Page 61

“Tell you what, let’s talk to her and if she clears you for work. We’ll figure something out, okay?”

The doctor had cleared Mandy for work, but Kate still had trouble delegating and giving her sister tasks, afraid that anything might trigger another episode of depression. Mandy’s episodes became less frequent with time, and she became more help than Kate had admitted to herself.

Kate told Ian how Mandy had gotten a celebrity interested in their restaurant—it took a bit of explaining about what TV was and that a TV cooking show was widely popular. Ian blinked, disbelief written all over his face, but he didn’t interrupt.

She told him how she’d wound up in Scotland. How this was their last chance to save the restaurant and keep their home. Ian didn’t ask questions but listened intensely. His face solemn, he nodded from time to time.

Telling someone about her life was strange. She didn’t usually like to talk about herself or her past, but sharing with Ian was freeing, and surprisingly easy.

When she finished, the last word drying out like a drop of water in the fire, Ian was looking at her, his jaw muscles working.

“Say something,” Kate said finally, unable to wait any longer to hear what he thought.

“So ye want to go back to… 2020? Is that so?”

She clenched her fingers together till her knuckles whitened and hurt. She didn’t want to go back. What she wanted, was to stay with him forever. But she had to leave.

“Yes, Ian,” she said, her throat painful.

He nodded.

“Aye. It makes sense now.”

“What does?”

“God wouldna have sent me a woman like ye to make me happy. He sent ye to me to punish me. To give me the biggest happiness of my life only to take ye away.”

Pain pierced Kate’s gut. “No, no. No one is punishing you. You were already hurt enough. You should stop beating yourself up for something that was done to you. For something beyond your control.”

“’Tis all right, lass. At least I’ll ken ye’ll be alive and safe, even though in the future. I never expected to be happily marrit. My life is destined to be lonely, lass.”

Kate’s chest tightened painfully. To hear a man like him saying that was so sad.

And yet it reflected her own thoughts about her future. She’d never thought she’d be one of those women who found their soul mate. Somehow, in the back of her mind, she’d always known she wasn’t worthy of true love. She wasn’t lovable.

Maybe that’s why her mom never took care of her. Something about her made her simply unworthy.

“So is mine,” she said.

“Yers?” He chuckled. “Ye should be praised and worshipped and loved every single day, by a man who’s worthy of ye. ’Tis nae me…”

But it was him. Kate knew it like she knew her own name, if anyone could make her happy, it was Ian.

“I promised ye, I will take ye to Inverlochy,” he said. “And I will make sure ye get back to yer time.”

Kate’s heart shook and trembled, threatened to break into a million pieces. She loved him for promising to take her back, but the idea of leaving him tore her chest apart.

“Well, I’m not leaving yet.” She crawled to him and straddled him.

The blanket fell off, and Ian looked her up and down with the eyes of a ravenous predator.

“Nae, ye’re certainly not. Not if I have any say in the matter.”

He drew her onto his chest and kissed her hungrily, and Kate forgot everything but his body and her shivering need for it.

But she knew it would never be enough. Leaving Ian would be like leaving a part of her soul behind.

Chapter 22