Temptation Read online

  “All right, what do I do now?” she asked as she moved toward the other end of the sheep.

  It took her forty-five minutes of hard work to turn the first tiny lamb inside the ewe. And every few minutes the ewe’s uterus would give a violent contraction and Temperance’s arm would be squeezed so hard that tears of pain would come to her eyes.

  “You’re doin’ well,” James said softly from behind her, and she could tell that his emotions were involved in this for his accent thickened. He put his big hands on her shoulders and kneaded them while the contractions strangled her arm. “Just relax. Breathe,” he said softly into her ear.

  When the contraction relaxed and she could feel her arm again, he talked to her about what she was feeling inside the ewe’s uterus. “Feel for the foot. There, got it now? Now pull. No, you won’t hurt her. She’s in too much pain now to know what you’re doin’. There, good. Pull. Slow, now. There! Pull again. Harder this time.”

  All of a sudden the lamb popped out of the ewe and into Temperance’s lap. It was wet and covered with blood and a sac of mucus, but Temperance didn’t know when she’d ever seen anything so beautiful. Holding the little creature, she looked up at James in wonder.

  “There’s another one,” he said, smiling at her. “Get it; then we clean them up and try to get the mother to nurse.”

  After the first lamb the second one was easy, but Temperance could feel that the contractions were much lighter now, and she looked up at James in alarm.

  “Just get the lambs out. We’ll worry about the mother later.”

  In another few minutes there was another lamb in Temperance’s lap, and she watched as James grabbed handfuls of grass and tried to clean the afterbirth off the new lambs. Without thinking what she was doing, Temperance grabbed a white cloth from off the bushes and began cleaning the second lamb.

  The lamb James had, by instinct, went to its mother to nurse, but the ewe just lay there, still panting.

  “She’s dying,” James said softly to Temperance. “Sorry for this to happen on your first one.”

  “My first sheep,” Temperance said emphatically as she put her lamb next to its sibling, then put her hand onto the big ewe’s stomach. “I’ve had to attend to the births of human women three times,” she said as she put one hand over the other and began to knead the ewe’s stomach. “One time the afterbirth got stuck and the midwife pushed and pushed on the woman’s stomach until—”

  She was working so hard that she couldn’t talk anymore.

  James pushed the lambs aside, then knelt beside Temperance and helped her knead. And after several moments the sheep expelled the huge afterbirth, which dropped onto the ground with a wet splat.

  James and Temperance sat back and watched for a moment. The sheep seemed to stop breathing for a few moments; then she opened her eyes, moved her head upward, then lifted her legs.

  “She wants to stand,” James said, triumph in his voice.

  They got off their knees, helped the big ewe to stand, and after a few wobbly seconds, she ran off, her lambs running after her.

  “Ingrates!” Temperance said, laughing, as she looked at James. He’d stepped away from her and was now holding up what had once been her clean shirt. It was now covered with what she’d removed from the lamb.

  “I told you I should have left it on,” she said, smiling, and taking it from him with the tips of one finger and her thumb. “Now what do I wear to go back down the mountain?”

  Still smiling, James removed his own shirt, quickly untying the cuffs and pulling it over his head, exposing his bare chest to the light.

  Temperance took the shirt from him and put it on, laughing when the cuffs covered her hands by inches and the tail reached to her knees. James lifted her hand, pushed the sleeves upward, then tied the cuff about her wrist. When he was on the second cuff, he nodded toward her rucksack, lying on the ground where she’d tossed it when she first saw the ewe.

  “Anything to eat in there?”

  “Cornish pasties. They’re—”

  “Even here in backward Scotland we’ve heard of such foreign food,” he said, smiling at her. “Come on; I know a place to eat.”

  Without hesitation, she ran along behind him as his long legs ate up the ground and he moved away from the side of the mountain where the men were looking after the sheep.

  There was an ancient tree holding on to the side of the mountain, and the ground beneath it was covered with what looked like lethally sharp rocks, but James climbed straight down the mountain for a couple of feet, then reached up his arms to her. She started to take his hand, but he wouldn’t let her.

  “Jump and I’ll catch you,” he said. “It’s too steep for that skirt.”

  She started to tell him that that was absurd, but the next moment she felt her body falling forward into his arms in complete trust. He caught her about the waist, swung her around, then set her down on a path. Sort of a path, as it was only about six inches wide. One misplacement of her feet and she’d fall straight down.

  “If you’re scared, hold on to my belt,” he said as he started walking.

  “Shirt off; hold on to your belt,” she said. “No wonder you don’t want to get married when you lead all the girls about with those requests.”

  She smiled when James’s laughter floated back to her. She really must stop being so outrageous! But, truthfully, it was a relief to be around a man who wasn’t begging her to give up what she wanted to do in life and marry him. Sometimes Temperance thought that she was a challenge to men, rather like climbing the highest mountain. How many men had said to her, “Come away from all this and be my wife. Bear my children”?

  Because of where they always seemed to lead, Temperance had had to keep humorous remarks to herself. At least she’d never been able to share them with any man.

  But now she could. James McCairn was a man she could laugh with and not fear the consequences. As a result, she felt herself becoming more outrageous by the minute.

  James stopped so abruptly that Temperance had to put her hand on his bare back to steady herself. His skin was certainly warm! she thought as she reluctantly removed her hand.

  “What do you think?” he asked, turning back toward her.

  Temperance put her back to the rocky side of the trail and looked out. Below them was the village, the same breathtaking view she’d seen with Ramsey on the horse. To the left was what looked to be a little cave. “It’s beautiful,” she said honestly.

  In the next second, James disappeared around a corner, and she lost no time in following him. It was a cave, about six feet deep, eight feet wide, and inside was a rough plank bed covered in sheepskins and a little stone circle where she could see there had been many fires.

  When she looked back at him, he had an expression of a boy, as though he really, really wanted her to like his secret place.

  “Cleaner than the house,” she said seriously.

  James smiled as he put the rucksack down on the ground. “Have a seat,” he said cheerfully as he tossed a sheepskin to the ground, “and tell me all about yourself.”

  “Well . . .” she began, her eyes twinkling in mischief as she watched him rummage inside the canvas sack. “—but Mother says that I’m so adorable but then I know that because all the boys tell me that so that’s why I want to marry a lord and become a princess and—”

  Smiling, James took a pasty from the sack, leaned back on one elbow and bit into it. “I don’t think a woman has ever made me laugh as much as you do,” he said thoughtfully.

  Temperance suddenly had a dose of reality. They were very alone in the little cave, and he was half naked, and . . .

  “So why are you really here?” he asked, looking at her with squinted eyes.

  “You need a housekeeper, and I need a job.” She was glad to think of something else besides his bare body.

  With his head turned toward the front of the shallow cave as he looked out over the village, he snorted. “You’re as much a housekeepe