Chapter Eight

Eight

"A ye lass. 'Tis Jamie Graham. In the flesh." His hazel eyes narrowed dangerously. "Ye're seein' better than ye used to, ain't ye?"

Prudence took another step backward. "I went to London. I had an operation." She was a terrible liar and they both knew it.

To her shock, he flung a wiry leg over the windowsill and climbed into her room. No man other than her papa had ever set foot in her bedchamber. She hugged her night rail tight around her.

"Maybe it was a miracle," he said. "You one of them Catholics?" He wiggled his bony fingers at her. "Did a priest sprinkle holy water in yer eyes? I don't want no one sayin' Jamie Graham don't understand miracles. Me own da's a minister of the kirk."

In her surprise, she forgot her fear. "Your father is a minister?"

"Aye, that he is." He leered at her. "Don't it show?"

"Of course," she said faintly. "I suspected it from the first moment we met."

He brushed dirt and leaves from the seat of his pants onto her pristine rug. "Damned ivy."

Prudence drew herself up. "I wish it had been rose bushes. It would have served you right for daring to spy on a young lady."

Her indignation did not trouble Jamie. His gamin face crinkled in a smile. "Nice place ye got here." In horror, she watched as he flung himself on the bed, crossing his ankles and resting his head on folded hands as if he planned to stay. "Very nice indeed."

He gave the down mattress an experimental bounce before jumping up. His boots left dirty smudges on the counterpane. She jerked up her bolster, brushed it off, then clutched it in front of her. Her eyes widened as Jamie careened around the chamber like an elf run amok.

He scooped up her gilt hand mirror and surveyed his foxlike face from all angles, then puckered up and blew his reflection a kiss before lifting her hairbrush to his matted mop. At her helpless sound of dismay, he turned the brush over in his hands and studied it with a sly smile.

"Worth a pretty shilling, if ye ask me."

"I didn't ask you," she said, desperate to rid her chamber of the horrid creature.

He tried on her spectacles and splashed a dab of rose water behind each ear. "The ladies love a good scent on a man, don't they? That's what Sebastian told me." He spun around on the stool. "Look what it's done for him. Two lovely lasses under one roof. Which room does he come to first every night? Yers or hers?"

Prudence's trembling ceased. She felt dangerously close to using the hairpin in her hand. Jamie had good reason to be thankful it wasn't a loaded pistol. "I don't think rose water was what Sebastian had in mind. Would you please leave my room?"

Jamie's mischievous grin faded. He rose, shrugging his thin shoulders. "Never say Jamie Graham don't aim to please the ladies. I thought ye might be lonely while Sebastian was out gallivantin' with the other one."

He started for the window, casting her a wounded glance from beneath his sparse auburn lashes.

"Wait." Prudence startled herself as curiosity overcame both anger and fear. She might never have a better opportunity to learn about her aunt's enigmatic fiancé. "Is Sebastian Kerr his real name?"

Jamie shrugged again. "It is now. Used to be Kirkpatrick. Sometimes we just call him Kirk." Sighing, he sank down on the window seat. "Why is it every time I'm in a lass's bedroom, I end up answerin' questions about him?" His voice shifted to a whining falsetto. "What color does he like? What's his favorite food? What pleases him in bed?" He snorted. "If I knew that, they wouldn't need to worry about it, would they?"

"He wouldn't be very pleased to know you'd been here, would he?" She dared a sweet smile.

He acknowledged her threat with a mocking smirk.

"Have you ever been to his home in the Highlands—Dunkirk?"

"Aye. Tiny snuck me up there one night when we was hidin' out."

"What is it like?"

Jamie shook his head at the memory. "A crumblin' hole of a castle perched at the edge of heaven itself."

Prudence sat down cross-legged on the carpet, still clutching the bolster. "If it's such a hole, why does he risk everything to gain it back?" Her real question remained unspoken. Why will he even marry Tricia for it?

"'Cause he don't want a stinkin' MacKay to have it. The MacKays and the Kerrs have been sworn enemies since the massacre at Culloden. Sebastian's ma came all the way from France to be MacKay's bride. Sebastian's da kidnapped her and kept her for his own. MacKay swore revenge. When Sebastian's da dropped dead in his boots, MacKay took Dunkirk. Sebastian was little older than a lad. There was nothin' he could do to stop him."

"Did you know Sebastian's father?"

"No." Jamie shuddered. "But Tiny told me about him. He was the meanest son-of-a-bitch whose boots ever shook the heather. Did ye see the scar under Sebastian's chin?"

She nodded slowly, hesitant to remind Jamie of her nearness to Sebastian in the crofter's hut.

"That's where his da's ring caught him when he dared to shed a tear at his own ma's burial. ‘Men don't cry,' he told him. And the lad little more than a babe himself!"

Prudence twisted the bolster in her hands, caught off guard by the dangerous welling of emotion in her throat.

"Lass?" Jamie's voice was surprisingly kind.

She lifted her head, blinking back unshed tears.

He cocked his head to the side, studying her. "Back at the hut, Tiny didn't understand what Sebastian saw in ye. Ye ain't really his sort, if ye know what I mean. But I can kind of see it now. Ye ain't so bad. When ye came out of the house that first day, I thought it might be ye he set out to marry. It would have made good sense to keep ye quiet that way."

She pursed her lips thoughtfully.

Jamie shifted his weight from window seat to windowsill. "Look, lass, just watch yer back when he's around."

She stood, letting the bolster drop to the floor. She barely felt the brush of the kitten against her ankle. "Why?"

"Ye know what they say about curiosity and cats." He drew his forefinger across his throat.

She glanced down at her cat. When she looked up again, the window was empty and Jamie was running fleet-footed and silent across the lawn. Prudence stood for a long time, staring at nothing and shivering in the warm night breeze.