Rogue with a Brogue by Suzanne Enoch Page B

their family histories were intwined, it had been surprisingly easy to refrain from mentioning MacLawrys or Campbells, or MacAllisters or Stewarts. She certainly knew at whom the majority of his suspicion and anger had been aimed over most of his twenty-seven years, just as he was obviously aware how many times his family’s name had been sworn at by hers. And words were the least of it. Mary nodded.
    â€œIs this your first time in London, then?” she asked, deciding to change the subject before things became testy.
    The glance he sent her from beneath long, dark lashes was amused. “Nae. We all attended Oxford, though there’s some debate over whether Bear actually opened a book. I came doon a few times with friends, but nae fer long. And I had to march in a parade before Prince George once, when my regiment came back from the Peninsula.”
    â€œSo you served in the army?”
    They both reached for the same tea cake, their fingers brushing. And neither of them gave way. If this was purely a friendship they were beginning, it was an odd one; she didn’t get shivers when she held hands with Liz or Kathleen. Finally he turned up her palm and placed the sweet into it.
    â€œAye. Fer four years.”
    â€œBut the Mac—you, I mean—stayed in the Highlands to avoid the English, I thought. Why fight for them?”
    He shrugged. “It was encouraged that we prove our loyalty to the Crown. If I hadnae gone, Bear would have. As his head is better suited fer being a battering ram than fer thinking, I’m fairly certain he would’ve gotten himself killed.”
    â€œYou’re very close to your brothers and sister, aren’t you?” She knew they were a feared and united clan, but for some reason the idea that they felt affection for each other had never really occurred to her—not that she’d spent much time thinking about the MacLawrys at all, except as the people who prevented her from visiting her grandfather in Scotland on all but the rarest and briefest of occasions.
    â€œDid I give that impression?” he returned with a slow grin. “Aye, we wouldnae have survived withoot each other. They’re my dearest friends. Are ye and yer cousins close? Ye seem to have at least forty of ’em.”
    Mary chuckled. “My father has two younger brothers and three younger sisters. At last count I had thirteen first cousins.”
    â€œBut ye’re yer father’s only bairn?”
    â€œYes.” She nibbled at a cake to give herself a moment. “I had an older brother, William—named for my grandfather—but he died before I was born. Only a few days old, I think. They don’t talk about him much. And because Mother got so sick when I was born, they didn’t want to risk having another child.”
    â€œYe know, considering how much I thought I knew about ye, Mary, nearly everything ye tell me is a surprise.” He moved in closer to the table and reached out to tap his forefinger against her knuckles. The gesture looked innocent enough, but as he met her gaze with those light blue eyes of his, it felt surprisingly sensuous. Oh, my.
    â€œLikewise,” she returned, attempting to keep her mind on the conversation. “You and your brothers were bedtime stories my uncles and cousins told me to keep me awake and shivering under the covers. You’re supposed to have a needle-thin dagger in your boot, for instance, that’s still red with the crusted blood of … my kin.”
    â€œOh, aye, I do.”
    She blinked. “What?”
    Reaching beneath the table, he produced an old, sharp-looking knife. It looked very clean, just the sort of tool a Highlander would use for skinning the deer he shot. “More or less, anyway.” His gaze growing serious, he sheathed the blade again. “It’s nae spilled a drop of yer kin’s blood. My fist has; I split Charles Calder’s lip just last week, as I