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Sighing and giggling at the same time, she closed her eyes. Suddenly, a darkness covered her. Robert was standing over her, his thick body blocking out the sun.
She couldn’t determine if she was dizzy from whipping her head around or because warm brown eyes stared at her.
‘We need to talk,’ Robert said.
Aye, they did. She patted Alec’s stomach and got up. Maisie had walked around a tree. Brushing the dirt from her little fingers, she placed her in Flora’s lap and grabbed her shawl.
She gave Flora a smile. ‘Please check the traps and set them again. See that Alec picks up some kindling sticks. We’re awfully low. I’ll be right back.’
She turned to Robert. ‘We’ll walk to the valley.’
Since her arrival, she hadn’t dared go to the valley in the full light of day. However, it would afford them some privacy and maybe in the light of the devastation he would offer his help.
* * *
Robert followed. He tried to pretend to himself it was curiosity that made him watch the way she walked or how she nervously bit her bottom lip.
Her shawl was a deep hue of green and it highlighted her colouring, framed the length of her curves. Her hair was not a dark brown as he had supposed, but a flaming red. Not the soft red of English beauties, but a deep poppy-coloured hair, almost unreal in its intensity. Her eyes were the colour of whisky in bright sunlight. Her skin was covered by so many freckles they darkened her skin. Her mouth was wide and her lips were the colour of peaches.
Her limping was more pronounced the further they walked and he slowed his pace to walk beside her.
In all his years, he had never seen a woman look as she did. It was as if she were sent down from the sun. Her colouring alone would have made her unusual, her height something to gawk at. She was not beautiful. Indeed, her nose was almost crooked and her chin too pointed. But it didn’t matter.
He wanted her. He was too experienced not to recognise the first talons of lust. But that, too, did not matter. There were other matters needing his attention.
‘When you came here, you didn’t come with four children, did you?’ he asked.
‘Nae. They are the only ones who survived.’
‘Is the boy mute?’
Her brow furrowed and she gave a quick shake to her head. ‘Creighton refuses to speak.’
He suspected as much. All morning, the boy had glared with silent unflinching hatred. Fortunately, Alec’s chatter had filled any awkward silences.
There had been plenty of awkward silences, too. He did not know what to do with the children. So he had fixed breakfast for himself and for them. He was glad he wouldn’t have to worry about their care much longer.
They reached the crest of the hill and Gaira turned around to begin her descent.
‘Here, let me help you.’ He moved closer and gestured with his arms.
She waved him away. ‘I’ve been doing it fine.’
He pointed to her ankle. ‘Is it broken?’
‘I doona think so.’
She didn’t say any more, though the ankle was swollen. What woman didn’t complain about an ailment?
‘You said you were travelling to Doonhill when it occurred?’ he asked. They passed the valley’s curve and he could see the lake.
‘Aye, I think I arrived only a few hours later. I was coming to visit my kin.’
‘Alone?’
‘Of course alone.’ Wariness entered her eyes. ‘What does it matter?’
It didn’t. He didn’t know why he asked. But he didn’t know why he was here, either.
‘What woman travels alone and dressed in a man’s clothes?’ he asked.
She stumbled, but he pretended not to notice.
‘What kind of English soldier travels alone in Scottish lands to inspect a village his men massacred?’ she retorted.
He didn’t have an answer for that. What would she think when she knew that he was no mere solider, but ‘Black Robert’, the most feared of English knights?
His squire had started the rumours and songs of Black Robert. The more deeds he did, the more the rumours and songs spread. He couldn’t enter a new camp or battlefield without the name being whispered. He was lucky she did not recognise him. If she had, his sword would be through his own gut.
They reached the bottom of the hill and walked to where she’d been digging. As they neared the bodies, she made a clearing sound in her throat.
He waited. Although it was he who had wanted to talk, he knew why she wanted the conversation here. In the light of day, there were unflinching views of the horror. Children with their plump arms ripped off, women sliced and men face down were all lined up. Waiting to be buried with the potatoes.
