by Julia London
After breakfast, he went to the throne room for a standing Friday morning discussion of clan business with Duff, Robbie, and Geordie.
“Are you ill, Laird?” Duff said as Jamie walked in, and glanced at his pocket watch.
“I am well,” Jamie said, and sat heavily in his chair. He had no desire to hear the clan business this morning. No desire whatsoever.
Duff put his watch back into his pocket. “I had a wee chat with the Brodie laird this morning before they took their leave—”
“They’ve gone?” Jamie interrupted, surprised.
“Aye,” Duff said. “Said they never meant to stay as long as they had, but they quite liked the dancing.”
Jamie nodded, dubious. He hadn’t exactly settled things with Isabella or her father. He’d left her last night with a question still twisting between them. Were they reconciled, or not? “What news, then?” he asked, and absently rubbed his thumb along the gash in the chair’s leather.
“The Brodies have proposed a devil’s bargain,” Duff said. “They want a renewal of the betrothal, aye? But if we canna come to agreement on the terms, then they’ll agree to sell land to Murchison.”
“What has one to do with the other?” Jamie asked as his muscles began to tense.
“Nothing but satisfaction,” Duff said.
“Meaning?”
“The land borders ours in the east.”
Jamie stared at Duff, understanding then what they had done. Either he agreed to renew the engagement with Isabella, or the Brodies would work with Murchison to squeeze him out. The land meant nothing to the Brodies—they couldn’t graze cattle in those hills or farm it.
But Murchison could put dozens, if not hundreds, of sheep there. It would be only a matter of time before they encroached on Campbell land and began to compete with the cattle for grass. With the tenants in the west agreeing to sell, and the Brodies selling in the east, the Dundavie lands would be surrounded by sheep, with no escape but through a marsh. “I see,” Jamie said. “They intend to extort a marriage, aye?”
Before Duff could answer, Geordie scribbled on his slate. Hav care.
Jamie looked curiously at his brother.
Geordie wiped the slate clean and wrote again, holding it up to Jamie. Yur hart.
Jamie shook his head, confused.
Frustrated, Geordie slapped his hand on his slate.
“What have we to lose?” Robbie said with a shrug. “We were set on the marriage before Geordie raised a bloody hand, aye? It was to our advantage, we said. It was our fault that she cried off. No’ a bloody thing has changed—it’s still the best arrangement for us.”
“Aye,” Duff agreed. “I canna think of a better option for us.”
“Neither can I,” Jamie said, and Geordie huffed impatiently. “But if I were to say no,” he added carefully, eliciting a gasp from Duff and a wide-eyed look of surprise from Robbie, “we might drain the marsh. They may surround us with sheep, aye, but we could drain the marsh and farm it.”
Duff’s eyes narrowed. He placed his beefy hands on the table before him. “Beggin’ your pardon, Laird, but are you suggesting that you no’ marry the Brodie lass?”
“I’m no’ suggesting that, no,” Jamie said calmly, and rubbed his thumb along the gash in the chair. “But we must consider all our options.”
“Draining the marsh,” Robbie repeated skeptically. “You would take the suggestion of a slip of an English woman with no more experience than a mockingbird?” He clucked, waving a hand dismissively at his cousin.
“No experience, aye,” Jamie agreed. “But you must admit it makes a wee bit of sense.”
I, Geordie wrote.
Duff looked at Jamie as if he thought he’d lost his mind. “We need heirs, lad. Draining the marsh might make a wee bit of sense, but it canna give you heirs.”
Jamie shrugged and looked out the window.
“What in blazes are you thinking, then, Jamie?” Robbie demanded.
“I donna rightly know.” It was the honest truth. “But I’ve a lot to think about,” he said, and walked out of the throne room.
There were times in a man’s life that no counsel, no friend, no one could answer the questions that were burning in his head. No one but him.
