Page 105 of Keeping Kate
He stepped forward and offered his gloved hand. Kate took it, staring up at the young man. “No,” he said. “The other lady was not nearly so beautiful as this one.”
Kate cupped his gloved hand in both of hers, then nodded to the other sergeant.
“They got away, the whole lot,” the other sergeant told the lieutenant.
“We will start a search immediately. How many women came to see the prisoners? Can you describe any of them?”
“Ughsome,” one guard said. “All of them. And the prisoners—just vanished.”
“Somehow, they got past us,” the other one said. “I am not sure how. I felt as if—I was drugged. Did you feel like that, Hobbs?”
“Summat like that, aye.”
“Fools, both of you! The captain of the castle will want to see the two of you. Go on,” the lieutenant said sharply. He turned to look over the wall. “Poor soul,” he muttered, glancing down.
“Captain, I apologize,” he said, turning to Alec. “This is a pretty mess and needs clearing up. We may need to call upon you later. For now, we can summon a physician for you if you need one.”
“I am fine,” he said.
Kate took his arm. “Let me take my husband home now, sir, and tend to his wounds.” She smiled up at the man, at all of them, for the two sergeants lingered, and others stood watching. And Alec saw every man there smile at her, looking by turns stunned, affectionate, awed, and honored, and it was as if she had smiled at each man alone, making him feel singled out, superior, nearly blessed.
Then she turned and smiled at Alec, and he knew it was truly for him alone.
“Come ahead, my lass,” Alec said, taking her arm. “I had best get you gone from here before you wrap every last soldier in Edinburgh Castle around your little finger.”
She slid an arm around his waist. “There is only one man here I want to charm.”
He smiled, feeling the warmth of her words and her love within, and they went through the castle gates and walked in the cool blue shadows of the buildings crowding the top of the hill.
He hurried her along, hardly daring to look back until they reached the chocolate shop and the turn into the narrow close that would take them down the angled slope to Hopefield House.
Drawing her into a shadowed niche, Alec put his arm around her, held her tightly against him. He felt her arms loop around his neck, and she rose on tiptoe to kiss him. He felt himself whirl down into the magic of that kiss and into the miracle that had come into his life. A string of miracles like links in a silver chain, and she the crystal at the heart of it.
“I love you, Katie-Katherine,” he whispered, kissing her again. “You have thrown your glamourie fast about me, and I never want to come out of it.”
“Oh, but you are the one who threw the magic around me,” she said. “No one ever could but you. And I have surrendered to it.”
“Then we will have to stay in each other’s thrall forever,” he said. She laughed and pressed herself deeper into his embrace.
“You will have to come out of it now and then,” she whispered.
“Why? There’s no reason that I can think of.” He had her laughing now, a silvery chiming laugh that he loved, a healing sound for him.
“You have spoiled me with your fine manners and your fine house and now these sedan chairs. I rather like riding about in them.”
“Ah. I can keep you in fine stead, if you like, in the city and in the Highlands. And I would wager that we will be better off going to my Highland estate soon as we can to get away from the kerfuffle we have caused here in town.”
“Come into the house for now, Captain. You are injured and I want to tend to it.” She walked with him toward the house. “I have ways of tending to such things.”
He laughed. He could not help it. “Do you indeed. I truly love you, Katie my las,” he said. “And the sooner we are alone, the sooner I can show you how much.”
She smiled sweetly, and as she looked up, Alec saw it again, that soft radiance like an inner light—the glamourie, the fairy gift within her.
He knew then that he would be blessed to see that luminosity in her every day for the rest of his life, not always with his eyes—but forever with his heart.
