Gregor seemed amused. “Try to have faith in us, because I’m trying to have faith in you.”
Assuming his place in the purportedly loving arms of his family was a more awkward mantle to bear than he ever would’ve imagined. “Why bother?”
“Because, prodigal brother, if I didn’t, Cormac would beat, Anya harry, Declan battle, and Bridget badger me until I did.” Gregor wandered back to the door, an easy smile softening his words. “Now put on that plaid”—he gestured to the pile of wool dropped haphazardly in the corner—“and act the MacAlpin.”
Aidan stared at that stretch of tartan long after Gregor had gone. He’d not worn a plaid since he was taken—they didn’t wear such things in the Indies, of course. And since his return, that simple, foreign scrap of cloth had struck him as so rife with meaning and import, he hadn’t the heart.
He donned it, finally, and was reluctant to admit just how moving it was to wear a Scotsman’s breacan feile again.
It took Aidan an hour to walk to the Farquharson farm. He would’ve loved to ride Gregor’s chestnut gelding, but something about his older brother’s manner spoke to a lingering distrust, despite what he might claim otherwise.
Aidan had been the one kidnapped so many years ago—why the burden would fall on him to prove his loyalty, he couldn’t fathom. But he’d noticed the MacAlpin men postured like roosters at a cockfight, each one angling for dominance, particularly Gregor. So, it seemed until Aidan proved he wasn’t really some criminally minded blackguard come from the tropics to swindle the family, he’d be held in suspicion.
And now he was to suffer the humiliation of once again laboring for another man’s bread. His dread grew with every step.
But he needed to act the aspiring businessman, and businessmen knew how to read simple words on a page. He’d rather indenture himself again before confessing the shame of his illiteracy to his brothers. Anya was the only one who knew, and with her son, she had no time for tutoring.
He crested a low hill and spotted the humble Farquharson cottage. Modest pastureland spread before him like a knotty green blanket.
His eyes found Elspeth at once, tripping over her skirts in a mucky paddock, dragging a heavy bucket behind her. Reaching the trough, she hoisted it up to dump the contents, but even leaning it against the edge, she couldn’t get the bucket high enough, and it kept sliding down.
The scene was preposterous. He jogged down the hill. What was a bookish girl like this doing as a farmhand?
Aidan watched the bucket slip from her hands, fall, and land on her toe, the contents spilling along the muddy ground. She doubled over to lean on the fence, breathing heavily, her hands fisted.
He noted her entirely inappropriate footwear. She’d be lucky if she hadn’t broken a toe.
Last time he’d seen her, she’d thought he was a brute. He might as well be a brute in truth.
“Easy, luvvie.” With a hand on the fence, Aidan vaulted into the paddock. He plucked the bucket from the dirt, scooping as much of the oats back in as he could.
She looked up, stricken. Her blond hair looked yellow in the sunlight, and he wondered if it was his imagination that put matching yellow flecks in her light blue eyes. “Thank you.”
He bit his tongue, wanting instead to snap, Don’t fret, I’ll not sully you with my boorish hands. Instead, he asked, “Is it breeding time?”
Seeing the girl’s blush, he swallowed a swear. She’d best be a good teacher, because it seemed he was going to have to work hard for these lessons.
“Breeding?” she asked weakly.
He spoke through gritted teeth. “Yes. I asked, are the sheep currently breeding?”
“Oh, breeding.” Her shoulders relaxed. “No, we’re not breeding. My father didn’t …” She turned from him and shrugged. “We don’t own a ram.”
He ran his hand through the oats in the trough. “But if you’re not breeding, why do they eat this?”
“It’s their feed.”
He cursed under his breath. What sort of daftie was this girl’s father? “They get grain this time of year?”
Though she wasn’t facing him, he could tell she gave a cursory nod.
He studied her back. She was a wisp of a thing, her shoulder blades sharp against the linen of her dress. Anger flared, hot and quick. “And what have you eaten today?”
She turned to look at him, and he saw he’d hit close to the mark. But instead of seeing her usual fear of him glimmer in her eyes, Aidan read despair.
His tone softened. “What I mean to say is, unless the beasts are breeding—which, without a ram, they obviously are not—grass is enough for them.”
He eyed the fence. Why they’d penned the sheep in a muddy paddock rather than put them out to pasture was beyond him. “But it seems your father didn’t take the time to learn this properly.”
That kindled a fire in her. “You’ll not speak so of my father.”