He’d go to his hothouse. He did his best thinking there, when his hands were buried in rich Scottish earth. He made his way there, looking neither right nor left, not wanting to speak with anyone or hear any complaints about this or that. He wanted only to think about what he would do about the Brodies’ offer to settle the betrothal. What he would do with his bloody life.
But when he turned toward the mews he saw Peader walking toward him, his head down as if he were searching for something.
Then Daria appeared, the dogs trailing behind her. Her face was bright, her cheeks rosy, the signs of exercise on a brilliantly bright day. She went up to the boy and touched his hand. The boy opened his palm, and Daria put something in it. They both bent over it, not noticing Jamie’s approach until he cast a shadow on them.
Daria looked up, and her beguiling eyes lit when she saw him. “As I live and breathe, Laird Campbell has come to enjoy a glorious spring day,” she said cheerfully.
He could feel a smile warming his face. “Miss Babcock. How do you fare this morning?”
“Quite well,” she said, and touched the boy’s arm. “Peter and I have had a walkabout.” She looked at the boy and pointed to his hand.
The boy instantly held out his hand to Jamie. In the center of his palm was a piece of agate, polished to a high blue sheen. Agate was plentiful at Dundavie; Jamie’s father had crafted his mother a necklace of such stones when Jamie was a boy.
“Quite bonny.”
Peader beamed at him.
Daria bent down to the boy, smiling at him. She folded his fingers over the stone, patted them, and then touched his pocket. The boy put his stone away. Daria nodded, then wiggled her fingers at him, and Peader took his leave, running a bit, then hopping on one leg before doing it all again.
“He’s bright,” Daria said as she watched him go. “I think he could learn to communicate rather well if given the proper attention. We’ve been teaching each other.”
Jamie had never considered it, really. The deaf and mute were generally kept from society, and the Campbells were no different.
“He is very fond of your dogs,” she added. “Were I you, I’d put him in charge of their care.”
“Would you? Have you any other advice for me?”
“I do. I think Duffson should be given his freedom. He has far more important matters on his mind than my wandering about.” She leaned forward, peeking around Jamie. He followed her gaze and saw the younger Duff chatting up a chambermaid.
“Aha.” Jamie sighed. The lad had the same important matters on his mind as Jamie had on his.
“He is easily distracted.” She folded her arms across her middle. “You need a better guard.”
“Aye, it is clear that is so. I ought to hang him for leaving his post.” He looked at Daria. “What other advice have you for me? More bogs that should be drained? Perhaps you’ve had more thoughts on botany? Or dancing?”
She pretended to think hard, then shook her head. “Nothing comes to mind. But if there is any advice you would like, you need only ask.” She cast her arms wide. “I am here, ready to advise, my liege.”
Jamie could feel his smile reaching out through his limbs. “Walk with me?”
“Of course.”
They began to walk, each with their hands clasped at their backs, as if to keep from touching one another. Or so Jamie wanted to believe. A yellow wildflower Daria had put in her hair bobbed around her cheek, slowly working its way free. Jamie imagined her picking the flower, then slipping it into her hair, pleased by the result.
“Did you enjoy the rest of your evening?” she asked.
The mention of last evening shook him from the pleasant rumination. “I did.” He glanced away, unable to look into her eye
s and think of Isabella. “I would that you had stayed to enjoy it as well. There were quite a lot of tall tales and lies bandied about.” He smiled at her. “A typical Scottish evening.”
“Tall tales happen to be one of my favorite pastimes. What tale did you offer?”
“Me? Why, I could scarcely manage a word among the lot of them.”
Daria laughed. “I wouldn’t have understood the tall tales even had I stayed, you know. Gaelic is a very difficult language to comprehend.”
“Aye, I suppose it is,” he conceded. He didn’t like the reminder of the differences between them, language being the most glaring of them. “I hope you will keep my confidence if I tell you that I find English a wee bit easier for conversation than my native tongue.”
Daria feigned a gasp. “Scandalous, Laird! But I swear I will not utter a word.” She smiled up at him. “At least not in your presence.”
“Of course no’. You’ve no one to tell here,” he teased as they reached the hothouse.
