“I don’t believe Bailey’s very familiar with art products,” Lady Esme said, “so he must have bought one of everything he could find that was remotely related to art.” She held a book entitled Drawing in Perspective Made Easy.
“This is very kind, but it’s far too much,” Emilia murmured, gripping a package of what appeared to be lead pencils.
“Ladies, would you mind very much if I stole Lady Emilia away from you?” Colin said.
“Of course we mind,” Claire said crossly. “You would interrupt our attempts to bring Lady Emilia into our fold.”
“Claire!” Lady Grace exclaimed. Grace was Duncan Mackenzie’s wife. She was also Claire’s older sister and the more sedate of the two of them. “Don’t listen to her, Colin. Of course we don’t mind.”
“But only take her away from us for a moment,” Claire scolded. “We want her back as soon as possible. We’ll be needing her to help us go through all this.” She gestured at the cluttered table.
Colin smiled but didn’t say that Claire would probably be disappointed.
He took Emilia’s arm and led her out of the sitting room and down the corridor to his bedchamber. Once he shut the door behind him, Emilia sank down onto his chair as if her body were deflating.
“Are you all right?” he asked softly.
“Oh yes,” she said. “I am just not accustomed to so much…energy.”
He nodded. “Lady Claire can be a force of nature.”
“I think I am simply unused to being in the presence of other women.”
Colin tilted his head at her, thinking of the past year—how the vast majority of the times he’d seen her she’d been at home with no one but her bastard of a father for company.
“Do you remember last year when the Knights were guarding my father at Vauxhall Gardens?”
“Aye,” he said. He’d never forget that night—it was the night Ross had been stabbed and had nearly died.
“It was the only time I’d been out of the house for a social event in over a year.”
“Why?” he asked her.
“My father fears I will say something to embarrass him. Or reveal him.”
“I’m sorry, lass.”
She shrugged. “It’s all right. I’m not a very social person to begin with, but it’s so odd and somewhat overwhelming to suddenly find myself surrounded by four lovely, friendly women…especially…Well, especially after last night and the circumstances that brought me here.”
“I can imagine,” he said, something warm blooming in his chest. Now that the sharp edge of the trauma of what had happened yesterday was fading, she was beginning to talk to him. He’d had a feeling that might happen, and was glad it was happening so fast. Emilia was a resilient one.
“Anyhow…You wanted to speak with me about something?”
“Aye.” He took a deep breath then plunged ahead. “I’m taking you away from London.”
She blinked at him, then her gray-blue eyes went wide. “You are?”
He nodded. “It’s too dangerous for you here.” Colin might not know what, exactly, Pinfield was guilty of, but he knew the man would do anything to protect his name. “If you stay in Town, he’ll eventually find you.”
“But…where will we go?”
“North,” he said.
“How far north?” Her voice was little more than a whisper.
“To Scotland.”
She stared at him, her lips parted. He waited. She was silent for what seemed like an eternity.
Colin was fighting against revealing a fidget when she finally murmured, “Well, that sounds wonderful. I’ve always wanted to visit Scotland.”
Chapter 5
At three o’clock, Colin and Emilia were ready to go. In the mews behind the Knights’ house, they stood beside a well-used but sturdy phaeton that the major had procured for them. It had worn leather seats, a retractable hood, and plenty of space in the boot for their luggage, which, given the amount of art supplies they were bringing, was quite bulky. A pair of young roan mares were hitched to the carriage to start them off on their journey.
“Goodbye.” Lady Claire drew Emilia into a tight hug, and the other women followed suit, all of them careful with her injuries, making Emilia feel as if she was cared for, an altogether brand-new sensation. She hugged them all back tightly, trying to show them how much she appreciated their kind acceptance of her.
“Please write to us.” Lady Esme’s expanding belly pressed against Emilia as they hugged.
“I will,” Emilia said. “I promise.”
Lady Claire turned on Sir Colin, her expression serious. “You didn’t forget what I gave you, did you?”
