Page 112 of The Devil Wears Tartan

I heave a dramatic sigh. “Go on, then.”

“You don’t have to think too hard about this just yet.” Her voice gets serious, and she sits up straight. “But I’m sure my mum would totally hire you if you wanted to work here.”

My breath catches. “Moira—”

She holds up one of her fingers again. “I just wanted to put it out there. You can think about it later. We’ve already been through a lot today, and I don’t know about you, but right now, I’m kind of done with talking.”

I let the worry and questions go. I set all my plans and protests free. They dissolve into the garnet glow of the room, leaving only me and her behind.

“You read my mind,” I whisper.

Then I pull my girlfriend back down onto the floor and kiss her without a care in the world.

CHAPTER 26

MOIRA

ONE YEAR LATER

“You’re playing with fire, Miss Andrianakis,” I murmur against Kenzie’s lips. “I’m gonna mess both our hair up if you keep kissing me like that, and we don’t have time to get ready all over again.”

“Lies,” she says, her hot breath making my heart beat even faster. “You can do a highland bun in like two minutes, and I can do them even faster.”

I wrap my hand around her wrist where she’s reaching over my shoulder to brace herself against the hotel room desk in front of me. She’s just finished putting my hair up in a bun while I sit facing the mirror above the desk. Her own hair is wound up in a bun I did for her with a big tartan bow tied around the base.

She really fought me on the bow, but when I told her it helps our students find us in the crowd when they’re feeling nervous, she relented.

I don’t even know if that’s true. I just thought she’d look adorable with a bow on.

“Is that a challenge?” I ask, giving her wrist a squeeze.

She pulls back to stare down at me with hooded eyes. “We do love our challenges, you and I.”

That’s all it takes. I spring up from my seat in the chair and whirl around to crush my mouth to hers. We land in a tangle of limbs on the queen size bed behind her.

She moans into my mouth when I slide my thigh between both of hers, pressing against her as her hips buck up to meet me. I run the tip of my tongue along her lips and brace my hands against the soft, tartan-patterned blanket stretched out over the comforter.

Of course it’s a tartan blanket. Being this close to the site of the biggest highland games in Scotland has encouraged the bed and breakfast we’re staying in to take the Scottish decor up to level one thousand. We’re here to support two Murray School students who’ve made it to the world championships this year. There were little packets of shortbread cookies on the pillows when we arrived last night, and hanging above the bed is a truly hideous oil painting of a bagpipe player perched on a windswept hill in the rain. The proportions are all off, and the bagpipes look like some sort of alien species attaching itself to the man’s body to suck the life out of him.

I try not to look at the painting when I shift us further up the bed, but the piper’s bulbous eyes draw mine up to meet them like the painting is possessed.

“Kenzie,” I whisper, “he’s watching us.”

She snorts. “Oh my god, Moira. I told you last night we could move it, and you said no.”

“If we move it, he might get angry and haunt us.”

She slides her arms around my waist after I’ve lowered myself back down on top of her. “I’ll protect you from the demon piper.”

I settle my head on her chest and listen to the steady rhythm of her breathing.

“I know you will,” I murmur.

It’s been over a year since the day we sat on the floor of Studio B and she asked me to be her girlfriend. Sometimes it feels like we’ve been dating forever, and sometimes I still feel a jolt of surprise when I wake up beside her and realize I really am in an amazing relationship with a girl I spent most of my life swearing I hated.

All I feel for her now is love—a love that’s somehow steady and sure but still elated and wild. She can thrill me with just a look, and she can calm me with a simple touch. Loving Kenzie feels like spinning through the steps of an intricate dance I have memorized but still manage to be surprised by each time I let go and throw my whole heart into the movement.

That’s where she meets me. Every time, she finds me there, and we share this dance as partners and equals.

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