Page 55 of Keeping Kate

“Katie darling, your obstinate nature does you no favors. It will go poorly with the Lord Advocate if you refuse to identify yourself.”

“We can both avoid trouble if you leave me here. I can find my way in these hills.”

“I am sure of that. So you live somewhere near here. Good. We are beginning to solve the puzzle. This way.” He pointed toward the horse in the distance, which calmly nibbled at grasses. “If you truly want to protect someone with your refusal to cooperate, take some advice. Do not be the sacrificing sort. It does not profit anyone in the end.”

“I am not sacrificing anything. My sister is more that sort. She considers others first, always, sometimes to her detriment. I am not like that.”

“I believe it,” he drawled. “If your sister does not have your wildcat ways, then bless the lass for a true saint.”

Kate laughed, surprising him. “My brother used to call her Saint Sophia. She is a patient soul, but has a temper. A while ago, some rebels stole her away, but she had the courage to defend herself and the spirit to make them regret it. And she married the very man who took her away.”

“Brave man to take on a sister of yours,” Alec muttered. “Rocks—step carefully.”

She did. “Sophie is sacrificing and loyal, but I am loyal, too. And I must go home. If you have the blood of true Gaels, you will understand that, Fraser that you are.”

“Frasers are loyal too. But loyalty can be overdone. I lost someone once by being too loyal, too sacrificing.”

“You? What do you mean?” she asked.

He sighed, wishing he had not spoken so quickly. “A few years ago, I was in Leiden studying, and I—parted with my fiancée, who was here in Scotland. I had urged her to do what made her happy while I was gone, and she did. She decided she would rather marry my brother. They had their first child by the time I returned home.”

Kate halted, stared up at him. “Oh! I am so sorry.”

“Aye, well.” He shrugged. “Both of them are gone now, sadly for their three daughters. He died last year, and she passed in childbirth over two years ago. They appointed me guardian to my nieces.”

She laid a hand to her heart, eyes wide with sympathy. “Are they in Edinburgh?”

“Aye, living in my house. I am not there often. Relatives care for them there.”

“So young to lose their parents. They must be very sweet. Could I meet them?”

That surprised him. “What of your great urge to be shut of me?”

“If I cannot get shut of you, and if I must go to Edinburgh, I would rather meet your wee nieces than the Lord Advocate.”

“You would see him either way. He is my uncle.”

She stopped, staring. “A Fraser as well?”

“No. My mother’s brother.”

“Why did you not tell me this? Perhaps I had no need to worry about him.”

“We cannot expect your freedom just because he is one of my uncles. You could try your bonny charm on him, but do not expect him to chase you through the streets and hills as I seem to be doing.”

“That wee charm is just for you,” she snapped.

“Is it,” he said, tugging her toward the horse.

“I doubt anyone related to you could be charmed.”

“Not him—he can be a disagreeable old man. But you can try.”

She muttered something in Gaelic and stomped away, stretching out her arm between them. Keeping her firmly in his grasp, Alec lengthened his stride.

“Lass,” he said, “I wonder if you are not so much the irresistible siren as an overindulged young miss who suits herself.”

“I would not be in this fine pickle now if I was doing this to suit myself!”