How to Marry a Royal Highlander

by Vanessa Kelly

  She shook her head. “Then why is he so set on it? It hardly seems like an advantageous match. Surely you could do much better.”

  She clamped her lips shut, clearly annoyed to have revealed that she thought him a good catch. When he cast her a teasing grin, she held up a hand to cut him off.

  “Despite your perfectly dreadful personality,” she added. “But you know what I mean. It was ridiculous how many well-dowered girls in London were panting after you.”

  “Ridiculous, eh?” he asked. If he didn’t miss his guess, Miss Eden Whitney sounded jealous. “You don’t approve of my ability to charm the fair ladies of the ton?”

  “You are the least charming man I’ve ever met. But you’re rich and heir to an earldom, and not entirely horrible to look at. So, it’s no wonder you had so many girls swooning over you. That does not excuse, however, your disgraceful tendency to encourage women to dangle after you.”

  “I never once encouraged any woman to dangle after me,” he protested. Except for her, and it was too bad she’d always resisted his bait. “And, I repeat, I have no intention of going through with a farce of a marriage.”

  She waved an irritated hand. “We’ll get to that in a moment. I’m still curious to know why your grandfather is so determined that you marry your cousin. Did he make some sort of deathbed promise about it?” she said sarcastically.

  “Actually, he did.”

  “You must be joking. Who does that sort of thing anymore?”

  “Highlanders do.”

  She didn’t speak for a few moments. “It sounds barbaric, if you ask me,” she finally said.

  “What you don’t understand is how important familial bonds are within the Scottish clans. My family is a member of Clan Graham, as is Donella’s. In fact, Donella’s uncle is chief of one of the oldest cadet branches in the clan. Not only did Donella’s father wish her to marry me—a wish reiterated on his deathbed—her uncle also wants her wedded to the heir of the laird. As a loyal member of the clan, my grandfather chose to agree.” Alec couldn’t hold back a grimace. “My grandfather might be a peer of the realm and a canny businessman to boot, but when it comes to clan business he’s as old-fashioned as they come. He thinks it’s a grand idea to strengthen the family bonds within the clan. The old ways are the best, as he’s fond of saying.”

  “But you’re not a Graham,” Edie protested. “And neither is your grandfather, since his name is Callum Frances Haddon, Seventh Earl of Riddick. And you’re a Gilbride, so how can he—or you—be a member of Clan Graham?”

  She had been doing her homework on him. It seemed Edie was more interested in him than she liked to let on.

  “The Haddons are what’s known as a sept family,” he said. “Those are families who have chosen to swear fealty to a particular clan. The Haddons took an oath of loyalty centuries ago to the Montrose family, which heads Clan Graham. And, of course, there have been marriages between Grahams and Haddons over the centuries. The bonds run deep.”

  She frowned. “I thought you said Miss Graham’s uncle was the head of the clan.”

  “Of one of the cadet branches of the family, of which there are several. The head of the entire clan is James Graham, the current Duke of Montrose. In fact, Mugdock Castle, which is just on the other side of those woods”—he broke off to nod at the road ahead, which ran up to a thick stand of trees—“is the historic seat of Clan Graham. That’s one of the reasons I wished you to see it.”

  She glanced ahead at the large hill, encircled by a moor on the lower reaches and covered by woods higher up. Mugdock sat on top, still hidden by trees and the rise of the hill.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said, casting him a quick smile. “And I can actually see it.”

  “The view from the castle is even better.”

  She gave her head a small shake and then focused her attention back on him. “So, the duke is the head of your clan, but Miss Haddon’s uncle is a branch chief, a lesser position.”

  He nodded. “The clans all have cadet branches, and each has its chief. For instance, there are the Montrose Grahams, the main branch, but there are also the Fintry and Claverhouse Grahams, the Menteith Grahams, and the Inchbrakie Grahams. Then there are dozens of sept families, too. Oh,” he added with a wicked smile, “don’t forget all the different spellings of the name Graham. All those families belong to the clan, as well.”

