Zeus pawed the earth and snorted, as if he, too, was appalled to be near such a sad specimen of a horse, and Ronan reined him in.
“Oh, dear,” Imogen squeaked. “Your horse is so very fierce. And rather frightening. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.”
“And why is that?” he couldn’t help asking.
“Because he’s like you, of course.” She smiled again. “While Pudding here is so much more suited to my speed and ability. I do hope they will get along. She’s quite gentle, though she does like to bite unprovoked.” Her giggle was shrill. “Gum you, really, since she has no teeth.”
Ronan narrowed his eyes. “Lord Kincaid’s stables are the only stables in Scotland to rival mine, Riverley’s, or Lord Glenross’s. I find it hard to imagine that his only daughter doesnae ken how to seat a mount that isnae a lump on legs. And why the devil is a horse that ancient part of yer father’s stock?”
“Oh, bite your tongue, sir, or you’ll hurt poor Pudding’s feelings!”
Ronan glanced at the attending groom, who seemed fixated on the nearby shrubbery. His mouth was white, as though he was trying to keep his lips sealed. Ronan’s gaze thinned and returned to the guileless woman sitting on the horse. Was this another of her games? It had to be. He’d never known a Scot who couldn’t seat a horse.
She stared up at him expectantly. “Shall we? Though I do not know how fast Pudding will go.”
“Aye, of course. After ye.” And the next decade.
As they crept forward, Ronan pasted a patient smile on his face, though his teeth felt like they were grinding down to his gum line. He had to retake control somehow.
“I’m glad I’m no’ late. I rode from Maclaren, ye see. I didnae have time to change. Sorry about the dirt and the blood.”
A choked sound emerged from the woman beside him. “Blood?”
“On my plaid,” he said helpfully.
He felt her gaze settle on the stains and caught the slight widening of her eyes before she could hide it. “Let me guess, you were in a brawl? Or were you playing with your claymore and cut yourself?”
“Sacrificing virgins,” he said. “Same thing, I suppose.”
“Is that a Highlander tradition?”
He slanted a glance at her. “More like a Maclaren tradition.”
“Well, I assure you, Lord Dunrannoch, there will be none of that in the future.” She broke off abruptly as if she’d said something she hadn’t meant to say.
“Sacrifice or virgins?”
“Either.” Her voice shook slightly. “This conversation is unseemly, my lord, but then I should expect as much from you, shouldn’t I?”
It was. But by God, did it make his blood heat. Her virtue didn’t matter to him. He wasn’t going to marry the chit, but something in her tone pricked at him. “Should I be worried?”
“That I might not be a doe-eyed innocent raised to be served on a platter for some undeserving male to enjoy?” Glacial green eyes met his, and for a moment the pain in them nearly sent him to his knees. He blinked. She was a socialite, one given to a life of indolence and ease, yet those eyes of hers spoke of hurt. Of betrayal. Of something fractured and not quite repaired. Ronan had an urgent need to peel back her layers, lay her secrets bare. And her eyes said she had many.
Instead, he pushed a grin to his lips, deliberately misunderstanding her. “That ye’re expecting things from me. It’s a dangerous road, ye ken. Expectations are the devil’s poetry.”
“My goodness, you are positively Byronic. Who would have thought?”
“I am a man of many talents,” he said. “In fact ye should see my sw—”
“Yes, yes, your sword. You’ve spoken of that at length already.”
“At great length.”
She rolled her eyes and replied in a droll tone, “So you keep saying. You know, overcompensation is a well-known male flaw. Should I be worried, Your Grace?”
Ronan couldn’t help it; he laughed out loud. He hadn’t felt so invigorated or light in years. And to his surprise, she was biting back her amusement, too. A genuine smile split her face, one that lit her green eyes and transformed her.
Now that he’d seen that sliver of the real woman, Ronan couldn’t stop staring. Her eyes, the color of spring grass, mesmerized him. Her lips were a glistening pink bow when curled upward in laughter and not pinched tightly together. Her chin matched the stubbornness of her nature, yes, but that he already knew. And her neck… It was long and graceful and elegant. For a second, he wanted to put his lips against it, make that alabaster column flush with color.
