Snowy Night with a Highlander Read Online Free PDF Page B

paused and glanced back at him. “You may wait on the other side of the wagon, if you please!”
    Duncan touched the brim of his hat and walked around to the other side of the wagon. But he peeked around the back, watching her enter the forest with her arms held wide, as if she were surrendering to someone, and slowly, carefully, made her way into the forest.
    Fiona Haines, Duncan was discovering, was a curious and surprisingly lively young woman.
    *   *   *
    When Fiona emerged from the woods, the Buchanan man was standing at the back of the wagon, one arm folded across his chest, the hand resting beneath his other arm, which seemed to hang at an odd angle from his body, and one leg casually crossed over the other. His head was down and the brim of his hat was pulled low, over his face. He was tall, well over six feet, a big man with very broad shoulders.
    He was intriguing, this big, silent man with the damaged arm and the patched eye, and she was curious to know what he looked like beneath the scarves and the wool coat and gloves and the eye patch. If he hadn’t spoken a word or two at the way station, she would have thought him mute.
    He straightened when he saw her and opened the wagon’s gate. He leaned over, cupping one hand to help her up. Fiona followed him and stood a moment, looking at his hand. “Come on, then,” he said low, the irritation evident in his voice.
    But his voice! It was quiet and low, like a dark whisper. It sparked something in her, a rush of blood and a distant memory or a dream so fleeting she could not catch it. “I am coming,” she said. “No need for a fit of apoplexy.” She slipped her booted foot into his hand, felt his fingers close tightly around her foot, then vault her up, as if she were light as a feather. She put one knee down, a breath catching in her throat when he put a hand to her hip to keep her from falling backward.
    Fiona quickly moved inside and glanced over her shoulder, looking at him. The Buchanan man put his good hand on the gate, and swung it shut, locking it into place, and returned her look. Their gazes held a long moment. A long, crackling moment.
    “Ready?” he asked.
    “Yes. Thank you,” she said, and reluctantly turned away from him to pick her way through the crates and bundles to her little spot in the wagon.
    When his weight dipped the wagon to one side, and he started the team to trotting again, Fiona could not help but think of that broad expanse of his back, just inches from her, and the delicious feeling of his hand on her hip.
    The thought of it lulled her into a shallow sleep; she lay down on the bench, pillowing her hands beneath her face. She thought she dozed only briefly, but when the wagon came to a halt—almost flinging her to the floor—Fiona noticed it was dusk.
    She pushed herself up and winced at the pain in her neck, the result of napping on the bench. The sounds of people and animals reached her—a village, she supposed—as did the growl of her stomach. Fiona made her way to the end of the wagon and climbed down, forcing a devil-may-care smile to a pair of men in dirty buckskins who—how lucky for her—were on hand to watch her emerge from the wagon. “Good evening,” she said, and turned away from them, almost colliding with Mr. Duncan.
    “Oh. Pardon,” she said. In the waning light of day, he looked even more darkly mysterious. “Please tell me we have stopped to dine. I am famished.”
    “We’ve stopped for the night.”
    “For the night,” she repeated, and glanced around her. The village was rather small—a few buildings on the high street and one inn. “Where are we?”
    “Airth.” He leaned over her and removed a saddlebagfrom the back of the wagon and manuevered it over one shoulder.
    She was not familiar with Airth, and wanted to ask him more, but he was moving. So Fiona moved with him.
    Mr. Duncan stopped and nodded at the wagon as if she were a child. “You stay.”
    “Pardon, but I donna believe