“No, it’s . . .” She looked around them at the still night. They were far enough south now that the plants were beginning to change. She’d noticed flowers that she’d only seen in Uncle T.C.’s drawings. “I didn’t think it was boring then,” she said as she looked at the ground. “Alex.”
“What did you say?”
“That when I was at home, I didn’t think it was boring.”
“No, I heard that. What was the last part?”
She smiled. “Alex. Is that what you wanted to hear?”
“No, I like Mr. McDowell better.”
She picked up a clod of dirt and threw it at him, and when she hit his arm, he made sounds as though he were truly hurt. “You aren’t a gentleman.”
“Never wanted to be. I just wanted what a gentleman’s stallion had.”
Laughing, she stood up. “I think it is time for sleep. I’ll just have my maid warm the bed for me and get my chocolate and I’ll be ready to turn in.” She expected him to laugh, but he was looking at her hard. “What is it?”
“You don’t look like a boy.”
“I hope not.” She glanced down at her clothes. “I must say that these breeches do give a person a great deal of freedom. And the lack of . . . of certain undergarments made riding today much easier.”
“No, it’s the way you walk, the way you move. Lass—” He held up his hand. “Cay, I mean, you’ll never pass as a boy looking like that.”
She put her hand to her hair. She was not going to cry! “I know. My hair is—”
“I could shave your head and you’d still look like a girl. It’s the way you stand, the way you move your hands.”
“What’s wrong with the way I move my hands?”
“There’s nothing wrong with any of it if you’re a lady entering a ballroom. But you look like a girl in boy’s clothing.”
“Oh,” she said, at last understanding what he meant. “You want me to move like Tally does.”
“I don’t know, but try it.”
She walked to the far side of the fire, put her shoulders back, her flattened chest out, and strode past him with a swagger that said she was the best and the greatest. When she stopped, she used her fist to wipe her nose, and looked at him in an insolent way, as though daring him to fight her.
Alex chuckled, then he full out laughed. “Surely you’re not telling the truth. The boy couldn’t walk like that.”
“He does all the time.”
“Let’s try it again, only this time not as though you’re trying to start a brawl. Shoulders back is good, but less swagger to your walk.”
“Maybe more like Adam.” She walked again, only this time she ate up the ground in just a few long strides, and she had a look that said she was too busy to pay attention to the rest of the world.
Alex cleared his throat to keep from laughing.
“No good? How about Ethan?”
Alex put out his hand to say she could try it.
Cay went back the other way, only this time she went slowly, noticing everything, and when her eyes lit on Alex, she gave him a long look, as though she’d never seen him before but would very much like to get to know him.
“Lord in Heaven!” Alex said. “Surely the boy doesn’t do that.”
Cay shrugged. “Girls follow him down the street.”
“Well, uh, I don’t think that you need to do that. We don’t want people following us. What about the other brother? What was his name?”
“Nathaniel. Nate.”
Cay looked about for something, then picked up a leather satchel lying by her saddle. “Pretend this is a book.” She held it close to her face and walked slowly across the space, oblivious to everything but the book. When she came to the end, she kept her head down but walked around a tree.
She returned to the fire and looked at Alex. “Well?”
He couldn’t keep from laughing. “I don’t think any of them are right. Could you not . . ?”
“Not what?”
“Well, lass . . . Cay, could you not walk like me?”
“Oh? You mean like this?” She puffed out her chest, put on a frown, and glared down at an imaginary person. “Can’t you come on, lass? I haven’t got all day. You’re more trouble than you’re worth.” She hurried off into the darkness, leaving herself behind.
“I don’t. . . ,” Alex began, then shook his head. “Maybe I do. But if you kept the walk and said nothing, you might do all right.”
“Was there a compliment in there?”
“Not from me,” he said, but he was smiling under all the hair on his face. “I think we should sleep now. We’ll work on your walk some more tomorrow.”
“You aren’t going to tell me I have to sit with my legs apart, are you?”
“Aye, I am,” he said solemnly.
“Maybe that’s good. If I committed that big of a sin my mother will find me wherever I am.” She picked up Hope’s big cloak off the ground and wrapped it around her. She planned to use it as a cover and as protection from the earth, but as she looked down at her breeches, she thought about the reality of their situation. If someone guessed that she was female, and if they saw that she was with Alex, it wouldn’t be difficult to figure out who they were. They could both be put in prison.
“I want you to cut my hair now,” she said softly, and she didn’t dare touch her hair or she’d start crying again.
She saw that he was about to apologize, or maybe make an excuse about why they should leave it until the morning, but he didn’t. He nodded toward a piece of log nearby, and she sat down on it, her back rigidly straight.
Alex took the scissors he’d taken from the store out of the satchel on the ground and went behind her. Her hair was still damp from her swim, but as it was drying, it was fluffing out into fat curls. To cut such hair was a great waste of beauty.
Cay glanced up at him, saw his hesitation, and wanted to tell him not to make this harder for her. Instead, she decided to goad him on. “Did I tell you about Benjamin?”
