When he ran his hands down her sides and around to pull her closer, she felt a jolt of excitement. He smelled of soap and sandalwood, and the sight of his bare, golden torso made her unsteady on her feet. Thank goodness he was holding her up.
Slowly he backed her across the room and eased her down to the bed. Settling beside her, he hesitated, propping himself on an elbow, his head hovering above hers. Beneath the ends of his hair, his eyes caught and held hers. The faint stubble on his chin glistened in the candlelight.
Her heart pounding in her ears, she gazed steadily back. She was ready. Her arms reached to pull him close.
The air was rent by a strangled groan.
“I cannot do this,” he gritted out and rolled away. “I cannot do this. I cannot do this with my mother lying in a box downstairs.”
She felt an instant of stunned disappointment before her head cleared and her arms went around him anyway. She squeezed tight. “It’s all right. I understand.”
And though she wouldn’t tell him so, almost as strong as her disappointment was her relief.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I just cannot—”
“Hush,” she said. Slowly she drew air into her lungs, giving herself time to adjust. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She sat and pulled the coverlet over them both, then lay back down. With a regretful sigh, he turned to face her and gathered her close, his head heavy against her shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he whispered once more.
And long minutes later, when her heart had calmed, for the second night in a row she fell asleep in his arms.
THIRTY-SEVEN
STILL WIDE awake an hour later, Trick eased away from Kendra and slid from the bed. Quietly he pulled his shirt back over his head, then lit a candle and slipped from the bedchamber, closing the door softly behind him.
The stone steps felt cold and rough beneath his bare feet as he trod carefully down them. A low murmur of voices drifted up the stairwell. Arriving on the ground floor, he stopped and stared.
Annag and Niall sat before his mother’s coffin. Behind it, Duncan hid, manipulating a clever arrangement of twine and twigs. A deep, unearthly “Oooooooooh” issued from his throat as he twisted his hands. Elspeth’s body jumped and twitched, and Annag jumped and screeched. Rising to his feet, Duncan burst into laughter and lifted a glass of whisky in a clearly drunken toast.
Trick couldn’t believe his eyes.
Niall caught his gaze and offered a small smile. He rose and came to meet him at the bottom of the stairs. “Couldn’t you sleep?”
“I kept thinking of her lying down here. Cold, in a box.” Trick ran a shaky hand back through his hair. “It seems so unreal. I thought I could just sneak down here and…convince myself, maybe. Sit here a while.”
Niall nodded slowly, then turned to his half-siblings and raised his voice. “Give us peace, will you? Go on to bed. We’ll sit with Mam alone.”
Still laughing, they staggered out, taking a bottle of spirits and their glasses along with them.
The candles surrounding Elspeth’s casket flickered in their wake. “Why were they sitting with her?” Trick asked after they’d stumbled out of earshot. “It’s plain as anything they held her in no esteem.”
“Da wouldn’t like to hear they’ve been shirking their duty. Mam must never be left alone—they say that a corpse left alone will find the road to hell.”
Knowing his mother’s history, Trick imagined Hamish and Niall would worry about her finding such a road. He went to the coffin and set the candle he was carrying beside the others, averting his gaze from his mother’s waxen face. “I feel like I should be able to talk to her. I came all the way from England to talk to her.”
“Then talk to her,” Niall said.
Trick sighed, wishing he had some of his brother’s calm confidence—wishing he knew where to start. Owing to Duncan’s prank, Elspeth’s hands were no longer neatly crossed on her chest. Wincing at the sight of the twine still attached, he began to reach, then stopped.
“Fix her, will you?” he asked in a voice rough with frustration. “Get that off her.”
While Niall gently did as he asked, Trick dropped onto a chair, staring blindly ahead. “I would think you’d rather sit by yourself than with those two. Especially considering they accord her no respect. I cannot believe what I saw when I walked in here.”
“I cannot sit alone—there must always be two on guard.” Niall took the seat beside him. “And a good prank at a wake is often enjoyed, even encouraged. You don’t know our ways here, Patrick. For all you were born within these walls.”
“You’ve the right of it there.” Trick sighed. He’d never felt very English, but he didn’t feel Scottish, either. He only felt confused.
“What did you want to say to her?” Niall asked. “You can say it, aye? Out loud, or in your head. Either way, she’ll hear you.”
“Do you think so?” Trick turned to gaze at his brother. “You seem a fine lad.”
Niall broke into a grin—straight, white, and as familiar as the one Trick saw in the mirror every morning when he was shaving, except none of his brother’s teeth were chipped. “I don’t think Annag would agree.”
“Nay, I expect she wouldn’t. How do you put up with those two?”
The younger man gave a sheepish shrug. “They’re not as bad as they seem. I grew up with them, aye? It takes two to fight.”
“And you refuse to participate.”
“More or less. Of course, once in a while…” The engaging grin reappeared before he sobered. “Annag…well, her husband’s dead these two years past. And her with three bairns on her own. She wasn’t always so bitter.”
Trick hadn’t realized she was widowed. “And Duncan?”
“He’s never wed—no sane woman would have the smaik.”
