Conall: The 93rd Highlanders, Book Two Read Online Free Page A

the past couple of months
as they both waited for Conall to come back. Now that he had, she’d
thought the captain would disappear. She was glad he hadn’t. There
was a steadiness and a calm about him that made her think
everything would be all right. She hadn’t thought that in many a
long year.
    “ I wish you
would let me find you better quarters,” he said. “The French have
dug huts of a sort. They’re far warmer than this one. I could get
someone to dig one for you. Or a tent. A nice big one.”
    “ Oh, you’ll
be getting me a marquis tent?” she asked with a laugh. “I’d be too
far away from the Ninety Third, then, wouldn’t I? And the ground is
too frozen for digging now.” She smiled at him as she stitched.
Several of the buttons on his double-breasted jacket were loose.
“You weren’t a farmer, were you?” she asked, curious about his
background. He’d never said much about it.
    He shook his head,
pulling her blanket tighter about himself. She idly wondered if it
would smell like him when she wrapped it around herself tonight.
She hoped so.
    “ No,” he
answered her, to her surprise. “My father was a professor of
history.”
    She stopped sewing and
blew on her fingers to warm them up. “A professor?” she exclaimed.
“So you’ve got schooling, then? What are you doing
here?”
    He laughed. “I’m not
really sure,” he admitted ruefully. “It just seemed like a good
idea at the time.” He gestured to the jacket in her lap. “And I
liked the scarlet.”
    “ Ah, laddie,
we all like the scarlet.” He laughed with her.
    “ Mrs. Scott.”
Their laughter died at the sound of Conall’s voice outside the
tent. They just sat and stared at each other for a second or two.
Avril’s heart began to beat fast and hard, and she wasn’t sure why.
It didn’t feel like fear. It was the same way she’d felt earlier
today, when they were surrounding her in her tent.
    Munro slowly stood up,
never breaking his stare.
    “ Come in,”
she called out quickly, afraid of what he’d do or say. Why was she
afraid all of a sudden? He always retreated when things got too
intimate between them, and he’d retreated today when Conall had
returned.
    Conall came into the tent
and stopped short when he saw Munro there. His back stiffened.
“Munro,” he greeted him cautiously. He turned and bowed his head
slightly. “Mrs. Scott. I hope I’m not intruding.” He was being very
formal. Avril felt out of her depth.
    “ Lieutenant,”
she said just as formally. “I’m mending the captain’s jacket for
him. What can I do for you?”
    “ I came to
see if you needed anything,” Conall said, and there it was again,
that tone full of longing and affection. The voice that made her
foolishly want things he wasn’t willing to give.
    “ You know
what I need,” she replied calmly. “Are you ready to give it to
me?”
    “ I shall take
my leave, Mrs. Scott,” Munro said, carefully folding her blanket
and laying it down on the cot. He held out his hand for his jacket.
“Thank you.”
    For some reason his
desertion tonight was a sharp disappointment. Blinking back
unexpected, inexplicable tears she bit off the thread and smoothed
her hand over his jacket before handing it back. “Be more careful
with it,” she said sharply. “You’re lucky you didn’t lose the
buttons.”
    “ Yes, ma’am,”
he replied respectfully, all humor and intimacy gone. He picked up
his scabbard and sash and moved toward the tent opening without
putting any of them on. “Good evening, Fletcher,” he said, and then
he was gone.
     
     

C hapter T hree
     
     
    “ I’m sorry,”
Conall said, and was surprised to realize he meant it. “I didn’t
mean to run him off.”
    “ You didn’t,”
Avril said, busy tucking her sewing things back into a small box.
“I did.”
    Conall didn’t want to
ask, he didn’t want to know, but some perverse creature in him made
him do it anyway. “Did you ask him to be your man
again?”
    Avril