  “Good Lord. How do you keep it straight?”

  “It’s no more complicated than the British aristocracy. All one has to do is look through Debrett’s to understand that.”

  “Perhaps, but let’s stick with the Scots for now. You called your grandfather the laird, did you not?”

  He nodded.

  “If he’s the laird, then why must he do what a chief from a cadet branch wants?”

  “The title of laird is more about the designation of a specific estate or land. In earlier centuries, the chief of a Highland clan was called a laird, but now it refers to a member of the Scottish nobility. Not necessarily a clan chief.”

  “So . . . then the branch chief can order your grandfather around?”

  “Nobody orders my grandfather around,” Alec responded drily. “But Grandfather would certainly want to honor the wishes of the branch chief and show his loyalty to an important member of the clan.” He shrugged. “In any case, he has always been in favor of the match for his own reasons. No one had to twist his arm.”

  Despite her skeptical frown, Alec had no intention of telling her why his grandfather was so adamant. It had as much to do with his deceased mother’s misfortunes and his subsequent birth as it did with clan loyalty.

  She tilted her head down and studied him over the rim of her glasses. He almost laughed at how perfectly the gesture mirrored her sister’s. If Edie started wearing spectacles on a regular basis, no one would be able to tell the twins apart.

  Except for him, and Wolf.

  “And what about Miss Haddon?” Edie asked. “How does she feel about the situation?”

  This was the trickiest part. “I’m not really sure.”

  She blinked. “How can you not be sure? When was the last time you talked to her?”

  “About ten years ago.”

  She gaped at him. A moment later, when one of the carriage wheels hit a large rut in the road, it almost bounced her from her seat. Alec grabbed her before she went tumbling over the side of the rail.

  Edie muttered a few choice words while she straightened her spectacles and then her bonnet. When she finally leveled her gaze on him again, she didn’t look any less annoyed.

  “Was that when your betrothal was also announced—ten years ago? You were, let me think, sixteen at the time?”

  “Yes, and Donella was barely fifteen.”

  More muttering issued from the lady beside him.

  “So, after this betrothal was announced,” she said, “you did what? Simply left home?”

  “Well, yes.” He couldn’t help thinking how ridiculous it all sounded.

  “Now, after ten years away, the first thing you’re going to do on your return home is try to break off the betrothal?”

  He shrugged. “I suppose that sums things up.”

  Now she was outright glaring at him. “And you never thought to tell me or Mamma that we would be walking into the middle of a clan feud?”

  Of course he’d thought about it. But if he had told them, he highly doubted they would have agreed to go north. Still, he could hardly reveal that to her.

  “Clan feud? We’re hardly going to be pulling out dirks and murdering each other.” At least he hoped not. “Besides, I thought you said it was none of your business.”

  “Our very presence in your household will make it our business, you dreadful man,” she exclaimed. “By the way, has no one ever told you that only the female can break off a formal engagement? It would be the height of scandal if you did it against her wishes. You would ruin the poor girl’s reputation.”

  Dammit. The last thing Alec need
ed was Edie’s feminine sympathy for Donella. “I have no intention of creating a scandal or ruining my cousin’s good name. I’ll figure out some way of managing the situation to everyone’s satisfaction.”

  She stared at him like he was an escapee from a madhouse, then went back to muttering under her breath.

  He mentally sighed. Like everything else when it came to Edie Whitney, things weren’t going exactly according to plan. He needed to settle her ruffled feathers and then bring her around to supporting his plan—a plan entirely dependent on her feelings for him, one way or the other.

  If he didn’t, he might soon be walking down the aisle with the wrong woman.

  Chapter Eight

  After Gilbride’s confident assessment of the mess he was in, Edie had been forced to wrestle her temper under control. Naturally, her stupid heart had leapt at the news that he didn’t want to marry his intended. Still, she was gobsmacked by his insouciant assumption that he could so easily break a longstanding betrothal. From everything he’d described about his family and clan, she doubted it would be easy at all. But the mighty Captain Gilbride, favorite of the ton, couldn’t imagine not snapping his fingers and getting what he wanted.

