Page 30 of Sinful Scot
The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow;
The storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.
~ Emily Brontë, “Spellbound”
She didn’t know how long she’d been watching him sleep, but her legs were starting to tingle, alerting her to the fact that they were becoming numb from kneeling. The sun was battling the thick, snow-laden clouds to break through the sky, and every once in a while a slash of light would glow from above and shine down on Rhys. Her breath would catch all over again at how captivating he was, even in slumber. The dark shadow of the stubble he’d had when she’d met him a week ago had grown thicker, lending a more rugged appearance to his face. His cheekbones were more prominent than before, and she bit her lip with the knowledge that he was likely not getting enough to eat. His ebony hair needed a washing, but she still wanted to plunge her fingers into it just to see what it felt like. She denied the urge, for one thing remained completely unchanged, even in sleep: he exuded dangerous power. And one did not awaken a wolf.
She sighed, yet still she did not move. He was beautiful. It wasn’t the right word to describe a man, she knew, especially one built so solidly, but he reminded her of things she thought were striking and vast and deadly in their own ways. A lightning-filled sky. A turbulent sea. Icy, snow-packed hills. It was that thought about snow and the flakes starting to fall from above that finally forced her to move.
She stood, her legs burning from her long-held position, and made her way to the woods to collect the additional herbs she needed to make a poultice for Rhys’s wounds. They looked better, but still had much healing to do. She didn’t doubt they hurt, but he’d cradled her all night until she’d awoken near dawn and found she was in his lap with her cheek against his chest. That was the first moment she’d thought to flee to Kinghorn, but she could not make herself go. Not yet. Not even when she thought about how her sister was likely worried sick and how she needed to make her way there to explain things. Not even though she was fearful of what he would tell her when he woke.
She needed to hear what had happened to him before she went back to Kinghorn. Could he prove he was Shona’s son from the future?
No, it was a foolish notion. Why was she even entertaining that he could?
Ye have a seed of doubt.
Devil take that seed! It was his eyes! She could not dismiss that she’d only once before seen eyes the same shade—in Shona MacKinnish’s one silver-gray eye. But it wasn’t just that, she thought, searching around for and finally finding hemlock and henbane. There was also the matter of his odd dress and speech. But those things alone did not prove his astonishing claims.
She paused, her fingertips hovering above a willow, and she sucked in a sharp breath of realization. She wanted him to banish her doubts. Oh, she was a foolish woman. She was eager to have everything she believed proven false, and for what?
For a man.
No, she was not quite that foolish. She easily could have a man. They would want her for the one holding King Alexander had not taken from her family, Castle Lochlavine which would go to her husband when she wed. So yes, she could have a man, but not necessarily one she wanted. Not one she chose. Not one she could love. Not one who would take a lashing for her instead of revealing that she had lied. Not one who would hold her, despite injury, to keep her warm, as she suspected he had done. Not one who would comfort her when she cried without saying a word. Not one who stirred the depths of her soul.
After grabbing some willow, she spotted the hairy, reddish upright stems of herb Robert. She reached out and plucked some of the succulent basal leaves of the plant. She could use this to treat Rhys’s wounds. As she ran her fingers over the sticky leaves, she thought about why she had not left yet. Rhys represented a possibility for her life that she’d not considered since she’d put her childhood behind her and the fantasies of love young girls often had. She did not want to turn from him, from hope.
“Maggie?”
She startled at the deep sound of his voice behind her. Turning the hem of her skirt upward to hold the herbs, she faced him. Her stomach tightened at the worried look she saw on his face. “Were ye afraid I’d left ye?” she blurted, suddenly wanting to know if he wished her to stay with him as foolishly as she wished to remain.
“Yes,” he said simply. His honesty gave her more hope, which her mind knew she needed to quell but her heart found nearly impossible. “Are you leaving?” His tone was careful, constrained, as if he didn’t want her to leave but would not stop her if she wanted to do so.
Devil take the man, that also gave her hope and made her feel even safer with him than was wise.
“Nae yet,” she hedged. “I wanted to treat yer wounds again first and listen to what tale ye have to relay so I can disprove ye,” she added to make herself feel better. “And then I’ll point ye in the direction of Perthshire and be on my way.”
He smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners with the kindness of it, and she felt almost as if he could read her thoughts. “What do you have there?” he asked.
She opened her skirt for him. “Herbs to treat yer wound—willow, hemlock, herb Robert, and henbane.”
“If I didn’t know you honestly believed those herbs will help, I’d think you were trying to kill me.”
“What do ye mean?” she asked, frowning. She looked between him and the bounty she’d gathered in her skirt.
“Hemlock and henbane are poisonous, Maggie.”
“What?” She shook her head. “It’s—”
He held up a staying hand, and she pressed her lips together on the urge to prove him wrong.
“Trust me,” he said. “I’m no doctor—”
“What?”
