Must Love Highlanders by Patience Griffin Grace Burrowes Read Free Book Online Page A

was baffling.
    “I grew up there. Everybody’s nice, but nobody’s real, and then,”—she cradled the cat against her shoulder—“they can slice you to ribbons, all the while blessing your heart, darlin’, and you poor thang, and that is such a shame-ing. I’m convinced the mixed message was invented by women of the American South.”
    “Family can be a trial.” Liam had the sense Louise’s family was worse than that. They were an ongoing affliction that bewildered her and wouldn’t go away, like persistent grief.
    “I grew up with cats,” she said. “Cats are honest. If they don’t want you to pick them up, they hiss and scratch. I love them for that. Love that they are simply what they appear to be, and if they enjoy your company, they are honest about that too.”
    Liam enjoyed Louise’s company. He ought not. She wasn’t precisely reserved, though she wasn’t quite friendly either.
    “Georgia is far away,” Liam said, closing the periodical. “Family often means well as they’re wreaking their havoc, and if you’re lucky, they find somebody else to plague with their good intentions before you’ve committed any hanging felonies. Have you seen enough?”
    Louise set the cat on the ground, and the beast went strutting off to its next diplomatic mission for the Scottish tourist industry.
    “Your family was hard on you?” Louise asked.
    She was a perceptive woman, so Liam gave her a version of the truth.
    “I went through a bad patch a few years back. One of those bad breakups you mentioned earlier, followed by a bit too much brooding for a bit too long. They worried.”
    If Louise regarded that as an invitation to pry, Liam would have only himself to blame, because he never disclosed even that much. He’d done a bit too much drinking, too.
    She picked up his magazine, a quarterly journal useful for inducing sleep or lining Dougie’s litter box. Liam intended to cancel his subscription, but hadn’t got ’round to it.
    “You seem to have found your balance now,” Louise said. “You read this stuff?”
    “I read the abstracts. Somebody needs to teach most academics how to write. The article I attempted was worse than usual, though the learned Dr. Stiedenback will cite it at every lecture he gives for the next three years.”
    Louise made a face, as if the milk had turned. “You know him? This is an American journal.”
    “The art world is small, especially the gallery art world.” And that world was the last topic Liam wanted to discuss with Louise Cameron. “Do you ever visit those people in Georgia?”
    “Every other Christmas. They tsk-tsk over all the boyfriends I don’t bring along, cluck about the New Year being full of new opportunities, and tell me I’m nothing but skin and bones.”
    Well, no actually, she wasn’t. “They’re of Scottish descent, then?”
    Ah, a smile. At last another smile. Part of Liam had been waiting hours to see that smile, and now the image he beheld—pretty chapel, pretty spring day, pretty lady—went from well composed to lovely.
    “You’re hilarious, Liam Cromarty. As a matter of fact, they are Scottish on my father’s side. Mom’s DAR royalty—Daughters of the American Revolution—and related to Robert E. Lee, too. Daddy is the reason my sisters and I ended up with middle names like Mavis, Fiona, and Ainsley.”
    “Good names.” Beautiful names. “Shall we head back to town? The temperature will drop as the sun sets, and Arthur’s Seat can be windy.”
    Louise passed him the periodical and stood. “You really think that Professor Stiedenbeck doesn’t write well?”
    Odd question, but at least she wasn’t interrogating Liam about his family.
    “Somebody has taken pity on the bastard and assigned him a decent editor this time around, but he offers nothing original and takes a long-winded, self-important time to do it. Not very professional of me, but I imagine he’s the sort who lectures his lovers into a coma before he gets on with