One Night with the Laird
One Night with the Laird
Nicola Cornick
Can true love be born from scandal?She is young and beautiful and fashionable, Edinburgh's most flirtatious hostess. But within the merry widow beats a grieving heart. Lady Mairi mourns the husband she lost two years before–and no matter how accomplished a lover Jack Rutherford may be, their wanton night together was an encounter of the body only, and Lady Mairi would prefer to forget it.But when Mairi is threatened by a blackmailer, Jack is the only man who can protect her. As they work together to uncover where the danger lies, their passion reignites. Little by little, the masks they wear burn away, and their most private secrets come to light….
Can true love be born from scandal?
She is young and beautiful and fashionable, Edinburgh’s most flirtatious hostess. But within the merry widow beats a grieving heart. Lady Mairi mourns the husband she lost two years before—and no matter how accomplished a lover Jack Rutherford may be, their wanton night together was an encounter of the body only, and Lady Mairi would prefer to forget it.
But when Mairi is threatened by a blackmailer, Jack is the only man who can protect her. As they work together to uncover where the danger lies, their passion reignites. Little by little, the masks they wear burn away, and their most private secrets come to light….
Nicola Cornick’s novels have received acclaim the world over
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Acclaim for Nicola’s previous books
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Award-nominated Cornick deftly steeps her latest intriguingly complex Regency historical in a beguiling blend of danger and desire.’ —Booklist on Unmasked
Don’t miss theScandalous Women of the Tonseries, available now!
WHISPER OF SCANDAL
ONE WICKED SIN
MISTRESS BY MIDNIGHT
NOTORIOUS
DESIRED
FORBIDDEN
Also available fromNicola Cornick
THE LADY AND THE LAIRD
DECEIVED
LORD OF SCANDAL
UNMASKED
THE CONFESSIONS OF A DUCHESS
THE SCANDALS OF AN INNOCENT
THE UNDOING OF A LADY
DAUNTSEY PARK: THE LAST RAKE IN LONDON
Browse www.mirabooks.co.uk or www.nicolacornick.co.uk forNicola’s full backlist
One Night with the Laird
Nicola Cornick
www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)
For Alison Lindsay. Thank you!
Contents
Epigraph (#ue803252d-aba1-5dcb-b26e-53adf887df66)
Chapter One (#u2ce08c9c-96c9-5f09-8b84-ed0a94fb036a)
Chapter Two (#u55b442bd-aa3c-5a11-94bf-c6cc84892805)
Chapter Three (#u2c155035-fd21-5a18-b490-dae4cad12610)
Chapter Four (#uf362c289-0343-54fb-8a55-addfaaa028d0)
Chapter Five (#u063fca0a-75ab-5bf8-b19a-28d99025c0e3)
Chapter Six (#uf44a3da6-761e-577e-afd2-1ed815f569d9)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Pleasure’s a sin and sometimes sin’s a pleasure.
–Lord Byron
CHAPTER ONE
Edinburgh, Scotland, April 1815
IT TOOK TEN minutes to cross from Edinburgh New Town to Edinburgh Old Town in a carriage, and for all of those ten minutes Jack had an almost uncontrollable erection the like of which he had never experienced before in his life. He had learned over the previous ten years that anticipation was one of the greatest aphrodisiacs of all; the anticipation he felt tonight was acute and almost impossible to bear.
Opposite him sat the woman who was the cause of his discomfort. He could not see her clearly in the drifting lamplight, but his awareness of her was sharp. Jack could smell the jasmine perfume that lingered on her hair and on her skin. He could see the shadow of a smile that curved her lips beneath the mask and he could still taste her from the kiss he had snatched a few minutes earlier. She had pushed him away then, but playfully, in a way that promised more, much more.
He had a rake’s reputation, but it was a long time since he had bedded a woman. He wondered if that accounted for this reckless urge to throw caution to the wind and take this woman he had met a mere four hours before. Jack did not know her name. He had not seen her face. He knew only that his sexual awareness of her was so keen that if he did not have her, and soon, he would be in danger of exploding with the frustration.
She knew it too. He could tell that she could feel the tension in the carriage, the expectation wound as tight as a spring. He wanted to wipe that satisfied little smile from her face with a kiss. He wanted to take her here in the carriage with each lurch of the wheels over the cobbles driving him harder into her body. He had no notion why she affected him so and he did not like it because it pushed him close to losing control; he only knew that from the moment he had first seen her he had wanted her.
The coach drew up with a sudden jerk. A groom, black-clad and inscrutable, opened the carriage door and let down the steps. Jack sat back to allow his companion to descend first. She gathered up the filmy silver skirts of her gown in one hand and stepped lightly down. Jack followed, glancing about him curiously. The carriage had stopped on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile. He could see the dark bulk of St. Giles’s Cathedral. The streetlamps glimmered in the soft falling rain.
She took his hand and drew him along one of the narrow alleyways that plunged downhill away from the main thoroughfare. The darkness was absolute here. He could hear the tap of her slippers on the cobbles and feel the rain cold against his face, soaking his hair and his jacket. The walls of the tenement buildings pressed close on each side.
He was rushing headlong into danger; in these deep alleys he could be robbed and murdered and no one would come to help him. A knife in the ribs would be rich reward for his reckless pursuit of passion. He paused, good sense overriding lust for a moment, but then she turned to him, pressing her body against his, reaching up to kiss him. The cold tenement wall was at his back, but she was all heat and sweet fragrance. Her kiss was fierce and urgent, sweeping away any polite preliminaries, demanding a response. She put one hand on the nape of his neck and held his mouth on hers, tangling her fingers in his hair. He felt the hot slide of her tongue against his and groaned into her mouth.
He slipped his hands beneath her cloak and felt the slippery silk of her gown slide beneath his palms. He caught her about the waist and drew her closer. Her breasts were pressed against his chest and she rubbed her hips against his. It was galling to be so at the mercy of his senses when he was a man of experience and not a schoolboy, but Jack seemed powerless to resist the molten lust that was coursing through his veins.
The faintest thread of light glimmered in her eyes as she smiled at him. She broke away, but only to turn the handle of a door set back in the corner of the wall, deep in shadow. She took his hand again and pulled him inside.
The house was not as he had expected. Here, in this poor neighborhood of peeling walls and dirt-strewn cobbles, it was like a miniature palace. Everything was polished and rich and gleaming, wood, silver, gold. He saw it all only in a brief flash as she pulled him up the stone stairs: the jewel-bright colors in the long curtains that shut out the night, the scatter of cushions on the settle. When she stopped at the turn of the stair to kiss him again, she slipped a hand inside his pantaloons and stroked his shaft and he almost came there and then. He was panting with anticipation and lust, his mouth was dry, his heart pounded.
The room she took him into was all in darkness. Only the embers of a fire burned low in the grate. There was no candle. She shut the door with the quietest of clicks and stood for a moment with her palms resting against it. He could feel her looking at him. The dark sharpened his senses; he could hear her breathing, hear the little hitch in her breath that told him she was neither as calm nor as in control as she seemed. The knowledge gave him a savage satisfaction. He would have hated to be the only one to be so close to the borders of control.
There was a soft hush of velvet as she untied the ribbon of her cloak and allowed it to fall. The gossamer silk of her gown glinted again as she moved, coming over to him, placing one hand against his chest. Her fingers were sure on the buttons of his jacket; she slid it from his shoulders and then burrowed beneath his shirt to find the heat of his skin. He heard her sharp intake of breath as her hands slid over his bare chest. Despite the raging need inside him, he kept quite still and let her have her way. It felt like a small victory to resist her.
She reached up to kiss him. She was tall but he was taller still. He caught a curl of her hair in his fingers, satin-soft. He had no idea of its color as she had been wearing a hooded domino. His questing fingers found some pins holding more curls in place. He tugged. They fell with a tinkle onto the wooden floorboards, and her hair cascaded over his hands.
She nibbled his lower lip, then slid her tongue into his mouth, and his mind spun away into a dark realm of sensation. He drove a hand into her hair to hold her head still for his kisses, seeking the heat and demand of her mouth, meeting it and demanding more in return. Wherever he led she followed eagerly. She tangled her tongue impatiently with his. She nipped at his lips and tasted him deep.
Sometimes she ran ahead with needs of her own; it was she who pressed the cold handle of a dirk into his hand and then spun around in mute order that he cut her laces. It was madness in the dark but he managed somehow, sliding the blade beneath, hearing the first creak and tear of the fabric before it suddenly gave way and her gown and petticoats slithered down to lie at her feet.
She was naked. He could sense it. He could feel her warmth. He could smell the jasmine scent again, fainter now, transmuted into something different, sweet and hot, on her skin. He remembered the sensation of her breasts against him and reached for her, but suddenly the blade of the dagger was at his throat and he fell back a step and she put her hand against his chest and pushed. His thighs came up against the edge of a bed. The blade pricked harder and he allowed himself to fall into the softest, widest, most comfortable mattress he had ever known.
She ripped the shirt from him then and straddled him, her thighs pressed tight against his side. With one hand she freed the buttons on his pantaloons and allowed his shaft to spring free into her hand. He tried to tumble her beneath him, but the blade at his throat warned him to be still. It traced an idle path down his chest, over his breastbone, farther down the line of his stomach until the flat of the blade kissed the tip of his straining shaft. At the same time, she squeezed him in her palm.
Christ, she was quite mad. And he too was about to lose his mind.
She tossed the dirk aside and came over him, sliding down to take him inside her body. His mouth opened on a shout at the heat and warmth and slickness of her, but she swallowed his cries in a kiss. She rocked, deeper and deeper, tighter and tighter and his mind splintered and he grabbed her hips hard, grinding her down on him as he came violently, desperately, calling out.
She rolled off him and lay by his side. Above the harsh pants of his own breathing he could hear the quick gasp of hers. Despite the shocking wantonness of the entire coupling, Jack felt as though something was missing, something he did not understand.
He turned his head to look at her, foolishly since he could see nothing of her in the oppressive dark. Suddenly, though, he had the certainty that she was about to run. He felt it in the flicker of movement through her body, heard it in her intake of breath.
His hand shot out and grabbed her wrist just as she started to move. He pulled her back against him, tucking her into his side, holding her still.
“Don’t you know it is bad manners to run out on a man so soon after having him?” His whisper teased her hair. He felt it brush his lips.
After a moment she laughed and he felt her body soften against his. She said nothing, though.
“What is your name?” He wanted to talk to her, wanted it quite desperately, in fact, as though the physical connection between them simply was not enough. Odd, when previously he had never wanted more from a woman than the simply physical.
“Rose.” There had been the very slightest hesitation in her voice before she had spoken. Not her name, then.
“I’m Jack.” He did not deal in lies, half-truths or evasions. It was not his style.
She rubbed her hand gently over his bare chest in acknowledgment. She might be a woman of few words, but she made up for it in other ways. His blood was tingling from that small touch.
“I want to see you.”
“No.” Her response was instant and with a note of panic in her voice.
“Why not, sweetheart?” In deference to the fear, he kept his own tone light, brushing the tangled hair away from her face, his fingers a gentle caress against her cheek.
She shifted slightly in his arms as though she was uncomfortable with both the endearment and the gentleness. He knew she was rejecting the intimacy. It was odd when they had just shared the most intimate experience possible.
“I don’t want any light.” Now there was an unconscious command in her voice. A woman accustomed to giving orders, then. That made her all the more intriguing.
“And what if I do?”
“You will have to be satisfied with touch.”
She took his hand and placed it over her breast. It was a gesture intended to stop conversation. He realized that. Yet he still succumbed. He felt her nipple harden against his palm and felt his blood heat in response. He toyed with her breasts with fingers, lips, teeth and tongue, allowing himself to be distracted, taking pleasure from her gasps and the way she arched to his touch. She urged him on in broken whispers, begging him to nip and suck harder to a point where pleasure turns to pain. He was painfully erect again by then and she spread herself for him and pleaded for him to take her hard, then harder still, her hands gripping the wooden headboard tight as he plunged into her. It was wild and wicked and he felt as though he were in a hot, dark dream, but even as he ravished her he felt the touch of a shadow on him as though something, somewhere was wrong. It almost felt as though she was asking to be punished, as though each stroke of his body into hers, each nip of his teeth at her breast, was penance.
Through the long night she let him do whatever he wished to her; she was his plaything and it was spectacular, unimaginably exciting, and he felt exhausted, satiated, but he couldn’t quell that stubborn instinct that something was missing. The final time he made love to her slowly, languorously, trying to anchor the intimacy between them in something deeper, trying to capture and hold her. Jack had no idea why he wanted that connection when he was by nature a man who wanted only the most superficial of love affairs. Perhaps it was the challenge; he was unaccustomed to a woman who held something back. Normally they were the ones pushing him into a closeness he did not want.
By now her skin was flushed and damp, slick against his. She moved with him on the same dark tide of desire and pleasure, she came for him when he demanded it, her body was his, and yet somehow it felt as though she still eluded him in all the ways that mattered. Afterward she slept but he lay awake listening to her breathing, his mind alert. At one point she cried out. He pulled her into his arms and held her and she calmed, but he felt tears on her cheek where it was pressed against his chest.
Eventually the warmth of her in his arms lulled him into sleep too, only to awake hours later when the sun was high in the sky and the room was bathed in light.
Jack knew before he opened his eyes that she would be gone.
* * *
IT WAS STILL dark when Mairi woke. For a moment her mind felt empty, light and free, and her body felt supremely ripe with pleasure, satiated and satisfied. A second later the desolation swept in, dark, cold and lonely as a winter’s night, banishing the light.
It was always like this when she woke up. There was an all too brief period of blissful peace and then she fell into the dark. Grief and loss crouched in the shadows, waiting to spring. This morning the misery was sharper than usual, painful as a whetted knife. She had sought to drown her unhappiness in sensual pleasure and had only made matters worse.
She slipped from the bed and immediately missed Jack’s warmth. He had been lying on his side, with one arm draped across her in casual possession, drawing her close in to the curve of his body. She was not sure how she had been able to sleep like that, in the arms of a stranger. It seemed wrong, impossible to accept when she rejected any sort of intimacy with anyone. Odd that she could give her body to him wholly and completely, holding nothing back, and yet the act of sleeping together afterward was something she regretted.
Shivering, she dragged on her underclothes, then tiptoed to the chest and took out a plain gown and shawl. Her hands shook as she tried to tie the fastenings. She could not see what she was doing. She tiptoed to the door, slippers in her hand. Light was starting to creep through the shutters now. She did not want to look back, but something compelled her to turn.
Jack was lying in the center of the big bed, in the midst of all the crumpled sheets and tumbled blankets. The covers rode low over his hips, revealing the broad expanse of his muscular chest dusted with golden hair. Tawny hair several shades darker fell over his forehead, a contrast to the stubble shadowing his chin. His eyes were closed, the lashes thick and black. The strengthening light skipped across the lean planes of his face, a long nose and resolute chin. It was a strong face, handsome enough to cause any woman to catch her breath, but that was not why Mairi gasped.
She felt a pang of shock, then a pang of horror, sharper, stronger, almost violent in its intensity.
Jack Rutherford.
It could not be.
She put out a hand and grabbed the bedpost for support. No. It was not possible. She had deliberately chosen a stranger, picked him out at a masquerade ball. She had seen him across the ballroom in his black domino and mask, and there had been something about him that captured her interest. She had thought he looked a little dangerous, a little wild, unknown to her, perfect for her purpose. They had not even spoken; they had had one dance and she had been so aware of him, burning with the need that possessed her, that at the end of it she had taken him by the hand and brought him here, to the secret little house she owned in the back streets of the Old Town of Edinburgh. She had wanted the entire experience to be a secret, but unfortunately she had chosen a man who was not a stranger at all.
Jack Rutherford. She supposed that the clue had been in his name, but she had not even registered it last night. There were plenty of men called Jack. She had not recognized his voice either, but they had spent so little time in each other’s company of late that it was no wonder.
She felt shaken, completely confused. She did not even like Jack Rutherford. He was arrogant, self-assured, deplorably confident, all too well aware of his charm and the effect it had on every woman he met. They had been thrown into each other’s company when her sister had married Jack’s cousin three years before. Jack had suggested they should get to know each other better, intimately, in fact. She had rejected his advances with an icy disdain. After that they had barely spoken and held fast to an intense mutual dislike.
She tightened her grip on the wood until her fingers hurt. The blood was pounding in her ears. She simply could not understand why she had been drawn to Jack the previous night. All unknowing, she had chosen the one man she should never have gone near. They were bound by marriage and mutual acquaintance. She had no idea how she could keep her identity secret from him now.
A cold draught scuttered across the floor, setting her shivering again. She already had regrets enough about the night. She had wanted to lose herself in a world that was entirely physical, to escape the unhappiness that clouded her mind, if only for a little while. No matter how spectacular the sex had been, she had found there was no escape.
Jack stirred in his sleep and sighed as he turned over. Mairi felt another pang of fear. He must never find out that she was the woman he had spent the night with. Inevitably he would have questions, questions she did not want to answer. She would have to make sure she never saw him again. Yet with the ties between their two families, that would be almost impossible.
She rubbed her forehead in frustrated fury. It was almost as though she had deliberately chosen him, and that was a thought that disturbed her very much indeed.
She would close the door and walk away and forget all about him. She would pretend this had never happened.
She risked one last glance. Jack was a man with a hard edge, a ruthless man, but he had shown her tenderness tonight. The thought made her feel vulnerable. It was very difficult to equate the Jack Rutherford she had thought she knew, all arrogant charm and brash swagger, with this man. She felt off-kilter as though all her assumptions about him had been overset, challenged by his gentleness as a lover. He had wanted to know her, not simply know her body. That confused her.
She turned away, suddenly raked with misery, and closed the door. She had plunged them from barely civil acquaintance into profound intimacy. Now she had to turn back the clock.
Frazer materialized from the steward’s room as soon as she stepped into the hall. She wondered if he had slept.
“No need to look so disapproving,” she said. “You’re not my father.”
The steward’s expression remained, as ever, completely inscrutable. He had a dark, closed face, austere and secret. Truth was, Frazer was old enough to be her father and was in fact father to the host of handsome young men she employed as footmen and grooms. He had worked for her for ten years, ever since her marriage. Frazer was a servant, yet somehow Mairi felt she was the one who had to work for his good opinion. This morning she suspected she had lost it once and for all.
“Can I get anything for you, ma’am?” Frazer was exquisitely polite. “Would you like the maid to draw a bath for you?”
“Just the carriage, if you please,” Mairi said. She would not delay a moment. She fidgeted with her gloves. “If you could tidy the bedroom—”
“Of course, ma’am.” The steward’s voice was arctic.
“The gentleman is still asleep,” Mairi said.
“Would you like me to wake him? Give him a shave? Breakfast?” Mairi was sure she could detect sarcasm in Frazer’s voice now. She looked at him sharply. He looked blandly back at her.
“Let him sleep,” Mairi said. She could feel herself blushing at the implication. “Then show him out. Oh, and, Frazer—” She hesitated. “If he asks any questions...”
Frazer nodded. “Of course, ma’am. Not a word.”
“Thank you.” Mairi’s throat felt rough. Tears pricked the back of her eyes. Frazer might disapprove of her behavior, but she still held his loyalty. Four years now since her husband, Archie, had gone and she could still feel the pain of his leaving squeeze her heart like a vise.
Outside in Candlemaker Row the wind was sharp. A pearl-white sky was unfurling over the city of Edinburgh. Mairi drew the shawl more closely about her. By the time she reached the Royal Mile the carriage was waiting, one of Frazer’s handsome sons standing ready to open the door for her. She climbed in and set off for her house in Charlotte Square, for a bath and for clean clothes. She ached so much. Her body ached from the pleasure, but her heart ached more.
She closed her eyes. Despite the extraordinary intimacy of the night, she felt lonelier than she had ever felt in her life.
CHAPTER TWO
July 1815
“YOU LOOK BLUE-DEVILLED.” Robert, Marquis of Methven, threw down his cards and viewed his companion with amusement in his narrowed blue eyes. “Money troubles, is it?”
“Why do you say that?” Jack Rutherford placed his own hand slowly on the table and reached for his cup of coffee. It was rich, warm and exceptionally good and it did nothing to soothe his spirits. What he really wanted was brandy but these days he never drank it. He had had an unhappy relationship with alcohol in his youth and he had no intention of ever letting his drinking get out of control again.
“You’ve been playing as cagily as a spinster aunt betting a shilling at whist,” Methven said cheerfully. “Your mind is elsewhere. And it cannot be a woman who’s spoiling your game since you never let them get to you—”
Jack shifted edgily. Some coffee spilled. He looked up to see his cousin laughing at him.
“Damn you, Rob,” he said, without heat.
“Never seen you like this before,” Methven said. “I suppose it had to happen sometime. Who is she?”
Jack paused. The club was three-quarters empty and wreathed in silence, which was good since he did not fancy rehearsing his romantic disasters to an audience. It was a situation he seldom if ever found himself in. Usually he was fighting women off rather than pining for their company.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, after a moment.
Methven raised a quizzical brow. “No name?”
“We didn’t talk much.”
His cousin sighed with weary acceptance. Robert knew him well. “Description?” he said.
“She was tall,” Jack said. “She was slender and she had long hair. I don’t know,” he repeated. “It was too dark to see.”
Methven almost choked on his brandy. “Devil take it, Jack. Where did this...uh...encounter occur?”
“At a masked ball,” Jack said. “At least that was where it started. It finished...” He shrugged. “Elsewhere. Somewhere in the Old Town.”
Methven was laughing now. Jack supposed it was funny in a way; he had a reputation for leaving women before the sheets were cold, and here he was, craving a woman who had used him and discarded him with a ruthlessness that stole the breath. It had not happened to him before. He did not like it. He was always the one to walk away first.
Yet that was not why he wanted to find her. He felt unsettled, distracted. Three months. It was ridiculous. He should have forgotten her two months and twenty-nine days ago. Yet her memory lingered. Only the previous day he had let a business deal slip through his fingers because he was not paying attention and someone else had undercut him with a better offer. Women had never come between him and his work before, and the fact that this one had done so frustrated him and made him angry.
“What do you know about her?” Methven was asking.
Nothing much that he wanted to discuss, Jack thought. He knew she was lovely and lissome, with skin that smelled of jasmine and was as soft as silk. He knew her hair curled deliciously. He had traced the contours of her face and knew it was fine-boned with a straight nose and a haughty little chin. He knew she had high, rounded breasts, small but perfect, and that her stomach curved in a way that made him ache to have her again and that the skin of her inner thighs was the softest of all.
He knew he was getting an erection merely through thinking about her and that if he did not find her soon he would run mad. He was sure his determination to track her down was no more than a physical compulsion, driven by lust, and that it would burn itself out once it was satisfied. But until he could find her he remained very unsatisfied indeed.