  Well, she’d been a favorite of the ton, too, and look where it had gotten her.

  Breaking off a betrothal was serious business. It was rarely done, and especially not by the man. And it sounded like clan loyalties added yet another layer of complexity to the mix. Unless Miss Haddon wanted out of the arrangement and was willing to stand up to her relatives, Edie couldn’t see how Gilbride was going to manage it—not without acting like a man completely lacking in honor, which he most certainly wasn’t.

  All things considered, this trip was turning out to be a disaster. Not only would she and Mamma soon be pitched into the middle of a medieval-sounding clan feud, she also had a bad feeling she would soon be witness to a Scottish wedding.

  The curricle had entered a majestic wood, running under a thick cover of enormous oaks. If Edie hadn’t been so absorbed by Gilbride’s story, she would have been happy to enjoy the scenery. Especially since, for once, she could actually see it.

  She surreptitiously touched the delicate yet sturdy frames that fit her so perfectly. Most of the men she knew would be horrified to see her tricked out like a bluestocking, but Gilbride didn’t seem to mind in the least. He’d obviously spent a great deal of money on the finely wrought spectacles, and was determined she wear them. It was a truly kind gesture on his part, and since kindness had been lacking in her life as of late, it made the gift even more precious. It was a gift that didn’t seem to ask for anything other than a simple thank you in return.

  “What’s she like?” Edie blurted out, suddenly needing to know.

  “What’s who like?” Gilbride asked rather absently.

  “Miss Haddon, of course,” she said.

  She didn’t miss how his gaze narrowed or how his mouth went flat with displeasure. She realized now that by not wearing spectacles, she’d missed so many revealing nuances of expression and manner.

  “I hardly remember,” he said in a clipped voice.

  “But you said you’d grown up with her. Surely you remember something.”

  He maintained a grim silence.

  “Let’s start with something simple,” she said. “Is she short or tall, dark or fair, slender or—”

  “I take your point, Miss Whitney. As I recall, Donella is tall and slender with hair I suppose one would describe as auburn rather than red. She has green eyes, a fair complexion, and was already considered one of the prettiest girls in the county by the time I left.”

  That didn’t sound good. One could only hope she’d grown up to be skinny. If Edie were truly lucky, maybe Miss Haddon had developed a rash of freckles to go along with her hair.

  And wasn’t she just a terrible old cat for hoping for such things?

  “She sounds perfectly lovely,” Edie said. “What’s she like?”

  Gilbride’s attention was focused on the road and his animals. Breaking from the woods, the road curved through a lovely hillside meadow covered with bracken and heather, commingling shades of autumnal red and purple.

  When he didn’t answer, Edie nudged him in the ribs.

  He scowled down at her. “What does it matter what she’s like?”

  “Since she’s your intended, I assume I’ll be spending a fair amount of time with her. So I want to know what I’m in for.”

  He said something under his breath—an oath, by the sound of it, and not one she was familiar with. She made a mental note to ask him what it meant when he was in a better mood.

  “I remember that she was a very biddable girl,” he finally said. “She was always rather quiet, although not necessarily shy. Just . . . quiet.” His mouth edged up in a wry smile. “Although she certainly made no bones about scolding Fergus and me when we made too much noise or got into one of our many scrapes. Donella was an obedient lassie who never gave her parents or my grandfather a lick of trouble.”

  Eden wrinkled her nose. “She sounds . . .” She was about to say boring but stopped herself just in time. “Very pleasant. Is she accomplished?”

  “At least as much as I remember. She was a dab hand at reels, and she was learning all the other typical female accomplishments. Painting, music . . . she seemed to be good at it all.”

  Edie tried not to grind her teeth. She was good at dancing, too, but painting, drawing, and music had always bored her silly. Although she’d enjoyed studies like history, geography, and poetry, she much preferred being outdoors to sitting inside with her mother, wasting the afternoon on needlework or plucking away on the harp.

