“Nay. It is not soft enough. Gillendria, go fetch the silks stored in the tapestry room. Adam gave me something that should suit well. Bring me the bolt of gold silk.”
Duncan leaned back in his chair, his arms folded behind his head and his boots propped on the table. The front legs of his chair hovered precariously a few inches above the floor, then hit the floor with a thump when Galan kicked the back of the chair.
“What is wrong with you, Galan?” Duncan complained.
“Keep your feet off the table,” Galan reprimanded. “They’re dirty.”
“Leave him be, Galan. The table can be wiped,” Circenn said absently, fingering a pale blue wool and discarding it with a shake of his head.
Duncan and Galan looked at Circenn as if he’d lost his mind. “What have we come to? Mud on the table? You—sorting through fabric? Does this mean tupping in the kitchen is acceptable now, too?” Duncan asked, disbelievingly.
“Far be it from me to regulate tupping,” Circenn said mildly, lifting a fold of crimson velvet.
Galan snapped Duncan’s mouth shut with a finger beneath his chin. “I thought you hated the gifts Adam brought you, Circenn,” Galan reminded the laird.
Circenn tossed aside a pale rose linen. “Only bold colors for the lass,” he told the maids. “Except perhaps lavender.” He glanced at the seamstress standing near his chair. “Have you any lavender?”
At the top of the stairs, Lisa blushed. He was obviously recalling her bra and panties. The thought sent a flush of heat through her. But then her brow furrowed: Who was Adam and why did he bring gifts and why did Circenn hate them? She shook her head, watching him pick through the bolts spread across the table. A half-dozen women were gathered around Circenn, picking up the fabrics he had approved.
“A cloak from the velvet,” he said, “with black fur at the rim of the hood and cuffs. My colors,” he added smugly.
Lisa froze, thrown off balance by the possessive note in his voice. My colors, he’d said, but she’d clearly heard him say, my woman.
And it had thrilled her.
She stepped back quickly and ducked into a corner, leaning against the wall, her heart pounding.
What was she doing?
She’d been standing at the top of the stairs in the fourteenth century, watching him select fabric for her wedding gown!
Dear God, she was completely losing herself. The immediacy of the present was so compelling, so rich and exciting, that it was eroding her ties to her real life, undermining her determination to return to her mother.
She sank to the floor and closed her eyes, forcing herself to think of Catherine, to imagine what she was doing, how sick with worry she was, how alone. Lisa remained crouched on the floor, brutally forcing herself back to reality until she felt tears sting her eyes.
And then she rose, determined to take control of things for once and for all.
LISA PRESSED BACK INTO THE DEEP STONE ARCH OF THE doorway, scarcely daring to breathe. Her feet were numb and cramped from huddling on the chilly floor. She tightened her fingers around the hilt of the knife she’d filched from the kitchen. It was a lethal blade, razor sharp, as wide as her palm and at least twelve inches long. It would serve nicely to demonstrate her point. She was through biding her time and trying patiently to find the flask. She was going to get back to the future—now.
Watching him plan her wedding gown had been the final straw: Circenn had accepted that she was going to be here forever—worse, she had started to accept it as well. Concealing the knife in the folds of her gown, she’d slipped up to the second floor and hidden in the shadows of a doorway diagonal to Circenn’s chambers, waiting for him to come up to change for dinner, as he did every night. She conceded that if she hadn’t had an ill mother, she might well have embraced this experience. In her century, there were no men who could begin to compare to the masculine splendor of Circenn Brodie. But Catherine needed her and would always come first.
The staircase creaked faintly and she tensed. Peeking around the corner of the doorway she glimpsed Circenn gliding silently down the hallway. For such a large man he certainly moved quietly. In a moment, his back was to her. He inserted the key in the lock and she realized the time was upon her. She would obtain the flask, no matter whom she had to go through to get it. No more passive, bewildered, susceptible-to-seduction Lisa.
She surged from her hiding place, pressed the tip of the blade to his back, directly in line with his heart, and commanded, “Move. In the door. Now.” Placing her other hand at the small of his back, she pushed him forward.