“I did not.”
“And the instructions?”
“Aye, I have them. And I’ve already committed them to memory, so dinna fash yourself over it,” he told her.
Lady Claire cocked a brow at him. “If those wounds don’t heal properly, you’ll have me to answer to, Sir Colin Stirling.”
He gave a false shudder. “Answering to you is more frightening than facing a hungry pack of wolves, milady. I’ll not fail.”
“Good,” she said sharply.
The major handed Emilia into the carriage. “You’re in excellent hands,” he told her with a small, serious smile. “Stirling is one of the best men I know.”
She glanced over at Sir Colin, who was making some adjustment to the straps on the horses. Turning back to the major, she nodded. “He’s one of the best men I know, too.”
It was rather ridiculous she was saying that. Truly, before last night, they’d hardly spoken to each other. But she’d watched him over the months he guarded her father. She’d seen his kindness and his strength and, most of all, his competence. She felt safe with Sir Colin—she always had, even back when he was guarding her father and not specifically watching out for her. She’d felt that if anything bad had ever happened, he’d have been there, stopping it. Taking care of it.
He’d never been there when her father had hurt her. But that wasn’t his fault. Her father’s evil was an insidious one. He was careful, so much so that if she showed her wounds to the world, she was certain most people wouldn’t believe Lord Pinfield was responsible for them.
But these men and women had. They hadn’t questioned her or her motives once. They’d taken her in, been kind to her, helped her, doctored her, and now were taking pains to keep her safe. A flush of love for all of them warmed her, deep in the core of her heart.
Sir Colin climbed in beside her. The bench was narrow, and his thigh pressed against hers as he took up the reins. It was such intimate contact, instant heat bloomed in her cheeks. She tried to ignore it, instead waving to the Knights and their wives as Sir Colin directed the horses to a walk.
Moments later they’d turned out of the mews and onto the busy street, the London traffic congested and busy. Sir Colin smiled kindly at her, and she felt stupid for feeling his touch so intimately. Because he was kind to her didn’t mean anything. It certainly didn’t mean he wanted to do something like…like kiss her.
She licked her lips, the action involuntary, and images of kissing him flooded her mind. He had wonderful lips, full and soft-looking, and his teeth were white and straight…
Oh Lord. She was blatantly staring at his mouth. She jerked her gaze away.
It was just the newness of it all. She’d never been in such close proximity to a man before. It didn’t help that he was so handsome, so ruggedly Scottish, that his knees showed below the hem of his kilt, and his thick arms and chest pushing against the fabric of his coat were probably the most masculine things she’d ever laid eyes on.
“Are you cold, lass?” he asked.
“No, not at all.” In fact, she was feeling quite warm, despite the cool breeze that ruffled the curls that framed her face beneath her—or, rather, Lady Claire’s—bonnet.
“Good,” he said. “I put the plaids at the top so you can reach back and take one if you start to feel a chill.”
“Thank you.”
“And your back? Is it paining you?”
“It’s all right.” She leaned forward slightly on the padded bench seat. Her back still felt as if it had been flayed open—because it had been flayed open—but there was nothing Sir Colin could do about it.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, Sir Colin negotiating his way around a toppled fruit cart, the sounds of the living city of London surrounding them. People and horses and carriages were everywhere, coachmen scowling at slower vehicles, pedestrians moving about their business, looking serious and sometimes harried.
There was no attraction between them, Emilia told herself. Sir Colin felt protective of her and had vowed to keep her safe. That didn’t translate to attraction. And even if he did feel something beyond protectiveness toward her, nothing could come of it. With her father, a lord of the realm, probably already engaged in a frantic search for her, she was in no position act upon the lure of this handsome Scot.
And even if she was in such a position, what would she do? She nearly laughed at the thought. She was an inexperienced, reticent woman of twenty-one. Sir Colin was probably a decade older than her, worldly, and hardened by battle. How could he possibly be interested in a young Englishwoman who had been so utterly beaten down by her own life?
