She’d wager this man had known recent suffering. Her heart lurched in sympathy.
No.
She’d no business taking note of any gentleman’s appearance, especially his mouth. And what in heaven’s blessed name was she doing sitting in a tree, talking with him as if they were making polite conversation in a drawing room? She didn’t even know his name, for pity’s sake.
“Can you get down yourself?”
He dismounted. After removing his gloves and hat, he placed them on the same boulder she’d used for her stockings. He spied her discarded belongings, his gaze pausing on a stocking dangling from a bush. A purely masculine smile bowed his mouth.
Mortification swept her.
He held his riding crop as he purposefully made his way to the tree. He placed a booted foot atop the branch resting on the ground. “Here, I’ll come up.”
“No, I can manage perfectly on my own. You assure that devil keeps his distance.”
Sure-footed, Angelina edged along, her bare feet gripping the limb beneath her. Her injured toe protested, but the pain was unimportant. She must make haste. It wouldn’t do to be discovered with a man without a chaperone present.
The stranger released a hearty chuckle and raised the crop. “That’s what this is for. One or two sound smacks on his muzzle usually does the trick nicely.”
Usually?
“And what happens if it doesn’t do the trick?” She maneuvered the last few inches to the fork in the tree.
The gentlemen pointed the crop at the tree. “We run for it. He’s not named Deamhan for nothing.”
She sniffed. “Deamhan? Oh, that’s Scottish?”
“Yes, Gaelic for demon.”
“A most fitting name. Only Satan would be more appropriate.”
Shoving her hair off her face, she stepped onto the lowest limb, and hesitated a moment before taking his outstretched hand. She nearly jerked hers away when a jolt of sensation vibrated clear to her shoulder.
Once safely on the ground, she disengaged her hand. “Thank you.”
“I’d bow before I introduce myself, but I don’t trust him.” Gesturing toward the dozing bull, the man flashed perfect white teeth.
Of course they were. Just like Charles’s. And what a bounder he’d turned out to be.
New rule.
Don’t trust men with nice teeth.
She met the gentleman’s curious perusal.
Or beautiful eyes and sinfully thick lashes.
“I’m Flynn, Ear—” A grimace shadowed his face. “Marquis of Bretheridge. My estate, Lambridge Manse, borders these lands.”
“Thank you, my lord.”
Should she curtsy? A little late for conventions. Best to get on her way as soon as possible.
Not trusting the behemoth resting a stone’s throw away, Angelina warily gathered her belongings.
The marquis’s focus sank to her bare feet.
Muddy toes, one bloody, peeked from beneath her soaked and soiled skirt.
She swore his mouth quivered in amusement.
The first English peer she’d met besides her uncle, and she resembled a street urchin. Aunt Camille would have apoplexy if she found out. And Uncle Ambrose?
Gads.
Angelina didn’t want to imagine his reaction. His response would be unpleasant to be sure.
She made to turn toward the house. “Thank you, again.”
“Aren’t you going to tell me who you are?” Lord Bretheridge regarded her expectantly.
In another time and in another place, she might have— before she learned not to trust.
“No. I shouldn’t even be speaking to you. We’ve not been properly introduced.”
She spun on her heel and ran barefoot to the house.
Chapter 7
Flynn smiled as the black-clad young woman rushed along the path until she reached the house’s terrace.
Would she turn around for one last look?
Pausing, she flicked a swift peek behind her before disappearing through an open door.
The niece?
He’d wager Lambridge she was.
Waterford couldn’t possibly think Flynn would marry a woman he never met. Well, they’d just met, although he still didn’t know her name. Come to think of it, why would the duke subject his niece to something so unpleasant?
The woman seemed an enigma.
She refused to give her name because they hadn’t been introduced, yet offered no apologies for her bare feet and unkempt appearance.
He didn’t know many women who climbed a tree the way she had either. That accomplishment suggested she had a great deal of practice.
Why he found the notion intriguing, he couldn’t say. Perhaps the whole rustic American charm stimulated his interest. It reminded him of his free-spirited Scottish cousins.
The mystery woman claimed to be part Scots. Mayhap that explained his fascination.
A dim image of a Scottish lass possessing midnight locks and hazel eyes surged to his memory. Another vision replaced that memory almost immediately.
One of a pixyish, scratched face, peach lips, and wild reddish hair.
The duke hadn’t lied. The niece, for surely that’s who the nymph had been, was lovely. Indeed, beautiful. Her rumpled state couldn’t disguise the intelligence in her arresting eyes framed by dark auburn lashes.
Flynn had been close enough to see the deep emerald ringing her unusual ocean green irises, flecked with shards of blue. And her hair, a shade somewhere between copper and honey, was magnificent. How long was the tangled mass of flopping curls?
