“Otherwise you’d have what?” Priss exclaimed, rounding on him. “It’s not like I jumped you. You answered the door wearing a goddamn towel, which you conveniently let drop. You know damn well we’ve been less than a heartbeat away from going at each other for weeks. What in the hell did you think was going to happen?”
Jory looked confused, which Maura realized wasn’t unusual for him. What was unusual was the honest hurt she thought she saw in his eyes. Which confused her now as well.
“So then that’s it?” he said. “That’s all you were after?”
“No!” Priss huffed. “For Christ’s sake, I said it wasn’t just sex. Wasn’t.”
“Then why did you just say—”
“Shut up, both of you!” Maura exclaimed, momentarily clamping her hands over her ears. “And get dressed while you’re at it. I want you out of here in the next five minutes or I’m ringing up Constable Stiles.” She glared at Jory. “And wouldn’t your dear, sweet uncle be quite interested in hearing how you’ve spent your morning?”
“Mo, come now, no need for threats,” Jory said, his voice quickly turning all cajoling and reasonable. Although they both knew his uncle had a fondness for Jory that would likely preclude him doing anything worse than giving him a stern lecture. He would also likely tell his brother Gavin, Jory’s dad, who wouldn’t go so easy on him. Although who knew for sure, Jory was a master of talking his way out of—and into—things.
Being the baby in a family of eight certainly had its benefits, she thought morosely. Being an only child herself, she was technically oldest, youngest, and everything in between. Unfortunately, the only benefit she’d received from that arrangement was not having to wear hand-me-downs or wait in line for the loo.
Jory quickly climbed from the bed and pulled on his pants, then stepped between the two women, his back to Priss as she finished dressing. “Don’t be mad at her, Mo. I should have told you myself, but… well, you know how my father goes on about you and about how being with you was the smartest thing I’ve ever done and well, I—”
Maura held up her hand. “Please, if you think telling me you didn’t end things because you didn’t want to hurt your dad is going to make me feel better—”
“No, I was just tryin’ to explain.” He had the gall to reach for her hands.
Not only wasn’t Maura soft and rounded, she wasn’t short or petite either. And Jory still had a good four inches on her in height. Imposing and all male, she’d never gotten past that little rush of arousal every time she had to look up to look into his eyes. He had a body that had surely been chiseled by the gods. And the face of a fallen angel. She felt a little pang when she realized she’d never again have those shamelessly soft lips kissing every inch of her skin, from the back of her neck, all the way down to the instep of her foot. Never again would she get the chance to run her hands over those broad, keg-hauling shoulders, down that muscled back.
He must have seen something in her eyes, because he gentled his voice, making it all deep and drowsy. She could almost forget Priss was still in the room with them. Almost. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. Honest. It just… we’d been flirting a little and somehow it got a wee bit out of hand.” His mouth pulled down at the corners in a way that made him look remorseful and adorable at the same time. Like a little boy who’d gotten his hand caught in the cookie jar. The same little boy who knew he was mama’s favorite and could likely talk his way out of a spanking.
Of course, for all Maura knew, given the scene she’d walked in on and those knee-high black leather boots Priss was clutching, he might just enjoy a good whipping. Which was image enough to snap her out of her foolish little reverie. She’d known him to be a charming scoundrel even before she’d gone to bed with him, so she really had no one to blame but herself, she supposed. But if he thought he could sweet talk his way out of this, he was about to learn otherwise. She stepped back, out of his reach. “A wee bit out of hand?” she repeated. “Is that what you’d call this? Well, you’d best be following Priss out that door in the next minute,” she said, teeth clenched. “Or I’ll be taking your wee bit in my hand and yanking it off.”
When Jory flinched and covered himself, she smiled for the first, time since entering the room. Then sighed a little as her gaze was naturally drawn downward. A shame she couldn’t find a way to keep that bit for herself. A parting gift, as it were. Ah well. She’d known it was going to end at some point. Probably much like this, with her kicking him out of her bed. She just hadn’t expected to be kicking someone else out along with him. And even if she had, she’d never imagined it would be her best friend.
“Maura,” Jory began, but swallowed whatever else he’d been about to say when she made a snip, snip motion with her fingers. He finished getting dressed without saying anything else.
She supposed she should feel grateful that he at least hadn’t tried the always unoriginal tactic of turning it all back on her, claiming she was awful in bed and had driven him into the arms of another. Because given what they’d been doing all last night and up until day
break this morning, they both knew that would have been a bunch of rubbish. Jory definitely had the goods and knew how to deliver them. But Maura knew she’d more than compensated him in return. She glanced at Priss and her smile returned.
The two women had shared every intimate detail of their lives since they’d begun having sex, Maura having shared for a somewhat longer period of time than Priss. Whose given name was Patrice, and hadn’t earned that nickname unwarranted. Jory might be the one getting the short end of the stick after all, she thought a bit smugly.
Speaking of which, she made a mental note to add batteries to her next shopping list. Just because Jory wasn’t going to be having multiple orgasms anytime soon, didn’t mean she had to deprive herself of them.
“Come on, Priss,” Jory said, holding the bedroom door open.