“She was a lady,” he said, remembering the cut glass accent and the note of command. Not a virgin, for surely a virgin would not have been so utterly without inhibition. And yet for all her apparent experience, he had sensed her vulnerability. And she had been sad. He remembered the way she had cried out in her sleep and the tears on her cheek, and felt a sharp, unwelcome pang of protectiveness.
“Forget her,” Methven was saying. “You know what Edinburgh society is like. She is probably a bored wife or a predatory widow. You will only be one of many. It sounds as though you both got what you wanted.” He raised a shoulder in a half shrug. “Don’t spoil the memory, Jack.”
It was good, if unpalatable, advice. Jack did not flatter himself that his mystery seductress had bedded no one but him. The anonymous black carriage and the luxurious love nest both argued against it. He was probably only the latest in a long line of conquests. He had experienced a night of unbridled passion with absolutely no commitment given, wanted or required, the sort of night many a man would kill for. He should be grateful. And he should walk away. Most certainly he should not make a fool of himself a third time by returning to the house in Candlemaker Row in a vain attempt to find her or to persuade the steward, tight as a clam, to reveal even one tiny detail that might help him in his search.
Methven pushed the coffeepot toward him. “She must have been good,” he said. “Or bad in the best possible way.”
Jack did not reply. His mouth tightened. Oh yes, she had been good, very good indeed. He had never known a woman like her, never been so lost in carnal pleasure, never felt this ache of longing.
“Have you tried bedding a harlot for the sake of a cure?” Methven asked. “Replace one whore with another—”
Jack was already half on his feet, his hand going to his sword, before he realized what he was doing. He saw his cousin raise his brows in laconic amusement, realized that he had been set up and wondered what on earth was showing in his eyes.
“I apologize,” Methven said swiftly. “I did not realize it was like that.”
“It isn’t,” Jack growled. He subsided into his seat with a sigh and splashed some more coffee into his cup. “I don’t know...” He stopped. He did not know why he had reacted so badly when his cousin had, in all likelihood, been correct and the woman had probably been a high-class harlot. Except that somehow he knew she was not. And for some reason it mattered.
“She wasn’t a whore,” he said stubbornly.
“Have you been back to the place you met?” Methven said. His blue eyes were steady and watchful now, measuring Jack’s reaction. Jack kept his expression studiously blank.
“I have,” he said. The masked ball had been held at Lady Durness’s town house in Charlotte Square. The house was closed now for the summer and the butler had been less than helpful on the subject of her ladyship’s guest list. The anonymous black carriage had had no family crest. The house in Candlemaker Row, so opulent, had given no clues.
He had to accept that she did not want to be found, and as he was not a man who forced his attentions on unwilling women, that was the end of the affair. He was left with nothing but frustration, anger at having been used and a sense of thwarted lust.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. He summoned up a smile. “Was there something in particular you wanted, Rob? Your note mentioned a favor.”
His cousin nodded. He was staring thoughtfully into the middle distance in a way that made Jack feel uneasy. Then he raised his eyes to meet Jack’s gaze. “You know that Ewan is to be christened at Methven in a month’s time?” he said. “We would like you to be present.”
Robert had married Lady Lucy MacMorlan three years before and they already had two sons, the second baby having been born two months previously. James, the heir, had been baptised at a grand occasion the previous year. Now it seemed that the spare would be getting the same treatment.
“I suppose this will be another of your grand clan gatherings,” Jack said.
Robert played with the stem of his wineglass. “The christening will certainly be a formal occasion,” he said at last, “but the house party is a family event.”
Jack tried not to groan aloud. He hated family occasions, formal or informal, and this one would no doubt prove even more uncomfortable than the last. Traditionally the Methven and the MacMorlan clans had been enemies. Some members of the family still seemed to think that they were.
“Surely your marriage should have been sufficient to heal the rift between the clans?” he said. “Must you do more?”
Robert’s blue eyes were amused. “Yes, I must. Lucy and I have not seen Lachlan and Dulcibella since they eloped. They had the tact to stay away from James’s christening last year.”
“Well, you are not missing anything,” Jack said. “Don’t invite them. Grandmama can’t stand them. No one can. You had a very lucky escape there, Rob.”
Robert’s eyes warmed and Jack knew he was thinking of his wife. Three years previously Robert had been betrothed to marry Miss Dulcibella Brodrie when she had eloped with Lucy’s brother, Lachlan. Robert, Jack thought, had been immensely fortunate; Lucy was charming, clever and beautiful and loved him to distraction. Dulcibella was spoiled, shallow and spiteful and loved no one but herself. There were already rumors of a rift in her marriage to Lachlan.
“I have to be on good terms with Lachlan,” Robert said. There was an edge to his voice now. “Now that Dulcibella has inherited the Cardross estates, we are neighbors. I don’t want any border disputes.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. “There was something else, Jack. We wondered... Will you stand as godfather to Ewan?”
The atmosphere changed; silence settled. Jack could find no words. He felt cold to his bones at what his cousin was asking. To be a godfather he would have to embrace family ties, family responsibilities. He would need to be a real active presence in his godson’s life. God forbid that anything might happen to Robert and Lucy, but if it did he might even be required to act as both boys’ guardian, a role for which he was supremely unfit. Jack repressed a shudder.
“You don’t need me,” he said lightly. “Ewan has a whole clan of relatives far more suitable than I.”
Robert’s eyes narrowed. “Jack,” he said, “should anything happen to Lucy or I, I would want you to stand as guardian to both James and Ewan.”
Cold fear seeped through Jack’s body. It was impossible.
“Rob—” he said, with difficulty.
“Lucy and I would like it very much,” Robert said gently. “If you feel able to accept.”
Jack did not look at him. He kept his gaze fixed on the dregs of the coffee that swirled in his cup.
“I am not exactly an ideal role model,” he said, striving for a light tone. “Ewan deserves better.”
“On the contrary,” his cousin replied evenly. “Ewan could not do better.” Then as Jack remained silent, his tone quickened with impatience. “Jack, for God’s sake, give yourself some credit. I know what you are thinking, but you did what you thought was best for Averil—”
Jack cut him off with one swift gesture. He never talked about his sister and he was not going to start now. “I left her to rot in that terrible school, Rob,” he said. “I did nothing for her.”
There was silence, heavy with unspoken comment. Then Robert sighed. “Very well. I respect your frankness and I do understand.” He shifted in his chair. “You will still come to Methven for the christening, though?”
“That’s not really a question, is it?” Jack said. “You are ordering me.”
Amusement gleamed in Robert’s eyes. “I can do no such thing, as you are well aware.” He allowed a moment’s quiet. “Grandmama would appreciate it. She has been in poor health lately, as you know. Seeing you would cheer her.”
“I don’t respond well to blackmail,” Jack said mildly. He let out a long sigh. “Oh, very well. As long as she has no further plans to marry me off.”
“It would make her happy to see you wed,” Robert said.
“You’re looking shifty,” Jack observed.
His cousin sighed. “Grandmama may—and I only say may—have invited a number of eligible ladies to Methven for the house party—”
“Like a cattle mart,” Jack said. His mouth twisted. “You’re not selling this to me, Rob.”
“Now that you have the estate at Glen Calder, you must surely be thinking of the future,” Robert said mildly.
“My future does not involve a wife and family,” Jack said, his voice hard. “Not every man wants such things.” He gulped down a mouthful of coffee, and another. It was not what he wanted. What he wanted—what he needed—was the fierce burn of brandy. It was not often these days that he thought of drinking himself into oblivion, but tonight the prospect was tempting. Too tempting. He knew his weaknesses, knew how little it would take. He pushed the bottle further away. He wished Robert was not drinking brandy but it was not his cousin’s fault. Robert had offered to take coffee with him and Jack had refused and ordered him the spirits. He hated anyone pandering to his weakness.
“Jack, you should not blame yourself,” Robert said. He cursed under his breath. “You should not have to bear the weight of your parents’ mistakes.”
“Let us not speak of it,” Jack said. His throat felt rough, his voice strained. He could hear his cousin’s words, but they could not touch him. He did not believe them because the truth was that he had failed. As the only son, he had had the duty to protect his mother and his sister after his father’s death, and he had failed them both shamefully.
He eyed the brandy bottle. His fingers itched to reach for it. He could feel the compulsion creeping through him like a dark tide.
It was better that he should be alone. That way there was no danger he would fail anyone but himself. He slid a hand across the table, reaching for the bottle.
“...Lady Mairi MacLeod,” Robert said.
Jack stopped, his head snapping round. “I beg your pardon?”
“I said that I would like you to escort Lady Mairi MacLeod to the christening,” Robert repeated. Then, when Jack did not immediately respond, “I know that you dislike her, but she is my sister-in-law. It would be a courtesy.”
Jack groaned. “Must I?” he said. Just when he had thought that the evening could not become worse, it had done so.
Dislike did not even begin to encompass his feeling for Mairi MacLeod. When he had first met her three years before at her sister’s wedding he had thought her fascinating, cool, beautiful, self-contained, a challenge. He liked rich widows and they tended to like him in return. He had wasted no time in suggesting to Mairi that she should become his mistress. She had told him in no uncertain terms what he could do with his proposition and after that had treated him with the utmost indifference. Jack was not accustomed to rejection, and it annoyed him that even after so clear a refusal he was still attracted to Mairi MacLeod with a powerful dark strain of awareness he could not dismiss. A week in her company escorting her over bad roads on the long and arduous journey to the Highlands would make him want to alternately strangle her and make love to her and neither option was possible.
Robert gave an exaggerated sigh. “I fail to understand your antipathy.”
“Then let me enlighten you,” Jack said. “Lady Mairi is proud and haughty. She’s too rich, too beautiful and too clever.”
Antagonism stirred in him again. It infuriated him that he could not be indifferent to Mairi MacLeod. Not even his night of outrageous passion with his mystery seductress had been able to break her spell. In fact, oddly it seemed to make the craving worse. Now there were two women he lusted after and could not bed.
Robert was laughing. “Does she have any other faults you wish to share?” he murmured.
Jack ran a hand through his hair. “I would rather not escort her,” he said. “Why can’t she travel with her family?”
“Because they are at Forres and Lady Mairi is at her home just outside Edinburgh,” Robert said with unimpaired calm. “It’s a courtesy, Jack. As I said, we are trying to heal the breach between the clans.” He shrugged. “If Lady Mairi dislikes you as much as you say, then she will refuse your escort.”
“She might accept simply to torment me,” Jack muttered. He gave a sharp sigh. “Oh, very well. But you owe me a favor.”
“I really do not think so,” Robert said dryly.
“Five minutes,” Jack said. “It will only take me five minutes to ask and for her to refuse.” He would spend no longer than that in her company. He would go to Ardglen, he would invite Mairi to travel with him to Methven, she would refuse and then he would be gone. Once at Methven for the christening, they could cordially ignore each other.
He sat back, the tension easing a little from his shoulders. He and Mairi MacLeod could surely manage to be civil to each other for so short a time. Five minutes and then it would be done.
* * *
“Tell Lady Mairi MacLeod that Mr. Rutherford wishes to see her.”
Mairi had been in the drawing room when she heard the door knocker sound with a sharp rap that was both arrogant and commanding. A moment later there were voices in the hall and one, a deep drawl she now recognized with every fiber of her being, made her jump so much that she almost snipped off her own fingers rather than the long stems of the roses she was arranging. Laying the secateurs softly on the table, she tiptoed across to the half-open door and stood poised, aware of the tension seeping through her body. The heavy scent of the roses seemed to fill the air, stifling her breath. The blood beat hard in her ears. She gripped the door handle tightly and closed her eyes as the world spun too fast.
Time had lulled her into a false sense of security. She had left Edinburgh the same morning that she had left Jack sleeping off his excesses in her bed. She had come to her country house and had dropped out of society in the hope of avoiding him. She had begun to think she was safe.
Yet here he was.
She tried to steady her breathing, to tell herself there was no danger. Even if Jack had identified her, she did not have to confront him. She had told the footmen to admit no one, and they were very well trained. Even now she could hear one of them politely refusing Jack access to her with a smooth and well-practiced rebuttal.
“I’m sorry, sir, but Lady Mairi is not receiving guests at the moment.”
“She’ll see me,” Jack said briefly.
Mairi drew back, but it was too late. Perhaps Jack had seen the flicker of her shadow across the black-and-white marble floor of the hallway. Perhaps he sensed her presence. She had only a few seconds’ warning and then Jack was striding into the drawing room and facing her. There was both authority and an easy grace in the way he moved across the floor toward her. She felt all the breath leave her body in a rush, felt the shivers chase across her skin. She realized that she was shaking and knitted her fingers together to still the betrayal.
The first thing she noticed about him was the elegance of his tailoring. He had certainly gone to a lot of trouble in his dress before he called on her. She was not sure how to interpret that. Jack always dressed well, but today he looked spectacular; his clothes were expensive and beautifully cut, the linen pristine white, the boots with a high polish. He carried it off well too, casually but with supreme elegance. So many men looked ridiculous in their fashions, impaled on high shirt points, their jackets stiffened with buckram. Jack Rutherford did not need any artificial aids in order to look good. The jacket of green superfine fit his broad shoulders without a wrinkle. His pantaloons were like a second skin, molding his muscular thighs.
Mairi felt awareness spark and flare deep inside her. Her breath caught beneath her ribs, and her heart started to race. Jack looked a little bit dangerous, more than a little handsome with the tousled tawny hair tumbling over his brow and those narrowed laughing eyes, his face chiseled and clean-shaven. The impossible intimacies they had shared made her consciousness of him so fierce that she was not sure she could hide her reaction to him.
She was staring. She chided herself for it and took a deep breath to steady herself.
He executed a perfect bow. “Lady Mairi.”
There was no apology for interrupting her, no reference to the fact that he had explicitly ignored her desire for solitude. In Edinburgh she had been the one who had driven their encounter. Now that seemed absurd. Jack Rutherford was far too forceful to be anything other than in control. His easy charm cloaked a will of steel.
“Mr. Rutherford,” Mairi said, matching his indifference with a chilly civility of her own.
His gaze brushed her face. There was no recognition at all in his eyes.
He did not know.
Relief weakened her knees and she almost had to grab the table for support. Disturbingly, beneath the sense of reassurance were other emotions. She identified disappointment and realized that everything that was feminine within her wanted him to remember her.
Madness. She should be happy to have got away with it. She should be grateful and relieved, anything but this vain and foolish dissatisfaction.
“How do you do, sir?” she said. “I hope you are well.”
Jack’s mouth twisted as though to suggest that he knew the words were no more than a commonplace courtesy. He did not even trouble to reply.
“I understand that you will be traveling to Methven for the christening of your nephew,” he said. His gaze was moving about the room as though he had no particular desire to look at her. “I am here to offer my escort.”
He was here about Ewan’s christening. Mairi felt simultaneously relieved to understand the reason for his visit and deeply irritated that his offer had been made in such an offhand manner.
“How kind,” she said. Then, stung to sarcasm by his indifference: “I had no notion you desired my company so much.”
His gaze came back to her, cool hazel, remote. “The offer is made is at my cousin’s request, madam, rather than my own inclination.”
“Of course,” Mairi said. “I knew it would not be your choice.” She smiled at him, equally cool. “Please tell Lord Methven that I appreciate his thoughtfulness but I will make my own arrangements.”
Jack nodded. She could tell he was not going to try to persuade her to change her mind, presumably because escorting her to Methven Castle was the very last thing on earth that he wanted to do. Everything about his demeanor suggested that he wished to be gone from her drawing room and preferably her life. She could understand that. While she could think of nothing but their wicked night together, Jack still thought of her as a woman who had rejected his advances and treated him with disdain, a woman he was unfortunately bound to through their mutual relatives.
If only he knew. The irony of it almost made her smile.
“Goodbye, Mr. Rutherford,” she said. “It is fortunate that Methven Castle is large enough that we need see little of each other during our stay.”
She picked up the secateurs again, gripping the cool metal tightly against her hot palm.
In a moment he would be gone.
Jack’s gaze fell on the roses with their deep red petals. They looked rich and vibrant against the sun-warmed wood of the table. The sunshine slanted light and shadow across his face, accentuating the high cheekbones and the hard jaw. Mairi felt her heart skip a beat. He looked up and met her eyes, and her heart jolted again for fear that she could not hide her reaction to him.
“My grandmother would like those flowers,” Jack said, surprising her. “She adores roses. Do you grow them here?”
“In the walled garden,” Mairi said. She touched the petals lightly. “These were cultivated specially and named after me—Mairi Rose...” She stopped, catching herself, remembering that in Edinburgh that night she had told him her name was Rose.
Jack did not appear to have noticed. His head was bent as he considered the flowers. He did not move.
After a second Mairi’s breath came more easily. She walked toward the door and put her hand on the knob again, pulling it wider in a clear signal that it was time for Jack to leave.
“Good day, sir,” she said sharply.
Jack looked up and met her eyes.
Her heart stopped at what she saw there. The cool indifference was gone. In its place she saw incredulity and anger and a fierce heat that made her breath catch.
“Rose,” Jack repeated, very softly.
The tight, breathless sensation in Mairi’s chest intensified. The doorknob slipped against her damp palm. She felt a craven urge to make a dash for the stairs, to run, to hide. Except that there was nowhere to hide.
“I believe,” she said, and her voice was now no more than a thin thread of sound, “that you were leaving, Mr. Rutherford.”
Jack’s eyes narrowed, his gaze intensifying on her. She felt another shiver chase down her spine. Then he smiled.
“Actually,” he said, still very quietly, “I don’t think I was.”
He came across and leaned past her to place a palm against the drawing room door and closed it very firmly.
CHAPTER THREE
JACK WATCHED MAIRI walk away from him. Each step was a deliberate move to put distance between them. She looked composed, elegant, every inch the aristocratic lady.
His gut instinct was confirming what his mind was still refusing to accept. This was the woman with whom he had spent the most explosively passionate night of his entire life. This was the woman he had been seeking for the past three months.
He felt a blinding rush of fury. He had felt angry and frustrated enough when he had imagined that his mystery seductress was a complete stranger to him. To realize that it was Mairi MacLeod who had used and discarded him was breathtaking. Clearly she had had absolutely no intention of ever revealing her identity to him. It had probably amused her to reject his advances and then pick him up as though he were for hire. The only surprise was that she had not left payment when she was gone in the morning.
The knowledge that he had been a fool as well as a dupe did not soothe his fury. He should have recognized her but he had been so bound up in lust that he had missed the clues to her identity. He felt another sharp pang of anger, made all the more acute by the sudden and devastating knowledge that he still wanted her. She might be amoral, spoiled and deceitful, but he wanted her very much indeed.
She crossed the room toward the wide marble fireplace and turned back to face him. The afternoon sun struck through the long windows with their filmy drapes and spun a soft golden glow about her. Her gown of palest blue was a shocking, ethereal contrast to the striking dark auburn of her hair. She stood bathed in a gentle light, but there was nothing gentle about her beauty and Jack felt an equally fierce pang of response. He wanted to dislike her. He had every reason to dislike her. Strange, then, how the discovery that she was the passionate wanton of his dreams suddenly made her the most fascinating woman he knew.
He looked at the tender line of her neck and the way that the loose curls of red-gold hair caressed her nape and he was instantly transported back to the house in Candlemaker Row, the twisted sheets and the hot darkness, the intimate slide of her skin against his. He felt his body harden into arousal.
“You are Rose,” he said. “You spent a night with me in Edinburgh three months ago.” He knew it had been her. He had seen the truth reflected in her eyes a moment before, but he wanted to make her admit it.
She turned to look at him. Her expression was guarded, betraying no hint of emotion. “I am,” she said, “and I did.”
Jack was reluctantly impressed. Nine out of ten women would have denied it, claiming that they did not know what he was talking about. But perhaps Mairi was so brazen when it came to taking lovers that she did not care about protecting her reputation with lies.
“I expected you to pretend not to understand me,” he said.
Mairi raised one shoulder in a shrug. “That would have been a tedious conversation when we both know the truth,” she said.
She sounded indifferent, but there was a tension in her slender body that told Jack that she was nowhere near as cool as she seemed. That pleased him. She had been in control on the night she had seduced him. Now it was his turn.
“Mairi Rose,” he said. “How convenient to have an alias when you require it.”
Her lips tilted upward in the parody of a smile. “I have three names,” she said. “Mairi Rose Isabella.”
Jack raised his eyebrows. “Even better,” he said. “A choice of aliases.”
“I didn’t want you to know who I was,” Mairi said. She spoke dismissively, as though it were a matter of little importance that she had deceived him. Jack felt his temper catch. It was a novel sensation to be treated as though he was of no account, and it was not one he cared for.
“That,” he said, “was obvious. The plain black carriage, the army of silent retainers, the anonymous—if luxurious—tenement house hidden away down the back streets...” His anger was still simmering and he wanted to provoke her. “I can only assume that you have had a great deal of practice when it comes to selecting and seducing your lovers, Lady Mairi.”
If the barb hurt she ignored the sting.
“I apologize if you feel I used you,” she said sweetly. “A man of your reputation is surely accustomed to casual encounters.”
“I would still prefer to know the identity of the woman with whom I am making love,” Jack said cuttingly.
She smiled. “I do not believe you complained at the time, Mr. Rutherford.”
She laid emphasis on his title, as though deliberately drawing attention to the fact that she outranked him, a duke’s daughter and he nothing more than the younger son of a baron.
Well, hell. She might be proud; she might pretend to be above his touch, but she was still an amoral wanton and he still desired her.
“I’m not complaining,” Jack said. “I cannot deny that I enjoyed having you.” He had been deliberately crude and he saw the color come into her face. He felt no remorse; it was the least she deserved having flaunted her brazenness in his face.
“I might have preferred that you admit to your desires honestly,” he continued. “But the sex itself was very pleasurable. I like that you allowed me to do whatever I wished to you. A woman without inhibitions is a rare thing.”
He saw her expression harden into hauteur. She did not like being treated with such disrespect. Well, now she knew how he felt.
He strolled toward her across the room. As soon as he got close she turned away from him. He had the impression that given half a chance she would simply walk out on him, but as he was now between her and the door, he had cut off her escape. Which was good, because he had not finished with her yet, not by a long chalk.
He circled behind her. She kept her head bent so that all he could see was the sweep of her lashes dark against the curve of her cheek and the pure lines of her jaw and throat. She looked impossibly delicate. Her air of vulnerability was most deceptive. “Why did you choose me that night in Edinburgh?” he asked, his voice hard. “There must have been a reason. What was it?”
She looked directly up at him then. “I am sorry,” she said. “You appear to be laboring under a misapprehension, Mr. Rutherford.” Her blue eyes, dark as midnight, mocked him. “When I picked you up at the ball I did not even know it was you.” She paused just long enough for the insult to sink in. “You could have been anyone.”
Jack felt a rush of pure, primitive fury, impossible to deny, difficult to explain. She was taking blatant shamelessness to a new level in claiming that any man would have sufficed as her lover that night. And instinct told him she was lying.