“And who is that?” Alex asked as he picked up a strand of her hair and held it. He wanted to put it to his face and feel it on his skin. Between the time in jail and the weeks of the trial, it had been months since he’d felt the softness of a woman. “You have a fifth brother?”
“Benjamin is the youngest of my suitors. He’s just twenty-two and very handsome. Not as handsome as Ethan, of course, but very nice to look at. His family is quite wealthy, and he loves to gamble and play games and bet on horses.”
“Bet on horses? Surely you aren’t thinking of marrying a gambler!” Holding a thick strand of her hair, he made the first cut. As the glorious red hair fell to the ground, he stared down at it.
When Cay felt her hair being cut, she was determined not to cry. “But he makes me laugh and he comes up with wonderful games to play. I think maybe he’s the one I should marry. He’d think it was a great adventure that I ran across the country with a convicted murderer.”
“What kind of man is he that he cares naught about what you’ve been through?” Alex cut more of her hair. “What if I were guilty as everyone thinks I am? Do you have any idea what I could have done to you by now?”
“But you haven’t, and when I get back, I’ll tell Ben all about everything. He’ll even laugh about the jasmine oil I put in your hair.”
“Will he now?” Alex asked, frowning as he cut more of her hair. “He won’t be jealous?”
“Ben says that being jealous is a stupid emotion and when we’re married I must never be jealous of him no matter what he does.”
“He sounds like he means to run off with other women while you stay home with a passel of brats.”
“Isn’t that what a wife is supposed to do?”
“No,” Alex said. “I think a couple should work together to raise a family.”
“So you’re saying that a man should be jealous?”
“I think—” He stopped because he realized she was teasing him. “You’re a bothersome bairn, is
what you are. There now, I’ve finished.”
When Cay stood up, the cloak fell from her shoulders, and for a moment she just stood there looking at him, afraid to move her head. What would it feel like to have so little hair? Slowly, tentatively, she moved her head to one side, then the other. Actually, it didn’t feel so bad. He’d cut it until it hung just to her shoulders so she could tie it back at the nape of her neck as her brothers did.
She moved her head to one side, but this time faster. With about a foot of her thick hair gone, it was surprisingly light. She began to shake her head, and her hair flew about her face. When she stopped, she looked at Alex. He was watching her with wide eyes, the scissors still in his hand.
“I do believe that I rather like it.” She put one foot on the log and held an imaginary pipe in her hand. “So, tell me, sir, what do you think of the price of wheat today? Do you think it will go up again or have the English ruined that for us as well?”
He’d never seen anyone look less like a male than she did. Her hair swirled about her shoulders in thick curls and her long lashes made shadows on her cheeks. “I think you should let me do the talking.”
She stood up straight and swung her hair about her some more. It really did feel wonderful.
“Will you stop doing that!” Alex snapped.
“Why?”
“It bothers me, is all. You should go to sleep.”
“And what about you?”
“What I do is my own business,” he said, knowing he sounded grumpy. He knew he was still in love with Lilith, but it had been a long time since he’d been alone with a woman, and Cay was . . . He searched for the right word. Enticing. She was indeed enticing.
She was standing there staring at him, and he knew what she wanted. She wanted to know where he was going, what he was going to do, and when he’d be back. He wanted to again tell her that what he did was his concern, not hers, but he didn’t. “I’m going to wash this vile oil out of my hair,” he said at last. What he was really going to do was take a long plunge in the icy cold stream.
“You can’t do that,” she said. “You need to leave the oil in at least until morning to smother whatever’s in your hair. You can wash it out before we leave tomorrow.” She picked up the cloak and wrapped it around her. “But do what you want. I’m going to sleep now.”
She stretched out on the ground near the fire and lay there in silence for a moment, then she flipped one side of the cloak away from her. It was an invitation to him. It wasn’t much, but the wool would be separating them, and for her, she felt safer when he was nearby.
For what seemed like a long time, Alex didn’t move. It was as though he was making a decision. Finally, she heard his soft chuckle—a sound she was coming to know—and he stretched out on the grass next to her and pulled the side of the cloak over him.
“Good night, Cay,” he said.
“Good night, Alex,” she answered, and when she felt the heat of his body through the wool, she went to sleep.
Nine
“It still reeks,” Alex said as he sat down on the log and lowered his head, his fragrant hair hanging about him. “I can’t get rid of the stench of it. I soaped it three times, but all I can smell is . . . is flowers. I smell like a bloody flower!”
Cay was behind him with the scissors and trying to cut a few inches off his long hair. Personally, she envied him the smell of his hair, but she knew better than to say that.
She thought his real problem was that when they woke up this morning, they’d been snuggled together like puppies. While it was true that the heavy wool of the cloak was between them, they were still close together. Alex was on his side, facing the fire, and Cay was behind him, her body against his and her arm over his chest. Her face was buried in his fragrant hair, and she was having sweet dreams.
She knew Alex didn’t want to admit it, but he must have been having good dreams, too, because he’d picked up her hand and put her palm against his cheek.
But when Alex had awakened more fully, he came to his feet in a roar of anger. But he didn’t frighten Cay. She stretched out, smiled up at him, and told him he smelled wonderful. That’s when he ran to the stream, stripped off, and did what he could to remove the jasmine oil.
