Heather and Velvet

by Teresa Medeiros

  Beneath her challenging gaze, the women drifted away, leaving the musk of their perfumes lingering on the air. The plump hips of the girl who had pronounced her too thin swayed beneath her skirts. Prudence suspected she wasn’t wearing a bustle either.

  Their companion, a sheepish young man with long, unkempt hair, murmured a pardon and attempted to slip away. She crooked a slender finger at him.

  He bobbed an awkward bow, raking a hand through his curls. “Your Grace?”

  “Lord Desmond—Ned. It is Ned, isn’t it?”

  He looked absurdly pleased that she had remembered. Prudence squelched a flicker of shame.

  “Ned it is, at your service, my lady. What can I do for you?”

  She considered asking him to stand on his head and balance a wineglass with his toes, but the cruel impulse passed. She lay her fingers on his crisp linen sleeve. “I wish to discuss a certain wager I overheard last night between yourself and a young Mr. Cotton.”

  Lord Desmond colored prettily. “Cotton’s a rapscallion and a commoner. Pay him no mind.” He disowned his previous night’s companions by glowering at the circle of gentlemen leaning lazily against the chimneypiece. They lifted their glasses with comical precision, pretending not to be watching.

  Prudence led him away from the sheltered gloom of the window and into the fountain of light that poured from the candles of the chandelier, shimmering off the peach damask walls.

  “You were discussing,” she said, “which of you might first discover the source of my patent of nobility. Mr. Cotton suggested I could have performed some covert service for the King, such as shoving him out of the way of an assassin. You alleged that I might have performed a different sort of service for our liege.”

  “But I wouldn’t … I never … I swear I didn’t mean …”

  Prudence would have sworn his arm grew warmer beneath his sleeve, and she pursed her lips in a studious frown. “You then went on to wager with Mr. Cotton the corpulent sum of one hundred pounds that you might be the first to elicit a smile from me tonight.”

  They had reached the hearth. The young men straightened, tugging at their cravats in preening abandon. The freckled Mr. Cotton fidgeted with an ivory snuffbox.

  Prudence released her fawning captive. “I’m sorry, Lord Desmond, but you owe your friend a hundred pounds.”

  With those words, she dipped her slender shoulders in a curtsy and favored the gaping Mr. Cotton with a luminous smile. She knew—since she had been told—that her smile softened her features without dispelling the faint air of melancholy these child-men seemed to find so irresistible. As she turned to leave them, Ned groaned and Mr. Cotton whooped with triumph, slapping him on the back. Prudence lifted her skirts and slipped away, feeling the heat of their adoring gazes against her bared shoulders. A heady elation swept her at her power over them.

  Sebastian had laid that power in her hands and left it there like a loaded pistol, primed for a touch that would never come.

  Her smile faded, her complicity in their silly games leaving a bitter taste in her mouth. The more practical part of her found their attentions ridiculous. But if they chose to mistake her sarcasm for wit and her melancholy for sophistication, who was she to enlighten them? At least she didn’t have to pretend to be stupid. The neglected little girl within her basked in the fickle heat of their admiration.

  She drifted through the dancers, her silk stockings whispering against her calves. The wistful notes of a Bach cantata spilled from the pianoforte. She plucked another liqueur from a maid’s tray and downed it in one swallow, as if its warmth could thaw the icy claw tightening around her heart. It was nearing February, but it seemed as if the spring would never come.

  She set her empty glass on a pier-table, longing for escape. But from across the crowded drawing room, Tricia’s waving fan stopped her. Glancing at her aunt’s elaborate gown, Prudence nearly smiled. Tricia’s only concession to the simpler fashions inspired by the revolution in France was narrower panniers. She no longer had to turn sideways to enter a room.

  She saw two men flanking Tricia, and sighed. Not another plump elderly count, she prayed. Since Prudence’s unconventional inheritance, Tricia had renewed her old campaign to see her niece wed. Not only was Prudence stealing all of her attention, she had committed the unforgivable transgression of outranking Tricia in the nobility.

  The Viscount D’Artan hovered near Tricia’s elbow. It had been he who had arranged for their invitation to stay at the Campbells’ town house. He had been their constant companion since their arrival, helping Tricia query solicitors about her missing fiancé and even tolerating Boris and the Blakes as Tricia’s chosen traveling companions.

