A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [420]
They were in the Cherokee lands at the moment; she knew Ian visited the Indians frequently, and was on good terms with several villages. But if it had been a matter of some formal arrangement to be made, surely he would have asked Jamie to accompany him, or Peter Bewlie, with his Cherokee wife to interpret.
“Ian,” she said, with the tone in her voice that could bring almost any man up short. “Look at me.”
His head jerked up, and he blinked at her.
“Ian,” she said, a little more gently, “is this to do with your wife?”
He stayed frozen for a moment, eyes dark and unfathomable. Rollo, in the shadows behind him, suddenly raised his head and let out a small whine of inquiry. That seemed to rouse Ian; he blinked and looked down.
“Aye,” he said, sounding quite matter-of-fact. “It is.”
He adjusted the angle of the stick he had driven into the earth by the fire; the pale flesh of the fish curled and sizzled, browning on the green wood.
She waited for him to say more, but he didn’t speak—just broke off the edge of a piece of half-cooked fish and held it out to the dog, clicking his tongue in invitation. Rollo rose and sniffed Ian’s ear in concern, but then deigned to take the fish, and lay down again, licking the hot tidbit delicately before scooping it up with his tongue, gathering enough spirit then to engulf the discarded heads and fish guts as well.
Ian pursed his lips a little, and she could see the thoughts flickering half-formed across his face, before he made up his mind to speak.
“I did once think of marrying you, ye ken.”
He gave her a quick, direct glance, and she felt an odd little jolt of realization. He’d thought about it, all right. And while she had no doubt that his offer then had been made from the purest of motives . . . he was a young man. She hadn’t until this moment realized that he would of course have contemplated every detail of what that offer entailed.
His eyes held hers in wry acknowledgment of the fact that he had indeed imagined the physical details of sharing her bed—and had not found the prospect in any way objectionable. She resisted the impulse to blush and look away; that would discredit them both.
She was suddenly—and for the first time—aware of him as a man, rather than as an endearing young cousin. And aware of the heat of his body that had lingered in the soft buckskin when she pulled it on.
“It wouldn’t have been the worst thing in the world,” she said, striving to match his matter-of-fact tone. He laughed, and the stippled lines of his tattoos lost their grimness.
“No,” he said. “Maybe not the best—that would be Roger Mac, aye? But I’m glad to hear I wouldna have been the worst, either. Better than Ronnie Sinclair, d’ye think? Or worse than Forbes the lawyer?”
“Ha, bloody ha.” She refused to be discomposed by his teasing. “You would have been at least third on the list.”
“Third?” That got his attention. “What? Who was second?” He actually seemed miffed at the notion that someone might precede him, and she laughed.
“Lord John Grey.”
“Oh? Oh, well. Aye, I suppose he’d do,” Ian admitted grudgingly. “Though of course, he—” He stopped abruptly, and darted a cautious look in her direction.
She felt an answering stab of caution. Did Ian know about John Grey’s private tastes? She thought he must, from the odd expression on his face—but if not, it was no place of hers to be revealing Lord John’s secrets.
“Have you met him?” she asked curiously. Ian had gone with her parents to rescue Roger from the Iroquois, before Lord John had appeared at her aunt’s plantation, where she had met the nobleman herself.
“Oh, aye.” He was still looking wary, though he had relaxed a little. “Some years ago. Him and his . . . son. Stepson, I mean. They came to the Ridge, traveling through to