‘Will you help me?’ she asked.
After battles, dead bodies had simply been landscapes of war. He and his soldiers had buried many. But she was no hardened soldier. She could not have seen such atrocities before. Why would she endure such hardship?
‘Why do you not just leave?’
‘I won’t.’ She paused. ‘So, will you do it? I need to bury them and quickly.’
‘It would be more expedient if you burned them on a pyre,’ he said.
She gasped. ‘They’ve seen too much fire.’
He was not prepared for the weight of grief hovering over him. He was not prepared for any feelings. But this woman, bringing him here, was causing all the emotions of the world to stab and slice at him.
There was no logical reason for him to be here. He had had a bad dream and suddenly he was making the journey. He massaged the back of his neck and tried to distance himself from the gnawing gripping his chest.
But it hadn’t been a bad dream compelling him to come here. It had been a memory and one he had tried to forget.
It had been a long time since he’d felt anger and even longer than that since he had thought of the fire. But he had done both. It was the village that troubled him.
An entire village destroyed and his fellow Englishmen had done it. He could not shake the feeling he was responsible. If he had not been fighting a battle so near Doonhill, then all those people would be alive. They were innocent and shouldn’t have died.
‘So, will you bury them? Put them at peace?’ she repeated. ‘Quickly?’
To answer her would be to commit to something he did not want. But he could not mistake the urgency in her voice. Alone and only working a couple of hours a night, she would have to be here the better part of a sennight to get all of them buried. It would make her vulnerable to more danger.
‘You risk much staying here as long as you have.’
‘’Tis their kin. I felt... Nae, I needed to let the children know their families rest peacefully.’
It was practically a death wish for her to persist. ‘I am sure they are grateful for the efforts you have been making, but it is foolishness to remain here. The Englishmen who did this could have returned and slaughtered you all.’
She stopped biting her lip. ‘Like you?’
‘I told you it was not me.’
The haunted look in her eyes vanished. ‘Aye, but I’m not so sure I believe you. You’re obviously an English soldier and couldn’t have just been passing by.’
He did not answer her. He didn’t need her to believe him.
She folded her arms across her chest. ‘It is irrelevant to discuss this. They did not return and all I ask is for your help.’
She wasn’t leaving him alone. He added stubborn to her personality. ‘Aye, but there are other dangers here. The children informed me your supplies ran out. How are you able to gather food enough to feed five?’
‘We’ve been surviving.’
‘But for how long?’
She whirled to face him, anger bringing her to her full height. ‘I had hoped to have been done by now. I hadn’t planned on being injured. Will you help me? Because I know how precious little time I have to survive out here. I doona need you telling me. What kind of man won’t help a woman bury her kin?’
She pushed herself forward and grabbed a spade lying on the ground. He could see it was a crude tool, hardly sufficient to do the task before them. The blade was black, the handle nothing but a roughened stick. The original handle had probably burned in the fire.
Aye, she was stubborn, her chin was sticking out and there was a challenge to her eyes, but her lips were trembling and she was pale under her freckles.
Cursing, he covered the distance between them and grabbed the spade from her hands. She stumbled a bit from his force and he put his hand at her elbow until she got her balance.
‘Your dead will be buried today,’ he growled.
He could see her anger was quickly crumbling. She was struggling, choking on emotions and words he didn’t want to hear.
‘Why now? Why now are you being kind?’ Grief filled her voice.
An image of a slender body wrapped in white and lying against green leaves flashed before him. He abruptly let go of her elbow. She lost her balance, but this time he did not touch her.
‘I will bury your dead,’ he repeated, his voice cold. ‘But do not mistake what I do for kindness.’
He drove the weak spade through the tilled earth. The blade wobbled, but did not break. He could feel her standing behind him, but this time she did not interrupt him.