He grabbed her arm and jerked her close to his body. At such close quarters he could smell the sweet elusive fragrance that had haunted his nights. He could hear her breathing. It was not quite steady.
“I don’t believe you,” he said. “You must have known it was me. You chose me deliberately. I believe you have wanted me from the first time we met and your protestations of virtue were nothing but a sham.” He was not sure if it was pride or stubborn instinct that forced him to press the matter, but he was sure she was not telling the truth.
If she was a liar, though, she was a damned fine one. Her eyes were very candid. She shrugged. “Whether you believe me or not is your choice, Mr. Rutherford,” she said. Once again there was a touch of mockery in her voice. “Perhaps you have too good an opinion of yourself to wish to accept that I did not recognize you. My observation of you over the past few years suggests that your arrogance is such that you assume every woman must find you irresistible.”
Touché.
She had his measure. If Jack had not been so angry, he would probably have found it amusing that Mairi MacLeod knew him so well.
He eased his grip on her arm, sliding his hand down to her elbow. Her skin was smooth and warm beneath his touch, the lace edge of her sleeve just brushing his fingertips.
“But you did find me irresistible, Lady Mairi,” he said. “Whether or not you knew my identity.”
He drew her closer so that her skirts were touching his thighs. She was rigid with tension now. He could feel it thrumming through her body and see the pulse that beat in the hollow of her throat. Awareness crackled between them as hot and sudden as a flame catching at tinder.
“I believe you chose me because you wanted me,” Jack continued softly. He leaned closer; spoke in her ear. “Perhaps it was instinct, perhaps you did not realize what you were doing, but you wanted me as your lover.”
Now, for the first time, he saw a different expression in her eyes and knew at once that this was precisely what she feared; that some deep and powerful compulsion had driven her to pick him out from all the men at the masked ball that night. For a split second she looked frightened, but then disdain smoothed the emotion away and her defenses were firmly back in place.
“I did not have you down as a romantic, Mr. Rutherford,” she said lightly, “and I hesitate to shatter your illusions once again, but I do not believe in some sense of recognition that binds people together. That is nonsense.”
“You don’t believe that desire is a powerful enough force to draw people together?” Jack questioned mockingly.
“The only thing that is powerful here is your imagination, Mr. Rutherford.” Mairi’s tone was chill now, all emotion locked away. She released herself from his grip and stepped away from him very carefully, the pale blue silk of her gown brushing his leg as she passed.
“I was not imagining that night in Edinburgh,” Jack said. “You were completely abandoned in my arms, without restraint or shame. Although by your own admission you respond like that to any man who beds you.”
Mairi spun around, cutting him off with a decisive chop of the hand. At last he had provoked her beyond tolerance. There was high, angry color in her cheeks, and her eyes were a glorious stormy blue. “Enough, sir,” she said. “You are insulting and your observations on my character and behavior are of no interest to me. It is time you left.”
Jack held her gaze. “You cannot have it both ways, madam,” he said. “Either you are a harlot who spreads her favors indiscriminately or you are attracted to me specifically and should drop this pretense of indifference. I do not believe that you have said a single honest thing to me this afternoon. Be honest in this one thing at least and admit that you want me.”
Their gazes locked, his fierce with heat, hers defiant. He had never known a woman quite so guarded. He had never felt so strong a compulsion as he did now, wanting to smash her defenses and force her to admit to her desires.
He raised a hand and brushed the loose tendrils of copper-colored hair away from her neck. The minute he touched her, she froze. He let his fingers slide gently down to the base of her throat, dipping in to the hollow there. He felt her tremble. It was a tiny but betraying gesture and it made his blood surge. Her skin was heating now beneath his touch, a pulse beating against his fingers. She felt soft and warm and tempting.
He leaned in closer so that his lips were a mere inch from hers. Her eyes were a hazy slumberous blue now, half-closed. He brushed his lips across hers in the lightest of kisses. She gave a gasp; he felt her breath on his lips and was suddenly possessed with the most ravenous hunger to drag her into his arms and kiss her senseless.
Instead he ruthlessly reined in the urge and kissed her again, a little deeper, a little longer. Her lips parted, clung to his, betraying a truth she had refused to put into words.
“You want me,” he said.
The ache in his groin was intense now. In a second he remembered being in the carriage on that helter-skelter ride across Edinburgh, remembered the anticipation and the driving need. He kissed her for a third time and she tasted as sweet as he recalled; he ran his tongue along her lower lip and dipped it inside her mouth, tangling with hers, the kiss deepening into blatant demand. Another kiss, hard and insistent this time, and he was within a few ragged steps of losing control, pushing aside the spray of roses that lay on the polished table and taking her on it.
He felt the prick of a blade at his throat.
“These secateurs are sharp as any dirk,” Mairi said. Her voice was a little husky. “Step back, Mr. Rutherford.”
It took Jack several seconds to process the words, and during that time the blade only pressed harder, so he thought it wise to obey. He brought a hand up, running his finger against the cutting edge. It was, as she had said, fiercely sharp. As was the look in her eyes.
“I could disarm you,” Jack said. With a twist of the wrist it would be easy enough, but he suspected that Mairi MacLeod probably had another weapon concealed somewhere about the place, and she looked as though she would be very glad to have an excuse to use it on him.
“You have lost the element of surprise,” she said pleasantly. “You have also overstayed your welcome.” She walked across to the door and opened it for him. “Goodbye, Mr. Rutherford,” she said.
No fewer than three black-clad footmen came forward in a phalanx to escort Jack to the front door. Evidently they had been waiting to burst in and rescue Mairi if she had given the signal. Their expressions were threatening, especially the man who had failed to prevent Jack from entering in the first place. He looked as though he felt he had something to prove.
Jack, who had taken on far more intimidating men in far more intimidating places than Lady Mairi MacLeod’s drawing room, stifled a smile. He briefly weighed the merits of causing a mill and regretfully decided against it.
“You employ a private army,” he said, allowing his gaze to travel back from the row of black-clad retainers to Mairi’s face. “What is it that you are afraid of?”
He thought for a moment that she was going to refuse to answer and would instead have him thrown out on his ear on the gravel without any further conversation.
“I am a rich widow,” she said, after a long moment. “A very rich widow. There have been...” She hesitated. “Threats of kidnapping, of forced marriage. I employ an entourage for my own protection since I have absolutely no desire to wed again.”
“I pity the poor fool who would try to force you into marriage,” Jack said. “You seem very handy with a weapon.” The look he gave her was insolent, sweeping from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, and he saw the hot color sting her cheeks at his impudence. Her chin came up.
“I shall be tempted to wield one again,” she said, “if you do not leave my house immediately.”
Jack grinned. “You have nothing to fear from me, sweetheart,” he said. “I am even richer than you are and I do not intend ever to wed you, only to bed you. Again.”
He flashed her a mocking smile before strolling in his own good time down the front steps. He almost expected to feel her dirk thudding between his shoulder blades. Instead he heard the door slam shut behind him. Another black-clad groom was waiting on the gravel, holding his horse for him. Through the archway to the mews, he could see a traveling carriage being prepared, not plain black this time but with the crest of the Duke of Forres and the arms of MacLeod entwined. It was the last word in luxury, fast and well sprung, sufficient even to deal with the state of the Highland roads. Lady Mairi was indeed making her own travel plans and they did not involve him.
Once they were at Methven, though, she would not be able to avoid him. The castle was huge, but the nature of a house party was such that the participants were thrown together no matter their wishes. Jack was suddenly aware that he was looking forward to the visit with a great deal more enthusiasm than he had felt the previous night. A house party also gave ample opportunity for intimacy and he wanted to rekindle his affair with Mairi, wanted to taste again the heat and the passion of their night together. He wanted her, her fragility and her strength, the fierce emotions she hid beneath that cool exterior. He knew she desired him too. She had betrayed herself when she had kissed him. She might lie, but her body’s response to him did not.
He was also still very angry with her for pretending indifference to his face and then seducing him secretly, for spending one night with him and then dismissing him like a paid lover. He recognized the anger and it interested him. He was not generally an introspective man, but something about Mairi MacLeod had him examining his reactions and his emotions like a poet or a philosopher. It was bizarre and he did not like it. But the anger was unusual. He did not generally bear grudges. He was not interested in revenge. Usually he forgot, moved on. It appeared that with Mairi MacLeod he had not moved on.
He shrugged. That was easy enough to solve. Another night of rapture, this time on his terms, and he would be ready to forget her. It had always worked before. His interest in a woman seldom outlived the intimate knowledge of her.
He encouraged his horse to a canter that raised the dust on the road. Lady Mairi MacLeod might be faithless and amoral, but then so was he. In that they were well suited. He was certain it would not be long before he was in her bed again.
CHAPTER FOUR
MAIRI SAT AT her desk with the household accounts spread in front of her. Jack Rutherford had gone, but the air still seemed to hum with his presence, fierce and elemental. It was impossible for her to concentrate. The columns of figures blurred before her eyes, and all she could see was Jack’s face and all she could feel was the touch of his lips against hers. She had wanted him very much and she knew he knew it.
Damn him.
She could not really blame Jack for being angry with her. Nor could she blame him for thinking her a whore when she had deliberately told him that any man would have done as a lover that night. That had been the literal truth, but no man could hear that without thinking her a shameless harlot.
With a little sigh she laid her pen aside and pinched the bridge of her nose to ease the headache behind her eyes. She could not understand why she was attracted to Jack. He was the complete opposite of her husband, Archie, who had been gentle and kind. Yet from the moment that Jack had walked into the drawing room, she had been acutely conscious of him, of the vitality and energy he brought with him, of the confident swagger in his step and the muscular perfection of his body beneath the close-fitting and beautifully tailored clothes. She did not want to want him. Yet it felt as though he had in some way imprinted himself on her so that her senses craved him, the taste and the touch of him. She disliked intensely the feeling that she was so vulnerable to him, but she could not escape it.
In Edinburgh she had used Jack shamelessly to drive out her feelings of loneliness and melancholy. She had sought out a man that night in order to forget for just a little while the huge weight of responsibility she carried and the secrets she kept. And for a time it had worked; she had forgotten everything in the bliss of Jack’s touch and the shocking, exciting sensations conjured by her own body. She had had so little experience of sex. She had had no idea, no notion at all, that it could be so delicious. It bore no resemblance to the mortifying fumbles she had endured at the start of her marriage to Archie MacLeod when they had barely managed to consummate their union.
Well, she had certainly made up for that inexperience now. She could barely believe that she had acted with such brazen lack of restraint when she had been with Jack. So much of her knowledge had been theoretical before, gleaned only from the books in her father’s library.
Even now the memory of Jack’s lovemaking made her feel very hot and slightly faint. She put her head in her hands and groaned. She hungered for Jack now. She wanted to know again that wicked pleasure she had felt at his hands. It was impossible. It could not happen.
Two blackbirds squabbling on the terrace outside roused her with their noisy calls. Shaking her head impatiently, Mairi turned back to the file of papers on the desk. This was mainly correspondence that Murchison, her secretary, had already filtered and deemed important enough for Mairi to see. Archie MacLeod had not been an elder son, but he had inherited a huge fortune from his nabob godfather at the age of one and twenty. There were the two houses in Edinburgh, the country estate outside the city where Mairi was currently living and Noltland Castle in the eastern Highlands near the town of Cromarty. There was money in bonds and investments. There were endowments to charity and a dozen other business and philanthropic ventures. The entire inheritance had come to Mairi at Archie’s bequest.
Today’s crop of correspondence included reports from the trustees of all the various charities that Archie had set up. While his inheritance had been rich beyond the dreams of avarice, his generosity had been equal to it. He had been desperate to use the money to do good; there were almshouses for the indigent elderly, an orphanage, a cholera hospital, so many good deeds and good works that Mairi’s head swam whenever she tried to keep track of them all. She was the custodian of Archie’s inheritance now, though, and she had to be worthy of it. She had to continue his good work.
At the bottom of the pile was one last letter, written in terse legal terminology. It was from Michael Innes, the heir to the MacLeod barony. Mairi read the letter through once a little carelessly and a second time with a growing sense of irritation. It stated that Innes was bringing a case to court to prove that Mairi was an unsuitable chatelaine of the late Archibald MacLeod’s estates. He claimed to have evidence of her lax financial management and her personal immorality. He would be laying this before the courts and petitioning for all the late Archibald MacLeod’s holdings to pass to him.
Mairi allowed the letter to drift down onto the desk. It was not the first time that Michael Innes had threatened to take her to court. He had resented Archie’s inheritance from the first and had always insisted that it should have been subsumed into the main MacLeod estate because he believed it was impossible for a woman to administer such a huge inheritance without a husband’s guidance. Mairi knew he was motivated by spite and greed. Now, though, a line at the bottom of the letter caught her eye and she paused to reread it for a third time.
You may be sure that I will not hesitate to expose all the old scandals in the pursuit of truth.
A ripple of unease passed down Mairi’s spine. She rubbed her eyes. They felt dry and gritty. Her head felt heavy as though it were full of sand. She tried to think.
I will not hesitate to expose all the old scandals...
Her father-in-law had worked very hard to make sure that those scandals would never be revealed. Mairi could not believe that Michael Innes knew anything of them. No one did. Only she and Lord MacLeod knew the truth in its entirety. Or so she had thought. But that was the trouble with secrets. You could never be completely sure that they were safe.
Mairi’s head ached suddenly, so sharply she bit her lip. She did not know what to do. There was no one to share her burden but Lord and Lady MacLeod. Archie had wrought devastation on their lives as surely as he had torn hers apart and there was not a moment when she did not seek to make up for that.
She sat irresolute for a minute and then picked up her pen. She knew she had to write to her father-in-law to tell him of this latest threat. He could not be left in ignorance. She felt sick as she started to write the letter. The old laird was too frail and too ill to be troubled with such matters these days, but she needed his wise counsel and there was no one else she could trust.
A moment later, there was a knock at the door and Frazer entered with a large dish of tea on a silver tray. Mairi moved her papers aside and Frazer placed it carefully on the desk. All Frazer’s movements were precise and ordered.
“I thought you might require some refreshment, madam,” he said.
“Thank you,” Mairi said, smiling at him. “I do. These accounts make my head hurt.”
“I meant as treatment for the shock, madam,” Frazer said.
“Ah,” Mairi said. Her smile broadened at Frazer’s austere expression. The steward was a strict Presbyterian and he never hesitated to make his disapproval known. She suspected that he considered it a part of his duties to try to keep her on the straight and narrow. “I collect you are referring to Mr. Rutherford,” she said. “I fear my sins have found me out.”
“Quite so, madam,” Frazer said, with no flicker of a smile. “I am sorry that Murdo and Hamish and Ross were obliged to hear the gentleman refer to the sensual excesses he shared with you.”
“Elegantly put, Frazer,” Mairi said. “However, since Murdo drove the carriage the night I picked up Mr. Rutherford and Hamish and Ross acted as grooms, I am sure they are already aware of my morally reprehensible ways. Thank you for the restorative tea,” she added. “You are most thoughtful.”
Frazer’s expression eased a fraction. “Murdo asked me to apologize, madam,” he said. “He is exceeding sorry for his failure to prevent Mr. Rutherford’s ingress.”
“Murdo is not at fault,” Mairi said. She stirred honey into her tea, then laid the spoon down thoughtfully. “I suspect Mr. Rutherford always does as he pleases.”
“Indeed,” Frazer said. “A dangerous man, madam.” He bowed and went out, shutting the door with exaggerated care.
Mairi took her teacup in her hand and walked across to the long windows. They stood open onto the shallow terrace. Beyond that a small flight of steps led down to the gardens, and beyond that Mairi could see the silver glitter of the sun on the sea. The July day was hot; only the slightest of breezes stirred her hair. If the weather held for a few weeks, it would be beautiful for the christening at Methven. It would also be awkward to be obliged to see Jack Rutherford again, but she would ask Lucy for a room as far away from Jack’s as possible. It was common knowledge that she and Jack disliked each other. Lucy would not think there was anything odd in such a request.
She drained her cup. Her thoughts were drifting to family matters now and she wondered if Lucy was enceinte again. If Lucy and Robert produced an enormous brood of children, there might be years of such trips to Methven for family occasions such as christenings, birthdays, even marriages in time. Mairi shuddered. She hated family reunions, hated the reminders of her own solitude and most of all hated her status as a childless widow. She had desperately wanted a family of her own. The lack of it was like a hollow space in her life, a painful barrenness that she could ignore but that would never heal.
She set her cup down with a clatter on the little cherrywood table by the door. In the fullness of time, Jack would probably bring a wife and family of his own to future events. Despite his denials, a man wanted a wife or at least an heir. She felt an empty, yawning sensation in the pit of her stomach. There was no child to inherit Ardglen, or Noltland or any of Archie’s fortune even if she could keep it safe from Michael Innes’s grasping hands.
To distract herself she stepped out onto the terrace and went across to lean on the sun-warmed balustrade. The air was full of the scent of roses and honeysuckle. The sun felt hot on her face. There was silence but for the faint jingle of harness and the sound of distant voices from the stables.
For a second it felt as though time had slipped back and any moment she would see Archie coming toward her, smiling as he strode across the gravel of the parterre in his ancient gardening clothes, burned brown by the sun, dusting the soil from his hands. She had always teased him that he employed several gardeners and yet preferred to do the work himself. He had never been happier than when he was outdoors.
The silence stretched, sounding loud. Nothing moved in the quiet gardens. It was a waiting silence, as though someone was watching, as though something was about to happen. Mairi felt odd, as light-headed as though she had had too much sun.
The loneliness ambushed her so suddenly and viciously that for a moment it seemed as though the sun had gone in. She could no longer feel its warmth or the roughness of the stone beneath her palms. It was terrifying.
“Madam?”
Mairi had not heard Frazer coming out onto the terrace until he cleared his throat very loudly. She turned, trying to pin a smile on her face. It felt forced, wobbly, and the tears stung the back of her eyes and closed her throat. She fought desperately for control.
“Hamish asked me to tell you that the carriage is prepared for your departure to Methven in the morning, madam,” Frazer said. “We will all be ready to leave as soon as you are.”
The words were commonplace, but for a second Mairi struggled to understand them. “Thank you,” she said. Her voice sounded husky. “Please tell Hamish I shall be ready by seven.”
“Of course, madam.” Frazer bowed. “And Mr. Cambridge is here to see you,” he added.
Damnation.
Mairi blinked. It was so inconvenient that Jeremy Cambridge was here now when she felt as wrung-out as a dishcloth. If she were not careful she would cry all over him and that would be a disaster on many levels.
“Shall I tell the gentleman you are indisposed?” Frazer spoke delicately, hovering by the terrace door.
“No.” Mairi cleared her throat. “No, thank you. If I am to leave for Methven tomorrow, there will be no time to speak to him. But, Frazer—” She raised her chin. “Pray give me a moment.”
The steward nodded.
As soon as he had disappeared, Mairi made a beeline for the pier glass that hung to the left of the fireplace and checked her reflection. It was not as bad as she had thought, though her eyes looked strained and bright and there were lines at the corners she could have sworn were new. With a sigh she tucked a stray curl back beneath her bandeau and turned to face the door.
When Jeremy Cambridge was announced she was standing behind her desk. She found she needed the physical barrier. Not that she needed protection against Jeremy. There was nothing remotely threatening about him. Jeremy’s father had been estate manager to Lord MacLeod, but he had had ambitions for his children to rise in society. He had sent Jeremy to university and his sister Eleanor to finishing school. Jeremy was now a respected banker in the city of Edinburgh and was among other things the MacLeod family’s man of business. He was large, solid and reliable. Steady. Safe. Mairi found herself thinking that he was the opposite of Jack Rutherford in every respect. He had nothing of Jack’s restless spirit or air of danger.
“Lady Mairi.” They had known each other for a number of years, but Jeremy was never less than respectful. He held out a hand to shake hers. “I was passing by and called on the off chance that you might be at home. I hope I find you well.”
“I am in very good health,” Mairi said. “No need for formality, Jeremy. Would you care for a cup of tea?”
She saw him relax. His gray eyes warmed. “Of course, if you have the time to spare. Frazer tells me you leave for Methven tomorrow. Will you call on Lord and Lady MacLeod on your journey?”
Mairi nodded. “I intend to. I hope Lady MacLeod will be well enough to see me.” Lord MacLeod would have received her letter by then. She paused, toying with the idea of confiding in Jeremy about the latest threat from Michael Innes, then decided against it. She needed to speak to the laird first. Jeremy did not know anything of Archie’s secrets, and it would be better if it remained that way. Besides, she had her vanity, and while she knew Jeremy well, she would not relish discussing with him what Innes referred to as her moral turpitude.
She waited while Frazer, who had evidently anticipated her order, maneuvered the tea tray into the room and placed it at her elbow on the table beside the gold-striped sofa. Mairi sat. Jeremy, who had been waiting for her to be seated first as a gentleman would, sat down opposite, his body angled toward her most attentively. Mairi’s lips twitched. Jeremy was so devoted. She had never been quite sure, though, whether he admired her or her fortune. Another face rose in her mind, strong, dark, not remotely a gentleman. She could feel the clasp of Jack’s fingers about her wrist, hear the low timbre of his voice and feel the touch of his lips. Her fingers shook. The teaspoon rattled against the side of the pot as she stirred.
“Is all well?” Jeremy asked.
“Of course.” Mairi could feel her face heating. She kept her gaze averted from him, making a little performance of pouring the tea, adding milk and passing it to him. “Is there any news of interest?” she asked. “I have been at Ardglen so long I have heard none of the latest gossip from the outside world.”
Jeremy’s face fell as though she had asked the one question he had been hoping to avoid.
“There isn’t a great deal of news,” he said evasively.
“Nothing from Edinburgh?” Mairi said.
Something moved and shifted in Jeremy’s eyes again. His gaze slid away from hers. “There’s nothing much to tell,” he muttered.
Well, that was odd. There was always news from Edinburgh, even in the summer when society was quiet and many people were at their country estates. Mairi waited, but Jeremy said nothing else, merely draining his cup in one gulp. He had ignored the cook’s homemade Abernethy biscuits, and now he looked as though he could not wait to leave.
It was the mention of gossip from Edinburgh that had wrought the change in him. Mairi felt a vague flicker of alarm. She wondered if the talk had been about her. Normally she was not so vain as to assume that everyone was talking about her, but taken together with Michael Innes’s threatening letter, it left her with a bitter taste of fear in her mouth.
Had Innes learned somehow of her night with Jack? Did everyone know?
She added more honey to her tea and drank it down, trying to calm the flutter of panic. The MacLeod heir had made such wild threats before. There was no reason to suppose that he had any more evidence now than he had had in the past.
She looked at Jeremy. He was staring evasively at the pattern on the Turkey carpet. The tips of his ears were bright pink and he looked as though he were sitting on pins.