He was trying to look like the wounded party, all beautiful pouty lips and wounded puppy-dog eyes. But Maura didn’t have enough temper left to call him on it. She just wanted them both gone.
Priss zipped up her boots and snagged her coat, looking at Maura as if she wanted to make one last attempt to explain away her duplicity. In the end, she wisely opted to remain silent. Instead she delivered a cool look at Jory, then left the room with her chin up, in a way only Priss could manage, considering she’d just been caught buck naked in her friend’s bed, with her friend’s lover.
“Come on, now, Priss,” Jory cajoled, quickly heading out behind her without so much as another glance at Maura.
She sighed, listening as he began a running dialogue, all the way down the curving stone stairs to the main floor. When she heard the ground-floor door shut, she wandered across her room and stepped out onto the small balcony that wrapped around the top of the spire. She looked directly down into the main courtyard of the crumbling ruin she always had, grumbling aside, called home.
She’d known Jory hadn’t really understood her connection to this big pile of stone, but she hadn’t realized he was resentful of it. Which is sure what it had sounded like. Of course, working for his parents at the pub and still living off of them at twenty-eight, he didn’t exactly have a clear appreciation of responsibility, much less a dedication to doing anything more with his life. And God knows her life was a master class in dedication.
The sky was gray and bleak, matching her mood, with the promised winter storm growing ever closer. The wind had an even sharper bite to it than usual, snatching at her auburn curls and tossing them whiplike about her face. She yanked them back in a knot, as she dispassionately watched Jory talk his way into getting Priss to give him a lift into town. Jesus and Mary, she thought, had she really fancied herself building a life with that one? She hadn’t, of course. Not really. Which, strangely enough, was more depressing. He’d just been the one who happened to be in her life when, at thirty, she’d finally began wondering if this was all there was ever going to be to it. Was it to be just one long st
ring of days that began and ended with her worrying about Ballantrae and how to keep it going? There should be more, she’d thought, and still believed. Just not with Jory.
Priss’s small Renault rolled through the main gates and edged down the pitted gravel drive, before disappearing amongst the towering pines crowded along the entrance road. Only then did Maura feel a pang of true pain. She could find another lover. It was going to be a lot harder to find another best friend.
She turned her attention to the west, away from betrayal and pain.
“Toward burden and responsibility, instead,” she said on a weary sigh, looking out over the land that stretched on as far as the eye could see. Though it was winter in the surrounding Cairngorms, green grass grew atop fallow soil here in the valley. The countryside rolled out before her like so much carpet, on and on in gentle swells, dotted occasionally with black-faced sheep and shaggy brown cows. Low, stone walls separated one tenant plot from the next. Small crofts marked each plot, their stone walls and thatched roofs looking a bit haggard and worn in the dull winter light. Smoke wisped from far too few of the stacked chimneys. However, the faint smell of burning peat mixed with the mist that rose off the loch, making the air feel even more dank than usual. She shifted her gaze out over the choppy gray waters of Loch Ulish, which formed the eastern boundary of her property. Her property.
Her shoulders hunched a little. More from the weight of responsibility than as a shield against the cold. She didn’t know which was heavier, the air… or her heart, but for reasons far more complex than this most recent betrayal. With another sigh, this one deeper, longer, and—only because she was alone, tinged with an edge of despair she didn’t bother trying to stifle—she turned away from the view of the land she both loved, and on occasion, loathed. Instead she leaned back on the railing and tugged the crumpled letter from the pocket she’d angrily shoved it into what now seemed like a lifetime ago.
She hadn’t bothered to open it then, nor did she now. The sorrowful look on Argus Danders’ face as he’d handed it over to her had been all the answer she’d needed. She’d known the bank wouldn’t extend her loan, but she’d held out for the miracle. Tearing the white packet slowly in two, she let the halves drift heedlessly to the ground, then tipped her head back and looked up at the sky, “I guess I only get one of those in a lifetime, eh, Taggart?”
Grief pulled at her and she fought off the fresh threat of tears. She wasn’t much for weepy theatrics, but she supposed if anyone deserved to indulge herself in a brief fit of them at the moment, it was probably her. Of course she’d known she was going to lose Taggart, had known for months now. But it hadn’t made the reality any easier to deal with when the time had finally come.
Her first clue had been the monthly letter that had never shown up. Then had come the official word. A single sheet of paper from his friend Mick Templeton, offering a brief line of condolence on her loss, followed by an even briefer notification that as soon as Taggart’s will was properly read to his heirs, he would fulfill Taggart’s final wishes regarding the Scotland property. He’d ended by promising that someone from the family would be in touch with her regarding the future of her financial arrangement.
She’d crumpled the letter, hating that she’d been reduced to a “financial arrangement” in the final picture of Taggart’s life, and at the same time, knowing she was doomed if that arrangement didn’t survive his death.
