A Highlander in a Pickup - Laura Trentham Page 0,24
her was not an image she needed to have flashing in her head at the moment. His footsteps grew louder. She tensed and stared unblinking at the paper, her eyes burning.
“What are you working on?” Iain’s rich baritone reminded Anna of dark chocolate—sweet but with a bite.
Slowly, she raised her gaze. He’d located a T-shirt in a forest-green color. She wasn’t sure if she was disappointed or relieved.
“I am working on…” She had to look back down at the paper and scan it, “… a site map for the portable potties.”
He propped a shoulder on the doorjamb and crossed his arms. “Titillating stuff.”
Was he teasing her? Something in the way his mouth was set made her think he was. “It’s a detail people only notice if things don’t go well. What are you working on?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s a lot of wood for nothing.”
One of his eyebrows rose, instantly turning his expression mocking. It was his superpower. “You were spying on me.”
Anna shuffled papers around on the desk. “No, I wasn’t. I was bird-watching, and you happened to get in the way.” Not that her excuse was believable as is, but the fire creeping up her face only undermined her credibility as an amateur ornithologist.
He made a sound between a grunt and a hum, the noise dripping with disbelief. Instead of leaving her alone, he meandered farther into the office to peruse the corkboard wall covered with snapshots from festivals of years past.
“The festival looks like a ripper of a good time.” He sounded serious and even admiring.
“The whole point is for people to have fun. And spend their money, of course.”
He shot her a raised eyebrow over his shoulder before returning his attention to the pictures. She fiddled with a silver letter opener with a funny-looking gnome squatting under a giant mushroom. Or maybe the mushroom was normal sized, and it was the gnome that was tiny.
Iain took a photo off the board and turned slowly, glancing between it and her. Without waiting for him to ask the question hovering between them, she stood and plucked the picture out of his hands. “Yes, it’s me.”
In the picture, she was sixteen. It had been the first festival dance competition she’d won with a solo performance. The picture captured her mid-leap, her hair like a sunburst around her head. Much to her mother’s dismay, she’d forgone the pinned fat, fake curls of many Celtic dancers, and her dance had been more innovative than traditional.
Her dress had been understated compared to the rest of the entrants’. She had merely worn a black leotard and an emerald-green, gauzy. wraparound skirt. She’d wanted to blaze her own trail and hadn’t been afraid to take risks. She’d do it her way or go home empty-handed. She’d placed first.
How much of her attitude had been brash confidence and how much a rebellion against her mom’s more traditional methods? She stared at the photo as if seeing a stranger and touched her face, although her expression was lost to time. Where had her confidence gone? Had time and experience worn it away like the sea to stone?
“We twa hae run about the braes, and pou’d the gowans fine; But we’ve wander’d mony a weary fit, sin’ auld lang syne.” His voice was deep and sonorous and held her enthralled even though she didn’t understand half of what he’d recited.
“‘Auld Lang Syne.’” She parroted the recognized words.
“Aye. Robert Burns. Not his finest, in my humble opinion, but fitting for your thoughts, me thinks.” His choice of words and cadence matched the old-fashioned lyrics.
“Braes are hills, but what the heck are gowans?” She took a step toward him, holding the old picture of herself over her heart.
He smiled a real smile. The first she’d seen him offer, and it was like a light flipped on inside of him. His brown eyes sparkled with unexpected charm. His teeth were white, the bottom center two overlapping. It made him seem more real to her.
“Gowans are flowers. Daisies, if you want to put a fine point on it.”
She held the picture out to him. “I suppose I have wandered many weary miles since that was taken.”
He tacked the picture back into the blank space it had occupied and ran a finger over her form. “You make it sound as though you’re old and worn, when you are far from it.”
She froze, not sure how to take his words and the sudden blast of intimacy. It wasn’t the first time she’d sensed an unexpected connection between