Page 71 of Wild Scottish Beauty

And even still, my heart twisted at the memories of what he’d once meant to me. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get overthe person he’d turned into, but I guess that was my own problem to deal with. For now, I just needed to get out of here and contact my solicitor.

I wished I had Willow to go home to. I could use her sunshine right now. Even if I couldn’t reciprocate, it was hard to not be around her and absorb her constant cheerfulness. I knew she’d had some issues with her brother, but they were still in contact, even though she was keeping him at arm’s length at the moment. I wondered if she would agree with what I’d done here tonight. To my surprise, I wanted to ask her opinion, her viewpoint mattering to me.

Maybe I’d bring myself to talk to her about it tomorrow. She had a good head on her shoulders, and she might be able to ease the sadness currently banded around my heart. I didn’t really need anyone to validate my decisions, but something propelled me to want to speak to her about this. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing to lean on a friend once in a while.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Willow

“Come on, Calvin. We’re going to find the restaurant. Somehow.” Calvin struggled in my arms, so I put him down on the hallway floor and he scampered forward. I’d already learned that I wouldn’t lose him, he never strayed far from me or Ramsay anyway, and I took a turn down another passageway in the castle.

It was positively pouring this morning. It was the kind of rain that made me want to burrow deeper into the comforters and hold on to the tendrils of the sexy dream I was having.

I’d been sitting on the worktable in the shop, my short sparkly skirt on, and Ramsay had been towering over me.

His hands gripping my thighs, spreading my legs, until he scooted me forward so I brushed against his hardness.

One flick of a button, and my breastshad been exposed to his mouth, and I’d bowed back as he’d suckled, his mouth hot against my skin.

No. Stop thinking about that.

He’s your boss. He’s not interested in you like that.

I’d promised Lia that I’d come by for breakfast, and grateful that I didn’t have to step outside in the sleeting rain to do so, I now took myself on an adventure through the castle, hoping that at some point I’d land at the restaurant’s door.

“Moo?”

It came out almost as a whimper, and I hurried to catch up to where Calvin had the ghost coo cornered.

“Clyde. He’s just a kitten.”

Calvin arched his back and pawed the air, and Clyde whimpered once more, hunching his shoulders and stomping the ground with a hoof. He shook his head, his large horns looking threatening, shaggy coat sticking out around his head.

He looked at me, pleading.

If a ghost coo could plead, that was.

Somewhere along the way, I’d stopped being so scared of Clyde, likely because he had demonstrable feelings about my little kitten. I took a moment to marvel at the ghost, the dim rays of light from the wall sconces filtering through his transparent image and wondered just how many other ghosts wandered the castle halls. Sophie hadn’t indicated there were any others that called the castle home, but if Clyde could wander about this massive place, so could anyone else, I supposed.

An image flashed in my head, of Calvin laughing, and I narrowed my eyes down at the little kitten. We were gettingbetter at communicating through mental imagery, which was wild in itself, and now I realized that he was just having fun scaring Clyde.

Because he could.

Not because he was scared.

“You stinky little devil.” I scooped up Calvin, and he blinked at me, the picture of innocence.

“Clyde, he’s just playing with you. Don’t let him scare you.”

Clyde tilted his head, and I held Calvin out to him.

“Truly. He’s just playing.”

The ghost coo tentatively leaned forward until his nose reached the kitten’s. The two booped noses, making my heart melt, and then Clyde raced down the hallway, bellowing his joy.

“Jeez.” I almost jumped out of my skin at his bellow. “The acoustics in this place are ridiculous.”

MacAlpine Castle was built as a square, yet some of the passageways inside the castle twisted and turned in odd ways. I wonder if that had been planned as protection from an attack so there wasn’t an easy in or out. I’d possibly read somewhere about having different-sized steps to trip up intruders running up the stairs. I took my time, not caring too much if I got lost, just enjoying exploring one of the oldest buildings I’d ever been in. I found myself in a drawing room of sorts, with a glass case that housed three different wedding gowns from days of yore.

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