April Moon by Susan King, Merline Lovelace, MIRANDA JARRETT Page B

the verve and strength he had always admired were still there. Her pride and temper still sparked, too.
    In the past, he had also known her compassion and gentleness, and he had the knack of making her laugh when she was overly serious. But he would be hard pressed to coax a smile or a kind word from her tonight, he knew.
    All he wanted, suddenly, was to see her smile again. Aware of the hurt he had dealt her, and knowing she was heartbroken and distressed over her father’s situation, he sighed.
    “Jenny,” he said. “I did not mean for it to happen quite as it did. I had my reasons, but I can’t explain now, out here, with rascals about in the night.”
    “I dinna want your explanation. I want—” She tossed her hands as if she had not yet decided.
    “I think you want to be angry with me.”
    “Aye, for now. And then I want to forget you.”
    “I have not forgotten you.”
    She was silent for a moment. “Why did you come back, Simon?”
    “To gauge the whisky and count the copper coils in the hills, of course,” he said lightly. “To patrol the hills and cliffs at night, and stop rogues and smugglers from making tracks through the laws of king and Crown.” And to find the friends and the winsome lass I lost, he added to himself.
    “You used to make tracks through the king’s laws yourself, and gladly.”
    He shrugged. “I’ve reformed.”
    “So have I,” she said. “I’m no longer a foolish wee lass eager to believe in bold, bonny Simon Lockhart.”
    “I cannot blame you for that.”
    “Then we agree on something.” She looked away, her gaze scanning the hills, black silhouettes against the purpling sky, with the luminous moon shining above a veil of clouds.
    “Will you be collecting the copper coils wherever you can find them, to disable the stills?” she asked.
    “Aye, some,” he said. “I will have rangers to assist me.”
    “I expect you’ll offer to pay five pounds per coil, so that the locals will turn them in. Bryson and the other excise officer have done that here.”
    “Aye, the revenue board wants that. Though I suspect that every man with a worn-out coil turns his own in, collects the fee, buys a new coil with the money and moves his still for good measure.” He lifted a brow.
    “I have no idea,” she said, while Simon chuckled.
    “Jane Colvin,” he said, using her christened name with mock sternness, “be honest, now. How many coils has Jock turned in?”
    “Several every year from his own stills, which you will never find, for we willna cooperate with a gauger who is a traitor to us,” she said. “Is that honest enough for you?”
    “Painfully,” he replied.
    “Why did you leave without a word, without warning?”
    “I thought you did not want to know why.”
    “I’m just curious.”
    “I’ll tell you, but…not yet.” I left because I loved you that much, Jenny Colvin, and wanted to protect you, he thought to himself. And because I wanted to make a better life than smuggling for both of us. But now he must make his way carefully into her heart again. Love had sent him away, andso had pride. Though the love had sustained him, he battled the pride still.
    “Will you be there?” she asked softly.
    “Be where?” He glanced at her.
    “When my father—when they—the gallows are ready for tomorrow morning.”
    “I will be there,” he said. “I owe Jock that much. And you.”
    She lowered her head in silence.
    “I’m sorry, Jenny,” he said softly. Sorry for Jock and sorry for all my secrets.
    “’Tis wrong to hang a good man, even if he does a bit of free trading now and then. And he’s no horse thief.”
    “Jock told me the same. The sheriff says differently. What the devil—” He pulled up on the reins, slowing the cart as he looked ahead.
    A group of men rode toward them, ten or twelve in all, leading horses. Wondering if they were part of the group he had seen earlier, Simon put a hand beneath his coat to touch the polished wood-and-steel grip