“That is not entirely true!” she protested. “Bethia has, on rare occasion, accidentally listened to what I have said.”
He chuckled as he reached for the door. “I would strongly advise against saying a word of my preference for English to Bethia, for she will surely see it as a portent of some great calamity to befall the Campbells.”
Daria tossed her head back and laughed as they stepped into the hothouse.
There was no one within, for which Jamie was grateful. He wanted this time with Daria to himself. As he walked down the narrow path, examining his experiments, it occurred to him that he rarely had moments alone. That he’d rarely felt a need for moments alone before now. He couldn’t recall a need to be alone with Isabella bubbling up in him like a thirst.
He thirsted now.
He paused at two pots of barley, examining the thickness of the stalks. He thought about how many iterations of barley he’d tried, seeking a greater yield per stalk. He would have sworn to anyone, to God Himself, that he was thinking of barley and only barley when he opened his mouth to speak. But instead, he said, “Isabella wishes to resume our engagement.”
He was as surprised as she that the words had tumbled out of his mouth. But there they lay, and he could not bring them back. For a moment, he dared not look at Daria. He couldn’t guess her reaction, and he suddenly realized he didn’t want to be disappointed. So many other things in his life had let him down; he didn’t think he could bear for Daria to be a disappointment to him.
She did not speak right away, and the silence began to press against his throat. He shouldn’t have said it. What purpose did he think it would serve?
“Is that what you wish, as well?” she asked quietly.
“It ought to be, aye,” he said flatly, and finally risked a look at Daria.
Her cheeks had bloomed and she was looking down, as if she were intently studying a strain of wheat. She nodded, as if she’d expected him to say yes.
“But I canna say that it’s what I wish any longer.”
Her head came up, her eyes searching his. “What do you wish?”
He wished for things he would never have guessed he’d wish for. He wished for things far beyond anything he would ever admit to himself, much less out loud.
He touched the flower in her hair, then brushed his fingers against her collarbone.
“I know what I wish,” she said. “I wish I had come to Scotland before Mamie shot you.”
He arched a brow as he stroked his fingers up to caress her earlobe. “So do I,” he said with a wry smile.
“She wouldn’t have shot you had I been there, and I never would have come here. I wish I had never come to Dundavie.”
Jamie’s hand stilled in surprise. And disappointment. He had thought that perhaps she liked it here. “It’s no’ a bad place,” he said, perhaps a wee bit defensively.
“No,” she said, her eyes locking on his. “It’s the very best place. And I shall miss it more than you will ever know.”
His mind was racing, his questions looming larger. He moved his thumb to her lips, brushing against them. One thought was crystal clear. “Stay,” he said. “Stay at Dundavie. As my guest, as my—”
“As your friend?” She smiled sadly and pressed her hand against his heart. “You know I can’t do that.”
But Jamie wasn’t going to stand for that, or the meaning behind it—not in this moment. He abruptly grabbed Daria in a tight embrace and kissed her. It wasn’t a gentle kiss; it was one brimming with confusion and hope and want.
He loved her. Everything suddenly seemed crystal clear to him: he loved this English rose.
He moved without conscious thought, picking her up and setting her on the wooden bench. He kissed her mouth, her cheeks, her brow. He playfully bit her neck and kissed the hollow of her throat as he filled his hands with her breasts. He was slender moments from losing control, from making love to her, and damn it all, he wanted to lose control. He wanted to take her. His mind and heart warred, his thoughts telling him that he couldn’t abandon his principles to satiate his burning need, and his heart insisting that he could.
When Daria slid her hands down his arms and to his waist, then intentionally brushed against his cock, Jamie sucked in a breath. He moved over her, drifting down with her onto the low table, Daria on her back beneath him. He groped for the hem of her gown and slid his hand under her skirts, touching the smooth skin of her leg, sliding in between her legs, pressing against her sex, his self-restraint holding by the thread of a spider’s web.