  “She seems like a veritable paragon,” she said, hoping she didn’t sound as jealous as she felt. “Pretty, talented, sweet-natured, and obedient. In fact, she sounds like the perfect wife. Tell me again why you don’t want to marry her?”

  Gilbride’s jaw worked, as if he was chewing on his answer. “Because she’s the most boring person I’ve ever met.”

  Edie had to bite the inside of her lip to keep from laughing. His trenchant assessment cheered her up immensely.

  Still, it wouldn’t do to be too hopeful. After all, Gilbride had only been a boy of sixteen when he last saw his cousin. What struck him as boring back then could be quite a different story ten years later. In her experience, men said they liked strong-minded women, but the opposite was true when it came to marrying them. Just look at her parents. Her father avoided his wife as much as possible when Mamma was making her views emphatically known. Edie had little doubt that Papa would have been happier with a spouse who was less managing and certainly less opinionated.

  Besides, his cousin might have matured and grown more interesting in the intervening years.

  “Maybe she’s changed,” Edie said. “Perhaps she was just shy.”

  He threw her an irritated glance. “Miss Whitney, you seem intent on convincing me that I should marry my cousin. Why is that?”

  Heat rose to her cheeks in a sudden rush. She supposed she did sound like she was making a case for Miss Haddon, though it would be utterly perverse. If there was one thing Edie knew for sure, it was that she didn’t want Gilbride married off to anyone, at least while she was around.

  She forced a laugh. “I’m just curious, that’s all. As I said before, it’s really none of my business.”

  “Good,” he said through clenched teeth. “Then perhaps we can change the topic.”

  “Whatever you like,” she said in a breezy voice.

  They approached the top of the hill, allowing Edie glimpses of the castle walls beyond the stand of oaks that fronted it. Most of those trees had dropped a great deal of their leaves, creating a vibrant carpet of red and orange under the wheels of the carriage.

  When they crested the hill, Mugdock Castle stood revealed in its ancient splendor, a large, crumbling curtain wall of gray stone that ringed the summit. One tower on the southwest corner looked to be intact. About four storie
s high, it was broader on the upper floors, giving it an odd, top-heavy look. Mugdock was certainly no fairy-tale castle, but rather a heavy, brooding structure with an almost primitive air. It made her think of ancient battles and fierce, kilted warriors who wielded dirks as they fought desperately to defend their lands from raiders or the hated English south of Hadrian’s wall.

  Edie loved it. “It’s . . . it’s so . . .”

  “Ugly? Aye, lassie, that she is,” Gilbride said in a heavy brogue, teasing her. “You won’t be finding any handsome princes at Mugdock, although you might stumble across some howling ghoulies. Mugdock was a warriors’ fortress, built to withstand attacks from other clans.”

  “It’s amazing, like a giant brooding over the landscape. Has it always been in the Graham family?”

  He cast her an odd smile, as if she’d said something to surprise him. “It changed hands once or twice in the 1600s but has remained under Graham control for most of its history.”

  “You mentioned that it’s the official seat of the Clan Graham. Does the Duke of Montrose spend any time here?”

  He snorted. “God, no. It’s half-derelict, and the manor house itself isn’t large. The duke and his family reside at Buchanan Castle, near Loch Lomond.”

  Eden frowned. “I would have thought the chief of the Buchanan clan resided at Buchanan Castle.”

  “Not anymore.”

  She threw him an exasperated glance. “Do the Scots deliberately go out of their way to make everything as confusing as possible?”

  “It’s part of our long-standing strategy to irritate the English. All you need to know is that we often fought each other, not just the invaders from the south, so many clan holdings passed back and forth over the centuries. The Scots are a rather fierce lot, and we don’t take kindly to anyone seizing what’s rightly ours.”

  She grimaced. “The Scots weren’t always successful in that regard, were they?”

  He was silent as he navigated a narrow stone gateway into an inner courtyard.

  “Depending on which side your clan was on or your religious preference, no, we were not,” he finally said. “Trust me when I tell you that for many a Highlander, past grievances are still fresh in their memories.”