“What about Laird MacKenna?” Miss Cameron said, shifting the weight of her heavy portmanteau from one hand to the other. “Would he want you to do this? Why, he probably itches to mete out justice himself. I would if I were the head of a clan.”
Her common sense fell on deaf ears.
“The laird’s wishes don’t matter here,” Malcolm said darkly. “Not in this glade.”
“Aye, and he’ll be happy we did it,” Klem answered, and the others nodded agreement while Phillip decided which man he should shoot. He had only one shot. Would it be Malcolm or the tall young man with the hulking muscles?
Miss Cameron turned to Phillip, her exasperation clear. “Say something to dissuade them,” she ordered under her breath.
“Such as?” he asked.
“You are the diplomat,” she reminded him. “Negotiating tense situations like this is rumored to be your strength. Don’t you believe you should be negotiating now?”
“Would it do any good, Malcolm?” Phillip asked the innkeeper.
“No good at all, Your Grace. We’ve a score to settle, and we are doing it now. Come along, lads, he can’t shoot us all.”
Malcolm and the other men started forward. Now was the moment Phillip should shoot. He must. He took aim, knowing he needed his mark almost on top of him for the shot to be effective.
However, before he could act, Miss Cameron swung back her heavy leather bag, and brought it with full force right into the big hulk’s groin.
The man was not expecting the attack from this quarter. She’d caught him completely off guard and, just like any other man who valued his “jewels,” he dropped to the ground. The others stopped, confused, since Phillip hadn’t fired a shot.
Miss Cameron didn’t miss a beat. She stepped over to Phillip, placed her hand over his holding the pistol and fired. The shot hit Malcolm in the shoulder. He cried out in surprise.
“Run,” she said calmly Phillip. “And this time, don’t diddle around.”
He was as stunned as the men, but he knew good advice when he heard it. The saddle would only slow him down. He dropped it and went for the nearest coach horse. The animal balked as he grabbed its lead rope and leaped onto its back. Holding mane, he whirled the horse around, grabbed Miss Cameron beneath the arms, and pulled her up in front of him.
“What are you doing?” she said in alarm.
“Saving your life,” Phillip answered, and kicked the horse into a gallop, just as the cry went up to stop them.
The Scots came after them but the poor coach horse was now out of his mind with fear. He went charging through the thick woods as if the hounds of hell followed, which was exactly what Phillip needed.
Of course, it would help matters if Miss Cameron were a touch more appreciative.
“Stop this horse. Let me off,” she said.
Phillip was too occupied riding through the forest to answer.
“I thought to save your haughty neck, not escape with you,” she confessed. “Please, leave me here.”
The ribbons of her bonnet, which had been knocked off to hang around her neck, came undone, and the hat blew away. She made a soft sound of distress.
“I’ll buy you another one,” he said.
“I don’t want another. I wanted that one,” she said.
Phillip didn’t bother to answer. They’d come up on a road. Fog lingered in the low places, but the rain had passed, and the clouds were clearing. A much-needed full moon made an occasional appearance. It would provide light to guide their way.
However, he reasoned, if it helped him, it would also help the Scots. He pushed the horse off the road at a trot, cutting across a boggy pasture. The grass was tall and wet. Their pace slowed to a walk. He moved toward the sheltering darkness of a forest.
“I don’t like horses,” she stated. “I don’t like riding.”
“I can tell. You have a death grip on my arm.”
She released her hold immediately, and he tightened his on her lest she slide off the horse. The animal was actually not a bad ride. He was no stranger to being ridden and comfortable going off Phillip’s leg.
They continued onward. Within an hour, the clouds had completely drifted away. The blue light of a silvery moon lit their way down a shadow-dappled path through the trees.
At last, Phillip decided they were safe. However, the moment he relaxed, Miss Cameron shoved all her weight against him. Phillip let her go. She slid down to the ground in a flurry of skirts.
Most women in her circumstances would either be in tears or making demands. She started walking back in the direction they’d come.
He watched her a moment, both amused and irritated. He’d never witnessed such a purposeful stride. One would think she planned to walk all the way to London by the way she moved. He was tempted to let her go…and yet couldn’t.
With a heavy sigh, Phillip nudged the tired horse in her direction. He had no problem catching up with her. Nor was he surprised that she ignored him, her head down, her face frowning in concentration. Dismounting, he walked with her for a pace, waiting.
He didn’t have to wait long. As if she could contain herself no longer, she rounded on him, the words exploding out of her. “How could you do that? You’ve ruined me.”
“Ruined you? I was under the impression that I may have saved you from death or something worse.”
She stopped. “You saved me?” The last of the pins fell from her hair as she shook her head in denial. It tumbled down her shoulders in a golden mess of curls. “I beg your pardon, Your Grace, but if I hadn’t intervened, you’d be minced meat right now.”
The truth of her statement pricked his pride. “I was the one holding the pistol.”
“And I shot it,” she answered, a statement that seemed to remind her of something else she wanted to say. “You don’t point a gun at a lot like that unless you are prepared to pull the trigger, even though such a little gun wouldn’t stop the likes of them.”
