her, does he not?”
“More than his own breath.” A hint of a smile brightened his eyes. “I havena been home in too long.”
She hated to ask but… “How do you know if they are still well?”
“I write to them, and they write me. Actually, ’tis Father Timothy who writes. We all know how to read and write, but the good father enjoys it more than anyone else.”
“Does he live with your parents then?”
“Aye,” he told her, slowing his horse when they entered the camp.
He told her a little bit more about his family—but not where they lived in the Highlands. She didn’t blame him for being secretive. If even common miscreants knew of him and trembled at his name, he must have many enemies. And what better way to get to a man than through the people he loved? She knew that lesson firsthand.
She would never tell anyone about him. She thought about her father. She’d have to tell him. How would she explain to him that she was falling in love with an infamous, merciless killer who was tender and thoughtful to her?
“I don’t want to ride my own horse, Tristan,” she told him softly when they were packed and ready to leave.
“Oh?” he asked with half a smile. “D’ye want to ride with me?”
She nodded. “Just for a little while longer. I like leaning on you. It does not make my back hurt.”
He nodded and tied their horses together then leaped into his saddle first. He leaned down and pulled her up across his thighs and into his arms.
They traveled at a slow pace, nibbling on apples and on each other. He kept her warm, wrapped in his plaid and his embrace. She didn’t want to hurry their pace and get to their destination sooner. The sooner they reached Dumfries, the sooner they faced a future together or alone. She loved her father and she missed him, but she didn’t want to go home. She’d already prepared herself to never see him again. She could wait a little longer. He likely didn’t even know she had contracted the pestilence. Word from her uncle wouldn’t have reached him yet.
“I wonder if my uncle will tell my father that he left me.”
“He willna tell him because he is cowardly.”
“I have been thinking about it,” she told him lazily, strewn across him. “I do not blame him for wanting to keep his child safe from the sickness.”
“Ye are thoughtful, lass.”
“I understand why he did it,” she said, looking up at him, “but you did not leave me, and I was a stranger to you. Why did you not leave me, Tristan?”
He shook his head. “What am I to say? I dinna know why I stopped to stare at a pile of dead bodies. I had no idea that there was a rose amid them.”
“But I was sick. Surely you thought I would die.”
“Aye, I did.”
“And still, you took care of me.”
He remained silent for a moment and then swallowed. “Aye.”
She stared up into his eyes and smiled at the soft, warm side of him that broke through and showed himself only to her. She loved that she could wipe his frowns clean off his face. People knew his name. Men were afraid of him—men who should be afraid of him. For them, he was a monster. To her…he was everything but that.
“What would your Father Timothy say about this? I believe God sent you to me. Even if I had to be sick to find you. I’m glad I did.”
He lifted her in his arms and kissed her until she felt lightheaded. She clutched fistfuls of his black hair while he ravaged her with his tongue inside her mouth.
Slowly, he kissed and licked his way down her chin, across her throat, taking his time to smell her skin, to breathe her in. She didn’t know what he was doing to her but the nipples on her breasts felt tight and hard. A spot below her belly began to ache.
“I feel odd,” she said, pulling away in his lap. “What is coming over me?”
“Desire,” he said in a slow, salacious voice. “’Tis comin’ over me as well. But—”
“But?”
“We must resist it. I am no rogue. I willna take advantage of ye and ravish ye after what ye have been through.”
“What if I want to be ravished by you?” she asked him. She thought she heard a little groan escape him.
“I dinna even know if ye are in yer right mind after havin’