by Imani King
I couldn't stop myself:
"You made a mistake too, you know. You thought I was telling her hunting was wrong and that wasn't what I meant."
"I know, I know Jennifer. None of it was your fault - as I said, it wasn't even those comments that made me fly off the handle, they were just the excuse. None of that was your fault, it wasn't about you at all. I'm so sorry. I didn't even think you were going to leave - I just got back from Edinburgh and Mrs. Clyde told me where you were."
I looked up at the sky and noticed that dawn was just starting to break. It must have been about five in the morning.
"Well..." I started, a little hesitant and still, despite the shared laughter, a little resentful about how I'd been treated, "why were you so angry?"
Our eyes met and the Laird reached up and ran one of his big hands through his sandy hair, sighing heavily.
"Do you really want to know? It would take hours - days, actually - to tell you the whole story but I could give you the short version."
I did want to know. It was an odd sensation sitting next to man of such size and such seeming self-assurance and seeing a certain vulnerability in his body language - in the way he held his head in his hands.
"Yes." I said, simply.
So Darach told me what the blow-up in the courtyard was about. It was about his daughter - and his wife. He told me that he'd married his wife - Diane - shortly after meeting her and getting her pregnant just under five years ago. It had been volatile from the start. When Cameron was born Diane moved from her home in London into Castle McLanald and for a short time it had seemed like maybe they could make it work. But she'd been unhappy there from the beginning and within weeks of Cameron's birth Diane was disappearing for days at a time, coming home hungover and spending thousands of pounds - hundreds of thousands, according to Darach - shopping online for clothing and antique furniture. When she seduced the head gardener, a man whose family had worked for the McLanald's for generations, Darach and his family had recognized it as the final straw it was and told her to leave, without Cameron.
Weeks later a lawyer from London had arrived with divorce papers demanding full custody and fully half of the McLanald fortune. Darach was fighting it but his lawyers had insisted that Diane be given weekend custody in order for the Laird not to be seen as punishing his wife or putting her relationship with Cameron at risk.
I'd heard stories like it before. The very wealthy, male or female, are no better armored against the charms of the beautiful and the manipulative than any of us. Diane was an ex-model with some small amount of fame and she'd even threatened to go to the tabloids with tales of drug use and sexual perversion that had been entirely cooked up in her own head.
I could tell, though, that even as the Laird gave me the story he was still leaving something important out.
"So," I started gently when he paused, "you were upset about Cameron? Why doesn't Cameron want to see her mother?"
Darach suddenly put his head in his hands and took a single deep, shaky breath - the kind you take when you're trying to control your emotions. He coughed, hard, before saying anything more and refused to look at me so I wouldn't see the pain on his face.
"Jennifer, please understand. It's very difficult for me to talk about this. I can barely even talk to my lawyer about it."
I nodded and, without thinking, reached out and put my hand on his back. The fabric of his shirt was cold but almost instantly I could feel the heat of his body - of the muscled curve of his shoulder - underneath. I'd intended the gesture to be comforting but as soon as it happened, as soon as I felt him, it changed into something else. I snatched my hand away just as quickly as I'd reached out, suddenly self-conscious.
"It's OK. I can see how much you love her," I told him, using words instead of touch this time, trying to get across to him that I understood how much he felt for Cameron.
"Diane is awful to her," Darach started, his voice low and controlled, "she takes her anger at me out on Cameron and..." he trailed off, unable to finish.
"Can't the lawyers do something about that? Isn't that abuse?"
Darach shook his head. "Diane is too smart for that. She'd never do anything to Cameron that would make her look bad. All I know is that my daughter is absolutely terrified to go to London and that every weekend I have to wrestle her out of my arms and hand her over to her thoroughly cold-hearted mother and it's killing me, it's driving me mad."
I'd seen Cameron's fear for myself, I'd felt the sobs wracking her tiny body as she begged me not to let her go back to her mother that upcoming weekend. I'd even experienced the anger I was seeing now in Darach, knowing someone was causing Cameron's terror but not knowing, at the time, who it was.
