to drift by. When he was about to suggest they pack up and head down the hill, she curled close, kissed his cheek, and rested her head on his shoulder.

“I will not forget this day, Asher MacGregor, not ever. When I am old and bent and slow, when I neither hear nor see well, I will still recall every detail of this day.”

He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and considered burning the city of Boston to the ground. He did not consider telling her that it had been too long since he’d had any word from his scouts in Boston. Any word at all.

Nineteen

In three days, Hannah would have the privilege of once again boarding the trains with Asher, Ian, Augusta, and wee John and heading north. In sixteen days, she would board a ship—Asher’s ship—and sail for Boston.

Not for home—which was one of the many insights to befall her in the past ten days.

Another was that when a woman loved a man, intimacy between them could come in many forms. With Asher, all closeness had a sensual thread, though not necessarily erotic. He could touch her with his gaze; he could read her with his body. Even silences across a breakfast table crowded with family could be comforting and speak volumes.

When that breakfast was concluded and Asher had asked her to meet him prepared to go on an outing, Hannah was all too happy to oblige.

“Where are we going, Asher?”

He winged his arm, she curled closer than courtesy required, and they took off across the wide streets of the New Town. “It’s a surprise, but I thought we’d wander toward the harbor and stop for some rum buns.”

Lovely idea. Lovely day. Lovely man. These few weeks of pleasure were the first superficial, glancing cut of heartbreak, the surprise and instinctive stilling of any response in anticipation of the burn and burden to follow.

She and Asher could remain in this benign state for a few more days, or Hannah could give in to the growing compulsion to hold nothing back, to move closer to the pain that awaited them both.

She walked along beside Asher for several blocks until he spoke again. “Do you realize your gait is no longer irregular?”

Hannah bodily inventoried her movement as they strode along. He was…
right
. “I’ve lost my limp.”

He smiled down at her. “A combination of putting a lift on your heel and walking you from one end of creation to the other. What was wanted was strengthening and straightening, though I’m sure the occasional dash of whiskey wouldn’t be ill-prescribed either.”

Now she stopped, trying to pinpoint when, where, how…

“Does it hurt, Hannah? Your back, your hip, your knee? Anywhere, does it hurt?”

“No.” Those places didn’t hurt at all. She resumed movement. “No, it does not. I want to kiss you. It doesn’t hurt, and I do not limp.”

The moment was a gift, like every moment they’d had together since arriving in Scotland. That she should share this revelation with him, that he should be the one to point it out to her was consolation beyond measure. “I want to skip. I want to ice skate, though it’s nearly summer. I want to run and dance in public. Oh, Asher, I want to dance.”

He patted her hand; Hannah resented the daylights out of her gloves. “Lady Quinworth’s ball is tomorrow night. We’ll dance, but for now we’ve arrived to our destination.”

Hannah peered up at the sign hanging over a tidy little shop on a quiet street. The place had a look of age about it, as if its solid granite presence predated the fancy neighborhoods farther back from the water. “This is a jeweler’s, Asher.”

And abruptly, she no longer wanted to skip and dance or ice skate, though she did still want to run.

***

A ring was a token of eternal regard, and in that sense, Asher was determined that Hannah should have one from him.

And yet, a ring was risky, and not simply because it announced to the entire world that they intended to marry.

Behind all of Hannah’s smiles, behind her affection, behind her comfortable silences and insightful observations, even behind the unfathomable pain of their impending separation lurked
something
, and it tormented Asher with the same sense of frustration as when he’d tried to diagnose a patient whose symptoms did not add up to a known ailment.

Did Hannah battle the identical feeling regarding him?

“If we’re to stand up at Lady Quinworth’s ball,” he said, “then all will be expecting you to wear my ring.” Hannah’s brows came down, her chin lifted, her expression shifted in a manner that had him adding, “Please let me do this, Hannah. I want to, badly.”