“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.”
“Actually, I learned it from my father, who learned it from your American Indians. I would imagine that it was your father who taught it to your brothers.”
“He . . . ?” Cay couldn’t suppress her feeling of hurt that her father had taught such a useful movement to her brothers but not to her. What other things had he shown them but not her? “What else do you know how to do?” she asked Alex.
“Do you think I’m going to show you how to do tricks that would let you run away from me?”
“You said I wasn’t a prisoner and that I could leave at any time. Besides, now that my ribs are no longer tied down, I’m beginning to . . .”
“To what? Enjoy yourself?”
“No, of course not. But I—” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Do stop looking at me like I’m a great bother to you and show me something else. When I see Tally next time I want to be able to do something that will impress him grandly.”
“Ah, then if you want to impress him grandly, you might want to try this.” He knew he shouldn’t take the time to show her a horse trick, but he couldn’t bear for all the credit to be given elsewhere. He had her exchange horses with him, and told her to stand to the side of the road with his. He dropped the dirty handkerchief he’d offered her the first night, then walked her mare down the road. While Cay watched, he rode toward her at a blinding speed and when he came to the handkerchief, he bent down and picked it up. It was almost the same thing he’d done when she’d dropped the cloth days before, but this time he went lower, and Cay had no idea how he held himself in the saddle without falling off.
Halting, he turned and walked the horse back to her.
“I want to learn how to do that.”
He got down and handed her the reins to her mare. “I’ll teach you, but not now. We don’t have time.” When he saw her face, he leaned toward her. “And if you try that alone and break your neck, you’ll answer to me.”
“When will you teach me?”
“When—” He wanted to say that he’d show her as soon as they got to Florida, but he knew that he was to leave with the exploration team and she was to stay behind. It was possible that he’d never see her after the two more days it would take them to get to the rendezvous place. But he wasn’t going to tell her that. “When we have time,” was all he’d say.
For the rest of the day, Alex watched her practicing the first trick. He made her ride in front of him so he could see what she was doing wrong and correct her—and to save her if she was about to break any of her body parts. But having her in front of him turned out to be a mistake, as he watched her moving all over her horse in her too-tight breeches and her thin shirt.
By the time they reached the tavern, he was in a bad mood. It made sense that she wanted to test her disguise, but he couldn’t make himself admit that. Or maybe it was that he wanted to spend the night on the trail with her again. He’d grown to like being close to another human being. During his hideous weeks in prison, for all his grief, there were times when he’d longed to be near people. To talk to someone past the few minutes he was allowed with T.C. To listen to a person other than a lawyer!
“I can make people think I’m male,” Cay said when she was trying to persuade him to let her appear in public as a boy. He couldn’t bear to disappoint her.
“All right,” he’d at last agreed. “But you have to do exactly what I say.”
“I always do, don’t I?”
Alex groaned. “You’re as obedient as a chicken.”
“A what?” she said. “A chicken? Of all the animals you could have chosen, why did you have to compare me to a chicken?”
“Maybe it’s the hair. Red rooster. Red hen.” Once again, she had restored his good humor.
Now, he was in the tavern and waiting for her to appear. He’d ordered two dinners and two mugs of malt, then wondered if she’d ever drunk an alcoholic beverage. But he couldn’t keep the myth that she was male if he ordered her a pot of tea.
Again he glanced at the door. She’d gone to the privy, but that was half an hour ago, so where was she, and what was she doing? Had she been recognized already?