  Prudence banished a shiver as she wove through the crowd. Both in the laboratory and out of it, the elderly viscount was as considerate of her feelings as a father. He had been painfully patient with her, even when she refused to reveal the exact formula that had killed her father until their research was more conclusive. But Prudence could not abolish the sense of desolation she felt each time she saw D’Artan. The viscount had come into her life and Sebastian had gone. That was her own doing, though, she reminded herself. Blaming it on the viscount would not change what she’d done. Nothing would ever change what she’d done. A garrote of pain squeezed her frozen heart.

  D’Artan’s attention was not on her now. His brows were knit into a silvery line as he glowered at the man next to Tricia.

  Prudence caught her breath with an odd ache at the sight of him. A black and green belted plaid was draped over his broad shoulders. His beringed hand rested proudly on the hilt of his claymore. A leather sporran hung at his waist.

  Tricia clung to the fall of ruffles at his wrist. “I must confess the Scottish sense of humor eludes me,” she was saying as Prudence approached. “The horrid solicitor we approached yesterday did all but tell me my fiancé was but a figment of my demented imagination.”

  “Not an apparition, my lady, but perhaps only a scoundrel.” The Scot’s gruff voice was touched with a musical burr, not yet obliterated by the stilted English of Edinburgh society.

  Prudence listened hungrily as he continued.

  “As difficult as it may be to consider, there are men who would prey on a woman of your beauty.”

  And wealth, Prudence added silently. The man was as tactful as he was charming.

  Tricia sniffled. A pair of handkerchiefs appeared. She took the lace-trimmed one the Scot wielded and dabbed at a sparkling tear. “I simply cannot accept that. My fiancé adored me. He must have been abducted. He would have never left me willingly.”

  Prudence slipped into their midst and gently touched Tricia’s elbow. “We’ve received no ransom demands, Auntie. You promised to go on with your life if we did not find him here.”

  Tricia swatted her hand away. “That’s easy enough for you to say. You didn’t lose the man you loved.”

  Prudence inclined her head as heat rose to her cheeks. She remembered too vividly the night she had gone to Sebastian’s room, the tender things he had said to her, the ways he had touched her. Shame and regret mingled, but always with it came the image of their bodies entwined on the satin counterpane.

  Tricia’s trembling lips curved in a brave smile. “Forgive me, won’t you?” she said to the kilted stranger. “I had only hoped that, hailing from the Highlands, you would have some knowledge of the Laird of Dunkirk.”

  The man drained his glass of whisky in a single swig. “Aye, that I do, Lady Tricia. I am the Laird of Dunkirk and have been for nigh on fifteen years.”

  Prudence’s dark musings were shattered as she lifted her gaze to meet the twinkling eyes of Killian MacKay.

  A man slipped through the shadows of the garden wall, his gaze riveted to the glowing squares of light set deep in the mellow brick. Rain poured off the brim of his hat. He gave the signal, and five dark shapes vaulted over the wall. Somewhere in the back of the mansion, a door opened and the rich, brilliant notes of a viola poured into the
garden.

  “Ain’t these fancy folk ever heard of bagpipes?” a voice muttered in his ear. “We’re in Scotland for God’s sake, not Paris.”

  “Quiet,” Sebastian snapped. “We’re going to be in the jail if you don’t hold your tongue.”

  “It weren’t my idea to come to Edinburgh.”

  “Would you rather we starve to death in the Highlands?” Sebastian adjusted the sack over Jamie’s head with a jerk. “We’ve robbed every kirk there but your own father’s.”

  Jamie sniffed, his annoyance muffled by a layer of burlap. “I was all fer it. Ye were the one who backed out.”

  “I’d rather rob my grandfather than your father. He’s the one who’s frozen all of my accounts at the Royal Bank. If I can get to my money, we can hole up in the Highlands until the spring.”

  “But if he spots ye first, ye won’t be needin’ the Highlands, will ye? Ye’ll be in jail or hell, wherever he chooses to send ye.”

