Page 19 of In Search of a Husband
“Nae!”
They both said at once, speaking over one another.
“Canna hold his whisky is all,” the younger man said, all tall and lanky. If she were to guess, he wasn’t much older than twenty. He laughed before slipping behind the bar and shoving his body into the older man’s, a silly territorial claim to the doorway. Funny that men felt they had to bristle their way everywhere, as if anyone could forget who this world worked for.
The older man whispered something as the younger one—Archie, it was—pushed past and disappeared.
“Finn Wallace, sit up and get out! Ye’re scaring the lady away.”
“Yer brother never would have tossed me out of his inn.”
Those blue eyes of his went cold. “Out,” the older man commanded in a deep, sturdy voice.
Yes, he most definitely was control personified. How the other man didn’t move was beyond Kate. She stepped forward as if pulled along by some invisible string. Or perhaps it was that she noticed that soft indentation on his strong chin, and how his lips drew her eyes. That perfect top lip. And how there was the lightest shadow of dark stubble across his jawline.
For a man dressed as if he had just strolled off Savile Row, it was an interesting contradiction.
Not that she was in the market for interesting contradictions. She needed to put something in her stomach to keep it from trying to consume itself, then find a castle. Which in Scotland wouldn’t be a challenge precisely, it was just finding the correct one.
The man referred to as Wallace stood, wobbled, then clutched his head before he stumbled out the door, grumbling the entire time in such a thick accent that Kate couldn’t make out what he was complaining about.
Kate startled when the door slammed shut behind him and flexed her hands. The man in the doorway motioned her to join him, so she did, her stomach gurgling as she glanced around her at the old inn walls of rough-hewn wood.
“I appreciate the meal,” she called out.
He grunted.
Very well. Not a man of conversation. Considering the last had left her ruined, she wouldn’t complain much.
Dried herbs hung from the old beams above as she followed behind in the short, dark hallway. The smell of smoke burned her nostrils, and the cool damp air didn’t help any. It wasn’t exactly an inviting place, but certainly one with potential. Only a few tables had been set for patrons out front.
“Have a seat,” he said before she entered the kitchen. His voice boomed off the wall of the small cream-colored room.
Kate nodded, walking behind him in a wide berth in case he spun around and growled. She wouldn’t put it past the man. She sank down in the rickety chair with her back against the wall, watching as this stranger cooked for her. He reached for a heavy cast-iron pan fromthe warped tabletop. His shirt pulled against his body with each precise move.
One day, when she was braver, she might ask if he were a fighter. For now, she would appreciate that whatever he did, he did it well.
“Do you like eggs?” he asked, never looking at her, instead reaching into a basket and gingerly cradling two eggs between his large hands.
“I do.”
He cracked them as if he had spent years learning how to do so. She had never seen a man cook before. Her father certainly never had. And she would guess the only kitchen the marquess ever saw was while passing through to the wine cellar or tupping a maid in the larder after hours.
This man…
She cleared her throat and tugged at her traveling dress. A fire burned in the giant fireplace nestled between two windows. Outside those windows appeared to be a garden, or a ghost of one anyhow. Now it was quite overgrown. A set of stairs led to a stable block and a river beyond that. In the back left corner of the room, behind a worktable, was an opened door to a precarious stack of paper and a desk and chair.
Kate only had more questions than answers as she waited.
Soon, butter sizzled in the pan and this man, perhaps the owner, whisked the eggs in a large ceramic bowl, adding a little water and some salt and pepper. Then he poured the deep-gold mixture in the pan. It sizzled before he added a heap of velvety cheese and folded the eggs over onto themself.
“It’s no’ much, but it will do,” he said, plating it up and placing it on the table in front of her.
Kate’s stomach grumbled. “Thank you.”
“I’m sure ye’re hungry. Where did ye travel from?”
“London.”
