Page 42 of In Search of a Husband
He heard a splash behind him as he marched away, then more barking, before a larger splash, and Kate’s undignified exclamation.
He paused on the bridge, his fists balled tight.
He preferred her undignified. It suited her better when she didn’t believe she was being watched. He liked the calm moments of sharing tea with her in the kitchen late at night just as much as he enjoyed her barging into the inn demanding to help. He enjoyed her singing and the way she floated into a room. He liked how she balled her fists or pointed at him when she was frustrated, and that pinched look that was supposed to be a glare. But there was nothing threatening about her, not even if she tried.
“What now, Kate?”
“No, Oscar, no!” Kate tripped, wading deeper into the water after the damn dog, her skirts preventing her to reach the beast from going after the swans.
“Oscar!” Gabriel bellowed, watching the swans turn toward the rambunctious dog. “Oscar, come here.”
“He won’t listen.”
“No one listens to me.”
“It’s not the time for understanding why, Gabriel. Help me—” She tripped and fell face-first into the water before standing up, flailing and sputtering. “You are supposed to be my friend,” she shouted at the dog with a wave of her arms.
Gabriel growled and stormed back toward the moat. “I’ve business to see to. I told ye this dog…”
“Then don’t help me,” she snapped back.
He barreled into the water and neatly hauled her backward by her dress, tossing her over his shoulder. Absolutely ignoring the way theweight of her body against his allowed him to breathe for the first time in weeks. As if her nearness rendered him calm.
“Put me down, you beast!”
He snorted when she wiggled against him, trying to free herself as he stepped over the stones in the water, nearing the shore.
“Ye’ll drown yerself.”
“Ohh, you…” Kate smacked his bottom, laughing triumphantly as his back stiffened. With two large steps, he dumped her onto the grassy knoll by the castle unceremoniously.
“Umph.”
“Stay there,” he growled.
“Those swans will eat Oscar alive.”
That would be the hope. Except he didn’t truly mean that. And he didn’t want the swans to attack Kate either. But he couldn’t tell her that for fear it would go straight to that beautiful, gorgeous head of hers.
“Damn it, Kate.” He jumped into the water and called after Oscar, staring down the large swan that quickly approached.
“Dinna dare,” he threatened the swan. “Come here, ye stubborn dog. Now!”
The swans had been a present to his mother years ago. She enjoyed watching them from her bedroom window. From a distance, they were beautiful. In person, they were a nasty, mean nightmare that loved to bite and chase anyone brave enough to venture close.
Oscar paddled through the water, holding his large head up and peeking at Gabriel as he approached, but swimming farther away. Soon, the water would be over Gabriel’s head.
He lunged, wrestling the dog so he could secure his arms around the beast.
“Good, you’ve got him,” Kate cried from the grassy knoll beside the moat. “Oscar, we’ll be having a talk later, you traitor. Swans are not playthings.”
Gabriel turned toward shore with the dog clutched in his hands. “Ye couldn’t have found a smaller dog, Kate?”
She grinned. “Not up to the challenge?”
He narrowed his eyes on her, the frustration in his chest suddenly melting into lust at her cheekiness.
Over eighty pounds of giant deerhound struggled to free himself from his captor.