That had been over three months ago. And there had been nary a word nor any form of contact since. Much less a bank draft. At the time she’d signed the papers with Taggart, she’d been so grateful to him, still was, that she’d agreed to the hundred-and-twenty-day window. Which meant his heirs still had another couple of weeks to make their decision on maintaining their investment agreement, before the property reverted back to her by default. For all the good that would do her. Of course, she’d had no way of knowing cancer would claim Taggart a few short years after their agreement had been signed. Nor did she know, at the time, that his heirs weren’t likely to be in any great hurry to jump in and pick up where their father had left off. Not that it would have mattered. She’d have accepted his offer if he’d written every clause he could think of into the contract. She hadn’t much of a choice.
It was hard enough losing the friendship she’d forged with Taggart Morgan, no matter how odd the circumstances that had initially founded it. What had begun as a business relationship had, over time, become a much stronger bond. He’d not only offered guidance and wisdom, but he’d felt as strongly as she did about preserving the last remaining stronghold of their families’ oft-joined clan. Losing the promised funding, which had only barely kept Ballantrae from complete ruin in the first place, had only made the blow that much worse.
And, she admitted, there was a small part of her that was a bit hurt that he hadn’t done more to safeguard their arrangement. He’d been well aware of her meager income here. What she earned from her own job writing articles and short stories for an Edinburgh magazine, plus the income from the crofters, hardly put a dent in the monthly maintenance alone on a place of this size. He’d mentioned more times than she could count how proud he was of her determination and dedication. It had certainly been in his power to make permanent arrangements, as he’d known for some time he wasn’t going to beat the disease.
But then, she’d remind herself that she really knew nothing about the situation between him and his sons, other than that it was severely strained. She had no idea what he’d felt obligated to do on their behalf, as the final chapter of his life, of their life together, was winding to a close.
Once again she contemplated reaching out to Taggart’s sons, much as she’d reached out to their father years ago. He’d been a complete stranger to her then, a name she’d stumbled across after much research and digging into the Ballantrae ancestry. Through a quite lengthy lineage, she’d discovered that he was The Morgan, the oldest living direct descendant of the last chief of Clan Morganach and therefore, technically current clan chief. As she was of her clan, being the most direct descendant of The Sinclair. The two clans had had a long and entwined history and ownership of Ballantrae. She saw no reason that history couldn’t be resurrected, and that relationship perhaps renewed.
She’d traced the last Morgan chief, Teague Morgan, to the colonies, and had discovered Rogues Hollow, astonished, given American history, to find it still existed. Further astonished to find it was still populated by Morgans, Ramsays and Sinclairs. The American Sinclairs were descended from Iain, the younger brother of her direct ancestor, the clan chief during that time, Calum Sinclair. But if the stories she’d read in her vast collection were to be believed, Morgan held a more direct claim. And, seeing as the American Sinclairs didn’t even live in the Hollow but a few months of the year, she’d eagerly contacted Taggart instead.
That initial letter to him had resulted in a surprising relationship that had provided far more than the financial backing she’d been so desperate to secure. But she was reluctant to strike again.
She’d known from her research that Taggart had four sons, but he’d never spoken of them. Even after they’d established a rapport that had her quite comfortably giving him her opinion on any number of subjects, she’d been reluctant to push him about the estrangement between him and his children. After all, it was none of her business and had no bearing on their relationship, personal or business. Had he brought them up himself, perhaps she would have pushed more. She’d been quite curious about it. But his complete silence on the matter had left her feeling she had no option but to tacitly agree to leave them un mentioned.
So far as she knew, they had no idea of her existence, much less that of Ballantrae. Mr. Templeton had only said he’d follow Taggart’s wishes. And despite Taggart’s promise that she and the tumbledown castle would be taken care of after his death, she had no way of knowing if he’d put it in writing, or simply made it a verbal request to his close friend to take it up with his sons.
Eve
n if Taggart had put it in writing, it was quite likely that without her presence, his sons could easily initiate some sort of legal maneuver to get out of the obligation entirely. After all, none of them still lived in the Hollow, and if they had no emotional tie to their only parent, it was doubtful they’d feel strongly about those ancestors who had come before him, much less the land they’d built their heritage on. On American or Scot soil.
Which left her with very few options.
A cold gust of wind blew in off the loch, making her tuck her arms more tightly around her waist. She hoped the storm held off a bit longer. She had an article that needed polishing and printing, so she could leave first thing in the morning for the three-hour drive to Durnish, to keep the appointment she’d made earlier, on the chance the bank didn’t come through. Her meeting was with Doug Wentworth, a land agent. Not that she was going to sell so much as a tuft of Sinclair soil, but she had to be realistic. If it got to the point where the bank was going to come and take it all away, she might have to reconsider that stance. Of course, she had no idea if there would be a buyer, or what the property would even be worth, as it was mostly farmland and she had a hard enough time leasing it to crofters as it was. But a smart girl understood her options. She looked across the loch at the gloom that was quickly deepening the gray skies, and wished she felt wiser.
Ducking back inside, she took one look at the bed and the tousle of linens piled on it, and kept on walking. Maybe Wentworth would see her early, she thought, snagging her keys from the bed and her mobile from the floor before shoving both into her pockets. She’d make Durnish by nightfall, and see him first thing in the morning and be back in time to still get the article done and make her deadline.
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