She was right. He’d thought the same.
He didn’t want to admit it.
But, for once, Miss Cameron wasn’t in the mood to argue. “How shall I explain this to Laird MacKenna?” she asked, looking around at their surroundings as if expecting the trees to answer.
“You won’t be telling him anything,” Phillip answered. “You are returning to London.”
Miss Cameron rounded on him, her spirit returning. “I am not.”
“You are,” he assured her. “I’m hiring a vehicle to take you back first thing on the morrow.”
Her nose wrinkled with distaste. “You don’t like the fact I was the one to fire the shot, do you? I’ve wounded your male vanity, and you want to rid yourself of me as quickly as possible.”
“What nonsense. I’m not vain—”
She interrupted his claim with a definitely unladylike snort of disagreement.
Phillip was perilously close to losing his temper. “Listen, Miss Cameron, I am worried for your safety. If you believe that is vanity, so be it. However, do you truly think MacKenna would welcome you with open arms after you shot one of his clansmen?”
That gave her pause.
“I didn’t kill him. I only wounded him,” she admitted in a somewhat contrite voice.
“An action that could be interpreted as your siding with me. I’m certain MacKenna will not be pleased.”
She raised her hands to her head as if wishing to hit herself for such an error in judgment, and then dropped them to her sides. “I only helped because I felt somewhat responsible for what they were about to do to you. In hindsight, I should have let them beat you into a pulp.”
“I’m fond of you, too,” he said dryly, surprised to find he was thoroughly enjoying himself. She had quick wits and a cool head in the face of danger.
But she wasn’t paying attention to him. “I am going to Nathraichean,” she said with a determination. “I will explain to Laird MacKenna. He knows I don’t like or trust you. He’ll understand my concern, and I’m certain
he will be as distressed over his clansmen’s behavior as I was—”
“Why were you going there anyway?” Phillip demanded, cutting through her verbiage.
“Are we back to this again?” She made an exasperated sound that she released in a sigh of resignation. “I met Laird MacKenna at a garden party. He called on me and, since I am a woman alone in this world and the security of a husband would not be unwelcome—” She said this as if blaming him for every single wrong in her life. “—I encouraged him. Naturally, when he invited me for a visit in Scotland at his estate, and I accepted. Can I be more clear for you?”
Phillip shook his head, satisfied.
She wasn’t. Hands on hips, she said, “Now, since it is obvious you will not be welcome, why are you going there?”
He grinned at her. He couldn’t help himself. She was not afraid of him or showing the smallest desire to toady up to him. She was also the one person who didn’t seem to want something from him.
But he wasn’t about to tell her why he was in Scotland. “It’s none of your business. Come along,” he continued, overriding any protest she could make. “We’ll keep walking and eventually find a place for the night. I’ll pay for your passage to London, and no one need be the wiser about what either of us was doing this night.”
Leading the horse, considering the matter settled, Phillip walked over a hundred feet before he realized she wasn’t following him. Instead, she was walking off in the opposite direction.
“Damn it all,” he muttered to the horse, his earlier admiration vanishing. “She can’t do one thing I ask her to.” He started after her. The horse lowered his head and dragged his back feet, a sign he wanted to rest but had no choice other than to follow.
She heard Phillip approach. Her step quickened. He stretched his legs and had no trouble catching up with her.
Phillip walked alongside Miss Cameron for a bit before saying, “Homer.”
Her chin came up. She didn’t ask about the word, but he sensed she wanted to.
He waited.
There was a long moment filled only with the sound of their footsteps and their breathing.
“Homer what?” she asked at last.
He smiled. He’d gambled on her curiosity, and won. “The name of the horse. I believe I shall call him Homer.”
Miss Cameron shot him an irritated look out of the corner of her eye. “Why should you name him at all? What gives you the right?”
“I have no right,” he said. “However, the old boy has carried us well and deserves to be called something other than ‘the horse.’ Do you not agree? Or do you believe it better to ignore his hard work and courage?”
“Is that a slap toward me?” she said, her back still stiff and unyielding, her eyes on the road ahead. “Are you saying I ignore you?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.
And then, when he least expected it, she murmured, “Homer is as good a name as any.”
“I thought so,” he quickly agreed. “Unfortunately, I believe Homer could care less. He’s exhausted. The poor old boy’s tail is dragging.”
Miss Cameron couldn’t resist glancing at the horse to see if what Phillip said was true, and her gaze met his. The tension eased in her brow. Her proud, stubborn chin lowered enough for her to say, “He should be. It has been a long day.”
“It has,” Phillip answered, slowing his step. Miss Cameron slowed hers also.
And a truce, however unacknowledged, existed between them. One Phillip credited himself with negotiating although not even the Spanish ambassador had ever made him work so hard.
This time, when he turned back in the opposite direction, she followed—but not without a dramatic sigh of resignation. They were both accustomed to being in charge, and he counted it a victory that she gave him this small trust.
They walked a ways in silence. Phillip thought of her, of her stubbornness and her pride. Finally, he could no longer contain his curiosity. “Why did you do it?” he asked. “You didn’t have to, and you’d be a more welcome guest at Nathraichean than you would be now.”