He knew. Mairi was sure of it. And if Jeremy had heard the gossip, so must everyone else. Her heart did a little sickening skip. She would apologize to no one for the night that she had spent with Jack Rutherford, but she did not want it to be the talk of Edinburgh. That would be beyond embarrassing. As a widow she was allowed a certain latitude in her behavior, but it was demeaning to feel that her reputation was besmirched and that everyone was dissecting her behavior. It had never happened to her before.
But perhaps she should have thought of that before she had thrown caution to the winds and enjoyed a night of wild passion with Jack.
“More tea, Jeremy?” she asked, reaching for the pot. She could only hope that the gossip would die down while she was out of the city. Her absence would surely starve it of fuel. Or so she hoped.
“No, thank you.” Jeremy leaped to his feet. She had been right; he was suddenly desperate to leave. She put out a hand, caught his and held it tightly. He was too much of a gentleman to wrench it from her grip, so he stood there like an abashed schoolboy in the headmaster’s study.
“Jeremy,” Mairi said. “You would tell me if there was something I should know?”
He looked shifty. There was no other word for it. The expression sat uncomfortably on such a fair, open face.
“Are people talking about me?” Mairi asked.
Jeremy did not answer directly. “It’s nothing,” he said. His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “I can see...” He cast a look at her, quick and furtive. “I can see that it’s nonsense.”
“What is?” Mairi said, mystified.
This time Jeremy eased a finger around his collar. “It’s nothing,” he repeated. “All nonsense.”
Most unsatisfactory, but short of torturing the news out of him, Mairi knew she could not make him talk. She sighed. “Then I wish you a safe journey home, Jeremy, and I shall hope to see you soon.”
Jeremy looked relieved. His gaze softened as it rested on her. He took her hand again. “And I hope you have a good trip to Methven.” He hesitated. “Once the christening is past, though, I think that perhaps you should return to Edinburgh.”
Mairi raised her eyebrows. “Do you? I had thought to go to Noltland first.”
Jeremy’s jaw set stubbornly. “Edinburgh would be better. You need to be seen in society rather than appear to be hiding out in the country.”
He kissed her hand this time with rather more fervor than she was expecting. “Lady Mairi—” he said. There was a great deal of repressed emotion in his voice.
“Jeremy?” She hoped to goodness he was not going to make her a declaration. She did not wish to hurt his feelings, but she could never look on him as anything other than a friend. Guilt gripped her; she had leaned heavily on Jeremy after losing Archie. She hoped he had not interpreted her friendship as something stronger.
“Goodbye, dear Jeremy,” she said, and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “You know how much I value your friendship.”
Jeremy blushed endearingly and almost tripped over the edge of the Turkey rug on his way to the door. Stammering that he would see her in Edinburgh in a month’s time, he let himself out into the hall, where Mairi could hear Frazer furnishing him with his outdoor clothes.
Silence washed back in. Soon Frazer would return to collect the teacups and her maid, Jessie, would come to discuss packing for her trip. She should not have left it this late really, not when she would be away for at least four weeks. The journey itself would take more than a week; Methven was on the northwest coast and she was making a number of calls along the way.
A part of her would be sorry to leave Ardglen just as the roses were coming into bloom. They always reminded her of Archie. He had been her friend since childhood and she missed him very much. She wandered out onto the terrace again and walked slowly down the mossy steps and along the neat gravel path to where the rose garden slumbered within its mellow brick walls.
The other part of her, the part that shrank from the loneliness, wanted to leave for Methven directly, but the shadows were lengthening and the afternoon was slipping into evening. It would be better to wait until the morning and make an early start. Once the christening was over she would travel to Noltland—no matter what Jeremy advised—and then back to Edinburgh for the winter season and then to her father’s home at Forres for Christmas. She liked to have plans. She needed them. They gave structure to her life, a life that sometimes seemed dangerously empty no matter how much work there was associated with Archie’s inheritance. She had to keep moving, keep traveling, keep occupied, to drive out the darkness.
CHAPTER FIVE
IT WAS EVENING by the time the traveling carriage drew into the courtyard of the Inverbeg Inn on the shores of Loch Lomond. Mairi had been on the road for twelve hours and was tired and travel-sore. She was glad to see the lanterns flaring at the inn door and to know that Frazer had booked ahead to secure her a room and a private parlor.
When the steward came hurrying to assist her from the carriage, however, it was clear that there was a problem.
“Forgive me, my lady,” he said, “but there is only one private parlor and it is already occupied.”
Mairi raised her eyebrows. “By whom?”
“By your husband, ma’am.” The landlord, a thin, nervous fellow with a sallow complexion and shifting gaze, had followed Frazer out and now stood at the bottom of the carriage steps. “He arrived but a half hour ago and asked for the private parlor. When I said it was reserved for you, he assured me there was no difficulty as he was your husband, traveling ahead of you on the road. He ordered the best food in the house.”
Her husband.
Mairi had little trouble in guessing whom she would find in the private parlor. Jack Rutherford. She felt a prickle of antagonism along her skin. Jack had a damned nerve in assuming the role of her husband. He could only have done it to provoke her because she had refused his escort to Methven or because with even more breathtaking arrogance, he had assumed that they would resume their affair on the journey. Either way she was going to put him straight.
The landlord was looking from Mairi to Frazer’s set face. “I’m sorry, madam. If there is a problem—”
Frazer cut in. “There is no difficulty, landlord.” He turned to Mairi. “If you would be so good to wait in the carriage, madam, I will go and deal with the gentleman.”
Mairi gathered up her skirts in one hand and stepped down. “I’ll deal with him myself,” she said.
Frazer looked alarmed. “But, madam, this could be dangerous—”
Mairi smiled at him and patted his arm. She paid Frazer and his sons to protect her, but she wanted to confront Jack on her own.
“Rest easy,” she said. “I doubt there is any danger. You may wait out in the passage and I will call you if I need some strong-arm tactics.”
The landlord looked affronted and muttered that there was no call for fisticuffs and that he kept an orderly house. A word from Frazer and the gleam of silver coin quieted him and he led them inside.
The inn was blessedly warm and very noisy. From the taproom came a roar of voices. A fug of tobacco smoke wreathed beneath the door, and the smell of ale was strong, overlaid by the delicious scent of roasting meat. The landlord led Mairi down a narrow stone-flagged passageway whose whitewashed walls were decorated with a motley collection of dirks and claymores. They might come in useful if Jack proved difficult.
The door of the private parlor was ajar and there was the murmur of conversation from within. Mairi pushed the door wide.
Jack Rutherford was sitting in a big armchair, feet up on the table, toasting his boots before the fire. He had removed his jacket and loosened his stock, and in the golden firelight he looked tawny and lazily handsome and every inch a chaperone’s nightmare. A plate on the table by his side bore the remains of some venison pie. A serving girl with an extravagantly large bosom displayed to advantage in a thin and low-cut smock was topping up his glass. She was standing very close to him and giggling as she poured. Some of the liquid splashed onto Jack’s sleeve, and the girl started to dab ineffectually at his clothing with her apron, giggling all the harder. Jack was watching her through half-closed eyes that held a gleam of laughter.
The draught from the open door stirred the fire to hiss and spit and the candle flames to waver. Jack looked up. The laughter died from his eyes and they narrowed to an unnerving green stare. He swung his legs to the floor and got slowly to his feet, sketching a bow. Mairi supposed she should be grateful that he had the manners to do even that. She walked forward into the center of the room, stripping off her gloves and laying her reticule in the seat of the chair opposite Jack’s.
“Ah, my errant husband,” she said coldly. “Already looking to set up a mistress while you wait for me.”
Jack smiled, a wicked smile full of challenge. He sat down again. “If the welcome I got from you was warmer, sweetheart, maybe I would not need to look elsewhere.”
“You would always look elsewhere,” Mairi said. “You are a rake, sir. I wouldn’t look for fidelity from you. If I wanted that I would get a dog.” She tried to erase the bitterness from her tone, but she knew she was too late. Jack had heard it. His gaze had narrowed on her thoughtfully.
The serving wench now barreled forward to claim Jack’s attention. Quite evidently she preferred to be center stage.
“You didn’t tell me you were married,” the girl said accusingly. She was twisting her hands in her apron, a maneuver, Mairi was quick to see, that pulled the neck of her smock even more dangerously low. Jack, however, seemed to have no difficulty in keeping his gaze from the heaving bosoms that were on a level with his eyes. He was dangling his half-empty glass from his fingers and watching Mairi with a speculative expression. He did not take his gaze off her for a single moment.
“It slipped my mind,” he murmured.
“Strange,” Mairi said acidly, “when you had told the landlord only a half hour before that we were wed.”
“My tiresomely lax memory,” Jack said.
“It is a match for your tiresomely lax morals,” Mairi agreed sweetly. She glanced around the room with its deep chairs and velvet curtains drawn against the night, then back at Jack, lounging comfortably in his chair. “Let’s cut the pretense, sir,” she said. “Was the taproom too shabby for you? Or are your pockets to let? Was that why you decided to pretend we were married, so that I would pay your bills?”
“It was all for the pleasure of your company, my love,” Jack said. His eyes gleamed mockingly. “I enjoy your conversation so much. It is so very astringent.”
Mairi loosed her cloak and laid it over her arm. The room was hot and she was feeling more heated still beneath Jack’s cool green gaze. She felt as though he could strip away all the defences she had cultivated so carefully over the years. There was something keen and watchful in his eyes. He saw more than she wanted him to see.
She turned a shoulder to him and addressed the landlord instead.
“I would like some of your beef stew and a glass of wine, please.” She flicked a glance at the table. “I will finish this bottle my husband has started—” She shot Jack a look. “Unless he wishes to have it all to himself.”
“I am drinking water,” Jack said, “but you are welcome to share if your taste runs to it.”
“Water?” Mairi stared at him, her antagonism briefly forgotten. It was so incongruous. She would have had him down as a man who drank nothing but the best claret and brandy.
Jack shrugged. There was an element of discomfort in his demeanor. “Riding is thirsty work,” he said. He spoke dismissively and yet Mairi had the impression that there was a great deal more behind the words. More that he was not prepared to disclose. After a moment he raised his brows in quizzical enquiry and she blushed to realize she was still staring.
“Landlord,” she said hastily, “I would like to be taken to my room, please, and to have some hot water sent up for washing.” She paused as an unwelcome thought struck her and she spun around to face Jack again. “I trust you have not moved into my bedchamber as well, sir?”
A devilish light sprang up in Jack’s eyes. “It was tempting,” he drawled, his voice dropping several tones so that it rubbed across her senses like rough velvet, “but I was waiting for you to invite me, darling.”
A wholly inappropriate wave of heat washed over Mairi, rushing through her veins. Her knees weakened and she almost slumped into the armchair, remembering only at the last moment that they had company in the room and that she should be slapping his face—not falling into his arms.
“You’ll have a long wait, then,” she said. “I suggest that you should have your own chamber. Then there will at least be space in there for you and your vastly inflated opinion of yourself.” She gave him a cool little smile. She was proud of that smile. It was diametrically opposed to the way she was feeling inside.
“I would like you gone from here when I return, if you please,” she said. “Frazer—” She turned to the steward. “If you could escort Mr. Rutherford to the part of the inn that is farthest away from me...”
“No need for an escort,” Jack murmured. “I can find my own way.” He stood up, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair and slinging it over his shoulder. He sketched her a bow that had nothing of deference in it. “Your servant, madam.”
The landlord, scratching his head over the eccentric ways of the aristocracy, led Mairi up the inn’s wide stair to the landing and indicated the third room on the right. It was big and well appointed, and Mairi’s traveling bags were already standing waiting at the side of the bed. Her maid, Jessie, a small dark girl who was the youngest of Frazer’s ten children, was busy unpacking and shaking out a gown for the following day.
Mairi sat down abruptly on the side of the bed. She realized she was trembling a little and she was not quite sure why. She could deal with Jack Rutherford. She could deal with most things. That was one thing her marriage and its scandalous aftermath had taught her.
Jessie was chattering, which was a good thing because it distracted her. Unlike her father, Jessie was not in the least silent and austere. “It’s no’ that bad, this inn,” she said. “Leastways it’s clean and comfortable.”
“The clientele leaves something to be desired,” Mairi murmured.
“I hear there’s a fine gentleman staying.” Jessie was full of the news. “Cousin to Lord Methven. Rich and handsome, they say. The kitchen girls are all hot for him.”
“I’m sure he’ll be delighted to hear it,” Mairi said.
Jessie stood staring mistily into space, Mairi’s gown forgotten in her hands. “They say he made a fortune in India,” she said. “Trading in spices and the like.”
“It was Canada,” Mairi said, sighing. “Trading in timber.” She did not know much about Jack’s background, but she did know that he had made his first fortune before he was five and twenty and his second after he had returned to Scotland, importing luxury goods through the port of Leith.
“They say that he is a master swordsman and a dangerous rake—” Jessie rolled the word around her tongue with fervor. “And that he owns a huge estate over Glen Calder way.”
“All of which makes him nigh on irresistible,” Mairi said sarcastically. “Is that my yellow muslin you are crushing in your hands?”
Jessie looked down. “Och, yes. I’ll have it pressed for you before tomorrow, madam.”
“Thank you,” Mairi said.
By the time she went back down to the parlor, the fire had been built up and a glass of claret poured for her. The same maidservant, sulky this time, brought in a plate of beef stew. Of Jack Rutherford there was no sign. Mairi knew she should have been glad, and she was. But she also felt a tiny seed of disappointment, and it was this that disturbed her more than anything.
She did not linger after her meal but went out into the passageway intent on retiring to her chamber to read. Her head was a little fuzzy from tiredness and from the good red wine, and at the bottom of the stair she paused, clutching the newel post for support. The door to the taproom was open a crack and she peeped in. Through the fug of smoke and the crush of people, she could see Jack Rutherford. He was sitting at a table to the left of the fire, playing cribbage with three other men, a tankard on the table in front of him. Mairi wondered whether it contained more water or if Jack had moved on to something stronger.
As she watched, there was a roar from the crowd as Jack won the game. Several men slapped him on the back and he grinned, lifting the pewter cup to his lips. Mairi watched his throat move as swallowed, slamming the empty tankard down and calling for another round for everyone, largesse that was greeted with another roar of approval. There was a pile of silver coin by his elbow that was considerably larger than the pile at the side of any of the other players; as she watched Jack scooped up a handful of silver and passed it over to the landlord in return for the new tankards of ale that even now were overflowing onto the table. It was a raucous, good-humored gathering and Mairi felt a small pang of envy. Jack was welcomed into the easy camaraderie of the taproom and not just because of his money.
One of the inn servants passed her with a murmured word of apology; the taproom door creaked a little on its hinges and Jack looked up from his game. For a moment their eyes met; then a spark of mockery came into his and he raised his glass to her in mocking toast. Mairi shot away up the stairs, furious with herself for being caught staring.
She saw no more of Jack that night and fell asleep quickly, lulled by the quiet lap of the waves on the shore of the loch. By the time she arose for breakfast, Jack had already set out on his journey to Methven. Mr. Rutherford was riding, the serving girl said, with his luggage following on behind. It meant that he would be a great deal quicker than Mairi was on the road and she could only be grateful to be spared an endless procession of nights staying in the same inns as Jack was.
When Frazer came out to the carriage, he had a face as long and dark as a wet day in Edinburgh.
“What on earth is the matter?” Mairi asked, as the steward stowed his purse in the strongbox beneath her seat.
Frazer’s mouth turned down even farther. “The landlord would take no money for our stay,” he said. “The entire bill had already been settled.”
He handed her a note.
Mairi had never seen Jack Rutherford’s writing, but she had no difficulty now in identifying the careless black scrawl as his.
“A gentleman always pays,” the note ran.
Mairi dropped the letter on the seat beside her. She remembered taunting Jack the previous night when he had appropriated her parlor. She remembered she had said he wanted the comforts that only money could buy. She also remembered that he was one of the richest men in Scotland and had no need to beg those comforts from her.
“Everyone thinks you are his fancy piece now,” Frazer said sourly. “And that I am some sort of pander who delivers Mr. Rutherford’s women for him as and when he wishes. The landlord congratulated me on such a profitable job. He promised his discretion.”
“Oh dear,” Mairi said. She knew she should feel exasperated, but she could not help her lips twitching. It was so obvious that Frazer was more annoyed to have been mistaken for a procurer than he was for the damage to her reputation. As the carriage rolled out onto the road to Achallader, Mairi reflected wryly that Jack’s had been a clever revenge. She had turned him down, but despite that he had given everyone the impression she was his mistress.
* * *
JACK REINED IN his horse when he reached the summit of the track above Bridge of Orchy. The view was spectacular: the great sweep of the mountains painted in green and gold, the glint of sunlight on the water below. There was an ache in his chest, a knot of nostalgia. He had not traveled this way in years. He was not really sure why he had ridden up here today when the road to Methven should have taken him along the wide glen below.
Nothing he had seen in Canada or beyond could surpass the peerless beauty of this land. He had turned his back on Scotland over ten years before, but eventually it had called him back. When Robert had returned to take up his title and estates, Jack had thought of staying on. Unlike his cousin he had no particular reason to return to his ancestral land, but in the end he had sold his business at vast profit and taken ship for home.
Below him on the road to Achallader he could see something that resembled a royal progress, a line of four traveling carriages rumbling along in convoy. Lady Mairi MacLeod was on the move. His mouth twitched into a smile. She was making such a grand statement of wealth and status with the carriages and the servants, the endless baggage train. He wondered how she had felt when she had discovered that he had paid her shot at the inn. Damned annoyed, he would imagine. She did not appear to have much of a sense of humor, and for that reason alone it had felt irresistible to provoke her.
He wondered suddenly if Mairi ever rode out as he was doing this morning, free of all the trappings of luxury, alone with nothing but the wide sky overhead. He doubted it. She was hedged about by so much protocol and protection. She had probably forgotten what it was like to be alone. But perhaps she was wise. She was fabulously wealthy and it was not so many years since rich widows in these parts had been kidnapped and forced into marriage.
Marriage, he suspected, was not on Mairi MacLeod’s agenda, and why should it be when she had everything she could desire and the freedom to take lovers as she pleased? He did not particularly resent her refusal of him the previous night. They were playing the game; she knew the rules as well as he did, and it would not be long before she succumbed. She desired him, and waiting only made the anticipation sharper and sweeter.
He frowned a little, remembering the bitter tone in Mairi’s voice the previous night when she had dismissed him as a rake. Rakes made the best lovers if not the best husbands, but perhaps that was where her antipathy arose. He had never met Archie MacLeod and had heard nothing but praise for the man, but perhaps there was something he did not know. Perhaps MacLeod, extraordinary as it seemed, had kept a harem of mistresses stashed across Edinburgh.
The carriages disappeared from sight, and the dust settled on the road. It was early morning and the air was cold and fresh. Silence enclosed Jack, pierced only by the song of a skylark as it rose higher and higher into the blue arc of the sky. The isolation was almost eerie, poised on the edge of loneliness. Jack urged the horse to a walk and headed on down the track into the next glen.
As the road wound downhill he passed a scattering of white-washed crofts at the side of the track. They were empty, the walls starting to crumble, ruined chimney stacks pointing to the sky. A little farther there was a tiny kirk, foursquare and gray, with its bell still hanging from the tower.
Jack paused. Memory was pressing close now. He could almost feel the ghosts at his heels. This had been one of his father’s livings though the Reverend Samuel Rutherford had not been a particularly devoted minister of the church. As the son of a baron, he thought it was his right to collect rich livings as he might silver or porcelain. They were an adornment to his status, but he had little interest in the congregations for whom he had a responsibility. Jack’s mouth twisted wryly. He had often thought that his obsession with work was a direct rebellion against his father’s deplorable laziness.
He tied the horse to the railings around the old churchyard and walked slowly up the path. This was where his parents were buried. His father had built a grand manor a quarter mile down the road, a house that Jack had taken great pleasure in abandoning to wrack and ruin. When he had returned from Canada and was looking for an estate of his own, Black Mount was the very last place he would have considered.
The dew was still fresh on the grass, though the sun was hot and would dry it soon. Jack paused by the graves of his parents. There was a ludicrously ornate mausoleum for his father, which was completely out of place in the stark simplicity of this country churchyard. His mother’s stone was less elaborate: “Beloved wife of Samuel Rutherford...” Those words, Jack thought, hardly did justice to the all-consuming love that his parents had felt for each other.
He felt chilled all of a sudden, though there was no cloud covering the sun. His parents’ love for each other had been exclusive, violent and in the end utterly destructive. When he was a child, it had been something he had not remotely understood. As an adult, he could see how dangerous love had proved to be for them.
He went down on his knees in the grass. Here, overgrown with strands of dog rose and bramble, pink and white, was a simple stone engraved with the name Averil Rutherford and the dates 1791–1803. He brushed the undergrowth aside. Suddenly his hands were shaking.
The harsh call of a black grouse made him jump. A shadow had fallen across the path. Looking up, he saw a man in black cassock and white collar, his father’s successor, perhaps, in this remote spot.
“Can I help you?” the man said, but Jack shook his head. Suddenly he was keen to be gone.
“No,” he said. “Thank you.”
He felt the man’s eyes on him all the way down the path, but he did not look back. He unhitched the reins and threw himself up into the saddle without bothering to lead the horse over to the mounting block, and kicked the stallion to a gallop. He knew he could not outrun the memories.
And he knew that no one could help him.
CHAPTER SIX
MAIRI STAYED THE second night of her journey with Lord and Lady Gowrie at Lochgowrie Castle near Kinlochleven. It was nice to be in a private house rather than an inn, to eat well, to have good company, hot water and a bed the size of Dunbartonshire. As she took a bath before dinner to wash away the aches and pains of the journey, she reflected that she was in all probability spoiled. Wealth and privilege tended to do that to a person even when that person was as aware as she that the privilege came with a very high price.
Maria Gowrie was a friend of hers and fellow member of the Highland Ladies Bluestocking Society. They dined quietly together, just the three of them, for Maria said rather plaintively that their neighbors, the Duke and Duchess of Dent, had refused their invitation since they too had a guest.
“The cousin of the Marquis of Methven,” Maria said. “Jack Rutherford. I did ask him if he would like to join our party here, but he is so in demand. He already had three invitations.”
Mairi rolled her eyes. Even here it seemed impossible to escape Jack. If he was not actually present, then people were still talking about him.
“I asked the Dents if they would all care to join us for dinner, but Anne Dent wishes to keep Mr. Rutherford for herself,” Maria continued.
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Nicola Cornick
Can true love be born from scandal?She is young and beautiful and fashionable, Edinburgh's most flirtatious hostess. But within the merry widow beats a grieving heart. Lady Mairi mourns the husband she lost two years before–and no matter how accomplished a lover Jack Rutherford may be, their wanton night together was an encounter of the body only, and Lady Mairi would prefer to forget it.But when Mairi is threatened by a blackmailer, Jack is the only man who can protect her. As they work together to uncover where the danger lies, their passion reignites. Little by little, the masks they wear burn away, and their most private secrets come to light….
Can true love be born from scandal?