We sat on the train station bench in silence for a little while as the pink light of dawn slowly spread across the sky. Eventually, the Laird spoke:
"Will you come back, Jennifer? Please come back. I haven't seen Cameron this happy for a long time and I promise you I won't lose it like that again - not at you, anyway."
I'd already decided to go back to Castle McLanald, but not just because Darach was sorry. I was going back for Cameron, too - asleep in her bed, possibly tormented by a cruel mother she couldn't escape and pretty much completely defenseless. Of course I was also going back because Darach wanted me to go back and it was already becoming very hard to say no to him. He shouldn't have acted the way he did but I could see his apology was heartfelt. I could also still clearly remember the electricity that had been there when I put my hand on his shoulder, just for that one second. He was so attractive, so dedicated to his daughter and so stupidly sexy. Just give it the summer. Even if nothing happens with the Laird, you can help Cameron come out of her shell. That's what I told myself, anyway. It wasn't a lie but the truth was a little more complicated. I wanted something to happen with Darach - much more than I was willing to admit at the time.
Chapter 6
Mrs. Clyde seemed almost slightly embarrassed at breakfast, as if she was worried she'd overstepped her bounds somehow. When she put my bowl of oatmeal and my mug of tea in front of me she allowed herself the following:
"I'm very glad to see you back here, Jennifer. You're good for the bairn."
The bairn. I'd worked out that this was the Scottish word for "child" soon after my arrival. It made me smile every time I heard it.
"Thank-you Mrs. Clyde. I'm glad we worked it out - the Laird and me, I mean."
Mrs. Clyde didn't say anything else, she just gave me a quick wink and went back to washing dishes.
I was just about ready to go back to my room for a shower and a nap after the dramatic night at the train station when Darach walked in with Cameron in his arms. Her head was nestled into his shoulder and she was obviously half-asleep, still dressed in her pink pajamas and with her blonde curls sticking out in all directions.
"Look who's here," the Laird whispered to his daughter and I felt something in my heart move at the tenderness in his voice. Cameron slowly lifted her head and turned to see who was there. When she saw me a slow, sweet smile broke across her face and she leaned out of her father's arms, reaching for me.
"Good morning, sleepyhead." I stood up and took Cameron from the Laird, sitting back down at the table with her on my lap.
"You're staying, Miss Robinson?" The hope in her voice would have been enough to shatter a much harder heart than my own.
"Yes, Cameron, I'm staying all summer. You can take me swimming in the loch now, if it gets hot enough."
"Can I? Can we ride horses to the Treacle-Eater's Tower?"
I nodded. The Treacle-Eater's Tower was apparently a stone tower a mile or so away from the castle and Cameron seemed particularly fascinated with it, frequently mentioning her desire to take me there and take me up to the very top so we could look out across the estate and see the sea on a clear day.
Later that afternoon, after a restorative nap, I found myself back at the loch with Cameron, who was busy gathering sticks for a fort we we
re going to build near the waterfall. Anne had come along and we were lying in the heather watching the child and chatting.
"My brother isn't always such a hothead, you know. If you could see how Diane treats that child, you'd understand why he's so wound up about it."
I wasn't sure why Anne was defending Darach to me - I hadn't left and Anne had obviously been told what had happened - she could see I was still there.
"I do understand," I said slowly, not sure what Anne was getting at, "but how he feels about Diane doesn't make it OK for him lose his temper with his employees."
"No, you're right, you're right." Anne picked at the heather we were lying on. "I just - it's really hard to explain. We've never had to deal with anyone like Diane and it just seems to be dragging on and on with no end in sight. We're all going slightly mad, I reckon. Did you know Mrs. Clyde slapped her across the face for taking a scone away from Cameron?"
I looked at Anne to see if she was joking but she wasn't. "Really? Mrs. Clyde slapped her?" I couldn't imagine Mrs. Clyde slapping anyone - she seemed far too dignified to be dealing out slaps.
