The Rock Read online

  She found him down by the riverbank fishing and took a seat on a rock beside him as if it were yesterday rather than eight years ago that she’d done the same. “Catch anything?”

  He shot her a sidelong look. Of course he’d caught something. He was one of the best fishermen in the village. Goodness, how it used to drive Jamie crazy.

  “How many?”

  He shrugged and nodded to the bucket a few feet away that she hadn’t seen before. “A half-dozen or so.” He paused. “Is it time?”

  “Soon. We’ll just have time to drop those fish off with the cook before Jamie sees them.”

  His mouth quirked, which she supposed was a promising start.

  He pulled the line in, stood, and held his hand down to her. As if it was the most natural thing in the world—and in so many ways it was—she slipped fingers into his. She’d forgotten the strength of his grip, the hardness of the calluses on his palms . . . and the warmth. It flooded her senses as she came to her feet before him.

  They stared at one another for a long heartbeat, the intensity of his gaze making her wobble.

  He had to grab her arms to catch her when her unsteady legs nearly made her slip. “Bloody hell, Elizabeth, be careful. I assure you, that river is every bit as cold as it looks.”

  She didn’t tell him that it wasn’t clumsiness, it was him. “Th-thank you,” she stammered. Good gracious, what was wrong with her? Why was she so nervous? Why was she so . . . fluttery? Why was she so aware of the closeness of his body, the hard lines of his face, the brilliance of his eyes, the softness of the lips that were a short tiptoe-rising distance away from her? Why did she feel so warm—like she was standing too close to the forge and might get burned?

  Apparently she wasn’t the only one affected. He stared down at her. Her eyes. Her mouth. “Elizabeth . . .” he started, half in warning and half in anger.

  He was going to kiss her. She felt the muscles in his arms tighten as he drew her incrementally closer. Felt the heat of his breath as his mouth lowered. Felt the slam of her heart against her ribs in anticipation. And then she felt . . .

  Nothing.

  He drew back, set her carefully away from the slippery edge of the muddy bank, and let her go.

  “We should go,” he said calmly, as if he hadn’t been moments away from putting his mouth on hers.

  As if she hadn’t been moments away from letting him.

  A flush heated her cheeks, but she, too, acted as if nothing had happened—or nearly happened. It was much harder pretending that she wasn’t disappointed it hadn’t. “Yes, Joanna will wonder where we are.”

  He gave her a dry look that was so wonderfully Thommy her chest swelled with happiness. “I doubt she’ll wonder anything, as I suspect that was rather the point.”

  Apparently he’d caught on to Joanna’s little game as well. She gave him a small smile of shared understanding, and they walked back together through camp. They didn’t talk, but their pace was slower than it might have been.

  Thom glanced up as the shadow fell over him. But he’d been aware of her the moment she came into view on the bridge. She was like a damned beacon for his senses. Or maybe it was the other way around—his senses lit up like a damned beacon whenever she was near.

  The men had made camp across the bridge from Newbattle Abbey in a small clearing along the banks of the River Esk. But Douglas had arranged for his handful of women traveling with them to stay in the abbey. Although the traveling party had thus far managed to avoid rain—and therefore the soggy, muddy roads that could have severely delayed their journey—the temperature had dropped to near freezing over the last few hours, and the women would be much more comfortable with the Cistercian monks.

  In other words, Douglas wasn’t taking any chances.

  Joanna’s efforts the past two days to bring Thom and Elizabeth together had not gone unnoticed by her husband—or anyone else for that matter. But Douglas didn’t have anything to worry about. As much as Thom had enjoyed spending time with his old friends—and he had enjoyed himself, perhaps more than he wanted to—no matter how many errands, dinners, and loose horseshoes Joanna arranged, it wouldn’t make a difference. It was too late for him and Elizabeth. They’d both moved on.

  Elizabeth might want him physically, but Thom did not delude himself that she wanted more from him than pleasure. Not when she could marry one of the most important men in the realm. A man like Randolph could give her something Thom never could: position, wealth, and security. And he maybe better than anyone knew how much those things meant to her.

  Although it would have saved him a whole hell of a lot of heartbreak had he recognized it earlier.

  Elizabeth was too practical, with too much of her brother’s ambition in her to risk a marriage to someone in Thom’s position. She and Jamie had both been scarred by their father’s death. Maybe if those difficult years had never happened, it would be different. But when her father had died in prison after being declared a traitor, his lands and wealth stripped by King Edward, his widow and children had been left with nothing. They’d been “little better than beggars,” Elizabeth had once said.

  Edward’s hatred of Sir William “the Hardy” Douglas had been extreme—even by the king’s notorious Angevin standards. With Edward’s mercurial temper, no one had wanted to chance taking in the “traitor’s” widow and children and risk having his vitriol turned toward them. Finally, half-starved, with little more than the “rags on their shoulders” and “one step away from an almshouse,” Isabel’s family had taken them in. The situation had been both “humbling and humiliating.”

  Elizabeth had laughed when she’d told him that, but now he realized how telling that had been.

  Eventually Edward’s temper had cooled toward the widow (if not the “traitor’s spawn”) and some of Lady Eleanor’s dower lands had been restored. By the time the family had returned to Douglas a couple of years later, the situation wasn’t nearly so dire. But the experience had left a lasting imprint on Elizabeth. From that point on, it seemed she was always looking beyond the little village of Douglas to something bigger.

  Randolph was one of the biggest. She wouldn’t let him go. No matter how much she lusted for Thom.

  All Jo’s machinations had succeeded in doing was make the inevitable parting when they arrived in Edinburgh tomorrow more difficult.

  Fortunately, he’d had a bit of a respite today. He had no doubt Joanna would have found countless pretenses to seek him out, but the Phantoms hadn’t given her a chance. MacLeod had asked him to ride out with Sutherland and MacKay to check on a bridge ahead of them that might need repairing from a storm a few weeks ago (it had), and then he’d ridden ahead to scout with Lamont and MacLean. Finally, on hearing that he was skilled with the making of swords, MacRuairi had asked him to take a look at one of his arming swords—he fought with two that he wore crossed at his back. All of which had taken him well away from the ladies for most of the day.

  But it appeared his respite was over.

  Elizabeth was smiling down at him, so beautiful it almost hurt to look at her. Actually, it did hurt, damn it. The heavy blue wool cloak she wore was trimmed with fur around the hood, framing her fair face like a snow queen—

  He stopped, her earlier accusations coming back to him. Had he made her into something she wasn’t? Holding her up as something “perfect” and unattainable? A pretty porcelain poppet in a shopwindow?

  He had to concede that there might be more truth to her accusation than he wanted to admit. He had always seen her through the window of that little girl he’d first mistaken for a princess. The embodiment of everything he wanted but thought he couldn’t have.

  She wasn’t perfect—he knew that. She could be stubborn, opinionated, and defensive—especially when it came to her family. She sometimes spoke without thinking and could be blind to what was right in front of her—he better than anyone knew that. She sometimes focused so much on the goal that she lost sight of everything else. And God k