  Slush spattered as Tiny landed behind them. “If the two of ye are goin’ to argue all night, we may as well trot around and tap on the front door. Maybe the butler’ll let us in.”

  Jamie plucked a flask from Tiny’s belt, shoved up his mask, and took a long swig. “Aaah! Nothing like stout Scotch whisky to thaw a man. All me best parts are frozen.”

  Tiny snorted. “No great loss fer the Edinburgh whores.”

  “That’s yer opinion, not theirs,” Jamie retorted.

  At a snort of laughter from one of their cohorts, Sebastian swung around and hissed him into silence. With pistol drawn, he led them around the side of the house, pausing only to untangle his breeches from a dormant rosebush. The lit squares of the casement-windows gave him a shimmering glimpse of a world of satins and silks. It was a world that would never willingly give anything to the impoverished son of a Highland laird.

  Sebastian had learned that lesson anew in the last few months. Bathing in icy streams. Shivering all night in ratty blankets. Eating dried meat so tough he had to chew it for hours just to taste it.

  The dashing highwayman was gone, leaving only a silk mask and a tartan rag crumpled in his pocket as an epitaph. In his place was a common thief and a hungry man. What Sebastian Kerr wanted, Sebastian Kerr would have to take. Prudence Walker had taught him that much. He could afford to yield to his crueler impulses now, all because a woman had left him with nothing to lose but his freedom … and his life.

  His numb fingers curled around the butt of his pistol. Beneath the burlap mask, he smiled coldly.

  As Prudence stared up at Killian MacKay, the color drained from her cheeks as rapidly as it had come. Tricia’s surprised protests faded to a sonorous buzz.

  No villainous hunchback was this man, but a tall gentleman with a thick mane of white hair. Deep crannies scarred his leathery brow, but his shoulders were unbent and surprisingly broad for a man his age. She lowered her eyes before he could glimpse her shock. Her gaze was drawn to the white hairs scattered across his heavy plaid—not his own, but long, fluffy cat hairs. Could this truly be the heartless ogre who had cast Sebastian from his home?

  “So you’ve never heard of a man who calls himself Sebastian Kerr?” D’Artan’s voice brought Prudence abruptly back to the conversation. A faint sneer twisted the viscount’s lips.

  A silvery tension arced between the two men as MacKay hesitated for the briefest moment. “Never,” he said.

  Prudence pushed her spectacles up on the bridge of her nose. As Killian MacKay met her cool, challenging stare, they both knew he was lying. But they also knew that unless Prudence cared to explain why she colored each time her aunt’s fiancé was mentioned, she would hold her silence.

  Tricia gaped as Prudence slipped her hand in the crook of MacKay’s arm and smiled up at him. “Perhaps we should give my aunt time to recover from such a shock. Have you visited the Campbells’ library? It’s quite extensive. Would you care for a tour?”

  “I would love to.” MacKay brought Tricia’s limp hand to his lips, then bowed to D’Artan, his smile mocking. “Viscount, always a pleasure.”

  D’Artan’s eyes narrowed to silvery slits as the warm crush of the drawing room parted before the striking pair.

  • • •

  The lamps in the library were unlit, though a crackling fire wafted the warm aroma of cedar into the air. Windows shiny with rain ringed dark walls of polished walnut.

  Prudence’s satin petticoat bustled about her as she sat on a narrow settee and arranged the skirts of her cranberry gown with meticulous care. MacKay sank into a wing-backed leather chair opposite her. For a long moment they studied each other in silence.

  As a young man, MacKay had prided himself on a knowledge of feminine fashion. The girl did justice to the softer, more natural styles sweeping London and Edinburgh. It would have been as much of a crime to bury her flawless skin beneath a layer of ceruse as to hide her hair under a wig. The dark mass had been swept upward and arranged in heavy coils at her throat. A wide sash matched the pink satin of her petticoat and emphasized her slender waist. Her prim demeanor might have been comical on another woman, but her dignity rendered it oddly touching. MacKay wished he was past the age where being alone in such warm, dark intimacy with a lovely woman would stir him.

  Prudence pushed up her spectacles in a gesture that she knew betrayed her tension, wondering what had possessed her to indulge this mad fancy. “Forgive me for being so blunt, Laird MacKay, but I have been seeking a small bit of property in the north of Scotland. This castle you call Dunkirk—might it be for sale?”