She is young and beautiful and fashionable, Edinburgh’s most flirtatious hostess. But within the merry widow beats a grieving heart. Lady Mairi mourns the husband she lost two years before—and no matter how accomplished a lover Jack Rutherford may be, their wanton night together was an encounter of the body only, and Lady Mairi would prefer to forget it.
But when Mairi is threatened by a blackmailer, Jack is the only man who can protect her. As they work together to uncover where the danger lies, their passion reignites. Little by little, the masks they wear burn away, and their most private secrets come to light….
Nicola Cornick’s novels have received acclaim the world over
‘Her books are fabulous.’
—New York Times bestselling author Julia Quinn
‘Cornick is first-class, queen of her game.’
—Romance Junkies
‘A rising star of the Regency arena’
—Publishers Weekly
Praise for theSCANDALOUS WOMEN OF THE TON series
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—New York Times bestselling author Mary Jo Putney on Whisper of Scandal
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‘Ethan Ryder (is) a bad boy to die for! A memorable story of intense emotions, scandals, trust, betrayal and all-encompassing love. A fresh and engrossing tale.’
—Romantic Times on One Wicked Sin
‘Historical romance at its very best is written by Nicola Cornick.’
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Acclaim for Nicola’s previous books
‘Witty banter, lively action and sizzling passion’
—Library Journal on Undoing of a Lady
‘RITA
Award-nominated Cornick deftly steeps her latest intriguingly complex Regency historical in a beguiling blend of danger and desire.’ —Booklist on Unmasked
Don’t miss theScandalous Women of the Tonseries, available now!
WHISPER OF SCANDAL
ONE WICKED SIN
MISTRESS BY MIDNIGHT
NOTORIOUS
DESIRED
FORBIDDEN
Also available fromNicola Cornick
THE LADY AND THE LAIRD
DECEIVED
LORD OF SCANDAL
UNMASKED
THE CONFESSIONS OF A DUCHESS
THE SCANDALS OF AN INNOCENT
THE UNDOING OF A LADY
DAUNTSEY PARK: THE LAST RAKE IN LONDON
Browse www.mirabooks.co.uk or www.nicolacornick.co.uk forNicola’s full backlist
One Night with the Laird
Nicola Cornick
www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)
For Alison Lindsay. Thank you!
Contents
Epigraph (#ue803252d-aba1-5dcb-b26e-53adf887df66)
Chapter One (#u2ce08c9c-96c9-5f09-8b84-ed0a94fb036a)
Chapter Two (#u55b442bd-aa3c-5a11-94bf-c6cc84892805)
Chapter Three (#u2c155035-fd21-5a18-b490-dae4cad12610)
Chapter Four (#uf362c289-0343-54fb-8a55-addfaaa028d0)
Chapter Five (#u063fca0a-75ab-5bf8-b19a-28d99025c0e3)
Chapter Six (#uf44a3da6-761e-577e-afd2-1ed815f569d9)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Pleasure’s a sin and sometimes sin’s a pleasure.
–Lord Byron
CHAPTER ONE
Edinburgh, Scotland, April 1815
IT TOOK TEN minutes to cross from Edinburgh New Town to Edinburgh Old Town in a carriage, and for all of those ten minutes Jack had an almost uncontrollable erection the like of which he had never experienced before in his life. He had learned over the previous ten years that anticipation was one of the greatest aphrodisiacs of all; the anticipation he felt tonight was acute and almost impossible to bear.
Opposite him sat the woman who was the cause of his discomfort. He could not see her clearly in the drifting lamplight, but his awareness of her was sharp. Jack could smell the jasmine perfume that lingered on her hair and on her skin. He could see the shadow of a smile that curved her lips beneath the mask and he could still taste her from the kiss he had snatched a few minutes earlier. She had pushed him away then, but playfully, in a way that promised more, much more.
He had a rake’s reputation, but it was a long time since he had bedded a woman. He wondered if that accounted for this reckless urge to throw caution to the wind and take this woman he had met a mere four hours before. Jack did not know her name. He had not seen her face. He knew only that his sexual awareness of her was so keen that if he did not have her, and soon, he would be in danger of exploding with the frustration.
She knew it too. He could tell that she could feel the tension in the carriage, the expectation wound as tight as a spring. He wanted to wipe that satisfied little smile from her face with a kiss. He wanted to take her here in the carriage with each lurch of the wheels over the cobbles driving him harder into her body. He had no notion why she affected him so and he did not like it because it pushed him close to losing control; he only knew that from the moment he had first seen her he had wanted her.
The coach drew up with a sudden jerk. A groom, black-clad and inscrutable, opened the carriage door and let down the steps. Jack sat back to allow his companion to descend first. She gathered up the filmy silver skirts of her gown in one hand and stepped lightly down. Jack followed, glancing about him curiously. The carriage had stopped on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile. He could see the dark bulk of St. Giles’s Cathedral. The streetlamps glimmered in the soft falling rain.
She took his hand and drew him along one of the narrow alleyways that plunged downhill away from the main thoroughfare. The darkness was absolute here. He could hear the tap of her slippers on the cobbles and feel the rain cold against his face, soaking his hair and his jacket. The walls of the tenement buildings pressed close on each side.
He was rushing headlong into danger; in these deep alleys he could be robbed and murdered and no one would come to help him. A knife in the ribs would be rich reward for his reckless pursuit of passion. He paused, good sense overriding lust for a moment, but then she turned to him, pressing her body against his, reaching up to kiss him. The cold tenement wall was at his back, but she was all heat and sweet fragrance. Her kiss was fierce and urgent, sweeping away any polite preliminaries, demanding a response. She put one hand on the nape of his neck and held his mouth on hers, tangling her fingers in his hair. He felt the hot slide of her tongue against his and groaned into her mouth.
He slipped his hands beneath her cloak and felt the slippery silk of her gown slide beneath his palms. He caught her about the waist and drew her closer. Her breasts were pressed against his chest and she rubbed her hips against his. It was galling to be so at the mercy of his senses when he was a man of experience and not a schoolboy, but Jack seemed powerless to resist the molten lust that was coursing through his veins.
The faintest thread of light glimmered in her eyes as she smiled at him. She broke away, but only to turn the handle of a door set back in the corner of the wall, deep in shadow. She took his hand again and pulled him inside.
The house was not as he had expected. Here, in this poor neighborhood of peeling walls and dirt-strewn cobbles, it was like a miniature palace. Everything was polished and rich and gleaming, wood, silver, gold. He saw it all only in a brief flash as she pulled him up the stone stairs: the jewel-bright colors in the long curtains that shut out the night, the scatter of cushions on the settle. When she stopped at the turn of the stair to kiss him again, she slipped a hand inside his pantaloons and stroked his shaft and he almost came there and then. He was panting with anticipation and lust, his mouth was dry, his heart pounded.
The room she took him into was all in darkness. Only the embers of a fire burned low in the grate. There was no candle. She shut the door with the quietest of clicks and stood for a moment with her palms resting against it. He could feel her looking at him. The dark sharpened his senses; he could hear her breathing, hear the little hitch in her breath that told him she was neither as calm nor as in control as she seemed. The knowledge gave him a savage satisfaction. He would have hated to be the only one to be so close to the borders of control.
There was a soft hush of velvet as she untied the ribbon of her cloak and allowed it to fall. The gossamer silk of her gown glinted again as she moved, coming over to him, placing one hand against his chest. Her fingers were sure on the buttons of his jacket; she slid it from his shoulders and then burrowed beneath his shirt to find the heat of his skin. He heard her sharp intake of breath as her hands slid over his bare chest. Despite the raging need inside him, he kept quite still and let her have her way. It felt like a small victory to resist her.
She reached up to kiss him. She was tall but he was taller still. He caught a curl of her hair in his fingers, satin-soft. He had no idea of its color as she had been wearing a hooded domino. His questing fingers found some pins holding more curls in place. He tugged. They fell with a tinkle onto the wooden floorboards, and her hair cascaded over his hands.
She nibbled his lower lip, then slid her tongue into his mouth, and his mind spun away into a dark realm of sensation. He drove a hand into her hair to hold her head still for his kisses, seeking the heat and demand of her mouth, meeting it and demanding more in return. Wherever he led she followed eagerly. She tangled her tongue impatiently with his. She nipped at his lips and tasted him deep.
Sometimes she ran ahead with needs of her own; it was she who pressed the cold handle of a dirk into his hand and then spun around in mute order that he cut her laces. It was madness in the dark but he managed somehow, sliding the blade beneath, hearing the first creak and tear of the fabric before it suddenly gave way and her gown and petticoats slithered down to lie at her feet.
She was naked. He could sense it. He could feel her warmth. He could smell the jasmine scent again, fainter now, transmuted into something different, sweet and hot, on her skin. He remembered the sensation of her breasts against him and reached for her, but suddenly the blade of the dagger was at his throat and he fell back a step and she put her hand against his chest and pushed. His thighs came up against the edge of a bed. The blade pricked harder and he allowed himself to fall into the softest, widest, most comfortable mattress he had ever known.
She ripped the shirt from him then and straddled him, her thighs pressed tight against his side. With one hand she freed the buttons on his pantaloons and allowed his shaft to spring free into her hand. He tried to tumble her beneath him, but the blade at his throat warned him to be still. It traced an idle path down his chest, over his breastbone, farther down the line of his stomach until the flat of the blade kissed the tip of his straining shaft. At the same time, she squeezed him in her palm.
Christ, she was quite mad. And he too was about to lose his mind.
She tossed the dirk aside and came over him, sliding down to take him inside her body. His mouth opened on a shout at the heat and warmth and slickness of her, but she swallowed his cries in a kiss. She rocked, deeper and deeper, tighter and tighter and his mind splintered and he grabbed her hips hard, grinding her down on him as he came violently, desperately, calling out.
She rolled off him and lay by his side. Above the harsh pants of his own breathing he could hear the quick gasp of hers. Despite the shocking wantonness of the entire coupling, Jack felt as though something was missing, something he did not understand.
He turned his head to look at her, foolishly since he could see nothing of her in the oppressive dark. Suddenly, though, he had the certainty that she was about to run. He felt it in the flicker of movement through her body, heard it in her intake of breath.
His hand shot out and grabbed her wrist just as she started to move. He pulled her back against him, tucking her into his side, holding her still.
“Don’t you know it is bad manners to run out on a man so soon after having him?” His whisper teased her hair. He felt it brush his lips.
After a moment she laughed and he felt her body soften against his. She said nothing, though.
“What is your name?” He wanted to talk to her, wanted it quite desperately, in fact, as though the physical connection between them simply was not enough. Odd, when previously he had never wanted more from a woman than the simply physical.
“Rose.” There had been the very slightest hesitation in her voice before she had spoken. Not her name, then.
“I’m Jack.” He did not deal in lies, half-truths or evasions. It was not his style.
She rubbed her hand gently over his bare chest in acknowledgment. She might be a woman of few words, but she made up for it in other ways. His blood was tingling from that small touch.
“I want to see you.”
“No.” Her response was instant and with a note of panic in her voice.
“Why not, sweetheart?” In deference to the fear, he kept his own tone light, brushing the tangled hair away from her face, his fingers a gentle caress against her cheek.
She shifted slightly in his arms as though she was uncomfortable with both the endearment and the gentleness. He knew she was rejecting the intimacy. It was odd when they had just shared the most intimate experience possible.
“I don’t want any light.” Now there was an unconscious command in her voice. A woman accustomed to giving orders, then. That made her all the more intriguing.
“And what if I do?”
“You will have to be satisfied with touch.”
She took his hand and placed it over her breast. It was a gesture intended to stop conversation. He realized that. Yet he still succumbed. He felt her nipple harden against his palm and felt his blood heat in response. He toyed with her breasts with fingers, lips, teeth and tongue, allowing himself to be distracted, taking pleasure from her gasps and the way she arched to his touch. She urged him on in broken whispers, begging him to nip and suck harder to a point where pleasure turns to pain. He was painfully erect again by then and she spread herself for him and pleaded for him to take her hard, then harder still, her hands gripping the wooden headboard tight as he plunged into her. It was wild and wicked and he felt as though he were in a hot, dark dream, but even as he ravished her he felt the touch of a shadow on him as though something, somewhere was wrong. It almost felt as though she was asking to be punished, as though each stroke of his body into hers, each nip of his teeth at her breast, was penance.
Through the long night she let him do whatever he wished to her; she was his plaything and it was spectacular, unimaginably exciting, and he felt exhausted, satiated, but he couldn’t quell that stubborn instinct that something was missing. The final time he made love to her slowly, languorously, trying to anchor the intimacy between them in something deeper, trying to capture and hold her. Jack had no idea why he wanted that connection when he was by nature a man who wanted only the most superficial of love affairs. Perhaps it was the challenge; he was unaccustomed to a woman who held something back. Normally they were the ones pushing him into a closeness he did not want.
By now her skin was flushed and damp, slick against his. She moved with him on the same dark tide of desire and pleasure, she came for him when he demanded it, her body was his, and yet somehow it felt as though she still eluded him in all the ways that mattered. Afterward she slept but he lay awake listening to her breathing, his mind alert. At one point she cried out. He pulled her into his arms and held her and she calmed, but he felt tears on her cheek where it was pressed against his chest.
Eventually the warmth of her in his arms lulled him into sleep too, only to awake hours later when the sun was high in the sky and the room was bathed in light.
Jack knew before he opened his eyes that she would be gone.
* * *
IT WAS STILL dark when Mairi woke. For a moment her mind felt empty, light and free, and her body felt supremely ripe with pleasure, satiated and satisfied. A second later the desolation swept in, dark, cold and lonely as a winter’s night, banishing the light.
It was always like this when she woke up. There was an all too brief period of blissful peace and then she fell into the dark. Grief and loss crouched in the shadows, waiting to spring. This morning the misery was sharper than usual, painful as a whetted knife. She had sought to drown her unhappiness in sensual pleasure and had only made matters worse.
She slipped from the bed and immediately missed Jack’s warmth. He had been lying on his side, with one arm draped across her in casual possession, drawing her close in to the curve of his body. She was not sure how she had been able to sleep like that, in the arms of a stranger. It seemed wrong, impossible to accept when she rejected any sort of intimacy with anyone. Odd that she could give her body to him wholly and completely, holding nothing back, and yet the act of sleeping together afterward was something she regretted.
Shivering, she dragged on her underclothes, then tiptoed to the chest and took out a plain gown and shawl. Her hands shook as she tried to tie the fastenings. She could not see what she was doing. She tiptoed to the door, slippers in her hand. Light was starting to creep through the shutters now. She did not want to look back, but something compelled her to turn.
Jack was lying in the center of the big bed, in the midst of all the crumpled sheets and tumbled blankets. The covers rode low over his hips, revealing the broad expanse of his muscular chest dusted with golden hair. Tawny hair several shades darker fell over his forehead, a contrast to the stubble shadowing his chin. His eyes were closed, the lashes thick and black. The strengthening light skipped across the lean planes of his face, a long nose and resolute chin. It was a strong face, handsome enough to cause any woman to catch her breath, but that was not why Mairi gasped.
She felt a pang of shock, then a pang of horror, sharper, stronger, almost violent in its intensity.
Jack Rutherford.
It could not be.
She put out a hand and grabbed the bedpost for support. No. It was not possible. She had deliberately chosen a stranger, picked him out at a masquerade ball. She had seen him across the ballroom in his black domino and mask, and there had been something about him that captured her interest. She had thought he looked a little dangerous, a little wild, unknown to her, perfect for her purpose. They had not even spoken; they had had one dance and she had been so aware of him, burning with the need that possessed her, that at the end of it she had taken him by the hand and brought him here, to the secret little house she owned in the back streets of the Old Town of Edinburgh. She had wanted the entire experience to be a secret, but unfortunately she had chosen a man who was not a stranger at all.
Jack Rutherford. She supposed that the clue had been in his name, but she had not even registered it last night. There were plenty of men called Jack. She had not recognized his voice either, but they had spent so little time in each other’s company of late that it was no wonder.
She felt shaken, completely confused. She did not even like Jack Rutherford. He was arrogant, self-assured, deplorably confident, all too well aware of his charm and the effect it had on every woman he met. They had been thrown into each other’s company when her sister had married Jack’s cousin three years before. Jack had suggested they should get to know each other better, intimately, in fact. She had rejected his advances with an icy disdain. After that they had barely spoken and held fast to an intense mutual dislike.
She tightened her grip on the wood until her fingers hurt. The blood was pounding in her ears. She simply could not understand why she had been drawn to Jack the previous night. All unknowing, she had chosen the one man she should never have gone near. They were bound by marriage and mutual acquaintance. She had no idea how she could keep her identity secret from him now.
A cold draught scuttered across the floor, setting her shivering again. She already had regrets enough about the night. She had wanted to lose herself in a world that was entirely physical, to escape the unhappiness that clouded her mind, if only for a little while. No matter how spectacular the sex had been, she had found there was no escape.
Jack stirred in his sleep and sighed as he turned over. Mairi felt another pang of fear. He must never find out that she was the woman he had spent the night with. Inevitably he would have questions, questions she did not want to answer. She would have to make sure she never saw him again. Yet with the ties between their two families, that would be almost impossible.
She rubbed her forehead in frustrated fury. It was almost as though she had deliberately chosen him, and that was a thought that disturbed her very much indeed.
She would close the door and walk away and forget all about him. She would pretend this had never happened.
She risked one last glance. Jack was a man with a hard edge, a ruthless man, but he had shown her tenderness tonight. The thought made her feel vulnerable. It was very difficult to equate the Jack Rutherford she had thought she knew, all arrogant charm and brash swagger, with this man. She felt off-kilter as though all her assumptions about him had been overset, challenged by his gentleness as a lover. He had wanted to know her, not simply know her body. That confused her.
She turned away, suddenly raked with misery, and closed the door. She had plunged them from barely civil acquaintance into profound intimacy. Now she had to turn back the clock.
Frazer materialized from the steward’s room as soon as she stepped into the hall. She wondered if he had slept.
“No need to look so disapproving,” she said. “You’re not my father.”
The steward’s expression remained, as ever, completely inscrutable. He had a dark, closed face, austere and secret. Truth was, Frazer was old enough to be her father and was in fact father to the host of handsome young men she employed as footmen and grooms. He had worked for her for ten years, ever since her marriage. Frazer was a servant, yet somehow Mairi felt she was the one who had to work for his good opinion. This morning she suspected she had lost it once and for all.
“Can I get anything for you, ma’am?” Frazer was exquisitely polite. “Would you like the maid to draw a bath for you?”
“Just the carriage, if you please,” Mairi said. She would not delay a moment. She fidgeted with her gloves. “If you could tidy the bedroom—”
“Of course, ma’am.” The steward’s voice was arctic.
“The gentleman is still asleep,” Mairi said.
“Would you like me to wake him? Give him a shave? Breakfast?” Mairi was sure she could detect sarcasm in Frazer’s voice now. She looked at him sharply. He looked blandly back at her.
“Let him sleep,” Mairi said. She could feel herself blushing at the implication. “Then show him out. Oh, and, Frazer—” She hesitated. “If he asks any questions...”
Frazer nodded. “Of course, ma’am. Not a word.”
“Thank you.” Mairi’s throat felt rough. Tears pricked the back of her eyes. Frazer might disapprove of her behavior, but she still held his loyalty. Four years now since her husband, Archie, had gone and she could still feel the pain of his leaving squeeze her heart like a vise.
Outside in Candlemaker Row the wind was sharp. A pearl-white sky was unfurling over the city of Edinburgh. Mairi drew the shawl more closely about her. By the time she reached the Royal Mile the carriage was waiting, one of Frazer’s handsome sons standing ready to open the door for her. She climbed in and set off for her house in Charlotte Square, for a bath and for clean clothes. She ached so much. Her body ached from the pleasure, but her heart ached more.
She closed her eyes. Despite the extraordinary intimacy of the night, she felt lonelier than she had ever felt in her life.
CHAPTER TWO
July 1815
“YOU LOOK BLUE-DEVILLED.” Robert, Marquis of Methven, threw down his cards and viewed his companion with amusement in his narrowed blue eyes. “Money troubles, is it?”
“Why do you say that?” Jack Rutherford placed his own hand slowly on the table and reached for his cup of coffee. It was rich, warm and exceptionally good and it did nothing to soothe his spirits. What he really wanted was brandy but these days he never drank it. He had had an unhappy relationship with alcohol in his youth and he had no intention of ever letting his drinking get out of control again.
“You’ve been playing as cagily as a spinster aunt betting a shilling at whist,” Methven said cheerfully. “Your mind is elsewhere. And it cannot be a woman who’s spoiling your game since you never let them get to you—”
Jack shifted edgily. Some coffee spilled. He looked up to see his cousin laughing at him.
“Damn you, Rob,” he said, without heat.
“Never seen you like this before,” Methven said. “I suppose it had to happen sometime. Who is she?”
Jack paused. The club was three-quarters empty and wreathed in silence, which was good since he did not fancy rehearsing his romantic disasters to an audience. It was a situation he seldom if ever found himself in. Usually he was fighting women off rather than pining for their company.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, after a moment.
Methven raised a quizzical brow. “No name?”
“We didn’t talk much.”
His cousin sighed with weary acceptance. Robert knew him well. “Description?” he said.
“She was tall,” Jack said. “She was slender and she had long hair. I don’t know,” he repeated. “It was too dark to see.”
Methven almost choked on his brandy. “Devil take it, Jack. Where did this...uh...encounter occur?”
“At a masked ball,” Jack said. “At least that was where it started. It finished...” He shrugged. “Elsewhere. Somewhere in the Old Town.”
Methven was laughing now. Jack supposed it was funny in a way; he had a reputation for leaving women before the sheets were cold, and here he was, craving a woman who had used him and discarded him with a ruthlessness that stole the breath. It had not happened to him before. He did not like it. He was always the one to walk away first.
Yet that was not why he wanted to find her. He felt unsettled, distracted. Three months. It was ridiculous. He should have forgotten her two months and twenty-nine days ago. Yet her memory lingered. Only the previous day he had let a business deal slip through his fingers because he was not paying attention and someone else had undercut him with a better offer. Women had never come between him and his work before, and the fact that this one had done so frustrated him and made him angry.
“What do you know about her?” Methven was asking.
Nothing much that he wanted to discuss, Jack thought. He knew she was lovely and lissome, with skin that smelled of jasmine and was as soft as silk. He knew her hair curled deliciously. He had traced the contours of her face and knew it was fine-boned with a straight nose and a haughty little chin. He knew she had high, rounded breasts, small but perfect, and that her stomach curved in a way that made him ache to have her again and that the skin of her inner thighs was the softest of all.
He knew he was getting an erection merely through thinking about her and that if he did not find her soon he would run mad. He was sure his determination to track her down was no more than a physical compulsion, driven by lust, and that it would burn itself out once it was satisfied. But until he could find her he remained very unsatisfied indeed.