He felt a grin pop onto his face. The girl had unexpected mettle. She was loyal to her family. He liked that.
“Fair enough.” The flock had come to feed at the trough, and Aidan waded among them, prodding at bellies, peeking in ears. “He’s started a wool business, you say?”
“Aye, we have.”
We. He grinned at that. If her father captained a sinking ship, Aidan imagined she’d set herself up as first mate. “And who will shear them? Come spring?”
“I will, I suppose.”
His grin faded as renegade anger surged anew. “Luvvie, shearing is hard work. It’s man’s work. Do you even have the proper tools?”
A muscle in her cheek twitched. “I do.”
He knew she was lying, but he saw right through it. The woman was guileless, and it was foreign to him.
Aidan stepped closer, and this time when she shifted away from him, it stoked an entirely different emotion. There was anger, yes, always anger. But at the sight of the flush on her cheeks and her breathlessly parted lips, that anger mingled with something he didn’t recognize. An unfamiliar, wanting spark of a feeling that he found he wanted to stoke to life.
He stepped even closer, backing her into the fence, close enough to discern the scent of oats that clung to her. On the most preposterous impulse, he raised his hand to brush some dirt from her cheek, then quickly lowered it again. “Shearing happens but once per year,” he said, his voice huskier than he’d intended. “How will you manage between times?”
“H-how do you know all this?” She glanced away, avoiding his gaze as nervously as she’d avoided his question. “I thought you worked sugarcane.”
Aidan felt the emotion bleed from his face. The cane. He took a long step back. Was that why she couldn’t look at him? Because she saw him as an indentured servant? Whenever he looked at his scars, at his detested brand, he saw a body that was forfeit. His had been a body owned by another. If he couldn’t see beyond the marks of his slavery, how could he expect her to?
He turned away, anxious that this perplexing woman not see his temper flare yet again. He took a deep breath before speaking again. “It was a sugar plantation, yes. One with many hands to feed. We … they … they raised sheep. Barbados Blackbellies. For meat.”
Eager to busy himself and calm his mind, he began to walk along the spindly fence, inspecting as he went. The rails had been poorly cut, and already hung broken in a number of spots. They needed a stone perimeter, not this makeshift thing. He jiggled the gate to test it and then opened it wide.
“Wait.” She jogged up behind him. “What are you doing?”
“Letting these beasts roam. The sheep need to graze. And you need to save the oats for your own belly.”
He scanned the surrounding countryside. “You’ll want to parcel this off into two pastures. How do you currently herd the beasts to and fro?”
“I … I do that.”
A laugh burst from him. “You chase them about? By your lonesome?”
She looked abashed, and he cursed himself. Talking to the woman was like walking on eggshells. “Well, we’ll have to amend that. Can’t have you racing around the countryside like a sheepdog.”
Her brows knit into a frown. “I don’t race about like a dog.”
“Then how do you herd them?” he asked, trying his damndest to look serious.
She wrung her hands. Poor chit appeared to be summoning all her dignity, which was a tall order considering the ring of muck about her skirts. “I … whistle.”
He couldn’t help it any longer. He let free a broad smile. “You whistle?”
“Aye. I whistle.”
“Luvvie, I’d pay my last bob to hear you whistle.”
Her answering shrug was meek, but the smile in her eyes wasn’t, and it brightened her, transforming those delicate features into something luminous and deep. She shuttered herself just as quickly, but not before Aidan had spotted it: like him, this Elspeth was more than she pretended to be.
Days later she found them: a pair of shears, sharp, shining, and new, nestled atop the paddock gate, with only a blue ribbon tied in a neat bow to tell Elspeth they were a gift meant for her.
Chapter 8
They’d had nearly a dozen lessons, and each had meant a visit from Aidan to her family farm. Elspeth treasured each one, waking early on days she expected him, getting well on top of her chores so that she could spend more time watching him by the sheep pasture.
And watch was all she could do, for he truly was doing a man’s work, cordoning off proper pastureland and building a low stone wall to fence it in.
Their old paddock, originally built for a pair of ponies now long gone, had been a good way to keep their few cattle penned and safe from reivers. But Aidan claimed it wasn’t large enough to accommodate twenty head of sheep. He said if the beasts could roam, they’d give better milk.
Elspeth didn’t care a whit either way. All she knew was it meant Aidan showed up to haul fence stones, and that she got to watch him.