Anne chuckled a little, obviously amused at the memory. "Yeah. Diane said something to Cameron about scones making her fat and tried to take it away and Mrs. Clyde just lost it. You haven't met Diane - if you're lucky, you won't."
The afternoon was perfect. About 75 degrees, sunny and with a light breeze that brought the scent of heather and wildflowers on it. We helped Cameron build her fort and then we helped her knock it down again when she decided it would be useless against invaders and she needed to start again. When we got ready to head back to Castle McLanald for something to eat it suddenly struck me that I felt happy. I didn't even recognize the feeling at first, and then I questioned it. Was I imagining it? What was this sensation of contentment, of not wanting to be anywhere else than right where I was? When I decided to accept it I couldn't help a big grin spreading across my face.
"Why are you smiling, Miss Robinson?" Cameron asked. She was a very observant kid - I'd already noted her slightly uncanny ability to detect people's moods.
"Because I feel happy, Cameron. I feel happy for the first time in a very long time."
Anne turned to smile at me when I said that, sensing the honesty in my words. But it was Cameron who pulled her signature move of slipping her chubby, muddy little hand into mine. She then looked up at me and said two words that just confirmed I'd made the right decision by deciding to stay at Castle McLanald:
"Me too."
The passage of the next couple of days didn't do anything to dampen my good spirits. In much the same way that finally feeling normal after a period of sickness turns 'normal' into 'wonderful' the experience of contentment felt even sweeter due to the emotional suffering of the past couple of years. I appreciated it more than I would have before my grandmother's passing and my heart was full of hope that she was still with me in some way, watching over me as I ran around the Scottish moors playing hide and seek with Cameron and sneaking up on rabbits and the odd sheep only to jump out at them yelling "boo!" and collapsing with laughter.
It was Friday morning when the Laird made his first appearance since our conversation at the train station. He strode into the kitchen where me, Cameron and Mr. Clyde were all filling ourselves with the bacon and eggs Mrs. Clyde had prepared for us and made an announcement:
"The Treacle-Eater's Tower. Today. Right now. What do you two ladies say to a ramble on the moor and a picnic?"
Cameron saved me from the embarrassment of my own over-enthusiastic yes and leapt up from the table screaming:
"Daddy! Yes! The Treacle-Eater's Tower! A picnic! Yes, Daddy!"
I smiled and nodded when Darach asked me if I would accompany them - I was on-duty, after all, although I would have gone anyway, and I spent the rest of breakfast trying to hide the hum of excitement inside me at the prospect of more time with him. Obviously not very well, because when I went to put my plate into the big old Victorian sink Mrs. Clyde was washing dishes in she gave me a little wink.
"Aye, you be careful with the Laird, Jenny. He's a charmer."
"I'll be fine," I said, projecting what I hoped was an unruffled tone to the housekeeper, "I'm just there to watch Cameron."
Chapter 7
I waited outside the castle in the gardens until Cameron appeared on the back of a small grey pony with a black riding hat on her head and her father beside her, holding the pony's reins. He gave me a nod and a smile as Cameron excitedly told me the pony's name (Marshmallow) and the various things he liked to eat (carrots, apples and, as Cameron adorably called them, 'sugar lumps').
It was a warm day and there was a faint haze in the air that gave the rolling hills of the estate a gauzy, softened look. Darach was so sexy - so masculine and tall standing next to his daughter's little pony in a pair of jeans and a lightweight gray sweater that skimmed over every muscle. The sense of ease I felt walking along beside them almost embarrassed me.
You're his employee. Remember that. Don't make a fool of yourself.
"So Jennifer. What do you think of Scotland, then? You've had a little time here now, is it very boring to a girl from the big city?"
Darach had this habit of looking directly at someone when he was speaking to them. Whenever he did it to me I had to make a conscious effort not to shyly avert my eyes like some besotted schoolgirl.
"Boring? No - not at all. I love it but I still, I don't know, it still doesn't feel totally real to me."
"What do you mean it doesn't feel real?"