Her attire suggested that she, too, was in mourning.
Orphaned, perhaps? It made sense and explained why she resided at Wingfield Court.
Still, Flynn sensed something more nefarious was afoot. Given the duke’s dubious history and sullied repute, Flynn doubted he would like whatever Waterford connived. A tenant for life with an absolute stranger didn’t appeal to Flynn any more than being blackmailed did.
Driven by curiosity, if for no other reason, he’d put in a teatime appearance. The afternoon might prove an amusing distraction from the worries plaguing him.
Fortunately for the young lady, he’d needed some air and decided to take a leisurely ride to Wingfield for the mandated appearance. Time in the saddle helped clear his thoughts. Besides, he wanted to personally inspect the exceptional herd his father had laboriously built before Flynn sold them.
Father had been so proud of the Galloways.
His father couldn’t boast an ounce of Scottish blood, though Mother’s grandmother had been Scots. Father had not only fallen in love with Mother, but all things Scottish.
Particularly the whisky.
Flynn long suspected if it wasn’t for his title, Father would have hied off to Scotland with Mother and lived the remainder of his days in some drafty old castle. Mayhap wearing a kilt and tooting a bagpipe.
Imagining the sight, Flynn cracked a smile.
If his parents had spirited to the Highlands, then Lord help the poor soul who might have been subjected to Father’s long shanks and knobby knees, or hear the man attempt anything remotely musical. Tone deaf as a stone, was his father. Mother used to say he couldn’t carry a tune if strapped to his back.
Using the shortcut his father often took through the meadow, Flynn had come upon the broken gate. Finding the trail of fresh cow manure, some of the piles yet steaming, he deduced the situation.
Devil it, how long had it been since Father or the duke inspected the fences?
Crossing onto Waterford’s estate and finding a young, attractive, barefoot, treasure crouched in a craggy oak had been wholly unexpected. At first he thought his eyes deceived him when he spied the sprite’s hair glea
ming between the leaves.
He’d glimpsed trim calves and well-turned ankles as she descended the massive oak. Her appearance and lack of shoes suggested she’d been wading in the stream. Other than his Ferguson cousins, he didn’t know another woman who would dare.
She hadn’t begged his pardon for her disheveled appearance. But then, he hadn’t apologized for his unrepentant ogling of her shapely limbs either.
He grinned and shook his head.
Deamhan and his harem wouldn’t have left the shade or the stream. The lazy brute couldn’t be bothered to wander the quarter mile to where Brook Tweadle crossed Flynn’s lands. No, the obstinate bull tromped his way to the duke’s property.
Had Flynn not come along, the chit likely would have been stuck, perched in the tree, for a long while. Perhaps the entire night.
He waved his hand at a persistent fly hovering about his face.
Withdrawing his pocket watch, he flicked open the engraved gold cover. Quarter past three. If he made quick work of it, he had time to muster the stable hands and set them to gathering the cattle and repairing the fence before he called at Wingfield Court.
If he arrived a trifle late, so much the better. Waterford, that old bulldog, would know Flynn wasn’t dancing attendance on anyone.
He placed his hat atop his head. As he bent to grasp his gloves, a black hair ribbon caught his eye. After retrieving the silky strip, he lifted it to his nose. A subtle mixture of flowers met his nostrils. His manhood twitched. Folding the ebony length, Flynn stashed it in his pocket.
Placing his foot in the stirrup, he swung into the saddle. He surveyed the cattle while reining the dun toward the broken fence. The animals would stay put for a while longer. Most lay serenely chewing their cud and enjoying the shade.
Perusing Wingfield Court, he patted the four year-old gelding’s neck. “Come, Kane, we have a tea to attend and a proposed bride to meet.”
Precisely forty-eight minutes later—Flynn checked his timepiece for the fourth time since galloping from the stream—he cantered along the sloping flagstone drive to Wingfield Court.
A footman garbed in ebony and garnet red dashed from the manor. “I’ll see your horse to the stable, my lord.”
Flynn started to demur, but changed his mind. He’d no intention of staying for dinner, but tea would assuredly take more than fifteen minutes, and Kane would be cooler in the stables. The temperature had peaked this afternoon, enough to wilt Flynn’s starched neckcloth.
“Thank you. If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, make sure a groom waters him and rubs him down. He’s been galloping off and on for the better part of an hour.”
He passed the reins to the footman.
The servant nodded, beads of perspiration already popping out on his forehead and upper lip. “No trouble at all, sir. He’s a beautiful stepper, he is.”