  MacKay sat up in his chair. The lass was betraying more than simple nervousness. No one in the drawing room had called him by name. “Dunkirk is little more than a crumbling ruin. ’Tis virtually worthless.”

  “Then it would not burden you to be rid of it.”

  He rose and walked over to the fireplace, as if seeking a warmth far removed from her cool stare. In his squared jaw, Prudence caught a glimpse of the stubborn patience that had let him wait sixteen years before taking revenge against the man who had stolen his bride. Her heart gave an odd thump at the sight of his broad shoulders silhouetted against the firelight.

  “Dunkirk is not for sale,” he said.

  She couldn’t help the note of pleading that touched her voice. “You are a wealthy man. I know you own most of Strathnaver. What value could an old ruin have for a man such as you?”

  He gazed into the flames. “A sentimental value. A woman I cared for once lived there.”

  And died there? The words resounded clearly through Prudence’s mind. For one terrible moment, she thought she had said them aloud.

  When MacKay turned to face her, though, there was no fury or bitter rebuke in his eyes, only a gentle sadness. “I’m sorry I cannot oblige your wishes, my dear. But, you see, Dunkirk is not truly mine to sell. I am keeping it in trust for someone else.”

  The plaintive strains of an oboe drifted into the room. The music was both dark and unbearably sweet, an alien counterpart to the steady patter of the rain against the windows.

  Prudence stood. “Forgive me, Laird MacKay. You’re absolutely right. I cannot ask you to sell what never belonged to you.”

  With a mocking curtsy, she left him standing before the hearth. MacKay’s hands trembled as he reached for the back of the chair. In the barren years since Michelline’s death, Killian MacKay had prayed often for forgiveness. But it seemed that God had seen fit to send not a spirit of compassion, but an avenging angel with violet eyes and a whisky voice. His gnarled fingers bit into the sleek leather as he bent his head in silent prayer, asking not for mercy, but for courage.

  Sebastian drew back his pistol and rammed the butt through the fragile glass.

  With a practiced twist of his wrist, he unlocked the tall double windows. He was inside before the musicians could falter to a discordant halt.

  A shrill scream threw the gathering into dead silence as six faceless, hulking blobs spilled into the room.

  “Weapons on
the floor, gentlemen,” Sebastian called out, his voice disguised with a rasp made all the more convincing by his raw throat.

  His command yielded only one pistol, a handful of canes, and an umbrella. A blue-haired lady crumpled in her husband’s arms.

  “We’d like a more substantial donation now,” he said. “All jewelry, gold, and money into the sacks, please.… Very nicely done. Aye, that’ll do very well, thank you,” he added as the jingle of fob watches and gold chains filled the tense silence.

  His men operated as he had taught them, moving with sacks open from one group to the next, never making eye contact and never breaking silence. It took Sebastian only a quick perusal to determine D’Artan was not there. Bitter disappointment welled in his throat.

  The tantalizing aroma of warm pastries drifted to his nose. He carefully kept his gaze averted from a silver tea cart heaped with cakes. His belly felt as if it were touching his spine. His mouth watered. His stomach rumbled. If he ate one cake, he’d end up on his knees before them all, stuffing cakes into his mouth like the ravenous beast all these fine people undoubtedly thought him to be.

  A young man with untidy hair hesitated to remove his heirloom ring. Sebastian jerked his pistol in an unmistakable gesture of threat. The freckled young man beside him nudged him into compliance, tossing into the sack himself an ivory snuffbox and a fat purse, which landed on the pile with a musical clink. Sebastian felt an unwelcome flash of empathy at the impotent fury reflected in the freckled man’s brown eyes. He sincerely hoped he wouldn’t be forced to shoot either of them before the night was done.

  His gaze strayed again to the cakes. Six months ago he would have been a guest at such a gathering, sipping champagne and nibbling a sweet crumbling cake. A fist of memory buried itself in his gut—tracing Prudence’s lips with the tip of his finger, the sweetness of her icing melting on his tongue. But that had been another world and another man. A man who had been foolish enough to let a pair of treacherous amethyst eyes besot him.