For all she could think about as she drifted off to sleep much faster than she would have ever expected given the circumstance and the strange bed, was that her sister was fortunate she hadn’t married such a man. Very fortunate indeed.
“Looks like you’re going to be spending some time in London, then, Dunc?”
Duncan wanted to lean over and wipe the smile off of Niall’s face, but the unfortunate truth was that his friend was right. He had backed himself into a corner and he didn’t see any other way out.
“It’s quite the commitment when you’re just doing this as a favor,” Keith added to the conversation as he poured them all another drink, to which Duncan only grunted.
For this was far more than a favor. He had lost a woman. Not only lost her, but she had chosen another man over him. That stung worse than anything else he could fathom. He had promised her father, on his word, that he would retrieve her and return her to their family. If Jane was telling the truth, it didn’t seem that was likely to be possible, but he certainly wasn’t going to leave the sister behind as well.
“I’ll talk her into leaving soon enough,” he said gruffly. “She’s a Highlander through and through. She’ll learn to hate the English, especially since the Christmas season is upon us.”
“You know, I’ve always wondered about the English Christmas,” Niall began to muse, but stopped when Duncan shot him a look that told him just what he thought about Niall’s wonderings.
“It’s fanciful,” Duncan said, waving a hand in the air. “Their celebrations have nothing to do with the actual reason for it. I only hope we will be long gone from here within the week before it arrives, and that we will be back to celebrate Hogmanay in Scotland, where we belong.”
“Have fun with the English,” Niall said with a wink. “As much as I would love to stay and watch how this all plays out — and spend a bit more time with the lovely Jane — I have to be returning. I cannot begin to fathom how this is going to end.”
“Me neither, Niall,” Duncan muttered. “Me neither.”
Jane woke sometime in the middle of the night, although she had no idea what time it was. A small bit of light shone in through the slit in the dark window curtains. She didn’t think she would ever get used to lights that never went out on the streets of London. At home, in the Highlands, when the sun set, the world turned black until morning but for the stars and moon to guide their way.
She heard an odd rustling and sat bolt upright in bed.
“Who’s there?” she asked when a muffled curse reached her ears.
“Just me,” came Duncan’s muttered voice. “Forget that I’m here.”
“I cannot pretend that you aren’t here,” she said practically, knowing that, if nothing else, Duncan’s pride and honor would prevent him from actually attempting anything untoward. “I thought we were keeping from scandal. I hardly think your presence in the bedroom is helping things.”
“No one will know,” he said. “I’m just looking for my plaid. I must have left it in here. Ye wouldn’t want me to freeze tonight, now would you?”
Jane heard the slur of his words then and she fixed her gaze toward where she could now see his silhouette.
“Are you drunk?” she asked, somewhat incredulous.
“Nay,” he insisted, but then she heard him stumble again, though how, she wasn’t entirely sure, considering there was hardly any furniture at all in the room.
“Whose house is this?” she asked, suddenly struck by the concern that the three of them had found themselves a vacant house in which to reside for the night.
“A friend of Niall’s,” he said, before a long pause. “I think.”
“Oh, dear,” she responded with a sigh, before sensing his nearing presence.
“What are you doing?” she asked, tucking herself deeper into the covers now.
“Looking for my plaid,” he repeated. “Have you seen it? It’s the McDougall red. Can’t miss it.”
“Of course I know the McDougall plaid,” Jane said, while deep within her she wondered why this strange nighttime conversation with a man she hardly knew somehow seemed rather… comfortable. “Everyone knows it.”
“Right,” he said, his voice close enough now that she could practically feel the deep rumble in her own chest. “So…”
“I have seen it,” she said slightly despondently as she was already quite chilly, for the room’s grate was bare and none of them had provided her with any intention to light a fire. “I’m lying underneath it.”
“You— oh,” he cursed. “I had forgotten. Keep it.”
“No, you take it,” she said, burrowing deep within to steal as much warmth as she could muster before it was gone. “There’s another blanket below it, although it is somewhat thin…”
“What do you take me for?” he said gruffly. “I’m not the sort of man who would leave a woman in the cold.”
“Well…” Jane wasn’t sure if she should say it.
“Well, what?”
“You did take me from my sister’s comfortable home into a freezing cold evening and forced me to stay in an empty house in a fireless room.”
Jane held her breath as she awaited his response, and was equal parts relieved and disappointed when she was met only with silence, until she saw his shadow turn and begin to retreat from the room.
“What are you going to use for sleep?”
She wasn’t sure what had made her ask him. It shouldn’t matter to her where he slept, or what he slept under. She was the victim here, and he had done nothing but cause her misery since the moment he had taken her.
And yet… she could sense that while he was too proud of a man to ever admit his mistake, he regretted his actions — and not just because he had taken the wrong sister.
He stopped in the doorway, his body taking up the entire frame.
“On the floor.”
“Without a blanket?”
He turned his head to look back at her over his shoulder, and while she couldn’t see his face, she could hear the grin in his words.
“I’m certainly not going to ask Niall to share.”
Jane took a breath, her heart beating hard when she realized just what she was about to suggest. There was every reason in the world for why she should say nothing and allow this man to keep walking out that door as she went back to sleep to prepare for what was sure to be a long day tomorrow.
But she didn’t have it within her to see another creature suffer — even if it was a big, hulking man who deserved to freeze throughout the night.
“You can sleep in here.”
He snorted. “Is this some kind of ploy to force me to return you tonight? For I most certainly will not be allowing you to sleep on the floor.”
“No, I mean…” This was a bad idea. A terrible one. “You can sleep on the bed. With me.”
That got his attention more than anything else had. He turned around completely in the doorway, and while his face was in shadow, she could sense how incredulous he was.
“You’re asking me to sleep with you?” he said, his voice filled with such disbelief that Jane wanted to throw the blankets overtop of her head and hide.