It hadn’t worked. His hair still smelled great. Cay got him to sit on the log so she could cut it, and every time she made a remark or, worse, put her nose to his hair, he got even more angry.
“I’ll shave my head, that’s what I’ll do,” he muttered. “I’ll go bald.”
“You’ll have to shave your face, too, as I do believe that that beard of yours smells just as heavenly.”
Turning, he glared at her.
“Sorry. The smell is very masculine. However, I can’t wait to tell my women friends about it. I wonder if I can get the recipe from the shopkeeper’s wife. I’ve never smelled jasmine oil so strong. I wonder what her jasmine tea is like?”
Alex stood up, still glaring at her, and took the towel off his shoulders. Unfortunately, it was the towel that was coated in jasmine oil, and just moving it made the air around them fragrant.
Cay had to bite her lips to keep from laughing out loud, but then she was tired of trying to placate him. He was being ridiculous. “At least you’re not a bank robber,” she said.
“And why is that better than being called a murderer?” He was saddling his horse and putting on the packs.
“They could identify you as soon as you walked in the door.” When he turned and gave her a look meant to make her stop talking, she just blinked at him. “They’d hire ladies to track you.”
Glowering at her, he took a step forward and she went backward. If she’d had on a dress, she would have tripped over some twigs on the ground, but with her breeches and her newfound freedom, she agilely stepped over them. “What would the handbill for your arrest say? ‘Smell this criminal.’ Maybe they could pass out little samples of the oil on bits of paper. People could compare the smell to the hair of every man they met.”
“You—” Alex began, but she could see that the anger was no longer in his eyes.
“The men who use rosewater would be eliminated. No, only jasmine would be guilty. Think what you’d do for the world of criminals. It wouldn’t be a man’s picture but his smell that would identify him.”
“All right, that’s enough,” Alex said, but he was hiding a smile. “Get on your horse and let’s go. If you can stop making fun of me, that is.”
“I’ll make my best effort, but I have a request. May I ride downwind of you?”
He couldn’t keep his laughter in. “Go on, lass, get up or we’ll never get to the rendezvous with Mr. Grady.”
She climbed into the saddle, and when she reined her horse past him, she ostentatiously took a deep breath and closed her eyes, as though in ecstasy.
Ignoring her gesture, he led the way out of the little clearing and back onto the road. “Remember, now. When we see people, keep your head down and say nothing. It wouldn’t take much for them to know you’re a girl.”
“But I don’t smell like one,” she said, grinning. “I leave that to you.”
He shook his head at her and they started moving.
Ten
Where is she? Alex asked himself again. Cay should be in the tavern beside him but she wasn’t. It had been her idea to give her disguise a test, and earlier, they’d had an argument about it.
“You will not!” he’d said in a way that was meant to be an order.
“I’m going to have to appear in public sometime, so why not now?”
“We’re still too close to Charleston.” He was sitting on his horse rigidly, his eyes straight ahead, not looking at her.
“I know we’re south of Savannah. Not that I’ve been allowed to look at the map, and not that you’ve told me anything about where we are, where we’re going, or how long it will take us to get there. In fact, you’ve still not told me what your plan for me is. I saved you from death, I’ve put my own life in jeopardy, but you don�
�t so much as inform me where and when, and when I ask you—”
“All right,” Alex said loudly. “If you’ll stop your chatter I’ll let you go into the tavern in your boy’s clothes. But you have to behave yourself. And stop fiddling with your hair!” As he looked at her on the horse next to him, he felt as though they might as well turn themselves in to the local sheriff now. To him, Cay didn’t look like a boy at all. And her absurd posturing that she said was like one or other of her brothers was laughable. No one in the world was going to believe she was male.
Cay’s smile was brilliant. “Do stop looking like you’re facing your doom. Only you think I look like a girl. By the way, is my dress packed away carefully?” She didn’t tell him, but she was concerned about the diamond pins in the bodice.
“Aye, lass, it is.” He couldn’t help looking like he was near to death because that’s how he felt when he saw her. He was sure they’d be caught as soon as she showed herself.
Glancing at him, she smiled and pulled her horse back so she was behind him. It was minutes later that he saw her lifting herself up on her right foot while removing her left from the stirrup. “What is that you’re trying to do?” he asked as calmly as he could muster.
“It’s a trick that Tally does that I couldn’t do because I always had on a dress. My cousin Derek taught it to him. He’s—”
“To be the laird,” Alex said quickly and he couldn’t help his feeling of . . . well, it was a feeling very much like jealousy. Alex was the one who’d shown her cousin, Derek Moncrief, how to put both feet into one stirrup and hide at the side of the horse. Alex had often used the trick when he wanted to sneak away from his father after he’d been forbidden to ride in the heather during the night.
“Not like that,” Alex said with more anger than he meant. “Put all your weight on your right foot, then slide your left leg back around. There, lass, now crouch down. No one can see you from that side of the horse.”
Cay grinned at him with such thanks that he looked away. “I guess it’s a Scottish trick.”