Page 25 of Gift-Wrapped in a Kilt

Rory arrived, and everyone shut up.

Except his wife. Emery said, "Jamie, what happened?"

Jamie shot Rory a sharp glance. "Your husband invited my ex-boyfriend to the party."

Emery compressed her lips into a slash.

Rory had gone stiff and blank-faced. Robot Rory, Emery called him when he was like this.

"Is this true?" Emery asked.

Her husband shrugged one shoulder.

Emery shook her head, part exasperation, part affectionate chastisement. She hugged Jamie tighter to her side and murmured, "Why don't you and I go downstairs and have a chat." In a louder voice, she said, "Rory and I will talk later."

Jamie swore her stoic big brother flinched a wee bit. Only Emery could cow Rory MacTaggart. Well, Emery and Sorcha MacTaggart, their mother.

"What about them?" Jamie whispered into Emery's ear. "Gavin and Trevor. And Rory."

Emery spoke in a commanding voice that made all three men take notice. "Rory made this mess. He can slog through it on his own for a while."

She flashed her husband a smile bright enough to blind airliners in flight thirty thousand feet above their heads. Emery towed Jamie out of the gallery and down the spiral staircase to the vestibule on the ground floor. They hustled through the dining room and out the rear door into the guest wing. Once they'd reached the sitting room, Emery urged Jamie to sit on the sofa. Emery then plunked down on the coffee table in front of Jamie.

Hands on her thighs, Emery sighed. "Tell me everything."

*****

Gavin stood there long after Jamie had left, glaring at the man who'd barged into the middle of his relationship with the only woman he'd ever really loved. Gavin wanted to punch Trevor. Grind his pretty-boy face into the wood floor. He didn't do a damn thing. What if Jamie wanted this asshole back? What if she'd pined for Trevor all these years and Gavin had been second choice?

He didn't know what to believe anymore. Jamie had offered him casual sex. If the sweet girl he'd fallen for could want his body and nothing else, maybe she did have a candle burning for the pretty boy.

Trevor slapped Gavin's arm. "Relax, mate."

Mate? Had the guy seriously called Gavin 'mate'? Like they were good buds. Like they might share a few beers and crack jokes together.

Gavin responded the only way he could. He sucked it up and acted like none of this fazed him.

"What are you supposed to be?" Gavin asked, waving at Trevor's outfit.

"A rake." Trevor grinned, his perfect white teeth bared. "Of the Regency variety."

Regency? Sure, Gavin had a clue what that meant.Not.The other part he understood. "You dressed up like an old-timey gigolo?"

"A rake is a libertine, a freewheeling man in the vein of Don Juan or Casanova."

"Like I said, a gigolo."

Trevor stiffened, grasping his lapels. "In the Regency period, a rake was a gentleman."

Gavin snorted. "Come on. Even back then, a rake —" He did his best imitation of the snooty way Trevor had pronounced the word. " — was nothing but a lousy lowlife who preyed on vulnerable women."

"Preyed on?" Trevor chuckled, his tone as derisive as his nose-up expression. "I'm surprised you have such a wide vocabulary. What are you meant to be, then? A waiter?"

"James Bond." Gavin ground the words out between his teeth.

Trevor shook his head with mock pity and tsked. "Bond was British. You are a lowly American."

"Maybe I am, but Jamie's with me."

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