now? Why now are you being kind?’ Grief filled her voice.
An image of a slender body wrapped in white and lying against green leaves flashed before him. He abruptly let go of her elbow. She lost her balance, but this time he did not touch her.
‘I will bury your dead,’ he repeated, his voice cold. ‘But do not mistake what I do for kindness.’
He drove the weak spade through the tilled earth. The blade wobbled, but did not break. He could feel her standing behind him, but this time she did not interrupt him.
It was late in the day when Gaira stood on the crest of the valley’s hill. It was her third time to do so, but this time she had a purpose. She clenched the greenery she had gathered for the graves.
Where she stood, she could see the garden of graves and the lake just beyond. Her eyes did not linger on the landscape, but on the man working below.
In the heat of the day, he had taken off his clothes and wore just his braies as she had seen the English peasants do in the fields. But this man was no peasant.
He dug with a spade and toiled at her request, but he held himself as a man used to commanding. Maybe it was the tilt of his head, his shoulders thrown back, or his sword gleaming by his feet.
He dug deep into the dirt and threw it off to the side. Each rugged cord of his muscles was defined by each movement he made. There wasn’t an ounce of waste on him and he was thick from his neck to his calves. A woman could trace his sinews with ease.
She felt a curious pull and her fingers were tingling again. She didn’t understand the tingling now, but she knew it wasn’t nervousness.
She focused on his more disagreeable features: the unruly length of his hair, the scruffiness of his beard, the flat scars peppering his body from his neck down and along his arms. But it was no use. His body pleased her.
‘Nothing but a ragabash loun you are, Gaira of Colquhoun.’ She had more important matters than noticing Robert of Dent was a fine-looking man.
Irritated, she took her eyes off Robert and saw new graves were dug and filled. He had even worked on the few graves she’d started. They were deeper now, the bodies more protected. In less than a day, he was done.
He was a contrary man. She had begged him, pleaded with him, but he hadn’t taken the spade until she had given up. He’d agreed to help and she still didn’t understand why.
And he had done it far more quickly than she would have been able to. She could only hope it was quick enough; that she had time to make it to her brothers before they were caught by her betrothed. There was a chance of making it. But she still needed Robert’s help.
She tried not to think about his reluctance to bury her dead. Surely he would stay now and help them the rest of the way.
Shifting the greenery in her arms, she carefully sidestepped down the steep hill. Slipping, her foot hit a rock and she stumbled, scattering branches everywhere.
‘Artless and bootless.’ She angrily picked up each branch and leaf and tucked them into the crook of her arm. ‘That’s what you are. In more ways than one.’
She slid backward until the slope became flat and then she whirled around. Robert stood a hand’s breadth from her. Startled, she stumbled again, branches flew and her body slid against his.
Her world was instantly, aggressively the smell of hot male and cedar and the feel of sweat-covered skin. Her fingers clawed down shoulder muscles she’d gawked at all day. Her breasts burned, her legs tangled. She teetered and pressed harder for support.
Robert inhaled, sharp, as if he’d been dropped into an icy lake. He ripped himself away.
She lost her balance. Strong arms yanked around her waist before her face hit the ground.
Greatly irritated and embarrassed, she flexed her foot. ‘Ach! ’Tis not further damaged. Nae thanks to—’
She couldn’t finish as she met his gaze.
Gaze was too tame a word. She felt pinned by brown eyes moving over her face as though she were a feast laid out before a starving man. She felt him taking in each and every one of her considerable freckles, her too-wide mouth and her unfeminine chin.
She was consciously aware of her raw-boned frame, her small breasts, the gangly length of her legs. The tingling in her fingers was spreading to the rest of her body. Rapidly. And back again.
His arms, arms she had been admiring only moments before, wrapped more tightly around her, cradled her, began to lift her.
She soaked up the thickness of his eyelashes as they shadowed the hard planes of his cheekbones, the cluster of tiny scars disappearing into his beard along the right of his jaw, the fullness of his lower lip.
He was going to kiss her; she knew it. She parted her lips to take in air.
Then he put her down and took a huge step away.
Humiliation swept through her. She stared at the pebbles around her feet. Braving the year-long seconds between them, she finally thought of something to say.
‘You’re done?’ she asked.
‘Almost.’ He picked up the spade and started to flatten some of graves.
She glanced at him. He wasn’t looking at her. Which was good. She was feeling too raw from his rejection.
‘What do you do with those branches?’ he asked.
The greenery from birch branches, twigs and fern leaves lay as scattered as her thoughts.
Frowning, she concentrated hard before she remembered. ‘They’re to honour the graves. I wanted to give them more than just dirt.’ He didn’t help her as she picked up the scattered branches. ‘Let them know they were—’
She couldn’t finish the thought. It hurt too much to think of her sister. Pained too much to remember how the children had lost their parents. She tiptoed over the graves and placed the branches and greenery over them. She was glad she could hide her face while she arranged the branches. But it didn’t take long. She didn’t have much.
Now she only had the living to worry about. And that included herself. At least until her body stopped feeling this longing for a stranger and her heart stopped feeling this foolish hurt.
She brushed the back of her hands across her cheeks. She didn’t know what to say to him.
‘I prepared the food,’ she said when she could bear the silence no more.
He didn’t answer and she looked up. He was looking at her decorated graves, his brow furrowed, his cheeks hollowed out. He stuck the spade into the ground with unnecessary force, his eyes not meeting hers.
She hesitated before walking back to the camp. He followed her, but when she stumbled at the top of the hill, he did not help her.
*