“She was a lady,” he said, remembering the cut glass accent and the note of command. Not a virgin, for surely a virgin would not have been so utterly without inhibition. And yet for all her apparent experience, he had sensed her vulnerability. And she had been sad. He remembered the way she had cried out in her sleep and the tears on her cheek, and felt a sharp, unwelcome pang of protectiveness.
“Forget her,” Methven was saying. “You know what Edinburgh society is like. She is probably a bored wife or a predatory widow. You will only be one of many. It sounds as though you both got what you wanted.” He raised a shoulder in a half shrug. “Don’t spoil the memory, Jack.”
It was good, if unpalatable, advice. Jack did not flatter himself that his mystery seductress had bedded no one but him. The anonymous black carriage and the luxurious love nest both argued against it. He was probably only the latest in a long line of conquests. He had experienced a night of unbridled passion with absolutely no commitment given, wanted or required, the sort of night many a man would kill for. He should be grateful. And he should walk away. Most certainly he should not make a fool of himself a third time by returning to the house in Candlemaker Row in a vain attempt to find her or to persuade the steward, tight as a clam, to reveal even one tiny detail that might help him in his search.
Methven pushed the coffeepot toward him. “She must have been good,” he said. “Or bad in the best possible way.”
Jack did not reply. His mouth tightened. Oh yes, she had been good, very good indeed. He had never known a woman like her, never been so lost in carnal pleasure, never felt this ache of longing.
“Have you tried bedding a harlot for the sake of a cure?” Methven asked. “Replace one whore with another—”
Jack was already half on his feet, his hand going to his sword, before he realized what he was doing. He saw his cousin raise his brows in laconic amusement, realized that he had been set up and wondered what on earth was showing in his eyes.
“I apologize,” Methven said swiftly. “I did not realize it was like that.”
“It isn’t,” Jack growled. He subsided into his seat with a sigh and splashed some more coffee into his cup. “I don’t know...” He stopped. He did not know why he had reacted so badly when his cousin had, in all likelihood, been correct and the woman had probably been a high-class harlot. Except that somehow he knew she was not. And for some reason it mattered.
“She wasn’t a whore,” he said stubbornly.
“Have you been back to the place you met?” Methven said. His blue eyes were steady and watchful now, measuring Jack’s reaction. Jack kept his expression studiously blank.
“I have,” he said. The masked ball had been held at Lady Durness’s town house in Charlotte Square. The house was closed now for the summer and the butler had been less than helpful on the subject of her ladyship’s guest list. The anonymous black carriage had had no family crest. The house in Candlemaker Row, so opulent, had given no clues.
He had to accept that she did not want to be found, and as he was not a man who forced his attentions on unwilling women, that was the end of the affair. He was left with nothing but frustration, anger at having been used and a sense of thwarted lust.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. He summoned up a smile. “Was there something in particular you wanted, Rob? Your note mentioned a favor.”
His cousin nodded. He was staring thoughtfully into the middle distance in a way that made Jack feel uneasy. Then he raised his eyes to meet Jack’s gaze. “You know that Ewan is to be christened at Methven in a month’s time?” he said. “We would like you to be present.”
Robert had married Lady Lucy MacMorlan three years before and they already had two sons, the second baby having been born two months previously. James, the heir, had been baptised at a grand occasion the previous year. Now it seemed that the spare would be getting the same treatment.
“I suppose this will be another of your grand clan gatherings,” Jack said.
Robert played with the stem of his wineglass. “The christening will certainly be a formal occasion,” he said at last, “but the house party is a family event.”
Jack tried not to groan aloud. He hated family occasions, formal or informal, and this one would no doubt prove even more uncomfortable than the last. Traditionally the Methven and the MacMorlan clans had been enemies. Some members of the family still seemed to think that they were.
“Surely your marriage should have been sufficient to heal the rift between the clans?” he said. “Must you do more?”
Robert’s blue eyes were amused. “Yes, I must. Lucy and I have not seen Lachlan and Dulcibella since they eloped. They had the tact to stay away from James’s christening last year.”
“Well, you are not missing anything,” Jack said. “Don’t invite them. Grandmama can’t stand them. No one can. You had a very lucky escape there, Rob.”
Robert’s eyes warmed and Jack knew he was thinking of his wife. Three years previously Robert had been betrothed to marry Miss Dulcibella Brodrie when she had eloped with Lucy’s brother, Lachlan. Robert, Jack thought, had been immensely fortunate; Lucy was charming, clever and beautiful and loved him to distraction. Dulcibella was spoiled, shallow and spiteful and loved no one but herself. There were already rumors of a rift in her marriage to Lachlan.
“I have to be on good terms with Lachlan,” Robert said. There was an edge to his voice now. “Now that Dulcibella has inherited the Cardross estates, we are neighbors. I don’t want any border disputes.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. “There was something else, Jack. We wondered... Will you stand as godfather to Ewan?”
The atmosphere changed; silence settled. Jack could find no words. He felt cold to his bones at what his cousin was asking. To be a godfather he would have to embrace family ties, family responsibilities. He would need to be a real active presence in his godson’s life. God forbid that anything might happen to Robert and Lucy, but if it did he might even be required to act as both boys’ guardian, a role for which he was supremely unfit. Jack repressed a shudder.
“You don’t need me,” he said lightly. “Ewan has a whole clan of relatives far more suitable than I.”
Robert’s eyes narrowed. “Jack,” he said, “should anything happen to Lucy or I, I would want you to stand as guardian to both James and Ewan.”
Cold fear seeped through Jack’s body. It was impossible.
“Rob—” he said, with difficulty.
“Lucy and I would like it very much,” Robert said gently. “If you feel able to accept.”
Jack did not look at him. He kept his gaze fixed on the dregs of the coffee that swirled in his cup.
“I am not exactly an ideal role model,” he said, striving for a light tone. “Ewan deserves better.”
“On the contrary,” his cousin replied evenly. “Ewan could not do better.” Then as Jack remained silent, his tone quickened with impatience. “Jack, for God’s sake, give yourself some credit. I know what you are thinking, but you did what you thought was best for Averil—”
Jack cut him off with one swift gesture. He never talked about his sister and he was not going to start now. “I left her to rot in that terrible school, Rob,” he said. “I did nothing for her.”
There was silence, heavy with unspoken comment. Then Robert sighed. “Very well. I respect your frankness and I do understand.” He shifted in his chair. “You will still come to Methven for the christening, though?”
“That’s not really a question, is it?” Jack said. “You are ordering me.”
Amusement gleamed in Robert’s eyes. “I can do no such thing, as you are well aware.” He allowed a moment’s quiet. “Grandmama would appreciate it. She has been in poor health lately, as you know. Seeing you would cheer her.”
“I don’t respond well to blackmail,” Jack said mildly. He let out a long sigh. “Oh, very well. As long as she has no further plans to marry me off.”
“It would make her happy to see you wed,” Robert said.
“You’re looking shifty,” Jack observed.
His cousin sighed. “Grandmama may—and I only say may—have invited a number of eligible ladies to Methven for the house party—”
“Like a cattle mart,” Jack said. His mouth twisted. “You’re not selling this to me, Rob.”
“Now that you have the estate at Glen Calder, you must surely be thinking of the future,” Robert said mildly.
“My future does not involve a wife and family,” Jack said, his voice hard. “Not every man wants such things.” He gulped down a mouthful of coffee, and another. It was not what he wanted. What he wanted—what he needed—was the fierce burn of brandy. It was not often these days that he thought of drinking himself into oblivion, but tonight the prospect was tempting. Too tempting. He knew his weaknesses, knew how little it would take. He pushed the bottle further away. He wished Robert was not drinking brandy but it was not his cousin’s fault. Robert had offered to take coffee with him and Jack had refused and ordered him the spirits. He hated anyone pandering to his weakness.
“Jack, you should not blame yourself,” Robert said. He cursed under his breath. “You should not have to bear the weight of your parents’ mistakes.”
“Let us not speak of it,” Jack said. His throat felt rough, his voice strained. He could hear his cousin’s words, but they could not touch him. He did not believe them because the truth was that he had failed. As the only son, he had had the duty to protect his mother and his sister after his father’s death, and he had failed them both shamefully.
He eyed the brandy bottle. His fingers itched to reach for it. He could feel the compulsion creeping through him like a dark tide.
It was better that he should be alone. That way there was no danger he would fail anyone but himself. He slid a hand across the table, reaching for the bottle.
“...Lady Mairi MacLeod,” Robert said.
Jack stopped, his head snapping round. “I beg your pardon?”
“I said that I would like you to escort Lady Mairi MacLeod to the christening,” Robert repeated. Then, when Jack did not immediately respond, “I know that you dislike her, but she is my sister-in-law. It would be a courtesy.”
Jack groaned. “Must I?” he said. Just when he had thought that the evening could not become worse, it had done so.
Dislike did not even begin to encompass his feeling for Mairi MacLeod. When he had first met her three years before at her sister’s wedding he had thought her fascinating, cool, beautiful, self-contained, a challenge. He liked rich widows and they tended to like him in return. He had wasted no time in suggesting to Mairi that she should become his mistress. She had told him in no uncertain terms what he could do with his proposition and after that had treated him with the utmost indifference. Jack was not accustomed to rejection, and it annoyed him that even after so clear a refusal he was still attracted to Mairi MacLeod with a powerful dark strain of awareness he could not dismiss. A week in her company escorting her over bad roads on the long and arduous journey to the Highlands would make him want to alternately strangle her and make love to her and neither option was possible.
Robert gave an exaggerated sigh. “I fail to understand your antipathy.”
“Then let me enlighten you,” Jack said. “Lady Mairi is proud and haughty. She’s too rich, too beautiful and too clever.”
Antagonism stirred in him again. It infuriated him that he could not be indifferent to Mairi MacLeod. Not even his night of outrageous passion with his mystery seductress had been able to break her spell. In fact, oddly it seemed to make the craving worse. Now there were two women he lusted after and could not bed.
Robert was laughing. “Does she have any other faults you wish to share?” he murmured.
Jack ran a hand through his hair. “I would rather not escort her,” he said. “Why can’t she travel with her family?”
“Because they are at Forres and Lady Mairi is at her home just outside Edinburgh,” Robert said with unimpaired calm. “It’s a courtesy, Jack. As I said, we are trying to heal the breach between the clans.” He shrugged. “If Lady Mairi dislikes you as much as you say, then she will refuse your escort.”
“She might accept simply to torment me,” Jack muttered. He gave a sharp sigh. “Oh, very well. But you owe me a favor.”
“I really do not think so,” Robert said dryly.
“Five minutes,” Jack said. “It will only take me five minutes to ask and for her to refuse.” He would spend no longer than that in her company. He would go to Ardglen, he would invite Mairi to travel with him to Methven, she would refuse and then he would be gone. Once at Methven for the christening, they could cordially ignore each other.
He sat back, the tension easing a little from his shoulders. He and Mairi MacLeod could surely manage to be civil to each other for so short a time. Five minutes and then it would be done.
* * *
“Tell Lady Mairi MacLeod that Mr. Rutherford wishes to see her.”
Mairi had been in the drawing room when she heard the door knocker sound with a sharp rap that was both arrogant and commanding. A moment later there were voices in the hall and one, a deep drawl she now recognized with every fiber of her being, made her jump so much that she almost snipped off her own fingers rather than the long stems of the roses she was arranging. Laying the secateurs softly on the table, she tiptoed across to the half-open door and stood poised, aware of the tension seeping through her body. The heavy scent of the roses seemed to fill the air, stifling her breath. The blood beat hard in her ears. She gripped the door handle tightly and closed her eyes as the world spun too fast.
Time had lulled her into a false sense of security. She had left Edinburgh the same morning that she had left Jack sleeping off his excesses in her bed. She had come to her country house and had dropped out of society in the hope of avoiding him. She had begun to think she was safe.
Yet here he was.
She tried to steady her breathing, to tell herself there was no danger. Even if Jack had identified her, she did not have to confront him. She had told the footmen to admit no one, and they were very well trained. Even now she could hear one of them politely refusing Jack access to her with a smooth and well-practiced rebuttal.
“I’m sorry, sir, but Lady Mairi is not receiving guests at the moment.”
“She’ll see me,” Jack said briefly.
Mairi drew back, but it was too late. Perhaps Jack had seen the flicker of her shadow across the black-and-white marble floor of the hallway. Perhaps he sensed her presence. She had only a few seconds’ warning and then Jack was striding into the drawing room and facing her. There was both authority and an easy grace in the way he moved across the floor toward her. She felt all the breath leave her body in a rush, felt the shivers chase across her skin. She realized that she was shaking and knitted her fingers together to still the betrayal.
The first thing she noticed about him was the elegance of his tailoring. He had certainly gone to a lot of trouble in his dress before he called on her. She was not sure how to interpret that. Jack always dressed well, but today he looked spectacular; his clothes were expensive and beautifully cut, the linen pristine white, the boots with a high polish. He carried it off well too, casually but with supreme elegance. So many men looked ridiculous in their fashions, impaled on high shirt points, their jackets stiffened with buckram. Jack Rutherford did not need any artificial aids in order to look good. The jacket of green superfine fit his broad shoulders without a wrinkle. His pantaloons were like a second skin, molding his muscular thighs.
Mairi felt awareness spark and flare deep inside her. Her breath caught beneath her ribs, and her heart started to race. Jack looked a little bit dangerous, more than a little handsome with the tousled tawny hair tumbling over his brow and those narrowed laughing eyes, his face chiseled and clean-shaven. The impossible intimacies they had shared made her consciousness of him so fierce that she was not sure she could hide her reaction to him.
She was staring. She chided herself for it and took a deep breath to steady herself.
He executed a perfect bow. “Lady Mairi.”
There was no apology for interrupting her, no reference to the fact that he had explicitly ignored her desire for solitude. In Edinburgh she had been the one who had driven their encounter. Now that seemed absurd. Jack Rutherford was far too forceful to be anything other than in control. His easy charm cloaked a will of steel.
“Mr. Rutherford,” Mairi said, matching his indifference with a chilly civility of her own.
His gaze brushed her face. There was no recognition at all in his eyes.
He did not know.
Relief weakened her knees and she almost had to grab the table for support. Disturbingly, beneath the sense of reassurance were other emotions. She identified disappointment and realized that everything that was feminine within her wanted him to remember her.
Madness. She should be happy to have got away with it. She should be grateful and relieved, anything but this vain and foolish dissatisfaction.
“How do you do, sir?” she said. “I hope you are well.”
Jack’s mouth twisted as though to suggest that he knew the words were no more than a commonplace courtesy. He did not even trouble to reply.
“I understand that you will be traveling to Methven for the christening of your nephew,” he said. His gaze was moving about the room as though he had no particular desire to look at her. “I am here to offer my escort.”
He was here about Ewan’s christening. Mairi felt simultaneously relieved to understand the reason for his visit and deeply irritated that his offer had been made in such an offhand manner.
“How kind,” she said. Then, stung to sarcasm by his indifference: “I had no notion you desired my company so much.”
His gaze came back to her, cool hazel, remote. “The offer is made is at my cousin’s request, madam, rather than my own inclination.”
“Of course,” Mairi said. “I knew it would not be your choice.” She smiled at him, equally cool. “Please tell Lord Methven that I appreciate his thoughtfulness but I will make my own arrangements.”
Jack nodded. She could tell he was not going to try to persuade her to change her mind, presumably because escorting her to Methven Castle was the very last thing on earth that he wanted to do. Everything about his demeanor suggested that he wished to be gone from her drawing room and preferably her life. She could understand that. While she could think of nothing but their wicked night together, Jack still thought of her as a woman who had rejected his advances and treated him with disdain, a woman he was unfortunately bound to through their mutual relatives.
If only he knew. The irony of it almost made her smile.
“Goodbye, Mr. Rutherford,” she said. “It is fortunate that Methven Castle is large enough that we need see little of each other during our stay.”
She picked up the secateurs again, gripping the cool metal tightly against her hot palm.
In a moment he would be gone.
Jack’s gaze fell on the roses with their deep red petals. They looked rich and vibrant against the sun-warmed wood of the table. The sunshine slanted light and shadow across his face, accentuating the high cheekbones and the hard jaw. Mairi felt her heart skip a beat. He looked up and met her eyes, and her heart jolted again for fear that she could not hide her reaction to him.
“My grandmother would like those flowers,” Jack said, surprising her. “She adores roses. Do you grow them here?”
“In the walled garden,” Mairi said. She touched the petals lightly. “These were cultivated specially and named after me—Mairi Rose...” She stopped, catching herself, remembering that in Edinburgh that night she had told him her name was Rose.
Jack did not appear to have noticed. His head was bent as he considered the flowers. He did not move.
After a second Mairi’s breath came more easily. She walked toward the door and put her hand on the knob again, pulling it wider in a clear signal that it was time for Jack to leave.
“Good day, sir,” she said sharply.
Jack looked up and met her eyes.
Her heart stopped at what she saw there. The cool indifference was gone. In its place she saw incredulity and anger and a fierce heat that made her breath catch.
“Rose,” Jack repeated, very softly.
The tight, breathless sensation in Mairi’s chest intensified. The doorknob slipped against her damp palm. She felt a craven urge to make a dash for the stairs, to run, to hide. Except that there was nowhere to hide.
“I believe,” she said, and her voice was now no more than a thin thread of sound, “that you were leaving, Mr. Rutherford.”
Jack’s eyes narrowed, his gaze intensifying on her. She felt another shiver chase down her spine. Then he smiled.
“Actually,” he said, still very quietly, “I don’t think I was.”
He came across and leaned past her to place a palm against the drawing room door and closed it very firmly.
CHAPTER THREE
JACK WATCHED MAIRI walk away from him. Each step was a deliberate move to put distance between them. She looked composed, elegant, every inch the aristocratic lady.
His gut instinct was confirming what his mind was still refusing to accept. This was the woman with whom he had spent the most explosively passionate night of his entire life. This was the woman he had been seeking for the past three months.
He felt a blinding rush of fury. He had felt angry and frustrated enough when he had imagined that his mystery seductress was a complete stranger to him. To realize that it was Mairi MacLeod who had used and discarded him was breathtaking. Clearly she had had absolutely no intention of ever revealing her identity to him. It had probably amused her to reject his advances and then pick him up as though he were for hire. The only surprise was that she had not left payment when she was gone in the morning.
The knowledge that he had been a fool as well as a dupe did not soothe his fury. He should have recognized her but he had been so bound up in lust that he had missed the clues to her identity. He felt another sharp pang of anger, made all the more acute by the sudden and devastating knowledge that he still wanted her. She might be amoral, spoiled and deceitful, but he wanted her very much indeed.
She crossed the room toward the wide marble fireplace and turned back to face him. The afternoon sun struck through the long windows with their filmy drapes and spun a soft golden glow about her. Her gown of palest blue was a shocking, ethereal contrast to the striking dark auburn of her hair. She stood bathed in a gentle light, but there was nothing gentle about her beauty and Jack felt an equally fierce pang of response. He wanted to dislike her. He had every reason to dislike her. Strange, then, how the discovery that she was the passionate wanton of his dreams suddenly made her the most fascinating woman he knew.
He looked at the tender line of her neck and the way that the loose curls of red-gold hair caressed her nape and he was instantly transported back to the house in Candlemaker Row, the twisted sheets and the hot darkness, the intimate slide of her skin against his. He felt his body harden into arousal.
“You are Rose,” he said. “You spent a night with me in Edinburgh three months ago.” He knew it had been her. He had seen the truth reflected in her eyes a moment before, but he wanted to make her admit it.
She turned to look at him. Her expression was guarded, betraying no hint of emotion. “I am,” she said, “and I did.”
Jack was reluctantly impressed. Nine out of ten women would have denied it, claiming that they did not know what he was talking about. But perhaps Mairi was so brazen when it came to taking lovers that she did not care about protecting her reputation with lies.
“I expected you to pretend not to understand me,” he said.
Mairi raised one shoulder in a shrug. “That would have been a tedious conversation when we both know the truth,” she said.
She sounded indifferent, but there was a tension in her slender body that told Jack that she was nowhere near as cool as she seemed. That pleased him. She had been in control on the night she had seduced him. Now it was his turn.
“Mairi Rose,” he said. “How convenient to have an alias when you require it.”
Her lips tilted upward in the parody of a smile. “I have three names,” she said. “Mairi Rose Isabella.”
Jack raised his eyebrows. “Even better,” he said. “A choice of aliases.”
“I didn’t want you to know who I was,” Mairi said. She spoke dismissively, as though it were a matter of little importance that she had deceived him. Jack felt his temper catch. It was a novel sensation to be treated as though he was of no account, and it was not one he cared for.
“That,” he said, “was obvious. The plain black carriage, the army of silent retainers, the anonymous—if luxurious—tenement house hidden away down the back streets...” His anger was still simmering and he wanted to provoke her. “I can only assume that you have had a great deal of practice when it comes to selecting and seducing your lovers, Lady Mairi.”
If the barb hurt she ignored the sting.
“I apologize if you feel I used you,” she said sweetly. “A man of your reputation is surely accustomed to casual encounters.”
“I would still prefer to know the identity of the woman with whom I am making love,” Jack said cuttingly.
She smiled. “I do not believe you complained at the time, Mr. Rutherford.”
She laid emphasis on his title, as though deliberately drawing attention to the fact that she outranked him, a duke’s daughter and he nothing more than the younger son of a baron.
Well, hell. She might be proud; she might pretend to be above his touch, but she was still an amoral wanton and he still desired her.
“I’m not complaining,” Jack said. “I cannot deny that I enjoyed having you.” He had been deliberately crude and he saw the color come into her face. He felt no remorse; it was the least she deserved having flaunted her brazenness in his face.
“I might have preferred that you admit to your desires honestly,” he continued. “But the sex itself was very pleasurable. I like that you allowed me to do whatever I wished to you. A woman without inhibitions is a rare thing.”
He saw her expression harden into hauteur. She did not like being treated with such disrespect. Well, now she knew how he felt.
He strolled toward her across the room. As soon as he got close she turned away from him. He had the impression that given half a chance she would simply walk out on him, but as he was now between her and the door, he had cut off her escape. Which was good, because he had not finished with her yet, not by a long chalk.
He circled behind her. She kept her head bent so that all he could see was the sweep of her lashes dark against the curve of her cheek and the pure lines of her jaw and throat. She looked impossibly delicate. Her air of vulnerability was most deceptive. “Why did you choose me that night in Edinburgh?” he asked, his voice hard. “There must have been a reason. What was it?”
She looked directly up at him then. “I am sorry,” she said. “You appear to be laboring under a misapprehension, Mr. Rutherford.” Her blue eyes, dark as midnight, mocked him. “When I picked you up at the ball I did not even know it was you.” She paused just long enough for the insult to sink in. “You could have been anyone.”
Jack felt a rush of pure, primitive fury, impossible to deny, difficult to explain. She was taking blatant shamelessness to a new level in claiming that any man would have sufficed as her lover that night. And instinct told him she was lying.
