Mackenzie Family Christmas (The Perfect Gift)(19)

Ian recognized one of his texts on Ming bowls. He remembered the broken bowl and felt a pang of loss. It had been beautiful, and he'd only been able to hold it a few short moments.

But the bowl was nowhere near as beautiful as his wife, who looked up at him with sensual blue eyes, and said, "Oh. I didn't see you come in."

Which made no sense to Ian. Of course she hadn't seen him--she'd been looking at the book. She might have heard him come in; seen him, no.

"I will take the babies riding tomorrow," Ian said, sitting down close to her. Her scent, familiar to him now, and so dear, began easing him, and his thoughts cleared. "Come with us." A ride to the folly high on the hill, winter sunshine, his wife and children snuggling at his side . . .

"I'd love to." Beth's face softened. "But I can't, you know. There is so much to do, more guests arriving, the menus to be sorted. Since Chef has left for France, Cook is having hysterics by the hour. She's terrified she won't be able to manage, even with the extra help we've hired." Beth rubbed her temples. "It is becoming quite an ordeal."

Ian sensed her unhappiness, but he relaxed, because he knew exactly how to make her feel better. That was another thing he could do that didn't involve crowds, or understanding how to answer people correctly, or looking into their eyes.

He started to lift the book from Beth's lap, kissing her cheek at the same time. Beth grabbed the book and pulled it back.

"Wait. I wanted to show you." She pointed to a picture, a colored illustration, protected by a leaf of thin paper. "What do you think of this one? It's very like the one I broke, isn't it? Same sort of vines and dragons, but in green and gray, instead of blue. The book says it's owned by a gentleman in France. I could write him."

Ian glanced at the picture, taking in every nuance of the bowl in two seconds flat. How could she think it was like the one the Russian had? Clearly it was not, or Ian would have purchased this bowl in the first place.

But he'd learned, to his amazement, that most people couldn't tell one Ming bowl from the other. The fanatics who shared his passion could, and they were the few human beings with whom Ian could speak at length and understand in return--at least, as long as they remained on the topic of Ming pottery. Hart had explained that a person either had the gift or did not, and Ian needed to show compassion toward those who didn't.

"No," Ian said, trying to soften the word. It sounded harsh all the same, falling flat against the thick velvet drapes at the windows. "It's not the same."

"But look." Beth traced the line of vine with her finger. "Surely the pattern is identical. I checked it against the book in which you found the first one . . ."

Ian lifted the tome away again, and this time, Beth let him. "It isn't blue," he said.

"Well, I know it isn't exactly the same, but . . ."

Ian closed the book and carried it to a table, taking a moment to line up its edges exactly with those of the wood. Once he was satisfied that the symmetry was perfect, he returned to the ugly sofa and sank down next to Beth. He sat shoulder to shoulder with her, hip to hip.

"I started collecting the bowls a year and four months after I came home from the asylum," he said.

Beth looked at him to listen, her gaze catching his. Her eyes were such a lovely color, blue with flecks of gold, like sunshine on a pond. Ian got lost in looking at her eyes a moment, forgetting what he'd been saying.

"You began collecting a year or so after you came home . . ." Beth prompted.

Ian's mind picked up the thought and returned to that gear. "I went into an antiques shop with Isabella, in Paris."

Ian stopped again, remembering how terrified he'd been to leave Mac's hired townhouse, how soothing Isabella's presence had been when she'd persuaded him to accompany her. His sister-in-law had known how to speak into Ian's panicked silences, how to calm him with a smile, how to ask his opinion and then give it for him, so that strangers wouldn't think him odder than he was.

He remembered that his brothers had been puzzled and angry that Ian had let Isabella lay a hand on his arm or give him a quick kiss on the cheek, when he refused to let the rest of his family touch him.

Ian had thought his brothers fools about that. If they couldn't understand the difference between three overbearing Scotsmen who smelled of smoke and whiskey, and a lovely young woman scented with of attar of roses, he couldn't help them.

"Ian?"

Ian had lost track again. He looked into Beth's face--the woman who'd saved him from himself and who loved him in spite of his many, many shortcomings--and the words went out of Ian's head. Nothing he'd been saying could be as important.

"Isabella likes to shop, yes," Beth said, watching him expectantly. "And she took you into an antiques shop. Did you see a Ming bowl there?"