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She looked down at them, then back at him, blinking. “You’re asking about my boots?”
“Aye.”
“You came riding up to me with a sword and your first question is about my shoes?”
Jamie glanced toward the basket hilt at his hip, then back at her. “It’s attached to me.”
“That’s not reassuring.”
He found himself smiling, which was foolish because Ewan was somewhere below the ridge with two ponies carrying enough untaxed whisky to inspire great enthusiasm among the government men, and Jamie had no business speaking with an American woman who might have been sent to distract him.
Yet as she stood there glaring at him, rain running down her face, muddy, and not at all properly frightened, Jamie had to admire her, and those bonnie boots.
“Do all American women from Boston traipse about the Highlands without an escort?” he asked, gathering the reins tighter when the mare tried to nose past his shoulder.
The woman folded her arms against the damp chill. “Do all Highlanders interrogate women about their choice of footwear?”
“Only when they’re remarkable.”
That earned him another look, but before she could answer she swayed. Jamie stepped forward on instinct, reaching for her elbow, though he stopped when she jerked away so quickly that one heel slid in the wet grass.
“I was going to keep you from falling.”
“I’m fine.”
Jamie let his gaze travel deliberately over the mud streaking her knees, the coat and trousers that shed water like the back of a duck, the empty hillside around her, and the dark opening in the hill behind them. She had no horse, no pack, no cloak beyond the peculiar coat, and no weapons he could see.
“Aye,” he said. “Clearly.”
“You’re very bossy.”
“Aye, so I’ve been told.”
The mare shifted again, and the woman’s attention snapped toward the jingle of the bridle before moving past Jamie to the track below, the hills beyond it, and Dunarraidh standing against the clearing sky with smoke curling from the habitable wing.
Jamie watched the humor leave her face. Until that moment the lass had seemed irritated more than frightened, but now her eyes moved over the castle, down toward the path, then across the glen where the rain had left the heather dark and the burns swollen. She turned in a circle as if searching for something or someone.
Her chin remained lifted, though the color had begun to leave her mouth, turning her lips white.
“Where am I?”
Jamie rested one hand on the mare’s neck while he studied her, wondering how she’d come to be here. “Near Dunarraidh.”
“I’m still in Scotland?”
“Aye.”
She closed her eyes for a moment and drew a breath that didn’t appear to help. “No.”
“You said yer from Boston.”
“I am.”
“Then I’m pleased to confirm that ye have successfully reached the Highlands of Scotland.”
Her eyes opened. “That’s not the part I’m objecting to.”
Mysteries were easier to solve after a full belly. They were considerably easier when one was not committing a hanging offense.
