Page 87 of A Scot on the Rocks

He took her hand, guiding her behind a shoulder of stone where the path doubled back. “Here. Quickly.”

There was just enough room for two people between the rocks, provided neither of them had any objection to standing extraordinarily close to the other. Olivia found herself with her back against cold stone and Jamie in front of her, his arm braced beside her shoulder, his back against the opposite wall, as he peered out toward the road. When a lantern swept across the hillside, Jamie drew back into shadow and Olivia held still, listening to the sound of the men on the path below.

One of the excisemen stopped. “Thought I heard a horse.”

“There’s sheep enough here,” another answered. “Mayhap one has learned to neigh.”

The first man didn’t laugh. He moved a few steps toward the slope while the lantern light climbed across the gorse.

Jamie set one finger against Olivia’s lips. She would have objected to the presumption under ordinary circumstances, but the man below was looking directly toward where they were hiding, so she limited herself to narrowing her eyes.

The lantern moved again. Somewhere below, a horse shifted its tack, and Jamie’s attention turned sharply toward the sound. Olivia was certain the exciseman would hear it too.

Instead, the man called to his companions, “Dunarraidh’s on the hill.”

“That blasted ghost again?” one of them said. “I’d rather meet a damned smuggler.”

Olivia remembered Jamie’s drifting sheet and polite knocks. The comparison with a genuinely terrifying specter seemed generous, but she wasn’t about to argue the point while the man’s lantern was close enough to illuminate the edge of her skirts.

“May the fleas of ten taverns find his breeches,” she whispered.

Jamie’s shoulders shifted.

She looked up to see he was biting the inside of his cheek.

“Don’t you dare,” she mouthed.

“Me?” he whispered, his voice barely carrying. “Ye started it.”

“I was offering a blessing on him.”

“A fine Christian woman ye are.”

His breath brushed warm against her temple, and she had to press her own lips together. They stood there trying not to breathe while a government officer debated whether to climb the hill and be murdered by a sheet.

A branch caught the man’s coat, and he cursed as he dragged it free. The second lantern approached, its bearer telling him that the captain wanted the bridge checked before they wasted another hour chasing sounds through the dark. After a long moment, the man turned and followed his companions back toward the road.

They waited while the footsteps faded. A birdcall sounded from the high ground, made by one of Jamie’s men to tell him the ponies were safely hidden. The sound was followed, a little later, by another from farther down the glen. Ewan’s party was clear too.

She should have been relieved enough to step straight out of the crevice, but Jamie was inches from her, one hand resting against the stone while the other lightly covered her fingers. She couldn’t remember when she’d caught the front of his coat, only that her hand had ended up there while they listened to the approaching men.

“Ye can breathe now,” he murmured.

She looked up intending to deliver a retort but it vanished from her mind when she saw his expression.

The teasing had gone from his green eyes. Rain clung to his dark hair and the warmth in his gaze was so different from the easy charm he bestowed on everyone that Olivia felt it all the way to her toes.

Jamie lifted his hand to her face, giving her ample time to draw away. When she didn’t, his fingers settled gently against her cheek, his thumb brushing aside a damp strand of hair.

She wanted him to kiss her. A great deal more than was sensible.

He leaned nearer, slowly enough that she knew he would stop if she asked. She could have closed the remaining space herself, and for an instant she nearly did, because he was Jamie, because he made her laugh when everything around her was strange, and because he’d never once expected her to be less capable than she was.

But then his hand fell away, and he eased back enough to give her room. “Apologies, Olivia. Ye are still in mourning.”

Damn her fake dead husband.

He offered his hand to help her out of the narrow shelter. She took it, grateful for the steadiness of him and miserable because she still wanted him to kiss her.