He embraced Els and shook Timmons’s hand firmly, but his ensuing climb up the stairs was a labor.
Els saw Timmons to his car.
“’Tis a huge relief,” he said, “knowing you have the picture now. Should anything happen.”
“I can’t very well run this place from New York and do my job,” she said.
“You’ve a good man in Jamie McLaren,” Timmons said as he slid into the car. “He’ll step up.”
“I’ll spend more time with him when I’m back next month,” she said.
Winter had loosed its grip, and on the Munro, the violet haze was creeping upward in the wake of retreating snowfields. Beyond the lake, a ring-necked pheasant strutted among daffodils that glowed in the late afternoon’s slanted light.
She opened the door to what had once been her mother’s bedroom and tiptoed over to the bed where Burtie lay. Through the closed door connecting to Harald’s bedroom, she could hear him snoring.
Burtie opened one eye. She had shrunk but was as steely as ever. “Going, are ye?” she asked.
“I’ve a meeting in London in the morning.”
“So you’ve said.”
“I’ve asked Mary Partridge to come in every day for a few hours.”
“No need for that.”
“Just until you get your strength back.”
“She’ll be fussing all o’er me.”
“Exactly,” Els said. She started to kiss Burtie’s forehead, but something in Burtie’s downturned mouth deterred her and she patted her arm instead. “See you in a few weeks.”
Just as the door was closing, Burtie said, “Have a good meeting, luv. And tell him he’s to come see me as soon as he’s through the lambing.”
Els smiled, more comforted than annoyed that nothing got by Burtie, even though more and more was getting by her father.
As soon as Tommy, the youngest McLaren, dropped her at the Aberdeen airport and pulled away from the departures pavement, she sprinted to the car park and into Mallo’s arms.
When he set a breakfast tray on the foot of the bed, she sat up and laughed at the mess they’d made of his tidy bedroom—clothing strewn about, an empty glass overturned in a patch of sun on the rug. The room smelled of wood smoke, coffee, and oranges. He’d put a single daffodil in a tiny vase on the loaded tray.
“Where did you find juice oranges?” she asked.
“I hear it’s what the posh hotels serve in America,” he said, and handed her a glass of pulpy fresh juice. Even on the coldest mornings, he walked around the house naked until he’d had his second cup of coffee.
“Trying to make me a regular customer?” she said. In the past year, she’d visited Cairnoch as often as trips to London and rare holidays allowed, but she could count on one hand the number of nights they’d spent in the manager’s cottage that came with his job. She resisted the growing pressure to transfer, fearing she’d be out of sight, out of mind as soon as she left Coxe’s immediate orbit.
Mallo joined her on the bed, savored a sip of the orange juice, and held up his glass. “When we’re married, we’ll have this all the time.”
“Married, is it? Where was the bended knee, the sparkly ring?”
“Are ye such an old-fashioned girl under all those power suits? It’s those novels ye read with bucklers swashing and wenches pretending to be coy.”
He set their glasses on the tray, put it on the floor, and yanked away the bedcovers, releasing a funk of sex. He knelt and gathered her against him; she felt the confident beat of his heart. “Neither of us should be kneeling unless both of us are,” he said. “The fact is, I can barely remember when ye weren’t a part of my life. I no sooner lost me dad than I found ye. Then yir mum went away, and there we were with but two parents between us.”
“I never thought of you as a brother.”
“Ye were no sister to me, either,” he said. “More like a voice inside me to keep me straight on what’s worth gettin’ into trouble for.” He held her closer. “The fact is, now I’ve found ye again, all these big plans—my political career, making Cairnoch sound again—depend on us sticking side by side. So tell me now if I’m a hatstand. Are these fantasies I’m cookin’ up all in me own head?”
“You’re completely, totally, utterly a hatstand,” she said. He relaxed his grip and sagged away from her, and she pulled him tighter. “But not about any of that.”
He let out his breath. She leaned back enough to look