She pulled her hair forward, her fingers quickly weaving into a long braid that she let hang loose. “Have you ever seen a man beaten? I have. A gang like that beat my brother-in-law Alex until he was close to death. Your sex goes a bit mad in large groups like that. You can’t be trusted to use reason. I couldn’t stand by and let it happen again.”
“You are talking about Haddon, aren’t you?” he said. The man Miranda had jilted him over. “Some men deserve their beatings.”
“Not Alex.” She knew what he was thinking. “They belong together,” she reminded him quietly. “They would have been together years ago when they were younger. However, my father hated Indians, especially the Shawnee. You know Alex is a half-breed?”
After his curt nod, she said, “He came to ask Father for Miranda’s hand. Alex is truly more white than Indian. His father was an English officer. He’d been raised with privilege. He understood how to ask for Miranda properly. However, all Father could see was the part of him that was Shawnee. He and three of his friends beat Alex to the point where I feared they’d killed him. I helped Miranda cut him down from the tree where they’d tied him.”
“Perhaps your father had just cause,” Phillip said, not wanting to empathize at all.
“He did. The Shawnee killed my mother and my baby brother Ben.” She said this as a statement of fact, completely devoid of emotion.
Phillip stopped, shocked. “That is a good reason,” he answered. “I’m surprised Miranda doesn’t share it.”
A shadow passed in Miss Cameron’s eyes. He sensed she wondered the same…but would never admit such. Her stubborn chin lifted. In a voice laced with pride, she said, “And be like you and your clan and carry a grudge for two hundred years?” She shook her head. “Men are ridiculous.”
“Some are. I have no grudge with anyone—”
“Except me,” she swiftly reminded him.
This woman never knew when to leave well enough alone. He swallowed his sharp retort, not wanting to give her any more fodder against him—and failed. “Tell me, then,” he challenged. “What is your secret? How can you put aside the deaths of those close to you so easily?” Elizabeth’s death haunted him, and he had no one to blame, save God…and he’d blamed Him for years. “How can you accept anyone connected with your family’s killers?”
“Because life goes on,” she said flatly. “Because, sad as it is, death is a part of life. Especially on the frontier. The Shawnees in that war party were not Alex. To hold him responsible would be the same as equating you to Klem and Fergus. Did you not inform me moments ago that you were not like them?”
She was right.
“Well put,” he murmured.
“And I know about blaming oneself,” she continued. “Father did that for years. He’d left us that morning to go with some trappers to look at furs they had to offer. He’d seen the Shawnee but had thought it was a hunting party.” Her hands balled into fists as she walked. “We hadn’t even known the Shawnee had gone on the warpath. Often something could happen miles away, and then war would spread before anyone could warn us. I was away from the trading post collecting kindling with Constance when Miranda came running to us in the woods. She’d seen them murder Mother in the garden. The three of us girls buried ourselves under a pile of leaves beside a fallen tree trunk. The braves came searching for us. They looked in the trunk but didn’t anticipate us hiding outside of it. We held each other’s hands all night long. I’ve never been so frightened and, with Mother gone, I had to make the decisions.”
At last, Phillip understood. The bonds between the Cameron girls were stronger than those of ordinary siblings. Would he and his twin experience this same need to unite together?
“But we survived,” she said firmly. “The three of us have held together over the years, and we shall continue to survive.”
In that one moment, Phillip felt such a desire to believe his tw
in was alive. He didn’t want Nanny Frye’s letter to be a hoax. He refused to believe it could be. “I still don’t know if I could marry someone from those who killed a family member,” he said. He would not forgive MacKenna if he’d stolen his brother. He’d kill him.
“I don’t know if I could either,” Miss Cameron confessed. She noticed her fists were clenched and spread her fingers as if wanting to release the tension in them. She didn’t look at Phillip as she said, “It has caused a great deal of conflict in Miranda. It was the reason she sent Alex away all those years ago. She couldn’t choose between him and her family.” She stopped, facing him. “That’s why, Your Grace, I made the choice for her the night of your betrothal ball. My intention wasn’t to humiliate you. I just couldn’t bear the thought of Miranda’s giving up someone she loved, someone she was meant to be with for us. Not a second time. Her happiness is very important to me.”
“I didn’t want her unhappy either,” he agreed. “But could we not have had the discussion in private? Did half of London have to be a witness?”
“That wasn’t good,” she admitted. “My only defense is that if I hadn’t spoken up, she would never have told you herself. Once the betrothal had been announced, neither of you could, or would, have backed out.”
She was right.
“Perhaps,” she continued thoughtfully, “the reason you are so angry—”
“I’m not angry,” he assured, and he wasn’t. Not any longer.
“You had to be,” she pressed. “Especially if your heart was involved. Miranda had assured me it wasn’t—?”
“It wasn’t,” he interjected. “But my pride was. There,” he said, “complete and brutal honesty. It feels good. I haven’t had the opportunity to practice it that much in London.”
“And there is no one to witness it?” she said, her voice light.
“There’s you, Miss Cameron. There is you.”
In the Bed of a Duke Page 5