They must have known her discomfiture, because one of them coughed away a smile and the other glanced again at the cottage. “Very good, miss.” After a look passed between them, they climbed into the carriage and whipped the reins.
Meg drew in a breath she couldn’t release. Who knew if they would report such a thing back to Lord Cunningham. No matter. The situation would last no longer than it took for Mr. McGwen to acknowledge her presence.
Which he did not do.
Even when she approached.
Humiliation sizzled beneath her skin as she stared from the dripping red cottage to the swishing paint brush to the red-pawed kitten playing in the grass. Anywhere but at … him.
She cleared her throat.
He cleared his.
“Mr. McGwen, you cannot be serious.”
“The color?” He slabbed more red onto the wall. “A wee bit gaudy, is it?”
“No. I mean”—she flustered, angered, then flustered again—“not the color. You.”
Sunlight glistened off the sweat on his back as he turned. Despite every plea within herself, her eyes skittered over him. Muscles shaped his arms, his shoulders, his red-haired chest.
He was solid and agile, with a readiness that made her certain he could outrun the wind or fight the wild. But it was his eyes that made her shiver.
Their softness.
The faint, sunlit twinkle.
She ignored the pull and crossed her arms. “McGwen, will you please put on a shirt?”
“Only got two. They’d not be worth a farthing after this.” He dunked his brush back into the copper bucket of paint. “Besides—”
“This is most compromising and—”
“Ye’ve already seen me without one before.” Before she had a chance to rage over the words, he angled his back to her again and pointed across his shoulder. “Fish hook. Ye dug it out yerself.”
She stepped closer and her breath dropped. Tiny scars pinkened his flesh, as if he’d been slashed in too many places to count. “You were injured.”
“Ye pulled it out.”
“No, not the fishing hook. Something else. The cuts.”
“What are ye doing here, Miss Foxcroft?” The way he spoke her name, the edge of distance in his voice, was altering. “I don’t think yer lordy would be pleased ye’ve come.”
“He is quite aware that I have. I assure you.”
“What do ye want?”
She had been prepared to tell him of the forthcoming matrimony, but the only thing that came out was, “I have spoken with Lord Cunningham, and despite his qualms, have decided it is imperative I discover all I can of my past.”
He stared, the sun in his eyes. “What are ye saying?”
“That I wish to know everything about myself.” Her heartbeat hastened. “And I wish you to teach me.”
“I’m not a good teacher.” He’d been teaching her things for the past seven years. How to maneuver cod traps. How to swim. How to put squid bait on a long iron hook.
This was different.
Wariness lanced him, and he ripped another vine of ivy from the cottage wall. “I’ve told ye everything, lass.”