She pushed these silly thoughts from her mind. They were thoughts for later. Right now she and Sir Colin were trying to leave London without being discovered by her father, and she needed to focus on the immediate problems at hand.
“ ’Tis good you’re keeping your head down,” Sir Colin said. “We dinna want anyone to recognize you.”
Even if she wasn’t wearing a wide-brimmed bonnet, even if she danced a reel on the phaeton’s bench, she probably wouldn’t be recognized, she thought ruefully. She had been out so seldom in society in the last few years, no one knew her anymore.
She didn’t voice those thoughts, though.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said, his gaze on the road, “about our name. What d’you think of the name Montgomery?”
“Er…it’s a good name, I think,” she said.
He nodded, satisfied. “Good. I’m John Montgomery, returning from a visit to London with my new wife.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed. She looked up at him. “We’re posing as a married couple, then?”
His brows drew together, his expression becoming extremely serious. “I mean nothing untoward by it. I’d never hurt you, lass, or compromise you in any way. You ken that, aye?”
Heat once again prickled across her cheeks. “Of course,” she murmured, though the devil inside her wondered if being compromised by this man would be such a bad thing.
“ ’Tis the safest thing. I thought of posing as your brother but no one would believe it. You’re far too bonny a lass to be any sister of mine.”
She laughed. “That’s not true.”
He gave her a strange look but didn’t comment.
“Do you actually have any sisters?” she asked him.
“Aye. Two of them. Twins.”
“I’m sure they’re lovely.”
“They’re hags.”
“Sir Colin!” she exclaimed, aghast. But his eyes were twinkling.
“I always called them hags as a lad. They called me bumptious wee nyaff. So ’twas only fair.”
“What’s a nyaff?” she asked, the Scottish word feeling strange on her tongue.
“An idiot.”
“Ah,” she murmured. “I suppose they deserved it, then.”
“Oh, they did. They bullied me relentlessly.”
“Are they older than you?”
“Aye, by two years.”
“Do they live in Scotland?”
“Aye, in the Highlands. Both are married now, with bairns of their own.”
“So you’re an uncle.”
“I am.” He smiled, seeming pleased by that.
“And they’re not hags, truly,” she told him.
“Well, I suppose not,” he said reluctantly, and in his expression she saw the little boy he must have been. A scamp with big amber eyes and wild brown hair, scowling and stamping his foot and calling his cruel big sisters hags.
“But they look nothing like you,” he added.
“What do they look like?”
“Dark hair. Dark eyes. Tall.”
“They look like you, then.”
“Aye, I suppose. Mayhap a touch more feminine.”
She arched a brow. “Just a touch? I doubt that.” Because from head to toe, Sir Colin was 100 percent masculine.
As they drove out of London, they talked about their plan. They would be John Montgomery and his reticent wife, Emilia, a middle-class Scottish couple returning home to Edinburgh from a family visit to London. Emilia hoped she wouldn’t have to speak too much, because her aristocratic English accent would be obvious the moment she opened her mouth.
Once she stopped having all those disturbing thoughts about Sir Colin, about his warmth and his handsomeness, and how they’d be each other’s sole source of company for Lord knew how long, she found it very easy to talk to him. Instinctively, she knew she didn’t have to bite her tongue with him as she did with her father, and society in general. Nothing she said to Sir Colin would go back to her father. She was for the first time truly safe, and it was so liberating.
Until she remembered her position. Who she was, where she was going, and why. When that happened, they launched into a long silence, Emilia drawing bucolic scenes in her notebook and sparring with her inner demons until dusk descended.
She often glanced at Sir Colin, wondering what he thought about. His expression was serious but otherwise emotionless, which she felt was deliberate. A mask he’d placed there for the benefit of others.