He grabbed her arm and jerked her close to his body. At such close quarters he could smell the sweet elusive fragrance that had haunted his nights. He could hear her breathing. It was not quite steady.
“I don’t believe you,” he said. “You must have known it was me. You chose me deliberately. I believe you have wanted me from the first time we met and your protestations of virtue were nothing but a sham.” He was not sure if it was pride or stubborn instinct that forced him to press the matter, but he was sure she was not telling the truth.
If she was a liar, though, she was a damned fine one. Her eyes were very candid. She shrugged. “Whether you believe me or not is your choice, Mr. Rutherford,” she said. Once again there was a touch of mockery in her voice. “Perhaps you have too good an opinion of yourself to wish to accept that I did not recognize you. My observation of you over the past few years suggests that your arrogance is such that you assume every woman must find you irresistible.”
Touché.
She had his measure. If Jack had not been so angry, he would probably have found it amusing that Mairi MacLeod knew him so well.
He eased his grip on her arm, sliding his hand down to her elbow. Her skin was smooth and warm beneath his touch, the lace edge of her sleeve just brushing his fingertips.
“But you did find me irresistible, Lady Mairi,” he said. “Whether or not you knew my identity.”
He drew her closer so that her skirts were touching his thighs. She was rigid with tension now. He could feel it thrumming through her body and see the pulse that beat in the hollow of her throat. Awareness crackled between them as hot and sudden as a flame catching at tinder.
“I believe you chose me because you wanted me,” Jack continued softly. He leaned closer; spoke in her ear. “Perhaps it was instinct, perhaps you did not realize what you were doing, but you wanted me as your lover.”
Now, for the first time, he saw a different expression in her eyes and knew at once that this was precisely what she feared; that some deep and powerful compulsion had driven her to pick him out from all the men at the masked ball that night. For a split second she looked frightened, but then disdain smoothed the emotion away and her defenses were firmly back in place.
“I did not have you down as a romantic, Mr. Rutherford,” she said lightly, “and I hesitate to shatter your illusions once again, but I do not believe in some sense of recognition that binds people together. That is nonsense.”
“You don’t believe that desire is a powerful enough force to draw people together?” Jack questioned mockingly.
“The only thing that is powerful here is your imagination, Mr. Rutherford.” Mairi’s tone was chill now, all emotion locked away. She released herself from his grip and stepped away from him very carefully, the pale blue silk of her gown brushing his leg as she passed.
“I was not imagining that night in Edinburgh,” Jack said. “You were completely abandoned in my arms, without restraint or shame. Although by your own admission you respond like that to any man who beds you.”
Mairi spun around, cutting him off with a decisive chop of the hand. At last he had provoked her beyond tolerance. There was high, angry color in her cheeks, and her eyes were a glorious stormy blue. “Enough, sir,” she said. “You are insulting and your observations on my character and behavior are of no interest to me. It is time you left.”
Jack held her gaze. “You cannot have it both ways, madam,” he said. “Either you are a harlot who spreads her favors indiscriminately or you are attracted to me specifically and should drop this pretense of indifference. I do not believe that you have said a single honest thing to me this afternoon. Be honest in this one thing at least and admit that you want me.”
Their gazes locked, his fierce with heat, hers defiant. He had never known a woman quite so guarded. He had never felt so strong a compulsion as he did now, wanting to smash her defenses and force her to admit to her desires.
He raised a hand and brushed the loose tendrils of copper-colored hair away from her neck. The minute he touched her, she froze. He let his fingers slide gently down to the base of her throat, dipping in to the hollow there. He felt her tremble. It was a tiny but betraying gesture and it made his blood surge. Her skin was heating now beneath his touch, a pulse beating against his fingers. She felt soft and warm and tempting.
He leaned in closer so that his lips were a mere inch from hers. Her eyes were a hazy slumberous blue now, half-closed. He brushed his lips across hers in the lightest of kisses. She gave a gasp; he felt her breath on his lips and was suddenly possessed with the most ravenous hunger to drag her into his arms and kiss her senseless.
Instead he ruthlessly reined in the urge and kissed her again, a little deeper, a little longer. Her lips parted, clung to his, betraying a truth she had refused to put into words.
“You want me,” he said.
The ache in his groin was intense now. In a second he remembered being in the carriage on that helter-skelter ride across Edinburgh, remembered the anticipation and the driving need. He kissed her for a third time and she tasted as sweet as he recalled; he ran his tongue along her lower lip and dipped it inside her mouth, tangling with hers, the kiss deepening into blatant demand. Another kiss, hard and insistent this time, and he was within a few ragged steps of losing control, pushing aside the spray of roses that lay on the polished table and taking her on it.
He felt the prick of a blade at his throat.
“These secateurs are sharp as any dirk,” Mairi said. Her voice was a little husky. “Step back, Mr. Rutherford.”
It took Jack several seconds to process the words, and during that time the blade only pressed harder, so he thought it wise to obey. He brought a hand up, running his finger against the cutting edge. It was, as she had said, fiercely sharp. As was the look in her eyes.
“I could disarm you,” Jack said. With a twist of the wrist it would be easy enough, but he suspected that Mairi MacLeod probably had another weapon concealed somewhere about the place, and she looked as though she would be very glad to have an excuse to use it on him.
“You have lost the element of surprise,” she said pleasantly. “You have also overstayed your welcome.” She walked across to the door and opened it for him. “Goodbye, Mr. Rutherford,” she said.
No fewer than three black-clad footmen came forward in a phalanx to escort Jack to the front door. Evidently they had been waiting to burst in and rescue Mairi if she had given the signal. Their expressions were threatening, especially the man who had failed to prevent Jack from entering in the first place. He looked as though he felt he had something to prove.
Jack, who had taken on far more intimidating men in far more intimidating places than Lady Mairi MacLeod’s drawing room, stifled a smile. He briefly weighed the merits of causing a mill and regretfully decided against it.
“You employ a private army,” he said, allowing his gaze to travel back from the row of black-clad retainers to Mairi’s face. “What is it that you are afraid of?”
He thought for a moment that she was going to refuse to answer and would instead have him thrown out on his ear on the gravel without any further conversation.
“I am a rich widow,” she said, after a long moment. “A very rich widow. There have been...” She hesitated. “Threats of kidnapping, of forced marriage. I employ an entourage for my own protection since I have absolutely no desire to wed again.”
“I pity the poor fool who would try to force you into marriage,” Jack said. “You seem very handy with a weapon.” The look he gave her was insolent, sweeping from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, and he saw the hot color sting her cheeks at his impudence. Her chin came up.
“I shall be tempted to wield one again,” she said, “if you do not leave my house immediately.”
Jack grinned. “You have nothing to fear from me, sweetheart,” he said. “I am even richer than you are and I do not intend ever to wed you, only to bed you. Again.”
He flashed her a mocking smile before strolling in his own good time down the front steps. He almost expected to feel her dirk thudding between his shoulder blades. Instead he heard the door slam shut behind him. Another black-clad groom was waiting on the gravel, holding his horse for him. Through the archway to the mews, he could see a traveling carriage being prepared, not plain black this time but with the crest of the Duke of Forres and the arms of MacLeod entwined. It was the last word in luxury, fast and well sprung, sufficient even to deal with the state of the Highland roads. Lady Mairi was indeed making her own travel plans and they did not involve him.
Once they were at Methven, though, she would not be able to avoid him. The castle was huge, but the nature of a house party was such that the participants were thrown together no matter their wishes. Jack was suddenly aware that he was looking forward to the visit with a great deal more enthusiasm than he had felt the previous night. A house party also gave ample opportunity for intimacy and he wanted to rekindle his affair with Mairi, wanted to taste again the heat and the passion of their night together. He wanted her, her fragility and her strength, the fierce emotions she hid beneath that cool exterior. He knew she desired him too. She had betrayed herself when she had kissed him. She might lie, but her body’s response to him did not.
He was also still very angry with her for pretending indifference to his face and then seducing him secretly, for spending one night with him and then dismissing him like a paid lover. He recognized the anger and it interested him. He was not generally an introspective man, but something about Mairi MacLeod had him examining his reactions and his emotions like a poet or a philosopher. It was bizarre and he did not like it. But the anger was unusual. He did not generally bear grudges. He was not interested in revenge. Usually he forgot, moved on. It appeared that with Mairi MacLeod he had not moved on.
He shrugged. That was easy enough to solve. Another night of rapture, this time on his terms, and he would be ready to forget her. It had always worked before. His interest in a woman seldom outlived the intimate knowledge of her.
He encouraged his horse to a canter that raised the dust on the road. Lady Mairi MacLeod might be faithless and amoral, but then so was he. In that they were well suited. He was certain it would not be long before he was in her bed again.
CHAPTER FOUR
MAIRI SAT AT her desk with the household accounts spread in front of her. Jack Rutherford had gone, but the air still seemed to hum with his presence, fierce and elemental. It was impossible for her to concentrate. The columns of figures blurred before her eyes, and all she could see was Jack’s face and all she could feel was the touch of his lips against hers. She had wanted him very much and she knew he knew it.
Damn him.
She could not really blame Jack for being angry with her. Nor could she blame him for thinking her a whore when she had deliberately told him that any man would have done as a lover that night. That had been the literal truth, but no man could hear that without thinking her a shameless harlot.
With a little sigh she laid her pen aside and pinched the bridge of her nose to ease the headache behind her eyes. She could not understand why she was attracted to Jack. He was the complete opposite of her husband, Archie, who had been gentle and kind. Yet from the moment that Jack had walked into the drawing room, she had been acutely conscious of him, of the vitality and energy he brought with him, of the confident swagger in his step and the muscular perfection of his body beneath the close-fitting and beautifully tailored clothes. She did not want to want him. Yet it felt as though he had in some way imprinted himself on her so that her senses craved him, the taste and the touch of him. She disliked intensely the feeling that she was so vulnerable to him, but she could not escape it.
In Edinburgh she had used Jack shamelessly to drive out her feelings of loneliness and melancholy. She had sought out a man that night in order to forget for just a little while the huge weight of responsibility she carried and the secrets she kept. And for a time it had worked; she had forgotten everything in the bliss of Jack’s touch and the shocking, exciting sensations conjured by her own body. She had had so little experience of sex. She had had no idea, no notion at all, that it could be so delicious. It bore no resemblance to the mortifying fumbles she had endured at the start of her marriage to Archie MacLeod when they had barely managed to consummate their union.
Well, she had certainly made up for that inexperience now. She could barely believe that she had acted with such brazen lack of restraint when she had been with Jack. So much of her knowledge had been theoretical before, gleaned only from the books in her father’s library.
Even now the memory of Jack’s lovemaking made her feel very hot and slightly faint. She put her head in her hands and groaned. She hungered for Jack now. She wanted to know again that wicked pleasure she had felt at his hands. It was impossible. It could not happen.
Two blackbirds squabbling on the terrace outside roused her with their noisy calls. Shaking her head impatiently, Mairi turned back to the file of papers on the desk. This was mainly correspondence that Murchison, her secretary, had already filtered and deemed important enough for Mairi to see. Archie MacLeod had not been an elder son, but he had inherited a huge fortune from his nabob godfather at the age of one and twenty. There were the two houses in Edinburgh, the country estate outside the city where Mairi was currently living and Noltland Castle in the eastern Highlands near the town of Cromarty. There was money in bonds and investments. There were endowments to charity and a dozen other business and philanthropic ventures. The entire inheritance had come to Mairi at Archie’s bequest.
Today’s crop of correspondence included reports from the trustees of all the various charities that Archie had set up. While his inheritance had been rich beyond the dreams of avarice, his generosity had been equal to it. He had been desperate to use the money to do good; there were almshouses for the indigent elderly, an orphanage, a cholera hospital, so many good deeds and good works that Mairi’s head swam whenever she tried to keep track of them all. She was the custodian of Archie’s inheritance now, though, and she had to be worthy of it. She had to continue his good work.
At the bottom of the pile was one last letter, written in terse legal terminology. It was from Michael Innes, the heir to the MacLeod barony. Mairi read the letter through once a little carelessly and a second time with a growing sense of irritation. It stated that Innes was bringing a case to court to prove that Mairi was an unsuitable chatelaine of the late Archibald MacLeod’s estates. He claimed to have evidence of her lax financial management and her personal immorality. He would be laying this before the courts and petitioning for all the late Archibald MacLeod’s holdings to pass to him.
Mairi allowed the letter to drift down onto the desk. It was not the first time that Michael Innes had threatened to take her to court. He had resented Archie’s inheritance from the first and had always insisted that it should have been subsumed into the main MacLeod estate because he believed it was impossible for a woman to administer such a huge inheritance without a husband’s guidance. Mairi knew he was motivated by spite and greed. Now, though, a line at the bottom of the letter caught her eye and she paused to reread it for a third time.
You may be sure that I will not hesitate to expose all the old scandals in the pursuit of truth.
A ripple of unease passed down Mairi’s spine. She rubbed her eyes. They felt dry and gritty. Her head felt heavy as though it were full of sand. She tried to think.
I will not hesitate to expose all the old scandals...
Her father-in-law had worked very hard to make sure that those scandals would never be revealed. Mairi could not believe that Michael Innes knew anything of them. No one did. Only she and Lord MacLeod knew the truth in its entirety. Or so she had thought. But that was the trouble with secrets. You could never be completely sure that they were safe.
Mairi’s head ached suddenly, so sharply she bit her lip. She did not know what to do. There was no one to share her burden but Lord and Lady MacLeod. Archie had wrought devastation on their lives as surely as he had torn hers apart and there was not a moment when she did not seek to make up for that.
She sat irresolute for a minute and then picked up her pen. She knew she had to write to her father-in-law to tell him of this latest threat. He could not be left in ignorance. She felt sick as she started to write the letter. The old laird was too frail and too ill to be troubled with such matters these days, but she needed his wise counsel and there was no one else she could trust.
A moment later, there was a knock at the door and Frazer entered with a large dish of tea on a silver tray. Mairi moved her papers aside and Frazer placed it carefully on the desk. All Frazer’s movements were precise and ordered.
“I thought you might require some refreshment, madam,” he said.
“Thank you,” Mairi said, smiling at him. “I do. These accounts make my head hurt.”
“I meant as treatment for the shock, madam,” Frazer said.
“Ah,” Mairi said. Her smile broadened at Frazer’s austere expression. The steward was a strict Presbyterian and he never hesitated to make his disapproval known. She suspected that he considered it a part of his duties to try to keep her on the straight and narrow. “I collect you are referring to Mr. Rutherford,” she said. “I fear my sins have found me out.”
“Quite so, madam,” Frazer said, with no flicker of a smile. “I am sorry that Murdo and Hamish and Ross were obliged to hear the gentleman refer to the sensual excesses he shared with you.”
“Elegantly put, Frazer,” Mairi said. “However, since Murdo drove the carriage the night I picked up Mr. Rutherford and Hamish and Ross acted as grooms, I am sure they are already aware of my morally reprehensible ways. Thank you for the restorative tea,” she added. “You are most thoughtful.”
Frazer’s expression eased a fraction. “Murdo asked me to apologize, madam,” he said. “He is exceeding sorry for his failure to prevent Mr. Rutherford’s ingress.”
“Murdo is not at fault,” Mairi said. She stirred honey into her tea, then laid the spoon down thoughtfully. “I suspect Mr. Rutherford always does as he pleases.”
“Indeed,” Frazer said. “A dangerous man, madam.” He bowed and went out, shutting the door with exaggerated care.
Mairi took her teacup in her hand and walked across to the long windows. They stood open onto the shallow terrace. Beyond that a small flight of steps led down to the gardens, and beyond that Mairi could see the silver glitter of the sun on the sea. The July day was hot; only the slightest of breezes stirred her hair. If the weather held for a few weeks, it would be beautiful for the christening at Methven. It would also be awkward to be obliged to see Jack Rutherford again, but she would ask Lucy for a room as far away from Jack’s as possible. It was common knowledge that she and Jack disliked each other. Lucy would not think there was anything odd in such a request.
She drained her cup. Her thoughts were drifting to family matters now and she wondered if Lucy was enceinte again. If Lucy and Robert produced an enormous brood of children, there might be years of such trips to Methven for family occasions such as christenings, birthdays, even marriages in time. Mairi shuddered. She hated family reunions, hated the reminders of her own solitude and most of all hated her status as a childless widow. She had desperately wanted a family of her own. The lack of it was like a hollow space in her life, a painful barrenness that she could ignore but that would never heal.
She set her cup down with a clatter on the little cherrywood table by the door. In the fullness of time, Jack would probably bring a wife and family of his own to future events. Despite his denials, a man wanted a wife or at least an heir. She felt an empty, yawning sensation in the pit of her stomach. There was no child to inherit Ardglen, or Noltland or any of Archie’s fortune even if she could keep it safe from Michael Innes’s grasping hands.
To distract herself she stepped out onto the terrace and went across to lean on the sun-warmed balustrade. The air was full of the scent of roses and honeysuckle. The sun felt hot on her face. There was silence but for the faint jingle of harness and the sound of distant voices from the stables.
For a second it felt as though time had slipped back and any moment she would see Archie coming toward her, smiling as he strode across the gravel of the parterre in his ancient gardening clothes, burned brown by the sun, dusting the soil from his hands. She had always teased him that he employed several gardeners and yet preferred to do the work himself. He had never been happier than when he was outdoors.
The silence stretched, sounding loud. Nothing moved in the quiet gardens. It was a waiting silence, as though someone was watching, as though something was about to happen. Mairi felt odd, as light-headed as though she had had too much sun.
The loneliness ambushed her so suddenly and viciously that for a moment it seemed as though the sun had gone in. She could no longer feel its warmth or the roughness of the stone beneath her palms. It was terrifying.
“Madam?”
Mairi had not heard Frazer coming out onto the terrace until he cleared his throat very loudly. She turned, trying to pin a smile on her face. It felt forced, wobbly, and the tears stung the back of her eyes and closed her throat. She fought desperately for control.
“Hamish asked me to tell you that the carriage is prepared for your departure to Methven in the morning, madam,” Frazer said. “We will all be ready to leave as soon as you are.”
The words were commonplace, but for a second Mairi struggled to understand them. “Thank you,” she said. Her voice sounded husky. “Please tell Hamish I shall be ready by seven.”
“Of course, madam.” Frazer bowed. “And Mr. Cambridge is here to see you,” he added.
Damnation.
Mairi blinked. It was so inconvenient that Jeremy Cambridge was here now when she felt as wrung-out as a dishcloth. If she were not careful she would cry all over him and that would be a disaster on many levels.
“Shall I tell the gentleman you are indisposed?” Frazer spoke delicately, hovering by the terrace door.
“No.” Mairi cleared her throat. “No, thank you. If I am to leave for Methven tomorrow, there will be no time to speak to him. But, Frazer—” She raised her chin. “Pray give me a moment.”
The steward nodded.
As soon as he had disappeared, Mairi made a beeline for the pier glass that hung to the left of the fireplace and checked her reflection. It was not as bad as she had thought, though her eyes looked strained and bright and there were lines at the corners she could have sworn were new. With a sigh she tucked a stray curl back beneath her bandeau and turned to face the door.
When Jeremy Cambridge was announced she was standing behind her desk. She found she needed the physical barrier. Not that she needed protection against Jeremy. There was nothing remotely threatening about him. Jeremy’s father had been estate manager to Lord MacLeod, but he had had ambitions for his children to rise in society. He had sent Jeremy to university and his sister Eleanor to finishing school. Jeremy was now a respected banker in the city of Edinburgh and was among other things the MacLeod family’s man of business. He was large, solid and reliable. Steady. Safe. Mairi found herself thinking that he was the opposite of Jack Rutherford in every respect. He had nothing of Jack’s restless spirit or air of danger.
“Lady Mairi.” They had known each other for a number of years, but Jeremy was never less than respectful. He held out a hand to shake hers. “I was passing by and called on the off chance that you might be at home. I hope I find you well.”
“I am in very good health,” Mairi said. “No need for formality, Jeremy. Would you care for a cup of tea?”
She saw him relax. His gray eyes warmed. “Of course, if you have the time to spare. Frazer tells me you leave for Methven tomorrow. Will you call on Lord and Lady MacLeod on your journey?”
Mairi nodded. “I intend to. I hope Lady MacLeod will be well enough to see me.” Lord MacLeod would have received her letter by then. She paused, toying with the idea of confiding in Jeremy about the latest threat from Michael Innes, then decided against it. She needed to speak to the laird first. Jeremy did not know anything of Archie’s secrets, and it would be better if it remained that way. Besides, she had her vanity, and while she knew Jeremy well, she would not relish discussing with him what Innes referred to as her moral turpitude.
She waited while Frazer, who had evidently anticipated her order, maneuvered the tea tray into the room and placed it at her elbow on the table beside the gold-striped sofa. Mairi sat. Jeremy, who had been waiting for her to be seated first as a gentleman would, sat down opposite, his body angled toward her most attentively. Mairi’s lips twitched. Jeremy was so devoted. She had never been quite sure, though, whether he admired her or her fortune. Another face rose in her mind, strong, dark, not remotely a gentleman. She could feel the clasp of Jack’s fingers about her wrist, hear the low timbre of his voice and feel the touch of his lips. Her fingers shook. The teaspoon rattled against the side of the pot as she stirred.
“Is all well?” Jeremy asked.
“Of course.” Mairi could feel her face heating. She kept her gaze averted from him, making a little performance of pouring the tea, adding milk and passing it to him. “Is there any news of interest?” she asked. “I have been at Ardglen so long I have heard none of the latest gossip from the outside world.”
Jeremy’s face fell as though she had asked the one question he had been hoping to avoid.
“There isn’t a great deal of news,” he said evasively.
“Nothing from Edinburgh?” Mairi said.
Something moved and shifted in Jeremy’s eyes again. His gaze slid away from hers. “There’s nothing much to tell,” he muttered.
Well, that was odd. There was always news from Edinburgh, even in the summer when society was quiet and many people were at their country estates. Mairi waited, but Jeremy said nothing else, merely draining his cup in one gulp. He had ignored the cook’s homemade Abernethy biscuits, and now he looked as though he could not wait to leave.
It was the mention of gossip from Edinburgh that had wrought the change in him. Mairi felt a vague flicker of alarm. She wondered if the talk had been about her. Normally she was not so vain as to assume that everyone was talking about her, but taken together with Michael Innes’s threatening letter, it left her with a bitter taste of fear in her mouth.
Had Innes learned somehow of her night with Jack? Did everyone know?
She added more honey to her tea and drank it down, trying to calm the flutter of panic. The MacLeod heir had made such wild threats before. There was no reason to suppose that he had any more evidence now than he had had in the past.
She looked at Jeremy. He was staring evasively at the pattern on the Turkey carpet. The tips of his ears were bright pink and he looked as though he were sitting on pins.
