Page 98 of To Wed a Wild Scot
Logan grunted with pain as he rose from the bed and padded across the room to the window. He pushed the drapes aside, cursing as another arc of pain shot across his chest.
It wasn’t nighttime, but late afternoon. Juliana was likely with Grace.
He turned away from the window, frowning at the empty room. There was no telling how long she’d been gone, or when she would return. What was he meant to do until she did? Damned if he knew. He hadn’t spent an afternoon in his bed since he’d poisoned himself with the laburnum when he was a lad.
Not alone, that is.
Logan wandered back across the room to the side of the rumpled bed, eyeing it with distaste. Juliana had told him to sleep, but he’d never been one for lying about. A few cuts and scratches weren’t going to change that.
He could eat. He wasn’t hungry, but a meal would distract him until Juliana returned. He went to pull the bell to summon a servant, but paused when he saw the coat he’d worn last night tossed over the back of a chair.
He’d left Cowden’s vowels in the pocket. Any one of the servants could have wandered in here and taken the coat away while he was sleeping. Even bloody knife wounds didn’t excuse such carelessness.
He took the coat up and rifled through it, searching for the slip of paper.
It wasn’t there.
No, it was impossible. It had to be there.
He searched through it again, digging deep into the pockets, but once again the search revealed nothing. He turned the coat upside down and shook it, wincing at the pain in his arm. Something dropped to the floor with a thud, and Logan reached down to pick it up.
It was the oathing stone he’d made for Juliana.
He stared down at it, a thousand different emotions flooding his chest at once. He hadn’t known it at the time—or at least he hadn’t yet admitted it to himself—but he’d been in love with her when he carved this stone.
Just as he was in love with her now.
Logan closed the stone tightly in his fist. He’d brought it all the way from Scotland with him. He’d kept it with him every day since then, tucked into the breast pocket of whatever coat he was wearing. All this time, he’d kept it close to his heart.
Just as he meant to keep Juliana close to his heart. Her, and Grace. They werehisnow.
And he was theirs.
He should have told her that the night before last, when they’d made love. He should have given her the stone then, and explained that he’d made it for her. That he’d loved her even then, all those weeks ago.
Logan gazed down at the stone, heavy in his palm. Heavier than it should be, because it didn’t belong to him. It belonged to her. It always had. As soon as she returned to him he’d give it to her, and with it, his whole heart.
But first, Cowden’s vowels. They had to be here. Logan drew in a deep breath and forced himself to search the pockets again, slowly and methodically.
He turned up nothing. The slip of paper was truly gone.
Logan dropped the coat back onto the chair. It didn’t make sense. The oathing stone was right where he’d left it, but the paper was gone. If someone had dropped the coat—if the paper had fallen out by accident—then the stone would be missing, as well.
It could only mean one thing. Someone had taken the paper deliberately. Juliana? It must be. He’d told her he had Cowden’s vowels in his pocket. No one else knew that paper was there, aside from…
Aside from Cowden, and Cowden’s murderous manservant.
Logan’s blood went cold.
No. Again, it was impossible. Even Cowden wasn’t that brazen. And if he was, how would he manage the thing? It wasn’t as if he could march into Logan’s bedchamber and rifle through his coat until he found it.
No, but a servant could. It would be the easiest thing in the world for a servant to wait for Juliana to leave, then creep into his bedchamber and take the paper while he slept.
Could Cowden have bribed one of Juliana’s servants?
If it were anyone but Cowden, Logan would dismiss the idea as ridiculous. But was it really too far-fetched to imagine a man who’d sent his manservant after Logan with a blade would draw the line at bribery?
Or worse.