“Your Grace, why have we stopped?”
Ronan blinked, his brain registering her inquiry with delayed slowness. They had indeed stopped. He glanced back to where they’d started and realized they’d gone ten yards, if that. It had felt like a lifetime. He shook his head, but that wasn’t what mystified him. Hell, had he been ogling the lass? And liking it? Dimly, he registered the stiffening beneath his kilt and the sudden boiling temperature of his blood.
Bloody hell. He was aroused.
Her stare fell to his lap, and a blush crept into her cheeks, but she arched a provocative eyebrow. “Sword problems?”
God help him, he wanted to laugh again, ravish that pert mouth of hers, and put her over his knee. And that wasn’t even taking into account what he wanted to do with his bloody…sword. He bit his lip to keep from chuckling. The brashness of her.
This would not do. He had to turn the tables, restore the order. Restore his God damned sanity. Without a further thought, he reached over and plucked the lady clear out of her saddle, ignoring her unladylike squawk of protest. She went quiet quickly, however, when she felt him hard against her thigh.
“Your Grace, this is—”
“Vastly preferable,” he said, cutting her off. “Unless, of course, ye do ken how to ride and wish to apologize for this shameful performance.”
“Of course not.” She held herself ramrod straight in front of him, hot color flooding her skin, just as he’d hoped. “Everyone is looking.”
“Let them look.”
Ronan settled her into place, wondering if he’d turned the tables so thoroughly that the odds were now against him. Beneath that hideous riding habit, he felt soft, womanly curves, and the heady fragrance of her saturated his nostrils. It was sweet and sharp, like the wildflowers that crowded the hills of Maclaren. She smelled like the height of summer, of lazy days on the edge of the loch, of mischief and laughter and forgotten childhood.
Good Lord, he was Byronic.
Growling, he kicked Zeus into a gallop, and she squeaked, one arm grasping the horse’s mane and the other flying around his waist.
“This is riding,” he said. “No’ whatever it was ye think ye were doing on Dumpling.”
“Her name is Pudding. Return me to my own horse. I’m…afraid.”
“Ye’re nae more afraid than I am an idiot.”
“I beg to differ,” she muttered and scowled at him. “You are an idiot, you oaf.”
“Then why are ye holding yer body like ye were born in the saddle?” he asked, leaning forward so his nose was almost in her nape. Her scent scattered his wits. Ronan felt her sudden inhalation, saw the streaming tempo of her pulse. He also saw the moment she gave in, when her shoulders relaxed and her body rolled with the gait of the horse. Like a natural. “Pudding is beneath ye, and ye ken it.”
She glared at him over her shoulder. “And I suppose you know what’s best for me?”
Ronan didn’t answer, instead wrapping an arm around her middle and bracing her back against his chest as he urged Zeus even faster. He should say something insensitive. Something coarse and off-putting. But he couldn’t. He didn’t want to. He wanted to relish the moment, enjoy the feel of her soft curves against him.
What the hell?
He’d lost his bloody mind. Ronan wheeled the horse around and headed back for her groom, who was leading her plodding mount with a pained look on his face.
&nbs
p; “What are you doing?” she asked.
The other walkers and riders in this part of the park were indeed watching, agape and whispering as he set her ungracefully back on the mare’s broad back.
“I’m putting ye back where ye belong,” he said. “On a horse that’s perfect for ye. Slow, dull, and boring.” He lowered his voice so only she would hear. “I suppose there’s more than a good chance ye’ll be like that in bed, too. Pity.”
Her eyes flashed. “You are a clod-brained cur.”
“Better a cur than a bore.”
“I am not a bore!”
Ronan only laughed and swung his horse around, leaving her fuming in his wake. The loss of her warm feminine figure only hit him when he was out of sight. He adjusted himself in the saddle and willed the tightness of his body to subside. That had been a near disaster, and not only because his cock was as hard as stone and demanding that he turn the horse around, but because his brain wanted him to turn back as well.