He knew. Mairi was sure of it. And if Jeremy had heard the gossip, so must everyone else. Her heart did a little sickening skip. She would apologize to no one for the night that she had spent with Jack Rutherford, but she did not want it to be the talk of Edinburgh. That would be beyond embarrassing. As a widow she was allowed a certain latitude in her behavior, but it was demeaning to feel that her reputation was besmirched and that everyone was dissecting her behavior. It had never happened to her before.
But perhaps she should have thought of that before she had thrown caution to the winds and enjoyed a night of wild passion with Jack.
“More tea, Jeremy?” she asked, reaching for the pot. She could only hope that the gossip would die down while she was out of the city. Her absence would surely starve it of fuel. Or so she hoped.
“No, thank you.” Jeremy leaped to his feet. She had been right; he was suddenly desperate to leave. She put out a hand, caught his and held it tightly. He was too much of a gentleman to wrench it from her grip, so he stood there like an abashed schoolboy in the headmaster’s study.
“Jeremy,” Mairi said. “You would tell me if there was something I should know?”
He looked shifty. There was no other word for it. The expression sat uncomfortably on such a fair, open face.
“Are people talking about me?” Mairi asked.
Jeremy did not answer directly. “It’s nothing,” he said. His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “I can see...” He cast a look at her, quick and furtive. “I can see that it’s nonsense.”
“What is?” Mairi said, mystified.
This time Jeremy eased a finger around his collar. “It’s nothing,” he repeated. “All nonsense.”
Most unsatisfactory, but short of torturing the news out of him, Mairi knew she could not make him talk. She sighed. “Then I wish you a safe journey home, Jeremy, and I shall hope to see you soon.”
Jeremy looked relieved. His gaze softened as it rested on her. He took her hand again. “And I hope you have a good trip to Methven.” He hesitated. “Once the christening is past, though, I think that perhaps you should return to Edinburgh.”
Mairi raised her eyebrows. “Do you? I had thought to go to Noltland first.”
Jeremy’s jaw set stubbornly. “Edinburgh would be better. You need to be seen in society rather than appear to be hiding out in the country.”
He kissed her hand this time with rather more fervor than she was expecting. “Lady Mairi—” he said. There was a great deal of repressed emotion in his voice.
“Jeremy?” She hoped to goodness he was not going to make her a declaration. She did not wish to hurt his feelings, but she could never look on him as anything other than a friend. Guilt gripped her; she had leaned heavily on Jeremy after losing Archie. She hoped he had not interpreted her friendship as something stronger.
“Goodbye, dear Jeremy,” she said, and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “You know how much I value your friendship.”
Jeremy blushed endearingly and almost tripped over the edge of the Turkey rug on his way to the door. Stammering that he would see her in Edinburgh in a month’s time, he let himself out into the hall, where Mairi could hear Frazer furnishing him with his outdoor clothes.
Silence washed back in. Soon Frazer would return to collect the teacups and her maid, Jessie, would come to discuss packing for her trip. She should not have left it this late really, not when she would be away for at least four weeks. The journey itself would take more than a week; Methven was on the northwest coast and she was making a number of calls along the way.
A part of her would be sorry to leave Ardglen just as the roses were coming into bloom. They always reminded her of Archie. He had been her friend since childhood and she missed him very much. She wandered out onto the terrace again and walked slowly down the mossy steps and along the neat gravel path to where the rose garden slumbered within its mellow brick walls.
The other part of her, the part that shrank from the loneliness, wanted to leave for Methven directly, but the shadows were lengthening and the afternoon was slipping into evening. It would be better to wait until the morning and make an early start. Once the christening was over she would travel to Noltland—no matter what Jeremy advised—and then back to Edinburgh for the winter season and then to her father’s home at Forres for Christmas. She liked to have plans. She needed them. They gave structure to her life, a life that sometimes seemed dangerously empty no matter how much work there was associated with Archie’s inheritance. She had to keep moving, keep traveling, keep occupied, to drive out the darkness.
CHAPTER FIVE
IT WAS EVENING by the time the traveling carriage drew into the courtyard of the Inverbeg Inn on the shores of Loch Lomond. Mairi had been on the road for twelve hours and was tired and travel-sore. She was glad to see the lanterns flaring at the inn door and to know that Frazer had booked ahead to secure her a room and a private parlor.
When the steward came hurrying to assist her from the carriage, however, it was clear that there was a problem.
“Forgive me, my lady,” he said, “but there is only one private parlor and it is already occupied.”
Mairi raised her eyebrows. “By whom?”
“By your husband, ma’am.” The landlord, a thin, nervous fellow with a sallow complexion and shifting gaze, had followed Frazer out and now stood at the bottom of the carriage steps. “He arrived but a half hour ago and asked for the private parlor. When I said it was reserved for you, he assured me there was no difficulty as he was your husband, traveling ahead of you on the road. He ordered the best food in the house.”
Her husband.
Mairi had little trouble in guessing whom she would find in the private parlor. Jack Rutherford. She felt a prickle of antagonism along her skin. Jack had a damned nerve in assuming the role of her husband. He could only have done it to provoke her because she had refused his escort to Methven or because with even more breathtaking arrogance, he had assumed that they would resume their affair on the journey. Either way she was going to put him straight.
The landlord was looking from Mairi to Frazer’s set face. “I’m sorry, madam. If there is a problem—”
Frazer cut in. “There is no difficulty, landlord.” He turned to Mairi. “If you would be so good to wait in the carriage, madam, I will go and deal with the gentleman.”
Mairi gathered up her skirts in one hand and stepped down. “I’ll deal with him myself,” she said.
Frazer looked alarmed. “But, madam, this could be dangerous—”
Mairi smiled at him and patted his arm. She paid Frazer and his sons to protect her, but she wanted to confront Jack on her own.
“Rest easy,” she said. “I doubt there is any danger. You may wait out in the passage and I will call you if I need some strong-arm tactics.”
The landlord looked affronted and muttered that there was no call for fisticuffs and that he kept an orderly house. A word from Frazer and the gleam of silver coin quieted him and he led them inside.
The inn was blessedly warm and very noisy. From the taproom came a roar of voices. A fug of tobacco smoke wreathed beneath the door, and the smell of ale was strong, overlaid by the delicious scent of roasting meat. The landlord led Mairi down a narrow stone-flagged passageway whose whitewashed walls were decorated with a motley collection of dirks and claymores. They might come in useful if Jack proved difficult.
The door of the private parlor was ajar and there was the murmur of conversation from within. Mairi pushed the door wide.
Jack Rutherford was sitting in a big armchair, feet up on the table, toasting his boots before the fire. He had removed his jacket and loosened his stock, and in the golden firelight he looked tawny and lazily handsome and every inch a chaperone’s nightmare. A plate on the table by his side bore the remains of some venison pie. A serving girl with an extravagantly large bosom displayed to advantage in a thin and low-cut smock was topping up his glass. She was standing very close to him and giggling as she poured. Some of the liquid splashed onto Jack’s sleeve, and the girl started to dab ineffectually at his clothing with her apron, giggling all the harder. Jack was watching her through half-closed eyes that held a gleam of laughter.
The draught from the open door stirred the fire to hiss and spit and the candle flames to waver. Jack looked up. The laughter died from his eyes and they narrowed to an unnerving green stare. He swung his legs to the floor and got slowly to his feet, sketching a bow. Mairi supposed she should be grateful that he had the manners to do even that. She walked forward into the center of the room, stripping off her gloves and laying her reticule in the seat of the chair opposite Jack’s.
“Ah, my errant husband,” she said coldly. “Already looking to set up a mistress while you wait for me.”
Jack smiled, a wicked smile full of challenge. He sat down again. “If the welcome I got from you was warmer, sweetheart, maybe I would not need to look elsewhere.”
“You would always look elsewhere,” Mairi said. “You are a rake, sir. I wouldn’t look for fidelity from you. If I wanted that I would get a dog.” She tried to erase the bitterness from her tone, but she knew she was too late. Jack had heard it. His gaze had narrowed on her thoughtfully.
The serving wench now barreled forward to claim Jack’s attention. Quite evidently she preferred to be center stage.
“You didn’t tell me you were married,” the girl said accusingly. She was twisting her hands in her apron, a maneuver, Mairi was quick to see, that pulled the neck of her smock even more dangerously low. Jack, however, seemed to have no difficulty in keeping his gaze from the heaving bosoms that were on a level with his eyes. He was dangling his half-empty glass from his fingers and watching Mairi with a speculative expression. He did not take his gaze off her for a single moment.
“It slipped my mind,” he murmured.
“Strange,” Mairi said acidly, “when you had told the landlord only a half hour before that we were wed.”
“My tiresomely lax memory,” Jack said.
“It is a match for your tiresomely lax morals,” Mairi agreed sweetly. She glanced around the room with its deep chairs and velvet curtains drawn against the night, then back at Jack, lounging comfortably in his chair. “Let’s cut the pretense, sir,” she said. “Was the taproom too shabby for you? Or are your pockets to let? Was that why you decided to pretend we were married, so that I would pay your bills?”
“It was all for the pleasure of your company, my love,” Jack said. His eyes gleamed mockingly. “I enjoy your conversation so much. It is so very astringent.”
Mairi loosed her cloak and laid it over her arm. The room was hot and she was feeling more heated still beneath Jack’s cool green gaze. She felt as though he could strip away all the defences she had cultivated so carefully over the years. There was something keen and watchful in his eyes. He saw more than she wanted him to see.
She turned a shoulder to him and addressed the landlord instead.
“I would like some of your beef stew and a glass of wine, please.” She flicked a glance at the table. “I will finish this bottle my husband has started—” She shot Jack a look. “Unless he wishes to have it all to himself.”
“I am drinking water,” Jack said, “but you are welcome to share if your taste runs to it.”
“Water?” Mairi stared at him, her antagonism briefly forgotten. It was so incongruous. She would have had him down as a man who drank nothing but the best claret and brandy.
Jack shrugged. There was an element of discomfort in his demeanor. “Riding is thirsty work,” he said. He spoke dismissively and yet Mairi had the impression that there was a great deal more behind the words. More that he was not prepared to disclose. After a moment he raised his brows in quizzical enquiry and she blushed to realize she was still staring.
“Landlord,” she said hastily, “I would like to be taken to my room, please, and to have some hot water sent up for washing.” She paused as an unwelcome thought struck her and she spun around to face Jack again. “I trust you have not moved into my bedchamber as well, sir?”
A devilish light sprang up in Jack’s eyes. “It was tempting,” he drawled, his voice dropping several tones so that it rubbed across her senses like rough velvet, “but I was waiting for you to invite me, darling.”
A wholly inappropriate wave of heat washed over Mairi, rushing through her veins. Her knees weakened and she almost slumped into the armchair, remembering only at the last moment that they had company in the room and that she should be slapping his face—not falling into his arms.
“You’ll have a long wait, then,” she said. “I suggest that you should have your own chamber. Then there will at least be space in there for you and your vastly inflated opinion of yourself.” She gave him a cool little smile. She was proud of that smile. It was diametrically opposed to the way she was feeling inside.
“I would like you gone from here when I return, if you please,” she said. “Frazer—” She turned to the steward. “If you could escort Mr. Rutherford to the part of the inn that is farthest away from me...”
“No need for an escort,” Jack murmured. “I can find my own way.” He stood up, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair and slinging it over his shoulder. He sketched her a bow that had nothing of deference in it. “Your servant, madam.”
The landlord, scratching his head over the eccentric ways of the aristocracy, led Mairi up the inn’s wide stair to the landing and indicated the third room on the right. It was big and well appointed, and Mairi’s traveling bags were already standing waiting at the side of the bed. Her maid, Jessie, a small dark girl who was the youngest of Frazer’s ten children, was busy unpacking and shaking out a gown for the following day.
Mairi sat down abruptly on the side of the bed. She realized she was trembling a little and she was not quite sure why. She could deal with Jack Rutherford. She could deal with most things. That was one thing her marriage and its scandalous aftermath had taught her.
Jessie was chattering, which was a good thing because it distracted her. Unlike her father, Jessie was not in the least silent and austere. “It’s no’ that bad, this inn,” she said. “Leastways it’s clean and comfortable.”
“The clientele leaves something to be desired,” Mairi murmured.
“I hear there’s a fine gentleman staying.” Jessie was full of the news. “Cousin to Lord Methven. Rich and handsome, they say. The kitchen girls are all hot for him.”
“I’m sure he’ll be delighted to hear it,” Mairi said.
Jessie stood staring mistily into space, Mairi’s gown forgotten in her hands. “They say he made a fortune in India,” she said. “Trading in spices and the like.”
“It was Canada,” Mairi said, sighing. “Trading in timber.” She did not know much about Jack’s background, but she did know that he had made his first fortune before he was five and twenty and his second after he had returned to Scotland, importing luxury goods through the port of Leith.
“They say that he is a master swordsman and a dangerous rake—” Jessie rolled the word around her tongue with fervor. “And that he owns a huge estate over Glen Calder way.”
“All of which makes him nigh on irresistible,” Mairi said sarcastically. “Is that my yellow muslin you are crushing in your hands?”
Jessie looked down. “Och, yes. I’ll have it pressed for you before tomorrow, madam.”
“Thank you,” Mairi said.
By the time she went back down to the parlor, the fire had been built up and a glass of claret poured for her. The same maidservant, sulky this time, brought in a plate of beef stew. Of Jack Rutherford there was no sign. Mairi knew she should have been glad, and she was. But she also felt a tiny seed of disappointment, and it was this that disturbed her more than anything.
She did not linger after her meal but went out into the passageway intent on retiring to her chamber to read. Her head was a little fuzzy from tiredness and from the good red wine, and at the bottom of the stair she paused, clutching the newel post for support. The door to the taproom was open a crack and she peeped in. Through the fug of smoke and the crush of people, she could see Jack Rutherford. He was sitting at a table to the left of the fire, playing cribbage with three other men, a tankard on the table in front of him. Mairi wondered whether it contained more water or if Jack had moved on to something stronger.
As she watched, there was a roar from the crowd as Jack won the game. Several men slapped him on the back and he grinned, lifting the pewter cup to his lips. Mairi watched his throat move as swallowed, slamming the empty tankard down and calling for another round for everyone, largesse that was greeted with another roar of approval. There was a pile of silver coin by his elbow that was considerably larger than the pile at the side of any of the other players; as she watched Jack scooped up a handful of silver and passed it over to the landlord in return for the new tankards of ale that even now were overflowing onto the table. It was a raucous, good-humored gathering and Mairi felt a small pang of envy. Jack was welcomed into the easy camaraderie of the taproom and not just because of his money.
One of the inn servants passed her with a murmured word of apology; the taproom door creaked a little on its hinges and Jack looked up from his game. For a moment their eyes met; then a spark of mockery came into his and he raised his glass to her in mocking toast. Mairi shot away up the stairs, furious with herself for being caught staring.
She saw no more of Jack that night and fell asleep quickly, lulled by the quiet lap of the waves on the shore of the loch. By the time she arose for breakfast, Jack had already set out on his journey to Methven. Mr. Rutherford was riding, the serving girl said, with his luggage following on behind. It meant that he would be a great deal quicker than Mairi was on the road and she could only be grateful to be spared an endless procession of nights staying in the same inns as Jack was.
When Frazer came out to the carriage, he had a face as long and dark as a wet day in Edinburgh.
“What on earth is the matter?” Mairi asked, as the steward stowed his purse in the strongbox beneath her seat.
Frazer’s mouth turned down even farther. “The landlord would take no money for our stay,” he said. “The entire bill had already been settled.”
He handed her a note.
Mairi had never seen Jack Rutherford’s writing, but she had no difficulty now in identifying the careless black scrawl as his.
“A gentleman always pays,” the note ran.
Mairi dropped the letter on the seat beside her. She remembered taunting Jack the previous night when he had appropriated her parlor. She remembered she had said he wanted the comforts that only money could buy. She also remembered that he was one of the richest men in Scotland and had no need to beg those comforts from her.
“Everyone thinks you are his fancy piece now,” Frazer said sourly. “And that I am some sort of pander who delivers Mr. Rutherford’s women for him as and when he wishes. The landlord congratulated me on such a profitable job. He promised his discretion.”
“Oh dear,” Mairi said. She knew she should feel exasperated, but she could not help her lips twitching. It was so obvious that Frazer was more annoyed to have been mistaken for a procurer than he was for the damage to her reputation. As the carriage rolled out onto the road to Achallader, Mairi reflected wryly that Jack’s had been a clever revenge. She had turned him down, but despite that he had given everyone the impression she was his mistress.
* * *
JACK REINED IN his horse when he reached the summit of the track above Bridge of Orchy. The view was spectacular: the great sweep of the mountains painted in green and gold, the glint of sunlight on the water below. There was an ache in his chest, a knot of nostalgia. He had not traveled this way in years. He was not really sure why he had ridden up here today when the road to Methven should have taken him along the wide glen below.
Nothing he had seen in Canada or beyond could surpass the peerless beauty of this land. He had turned his back on Scotland over ten years before, but eventually it had called him back. When Robert had returned to take up his title and estates, Jack had thought of staying on. Unlike his cousin he had no particular reason to return to his ancestral land, but in the end he had sold his business at vast profit and taken ship for home.
Below him on the road to Achallader he could see something that resembled a royal progress, a line of four traveling carriages rumbling along in convoy. Lady Mairi MacLeod was on the move. His mouth twitched into a smile. She was making such a grand statement of wealth and status with the carriages and the servants, the endless baggage train. He wondered how she had felt when she had discovered that he had paid her shot at the inn. Damned annoyed, he would imagine. She did not appear to have much of a sense of humor, and for that reason alone it had felt irresistible to provoke her.
He wondered suddenly if Mairi ever rode out as he was doing this morning, free of all the trappings of luxury, alone with nothing but the wide sky overhead. He doubted it. She was hedged about by so much protocol and protection. She had probably forgotten what it was like to be alone. But perhaps she was wise. She was fabulously wealthy and it was not so many years since rich widows in these parts had been kidnapped and forced into marriage.
Marriage, he suspected, was not on Mairi MacLeod’s agenda, and why should it be when she had everything she could desire and the freedom to take lovers as she pleased? He did not particularly resent her refusal of him the previous night. They were playing the game; she knew the rules as well as he did, and it would not be long before she succumbed. She desired him, and waiting only made the anticipation sharper and sweeter.
He frowned a little, remembering the bitter tone in Mairi’s voice the previous night when she had dismissed him as a rake. Rakes made the best lovers if not the best husbands, but perhaps that was where her antipathy arose. He had never met Archie MacLeod and had heard nothing but praise for the man, but perhaps there was something he did not know. Perhaps MacLeod, extraordinary as it seemed, had kept a harem of mistresses stashed across Edinburgh.
The carriages disappeared from sight, and the dust settled on the road. It was early morning and the air was cold and fresh. Silence enclosed Jack, pierced only by the song of a skylark as it rose higher and higher into the blue arc of the sky. The isolation was almost eerie, poised on the edge of loneliness. Jack urged the horse to a walk and headed on down the track into the next glen.
As the road wound downhill he passed a scattering of white-washed crofts at the side of the track. They were empty, the walls starting to crumble, ruined chimney stacks pointing to the sky. A little farther there was a tiny kirk, foursquare and gray, with its bell still hanging from the tower.
Jack paused. Memory was pressing close now. He could almost feel the ghosts at his heels. This had been one of his father’s livings though the Reverend Samuel Rutherford had not been a particularly devoted minister of the church. As the son of a baron, he thought it was his right to collect rich livings as he might silver or porcelain. They were an adornment to his status, but he had little interest in the congregations for whom he had a responsibility. Jack’s mouth twisted wryly. He had often thought that his obsession with work was a direct rebellion against his father’s deplorable laziness.
He tied the horse to the railings around the old churchyard and walked slowly up the path. This was where his parents were buried. His father had built a grand manor a quarter mile down the road, a house that Jack had taken great pleasure in abandoning to wrack and ruin. When he had returned from Canada and was looking for an estate of his own, Black Mount was the very last place he would have considered.
The dew was still fresh on the grass, though the sun was hot and would dry it soon. Jack paused by the graves of his parents. There was a ludicrously ornate mausoleum for his father, which was completely out of place in the stark simplicity of this country churchyard. His mother’s stone was less elaborate: “Beloved wife of Samuel Rutherford...” Those words, Jack thought, hardly did justice to the all-consuming love that his parents had felt for each other.
He felt chilled all of a sudden, though there was no cloud covering the sun. His parents’ love for each other had been exclusive, violent and in the end utterly destructive. When he was a child, it had been something he had not remotely understood. As an adult, he could see how dangerous love had proved to be for them.
He went down on his knees in the grass. Here, overgrown with strands of dog rose and bramble, pink and white, was a simple stone engraved with the name Averil Rutherford and the dates 1791–1803. He brushed the undergrowth aside. Suddenly his hands were shaking.
The harsh call of a black grouse made him jump. A shadow had fallen across the path. Looking up, he saw a man in black cassock and white collar, his father’s successor, perhaps, in this remote spot.
“Can I help you?” the man said, but Jack shook his head. Suddenly he was keen to be gone.
“No,” he said. “Thank you.”
He felt the man’s eyes on him all the way down the path, but he did not look back. He unhitched the reins and threw himself up into the saddle without bothering to lead the horse over to the mounting block, and kicked the stallion to a gallop. He knew he could not outrun the memories.
And he knew that no one could help him.
CHAPTER SIX
MAIRI STAYED THE second night of her journey with Lord and Lady Gowrie at Lochgowrie Castle near Kinlochleven. It was nice to be in a private house rather than an inn, to eat well, to have good company, hot water and a bed the size of Dunbartonshire. As she took a bath before dinner to wash away the aches and pains of the journey, she reflected that she was in all probability spoiled. Wealth and privilege tended to do that to a person even when that person was as aware as she that the privilege came with a very high price.
Maria Gowrie was a friend of hers and fellow member of the Highland Ladies Bluestocking Society. They dined quietly together, just the three of them, for Maria said rather plaintively that their neighbors, the Duke and Duchess of Dent, had refused their invitation since they too had a guest.
“The cousin of the Marquis of Methven,” Maria said. “Jack Rutherford. I did ask him if he would like to join our party here, but he is so in demand. He already had three invitations.”
Mairi rolled her eyes. Even here it seemed impossible to escape Jack. If he was not actually present, then people were still talking about him.
“I asked the Dents if they would all care to join us for dinner, but Anne Dent wishes to keep Mr. Rutherford for herself,” Maria continued.
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Nicola Cornick
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Can true love be born from scandal?She is young and beautiful and fashionable, Edinburgh′s most flirtatious hostess. But within the merry widow beats a grieving heart. Lady Mairi mourns the husband she lost two years before–and no matter how accomplished a lover Jack Rutherford may be, their wanton night together was an encounter of the body only, and Lady Mairi would prefer to forget it.But when Mairi is threatened by a blackmailer, Jack is the only man who can protect her. As they work together to uncover where the danger lies, their passion reignites. Little by little, the masks they wear burn away, and their most private secrets come to light….