It was almost nine o’clock at night when they finally stopped. Sir Colin had lit the lanterns on each side of the carriage hours before, but other than the soft golden glow they cast over the road, there was no light. Clouds had obscured the waxing moon and the stars, the road traffic grew sparse, and they could no longer see signs of life beyond the road, except for an occasional glimmer of light from a cottage or farmhouse.
They stopped in the town of Caxton, first at the Crown Inn, which had no vacancy, then the George, which was also full. Finally they tried the Cross Keys Inn, a small, whitewashed rectangular structure. Sir Colin gave Emilia the horses while he went to see if a room was available. She waited on the quiet street, holding the reins and studying the homey-looking buildings lining the street.
It had been a long time since she’d been out of London. Her father owned a house in Nottinghamshire, but they’d not visited it for several years. She had been locked up in a city teeming with people, close to others but rarely seeing them, alone and lonely but always surrounded. Here, though, it was peaceful. Serene. Being in this sleepy town reminded her of pleasant days spent as a child at Pinfield Manor, walking with her governess and her mother outside, playing with the village children; sledding and singing carols in winter; fishing in the warmer weather, lifting her skirts and kicking off her shoes and wading in the creek during summertime. That was back when she’d led a regular—albeit privileged—life. When had it all changed?
It was easy to pinpoint. The moment her mother had died.
Sir Colin emerged from the inn, opening the door and stepping into the light pouring out from inside. A boy followed him onto the dark street.
“Brush them down well,” Sir Colin told the boy, who was scrawny and could be no more than eleven years of age. “They’ve worked hard today.”
“Aye, sir.”
With a shy smile, he took the reins from Emilia. “Good news,” Sir Colin said, “they’ve a room for us.” He helped her from the bench seat then handed the boy a coin and asked him to bring up their luggage when he was done with the horses.
“Aye, sir. Thank ye muchly, sir.”
Sir Colin led her toward the door, bending to speak into her ear. “There was only one chamber availab
le. And it has just the one bed. We’ll be sleeping in the same room tonight, I’m afraid.”
The thought of sleeping in a strange place brought her as much panic as it had the night before. To know that Colin would once again be close to her—on the same bed—was a relief. And the anticipation of him lying beside her, perhaps touching her, made her stomach flutter with pleasure.
Excitement bloomed in Emilia’s chest. She managed to tamp it down, though she couldn’t contain her smile. It came from somewhere deep inside her, stretching her mouth wide. Muscles in her mouth that had been long denied still worked, and it felt wonderful.
Chapter 6
Sir Colin’s lips twisted. “I’ll sleep on the floor, of course.”
“We slept in the same bed last night,” she reminded him as they stepped onto the landing. “It’ll be all right.”
“Last night,” he said quietly, sounding like he was speaking from between his teeth, “we were surrounded by Highland Knights who’d gladly kill me to preserve your honor.”
Her brows drew together as he opened the door, and they walked into the brightly lit entry hall.
“I don’t think it makes one bit of difference,” she told him. She didn’t know how he might have responded to that, because the innkeeper appeared, clutching a long brass key. “Mrs. Montgomery?”
She began to greet him, then remembered her new Scottish identity, closed her mouth, and nodded.
“Welcome, ma’am. I’ll take you to your room.”
She inclined her head.
The man led them up a narrow staircase to a short landing that led to two closed doors on the right side and two closed doors on the left. He went to the far left door, slid the key into the lock, and opened it. “Here you are. No fireplace in this particular room, but there’s a good coal brazier near the bed. The missus’ll be bringing up your dinner, too, in a trice.”
“I thank you, sir,” Sir Colin said politely.
In a moment, the man was gone, and they were alone again. Sir Colin busied himself with lighting a lantern and the brazier, while Emilia removed her bonnet and pins and combed her fingers through her hair. The bonnet and the tight chignon at her nape had kept it somewhat subdued, but the edges that had been exposed all day to the elements were frizzed, and as the glow of the lantern blanketed the room, she glanced into the simple looking glass on the wall and sighed. She looked like a blond Medusa.
Highland Temptation Page 4