She was right—he was an idiot—because suddenly, he’d been enjoying himself.
He’d been duped before by a woman who had played him for a fool. Imogen wasn’t Grace, but the signs were there. She wasn’t to be trusted. And if he wanted to put Lady Imogen’s inheritance to good use for the sake of Maclaren, he needed to keep a level head and not be thinking with other, unruly parts of his body. Ronan groaned with the unhappy realization that said parts hadn’t calmed in the least.
He was in more trouble than he realized.
Chapter Six
Ronan raised his chin, looking up at the exterior of the terrace house. It was a fine address in New Town, the grand home itself pristinely kept. If not for the discreet nameplate bolted over the front door, inscribed with Haven, he would have imagined it to be the residence of some rich lord. Instead, it was a charity house run by his intriguing baggage of a fiancée.
Goading Imogen the afternoon before had been more entertaining than he’d expected, and throughout the evening and night he’d caught himself suppressing grins when he thought about that dreadful horse, one hoof in the grave, her stubborn huffs of indignation, and her saucy comments about his sword.
The woman had a stinging wit—one he wished he didn’t enjoy so much.
He’d had to suppress other, more troublesome thoughts throughout the night, too, mostly revolving around the feminine lines of her buttocks and hips as she’d ridden in his lap. Christ, taking her onto Zeus with him had been worth it, though. It had thrown her completely off balance, and now, as he walked toward the columned front door, Ronan felt buoyed. He grinned. She would never expect him here.
Inside, he was greeted by a clean, if spartan, foyer. To the right, he found a receiving room. There was no one seated behind the small desk, so he took the hallway leading toward the back of the house. The walls were whitewashed and unadorned, with rooms to either side. One door was open, and within the room, three women stood in a group. The moment their eyes fastened onto him, their alarm nearly bowled him over.
One unsmiling woman stepped forward, inspecting him from the top of his head to his boot tips. “May I help ye, sir?”
“Good afternoon,” he said. “This is the place called Haven?”
The reticence in the woman’s eyes increased. “Yes. What is yer business here? This is a women’s sanctuary.”
“I’m no’ here to disturb anyone,” he said. “But if ye dunnae mind, I am a potential investor and would appreciate learning more about yer facility.”
The woman’s pinched lips eased, her brown eyes turning a shade more welcoming. “Of course, sir. I can take ye to see Haven’s proprietor. She should be in her office.”
Imogen. He braced himself, feeling strangely short of breath.
The woman turned on her heel and led him through the corridor without another word.
“How many do ye help at a time?” he asked, curious when he passed a door that was open a scant few inches. It quickly closed as he met the mistrustful eyes of the woman behind it.
“Lady Imogen can take up to twenty women at a time, though she is planning to expand and offer education opportunities and skill training,” the woman replied. “Perhaps a safer living situation for the women and their infants, until they are prepared to strike out on their own. It’s always disheartening to see the women we help return to the abuse they came from.”
The situation made him think of his sister Makenna. Ronan had been devastated to learn that she’d been abused by her former husband, before she’d gained a second chance at happiness with Riverley. Perhaps, if she’d had access to a place like this she wouldn’t have stayed with Graeme for so long. She might have had other options. Oddly, he felt a surge of warmth toward Imogen for her efforts.
“Why does she do it?” he asked as they climbed a back staircase.
“If she doesnae, who will? Lady Imogen sees a need others would rather ignore, and she isnae afraid to meet it head-on.”
The woman led him along a first-floor corridor with more unadorned walls and spotless marble floors. The place was clean and practical, yet it was also quiet and secure. He could see why the women felt safe in such a sanctuary.
“When was Haven established?” he asked, eyes taking in everything as they moved down another hallway.
“Four years ago. I’ve been with Lady Imogen from the beginning. And so ye ken, she isnae just a financial backer. She’s here seven days out of the week, up to her elbows in blood, sweat, and tears. I couldnae tear her away if I tried.”
