“Are you?” she asked, her entire body starting to tremble.
“Aye, lass. In my own way, I am.” He put an arm around her waist, and several gasps from nearby matronly ladies made Lydia’s face burn with mortification.
“Oi, you lot can stop your bloody gasping,” Rafe growled, making their turbans quiver.
“Well put, Mr. Lennox,” Jane said as she and Mr. Hunt approached them. Jane fixed the matrons with a withering glare. “Mr. Kincade and my stepdaughter have been secretly betrothed for a year. He’s merely reaffirming their pledge, aren’t you, Mr. Kincade?” Jane lied so smoothly that even Lydia believed her.
“I am,” Brodie agreed, and he met Lydia’s gaze. “What do you say? Have pity on a man who loves you fiercely. Tell me you’ll be my wife, my love, my everything, lass.”
Lydia glanced hastily at her father, who did not look entirely pleased, but he also didn’t object. He gave her a small nod instead, while still scowling a little at Brodie.
“You truly love me?” she challenged Brodie, matching his quiet tone as another dance started up behind him.
“Aye, far too much to be wise. I love you blindly, madly.”
Lydia’s throat tightened as she tried to calm her racing heart. “When did you know?”
“That I loved you?”
She nodded.
“That first night I carried you away in my arms. I couldna hate you, even when I thought you were your sister. You enchanted me, lass. And in time, you showed me I wasna a broken man.”
Brodie squeezed her hands, and she saw the adoration in his eyes.
“So long as you love me, lass, I will fight the world to keep you.”
Lydia squeezed Brodie’s hands back. “Yes.”
“Yes?” His eyes gleamed with excitement as she nodded again. “Then dance with me.”
Brodie swept her onto the floor, and they danced throughout the evening. The master of ceremonies had to turn a blind eye to the succession of dances after Jane frowned at him quite sternly.
Word of Lydia’s secret engagement to Brodie took Bath by storm that night, but Lydia didn’t care at all. The only thing that mattered was that she was dancing with the man she loved, and they would go on dancing together the rest of their lives.
Epilogue
A Scottish wedding was always a magical event. Lydia entered the old stone kirk on Castle Kincade lands. She clung to her father’s arm as he walked her to Brodie, who stood proudly at the altar, his plaid kilt showing off his legs in a way that made her blush. Her father paused at the front of the church with her, and the two men shared a look of understanding before Brodie nodded at him.
Her father kissed Lydia’s cheek, and she blinked away tears as she joined Brodie before the altar. The ceremony was a blur of smiles and happy tears for Lydia as she spoke her wedding vows. She only had eyes for Brodie.
When it was over, they gathered in the kirkyard with their friends. In that moment, Lydia felt as though she could ask for nothing more of the world. She had a family who loved her and a Scottish rogue who worshipped her. It was as though every dream she had buried in her heart had been brought back out into the light.
Brodie curled an arm around her waist and leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Happy, my love?”
She gave him a smile that could barely contain her bursting happiness. “I don’t think it’s possible to measure my happiness,” she confessed.
Brodie turned her fully to face him as he cupped her face, his eyes searching hers. “My love for you rivals the depths of the seas and extends beyond the stars themselves.”
It never ceased to amaze her how much he had changed in the weeks leading up to their wedding. He’d become a happier man, a true romantic, and yet he was still that same wicked rakehell in their stolen moments together. The ghosts that haunted him from his past were starting to fade, leaving behind a man who enjoyed life.
Lydia curled her fingers into his cravat and pulled his head down to hers to steal a kiss.
“Dance with me tonight?” he asked.
“Where?” Lydia giggled.
“Anywhere.” His eyes smoldered as he added, “How about our bedchamber? I would love to see you dance like I did that night in the inn, for me and me alone.”
Lydia grinned. “Will it tempt you, my darling Scot?”
“Aye. Always.”
Rafe watched Brodie and Lydia whisper to each other in the kirkyard. He wasn’t one