Fondly rubbing Kane’s muzzle, Flynn agreed. “Indeed, he is. Smart too. Make sure to draw the bolt home on his stall door. Otherwise, he’ll open it.”
Now, if Flynn could endure this preposterous farce of a tea without telling the duke to bugger off. He wasn’t sure he would be able to choke down the steaming brew in this hot weather. He wasn’t fond of the beverage in the dead of winter, let alone midsummer.
Removing his handkerchief from his pocket, he daubed his upper lip and forehead. Hopefully, the interior of the house offered respite from the temperature. A movement from a ground floor window revealed someone covertly watched him.
His lips twitched in a combination of amusement and curiosity. The niece, perhaps?
It would be interesting to take in her appearance once she was primped and polished to snare a husband. He rather preferred the ragamuffin dangling in the oak with the bloody toe.
As the servant led Kane away, Flynn inspected the structure before him. Well over one hundred years old, the stones, mellowed by age and the elements, held an appealing provincial attraction.
Vague memories of visits as a young lad flitted into his mind. There’d been a pony. A stout, plodding Shetland he’d been permitted to ride around the glistening greens. And sweets. He particularly remembered Shrewsbury cakes, still his favorite confection.
He considered the area. The immediate grounds, garden beds, circular driveway—even the shutters—showed signs of recent neglect.
Tilting his head, Flynn squinted. Was that a nest atop one of the chimneys?
Dangerous, that.
He’d best advise Waterford. Why hadn’t the staff taken notice? And, why hadn’t the duke seen to the repairs and upkeep before coming for the summer? The man not only enjoyed everything in tip-top shape, he demanded it.
Perhaps he planned on inventorying everything that needed attention before putting the place on the market. The lands, prime for cattle grazing, also boasted decent stables and superb hunting.
If Flynn’s pockets weren’t windmill dwindled to a nutshell, he’d make an offer himself. The duke’s properties and Lambridge’s marched parallel to one another for a good fifty acres.
Flynn’s common sense and gut instinct shrieked for him to turn tail and dash, neck or nothing, for home. Pure folly, venturing into the viper’s pit.
What about my family?
He sighed. Best to get to it and see what gammon Waterford pitched him. No one forgave a debt as colossal as Father’s with something as simple as an arranged marriage.
Well, not when there was a bride as young and attractive as the niece.
The scales tipped grossly uneven, unless the duke had something else to reveal. Or perhaps the confounded lout made a May game of Flynn and sought to discover how malleable he was to being manipulated.
Constantly reminding himself he had his family’s well-being to consider kept him from planting a fist on Waterford’s red-veined nose.
The drape fluttered again.
Flynn denied the urge to wave or cut a cocky salute.
As he climbed the steps, he firmed his jaw and inhaled a deep breath. Instead of giving into the impulse to let loose a stream of profanity that would cause Hades to blush, he forced a pleasant expression to his face.
Flynn nodded to the austere-appearing butler standing at the entrance before stepping across the threshold, greatly relieved to find the condition within the house much cooler.
The butler gave the briefest of bows. “Good afternoon, Lord Bretheridge.”
He peered down his reedy nose.
Considering the top of the fellow’s head didn’t meet Flynn’s jaw, the effect was rather comical. He was sorely tempted to stand taller to see if the servant would tilt his head further. Except Flynn feared the majordomo might tumble tail over top backward if he did.
He almost grinned at the image. “Good afternoon to you as well. And your name?”
“Saunders, sir.” The butler exhaled an exaggerated sigh. “I suppose you wish to be relieved of your hat and gloves?”
No, I intend to take tea with them on.
Flynn hadn’t imagined the annoyance in Saunders’s voice. Where in God’s name had Waterford found the surly chap? And why hadn’t he sacked him long before this?
“Sir, your hat?”
“Yes, please.” Flynn passed the items to the butler’s outstretched hand.
The majordomo placed them on a table before closing the thick, arched door. Nose in the air, he marched past Flynn, sparing him nary a glance.
“Their Graces and Mrs. Thorne await you in the drawing room. Tea has been served already.”
What the blazes? Mrs. Thorne?
The niece was married—no, had been married? Thus, the black garb.
The plot thickened.
Why so desperate to marry off a widowed niece?
Something didn’t add up. A huge piece of the puzzle was missing. No
doubt during tea today, that tidbit would be served up, whole and raw. He’d be expected to swallow the distasteful thing without complaint.
“Sir, are you coming?” Impatience laced Saunders’s voice.
“Yes, forgive me, I was distracted by . . .” Flynn swiftly skimmed the entry for a logical excuse. “Distracted by that.”
Triumph and Treasure (Highland Heather Romancing a Scot Series Book 1) Page 8