Ronan felt a stroke of admiration. Most Society ladies didn’t get their hands dirty. Volunteering at charities meant raising funds within the upper classes and attending social meetings, not actually working. He’d made the mistaken assumption after reviewing Stevenson’s report that that was what she’d done with her time, and even after talking to McClintock, he hadn’t realized what running her shelter entailed. This was no hobby; Imogen had truly built something here and dedicated herself to it.
This place meant something to her.
And Ronan suddenly knew what he had to do.
He felt both elated with the perfection of it and guilty as sin. Think of the future of Maclaren. The distillery had supported and given jobs to so many after the Clearances had turned whole families off their farms and lands. It was his people’s livelihood, the heart of their clan, and without it, everything he had built, everything he had bled and sacrificed for would hang in the balance. No, he couldn’t let sentiment get in the way.
This was war…and war had casualties.
The woman leading him on the brief tour reached a door and knocked. “Imogen?” She stepped inside. “We have a visitor. This is…well, I didnae get your name. Sir?”
Ronan entered the office, his eyes immediately landing on a crown of dark, lustrous hair. Imogen was seated at her desk, her face turned toward a scattering of papers fanned out past her elbows. When she glanced up, for a split second he saw an unguarded expression, one of worry, the small press of lines between her arched brows indicating some burden. But then the brief vulnerability fled as Imogen shot to her feet, eyes landing on him.
A flush bloomed on her cheekbones. It was nearly the shade of her practical, berry-red dress. Nothing at all like the ridiculous gowns she’d worn on every other occasion.
“You! What…how did you…” She set her jaw and might have even ground her heel, though he couldn’t see behind the apron of the desk. “What are you doing here, Your Grace?”
“Ye ken each other?” The woman who’d led him there whirled around and stared up at him. Her eyes flicked back to Imogen and then narrowed in sudden shock. “Wait, Yer Grace?”
“One could say we are acquainted.” With some satisfaction, Ronan eyed his fiancée. “Do ye have a cold?” When Imogen looked blankly at him, his grin widened. “Yer voice is pitched lower than normal, which is a relief, actually. I quite value my eardrums.”
Her blush heightened as she cleared her throat with a round of weak-sounding coughs. �
��Yes, a cold. Of course. How thoughtful and gentlemanly of you to notice.” Her sarcasm was clear, but nothing could detract from his glee at having caught her out of character.
Imogen gathered the papers on her desk, her movements jerky. “As you might have guessed, Emma, this is the Duke of Dunrannoch.” She skewered him with a glare, almost choking on the completion of her sentence. “My betrothed.”
“Yer Grace,” the other woman greeted him and took her leave, though not before scowling at him.
“That was my overseer and midwife, Miss Emma Jobson,” Imogen said. “You shouldn’t have tricked her.”
“I didnae want special treatment,” he said, stepping farther into the office, taking it in with unabashed curiosity. Here, the space was different. There were paintings on the walls, potted plants, and trinkets, like a nautilus seashell and a small telescope on a tripod near the window.
Imogen made an impatient noise in her throat. “You haven’t answered my question.”
What was he doing here, yes. Before listening to her overseer, Emma, Ronan’s sole goal had been to invade her private space, turning up like a gnat to pester her. However, now his intentions had solidified. It was time to act.
“I’m off to London in two days. I’ve business to attend to there and it cannae be delayed.”
He saw the surprise—and no small amount of relief—in her clear green stare. “What a shame,” she murmured.
“Aye, I suppose ye would have liked to stay in Edinburgh for the Season.”
She went still and then stepped out from behind her desk. “Whatever do you mean by that?”
“Ye cannae expect me to leave my dear betrothed behind. We’ll go to London together. The arrangements have already been made.”
Her mouth opened and closed.
Swallowing his smile, Ronan stalked toward the desk, where one of her hands gripped the edge. “Just think of it, my wee lamb, the two of us setting London on its ear. Ye can have a room at my family’s home on Grosvenor Square.” He stepped closer. “It’s attached to my own.”
Shock poured through her expression. “I cannot go to London with you. I have duties here. Responsibilities, the women. You’ve seen what I do.”
What a Scot Wants (Tartans and Titans) Page 7