If it had been anyone else asking me those questions I would have been able to answer them easily, but it wasn't anyone else. It was Darach. The need to impress him somehow, to be interesting and smart and all of those things you want to be around certain men, was flustering me in a way I hadn't experienced for a long time.
"Uh, I just mean...there's nothing like this in America. I keep thinking I've traveled back in time," I looked out at the views of the Highlands stretching out around us, "I mean, look at it, it looks like the set of a romance movie. I keep expecting to see men in kilts fighting the redcoats."
Ugh. A 'romance movie'. Why did I say that? I looked away from Darach so he wouldn't be able to see the look on my face as I rolled my eyes at my own comment.
"Aye, men in kilts. Is that something you'd like then, Jennifer?" Darach was grinning at me, blue eyes sparkling like jewels in the sunlight and clearly enjoying himself.
It took over an hour to make it to the Treacle-Eater's Tower and it was an odd but lovely experience chatting and laughing with Darach and his daughter as if we'd all known each other for far longer than we actually had. I knew I was his employee. He knew I was his employee. Cameron knew I was her nanny. So why couldn't I stop the cozy feelings of familiarity bubbling up inside me? Why did it feel like reaching out and intertwining my fingers with Darach's would be the most natural thing in the world? My memories of that afternoon have a certain idyllic quality, as if it happened in a dream or a book my grandmother read to me as a child. It was one of those perfect days, and there hadn't been many of those for me recently.
Cameron carefully tied her pony to a small tree at the base of the tower and then all three of us made our way up the narrow stairs that wound their way to the very top. It hadn't looked that tall from a distance but once we emerged at the top the wind was incredibly strong, whipping my hair violently around my face. It was a small tower, only about fourteen or fifteen feet in diameter. Darach told me it had been built in the 1700s as a way for the McLanalds of the time to keep a lookout for the English, which blew my mind a little.
"You North Americans are so funny. I'm convinced you spend every moment in Europe marveling at how old everything is. We do exactly the same thing when we go there, except we're marveling at how new everything is."
He was right. It wasn't that I didn't realize how old things were in Europe, or how far back tangible history stretched, but to be standing in a tower that had been built to keep wa
tch for redcoats - not reading about it or seeing it portrayed on screen but actually standing on the very same stones that Darach and Cameron's ancestors had stood on, looking out at the same hills they had looked out at - it was an almost trippy sensation.
Cameron ran around the turret we stood on, pointing out the sea in the distance as well as various landmarks and telling me their significance. When we went back down again she roped Darach and I into a game of hide-and-seek that mainly consisted of picking a random spot in the heather, lying down in it and hoping the person seeking happened not to step on you. I thought about Darach's question - did I find the open, empty spaces of Scotland boring compared to the big city? The truth was that lying in the heather and looking up at the pale blue Scottish sky while a giggling four year old tried to find me was more fun than any nightclub or trendy restaurant I'd been to. I could feel the whispered beginnings of attachment stirring inside me that afternoon, before I even recognized them for what they were.
We ate smoked salmon sandwiches, cut into neat triangles by Mrs. Clyde, and passed around a thermos of hot tea for lunch. Cameron then led her little pony down to a small stream to let him have a drink.
"She's so good with the pony." I said, impressed that such a small child could have such confidence with an animal so much bigger than her. When I looked over at Darach, lying propped up on his elbows beside me, he chuckled.
"I was just going to say the same thing."
We kept our eyes on Cameron and her pony but I could just feel Darach's contentment, mirroring my own.
"You know she hasn't ever done that before - she wants to impress you," he said, absentmindedly picking a small yellow flower and twirling it between his fingers.
"Really?" I asked, somewhat surprised.
"Aye - can't you see how fond of you she is? She's desperate to win your approval."
When I thought about it I realized that I wasn't, in fact, surprised by Cameron's need for my approval. She had her father's, of that there was no doubt, but her need for a nurturing female figure was more than obvious. It suddenly made me desperately sad. I turned to look at Darach - his expression said he was thinking exactly the same things I was.