Daria’s breath was shallow, her skin flushed, and he thought she had never looked more beautiful. He kissed her again as he pressed himself against her. It was all too much. The desire in him was bubbling like a witch’s cauldron. He had never felt so incapable of restraint—but Daria had done something to him, had sunk down into his skin, her person knitting with his.
He abruptly lifted his head and closed his eyes. “Mi Diah,” he said, emotion raw in his voice, and he held himself above her, his arms taut with his restraint. “I canna be so careless with you, leannan.”
Daria’s lashes fluttered; then she rose up, grabbed his jaw with one hand, and kissed him with as much passion as he’d just shown her. “Be brave.” She wrapped her arms tightly around him and kissed the corner of his mouth.
It was a delicately small kiss, but it rocked Jamie to his depths. He had no defense against her. He was hopeless, hopelessly in love. He stroked her hair, kissed her mouth, her temple. “Daria,” he whispered into her hair. “Tha gaol agam ort.”
“What?” she asked laughingly, and kissed him, her hands stroking over his body, exploring him as he moved against her.
Jamie was lost in the feel of her body, the scent of her skin. He wasn’t certain how or when he’d freed his cock from his trousers, but the tip was pressed tantalizingly against her damp folds, and he could feel himself spiraling to the steady beat that was coming from somewhere . . .
Something made him focus on that beat.
It was not a siren call. It was coming from the door.
He rose just as Daria did. He stood up, pulled her from the table, and quickly adjusted his clothing as Daria turned her back to the door to adjust hers, smoothing the hair from her face.
“Stay here,” he said low and stalked to the door, his mood gone black for having been interrupted, and perhaps even blacker for having found himself in such a compromising position.
He threw open the door and glared down into the face of one of the young footmen. The young man spoke in rapid Gaelic, pointing toward the main keep.
“Aye,” Jamie said when the lad had delivered his message. He shut the door and turned around, pressing his back against it.
Daria was standing on the small path, her color still high. “What is it?” she asked, her voice full of trepidation. “Has something happened?”
“Aye, something has happened,” Jamie said. “Your rescue has come.”
Twenty-three
THE
WORDS DIDN’T make sense to Daria. She did not want to be rescued. What she wanted, with a strength that squeezed the breath from her, was for Jamie to make love to her. Madness. She was filled with madness. She stood on the edge of ruin as it was, but to invite the final push off the cliff?
“Who?” she asked angrily.
“English.” Jamie shoved a hand through his hair. “He knows only that they are English and they’ve come for you.”
Her parents? Of all days, of all moments, they came for her at this moment? She should be overwhelmed with gratitude, happy that she would at last be rescued from her captivity. But she was neither of those things. She was disappointed, recalcitrant, cross. She pressed her palm to her forehead as she tried to gather her thoughts.
This is an omen, she tried to convince herself. An omen that she had gone too far, that she had to stop before she did something she would never recover from.
She lifted her gaze to Jamie’s. His eyes were dark, his demeanor suddenly distant. He knew it, too. “My parents, surely,” she said.
He just held her gaze.
Daria looked at the door. “I can’t . . .” She couldn’t do so many things, she thought wildly. She couldn’t be with Jamie the way she wanted to be with him. She couldn’t linger here, and yet she couldn’t imagine herself beyond this day—
“Come, Daria.” He looked at the table where they had come so close to experiencing what she suspected would have been the most brilliant thing she had ever felt; a tiny shiver ran down her spine just thinking of it. But then he turned his back to it. “Let us discover who has come to rescue you.”
The conflicting swirl of emotions was a nauseating mix in the pit of her belly. She walked stiffly beside Jamie. She thought she should say something, anything meaningful, but she was completely numb.
As they reached the end of the mews, Jamie said, “Daria.”
She stopped and looked into his eyes. She could feel the pull between them, as strong as the moon pulled the tide. His gaze drank her in, his brow furrowed. There was so much she wanted to say—You astonish me time and again, I adore you, I want you, any number of things. But she couldn’t find her tongue.