Chapter Seven (#ulink_1def1ba6-f51d-562e-8f3d-3135693d65d3)
It was late in the day when Gaira stood on the crest of the valley’s hill. It was her third time to do so, but this time she had a purpose. She clenched the greenery she had gathered for the graves.
Where she stood, she could see the garden of graves and the lake just beyond. Her eyes did not linger on the landscape, but on the man working below.
In the heat of the day, he had taken off his clothes and wore just his braies as she had seen the English peasants do in the fields. But this man was no peasant.
He dug with a spade and toiled at her request, but he held himself as a man used to commanding. Maybe it was the tilt of his head, his shoulders thrown back, or his sword gleaming by his feet.
He dug deep into the dirt and threw it off to the side. Each rugged cord of his muscles was defined by each movement he made. There wasn’t an ounce of waste on him and he was thick from his neck to his calves. A woman could trace his sinews with ease.
She felt a curious pull and her fingers were tingling again. She didn’t understand the tingling now, but she knew it wasn’t nervousness.
She focused on his more disagreeable features: the unruly length of his hair, the scruffiness of his beard, the flat scars peppering his body from his neck down and along his arms. But it was no use. His body pleased her.
‘Nothing but a ragabash loun you are, Gaira of Colquhoun.’ She had more important matters than noticing Robert of Dent was a fine-looking man.
Irritated, she took her eyes off Robert and saw new graves were dug and filled. He had even worked on the few graves she’d started. They were deeper now, the bodies more protected. In less than a day, he was done.
He was a contrary man. She had begged him, pleaded with him, but he hadn’t taken the spade until she had given up. He’d agreed to help and she still didn’t understand why.
And he had done it far more quickly than she would have been able to. She could only hope it was quick enough; that she had time to make it to her brothers before they were caught by her betrothed. There was a chance of making it. But she still needed Robert’s help.
She tried not to think about his reluctance to bury her dead. Surely he would stay now and help them the rest of the way.
Shifting the greenery in her arms, she carefully sidestepped down the steep hill. Slipping, her foot hit a rock and she stumbled, scattering branches everywhere.
‘Artless and bootless.’ She angrily picked up each branch and leaf and tucked them into the crook of her arm. ‘That’s what you are. In more ways than one.’
She slid backward until the slope became flat and then she whirled around. Robert stood a hand’s breadth from her. Startled, she stumbled again, branches flew and her body slid against his.
Her world was instantly, aggressively the smell of hot male and cedar and the feel of sweat-covered skin. Her fingers clawed down shoulder muscles she’d gawked at all day. Her breasts burned, her legs tangled. She teetered and pressed harder for support.
Robert inhaled, sharp, as if he’d been dropped into an icy lake. He ripped himself away.
She lost her balance. Strong arms yanked around her waist before her face hit the ground.
Greatly irritated and embarrassed, she flexed her foot. ‘Ach! ’Tis not further damaged. Nae thanks to—’
She couldn’t finish as she met his gaze.
Gaze was too tame a word. She felt pinned by brown eyes moving over her face as though she were a feast laid out before a starving man. She felt him taking in each and every one of her considerable freckles, her too-wide mouth and her unfeminine chin.
She was consciously aware of her raw-boned frame, her small breasts, the gangly length of her legs. The tingling in her fingers was spreading to the rest of her body. Rapidly. And back again.
His arms, arms she had been admiring only moments before, wrapped more tightly around her, cradled her, began to lift her.
She soaked up the thickness of his eyelashes as they shadowed the hard planes of his cheekbones, the cluster of tiny scars disappearing into his beard along the right of his jaw, the fullness of his lower lip.
He was going to kiss her; she knew it. She parted her lips to take in air.
Then he put her down and took a huge step away.
Humiliation swept through her. She stared at the pebbles around her feet. Braving the year-long seconds between them, she finally thought of something to say.
‘You’re done?’ she asked.
