Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [358]
“You what?”
“Don’t worry, it’s nowhere close enough to be incest,” he assured her.
“Oh, good,” she said, with a certain amount of sarcasm. “I was really worried about that. How can I be your great-aunt, for heaven’s sake?”
“Well, as I said, I just thought; I hadn’t realized it before. But your father’s uncle was Dougal MacKenzie—and it was him that caused all the trouble by getting a child on Geilie Duncan, aye?”
It was the unsatisfactory method of contraception he had been forced to adopt that had caused him to think of it, in fact, but he thought it more tactful not to mention that. Neither shirt was fit to be worn by now. All things considered, he supposed it was just as well that Dougal MacKenzie hadn’t had his sense of conscientiousness, since that would effectively have prevented Roger’s own existence.
“Well, I don’t think it was all his fault.” Brianna sounded pleasantly drowsy as well. It couldn’t be much off dawn; birds were already making noises outside, and the air had changed, growing fresher as the wind came in off the harbor.
“So if Dougal is my great-uncle, and your six-times great-grandfather … no, you’re wrong. I’m about your sixth or seventh cousin, not your aunt.”
“No, that would be right if we were in the same generation of descent, but we’re not; you’re up about five—on your father’s side, at least.”
Brianna was silent, trying to work this out in her head. Then giving up, she rolled over with a faint groan, nestling her bottom snugly into the hollow of his thighs.
“The hell with it,” she said. “As long as you’re sure it’s not incest.”
He clasped her to his bosom, but his sleepy brain had grasped the point and wouldn’t let it go.
“I really hadn’t thought of it,” he marveled. “You know what it means, though? I’m related to your father, too—in fact, I suppose he’s my only living relation, besides you!” Roger felt thoroughly nonplussed by this discovery, and rather moved. He had long since reconciled himself to having no close family at all—not that a seven-times great-uncle was all that close, but—
“No, he isn’t,” Brianna mumbled.
“What?”
“Not the only one. Jenny, too. And her kids. And grandkids. My aunt Jenny’s your—hm, maybe you’re right, after all. ’Cause if she’s my aunt, she’s your umpty-great aunt, so maybe I’m your … gahh.” She let her head loll back against Roger’s shoulder, the spill of her hair soft against his chest. “Who’d you tell them you were?”
“Who?”
“Jenny and Ian.” She shifted, stretching. “When you went to Lallybroch.”
“Never been there.” He shifted, too, fitting his body to hers. His hand settled in the dip of her waist, and he sank back into drowsiness, giving up the abstract complexities of genealogical calculation for more immediate sensations.
“No? But then …” her voice died away. Fogged with sleep and the exhaustions of pleasure, Roger paid no attention, only snuggling closer with a luxurious moan. A moment later, her voice sliced through his personal fog like a knife through butter.
“How did you know where I was?” she said.
“Hm?”
She twisted suddenly, leaving him with empty arms, and a pair of dark eyes a few inches from his own, slanted with suspicion.
“How did you know where I was?” she repeated slowly, each word a splinter of ice. “How did you know I’d gone to the Colonies?”
“Ah … I … why …” Much too late, he woke to the realization of his danger.
“You didn’t have any way of knowing I’d left Scotland,” she said, “unless you went to Lallybroch, and they told you where I was going. But you’ve never been to Lallybroch.”
“I …” He groped frantically for an explanation—any explanation—but there was none, other than the truth. And from the stiffening of her body, she had deduced that too.
“You knew,” she said. Her voice wasn’t much above a whisper, but the effect was as great as if she’d shouted in his ear. “You knew, didn’t you?”
She was sitting up now, looming over him like one of the Erinyes.
“You saw that death notice! You already knew, you knew all the time, didn’t you?”
“No,” he said, trying to gather his scattered wits. “I mean yes, but—”
“How