One Night with the Laird

by Nicola Cornick

  Jack raised a brow at her and saw the pink color touch her cheekbones. “I would have thought that was obvious,” he drawled. “He covets what is mine.”

  Mairi made an exasperated tutting sound. “In the first instance, he does not. In the second, I am not a piece of property. And in the third, Jeremy is an old friend, nothing more. I value his business advice and Lord MacLeod trusts him. He is very pleasant.”

  “Damned with faint praise,” Jack said, noting that his temper was improving. “You have never called me pleasant.”

  “That’s because you are not,” Mairi said tartly. “You are not pleasant at all.”

  Jack caught her and pulled her behind a huge stone-carved garden urn. “But you like me,” he said. She felt wonderful in his arms, warm and soft and so tempting.

  “I’m not sure that I do,” Mairi said but he was intrigued to see that she was not struggling.

  “Then if you don’t like me,” Jack continued, brushing her earlobe with his lips, “you must like how I make you feel.” He kissed the tiny hollow beneath her ear and felt her shiver.

  “I will come to your room tonight,” he whispered.

  Her lips curved deliciously. “See that you do,” she whispered back.

  A bevy of servants appeared from the direction of the castle with more tea and cake piled up on trays. Mairi drew discreetly away from him and Jack sighed and released her. “I wish you could come riding with me,” he said abruptly.

  Her gaze softened. “I would like that too,” she said. “I would like to escape. I feel so penned in here.”

  She stood on tiptoe to press a kiss on his cheek. It was the most chaste and sweetest salutation and yet Jack felt it through his entire body. He watched her as she walked back to the pavilion. He wanted to take her away from the oppressive atmosphere of the house party, the stuffiness of forever being under everyone’s gaze. He wanted to be alone with her riding out on the high tops with nothing but the cold wind for company.

  Most of all he wanted to take her on a wild ride far away from the memories of Archie MacLeod. But he could not do that. He could not replace Archie and he was not even sure what it was that he wanted from her anymore.

  * * *

  MAIRI MANAGED A couple of blissful hours of peace tucked away in the library reading before Jeremy Cambridge found her. She had known that he would not wait until the morning. He would not want to discuss whatever business there was with Jack. When she heard his heavy tread approaching, she was tempted to jump up and hide behind the bookcase, but she knew that would be childish. He had annoyed her over tea with his pomposity and self-importance and she would have had to be insensate not to feel the antagonism between him and Jack. They were like two territorial dogs circling each other. She wondered why men had to be so downright foolish.

  Jeremy heaved himself into the chair opposite, sat forward with his hands dangling between his thighs and fixed her with a gaze that was more in sorrow than in anger. Before he had even started to speak she felt an acute sense of irritation, which she knew was hardly kind. She should try to give him a fair hearing.

  “I am so very sorry, Lady Mairi,” Jeremy said. He shook his head. “If only Lord MacLeod had apprised me of his plans beforehand, this need never have happened. There was no need for you to do anything so foolish as to betroth yourself to a dangerous rake who can only damage your reputation still further.”

  “I assume you are referring to Mr. Rutherford,” Mairi said, “since he is the only fiancé I have.” She closed her book with a snap. “Was that what you came all the way from Strome to tell me, Jeremy?” she said a little tartly.

  “I came to deliver this letter from Lord MacLeod,” Jeremy said, unfastening the buckles of his document case, “and to see how you are after the dreadful shock of the attack by Wilfred Cardross. I promised His Lordship that I would report back on your state of health.” He took the letter from the case but did not hand it to her immediately, holding it instead in his hand as though it were made of precious gold.

  “That is very thoughtful of Lord MacLeod,” Mairi said, resisting the urge to snatch the letter from him. “Please tell him that I am very well.”

  She held out her hand. Jeremy ignored the gesture, instead placing the letter neatly on the table between them. He resumed his scrutiny of her, his gaze so sorrowful it made her want to slap him.

  “I told you that you should return to Edinburgh to scotch the rumors about your misconduct,” he said.

  Mairi bristled. “Misconduct is a very judgmental word,” she said frostily. “And as I recall you said no such thing. You were so evasive that I had no notion of the nature of the gossip.”

  A shade of color touched Jeremy’s cheek. “It was not my place to speak of such tawdry matters,” he said.

  “Fortunate for me that Mr. Rutherford was not as fastidious as you, Jeremy,” Mairi said. She could feel anger bubbling up inside her again and made a monumental effort to smother it. “He was very willing to offer me his help.”

  “I would have offered you mine when you returned to Edinburgh and discovered the situation,” Jeremy said. “I was willing to overlook your moral failings. I was even prepared to offer you my protection, which I flatter myself would have been a great deal more respectable than that of Jack Rutherford.” By now he was bright red and spluttering and Mairi had stopped feeling annoyed and could only feel sorry that he valued himself so highly and clearly thought so little of her. She felt bereft too; she had thought that she and Jeremy had had a genuine friendship. She had always known he was a little stuffy and that like so many men he disapproved of women who were different and independent, but it was disappointing to see his opinions with such unflattering clarity.

  “I am honored by your regard, Jeremy,” she said, “and can only be sorry that I am promised to Mr. Rutherford when you could have offered me so much more.”

  “You mock me,” Jeremy said sharply, “but you will regret it, Lady Mairi. The whole of Edinburgh will be talking about your betrothal—”

  “They are,” Mairi said, “and in tones of most flattering excitement.” She reached out a hand for the letter from Lady Kenton that had arrived that morning. She had been using it as a bookmark.

  “Lady Kenton says that society is quite besotted with the news,” she said. She read aloud: “‘When a rake such as Mr. Rutherford chooses to wed, it gives hope to all the other ladies that they may catch an equally exciting husband.’” She folded the letter away again and stowed it back in the book. “So you see,” she said, “I am a beacon of hope to all my sex.”

  Jeremy gave a disapproving snort and hauled himself out of the chair. “It isn’t too late to reconsider,” he said, looking down at her. “Come back to Edinburgh with me. You know you dislike being here. You hate children and you do not enjoy the company of your family.”

  Mairi was incensed by this misrepresentation of her feelings. “I do not hate children,” she said with biting anger. “I am merely unaccustomed to them, as I was not fortunate enough to have any of my own. As for my family—” She felt a fierce and unexpected pang of affection. “I love them very much and I do not appreciate your criticism of them, particularly when Lucy and Robert are being generous enough to offer you their hospitality!”

  She felt so out of sorts when Jeremy had gone out that she decided that nothing but some fresh air would make her feel better. Lachlan, Dulcibella and some of the other guests had gone down to the lake for a picnic; as she walked down the chestnut avenue she could hear voices and laughter. It made a change for Dulcibella to be in a good mood. Mairi did not fancy company, however. For a little while she sat in the gardens, feeling the slight breeze stirring her hair and the sun on her face.

  It was odd that Jeremy’s words had upset her so much. The news he had brought from MacLeod seemed slight and it felt as though he had come all this way to rebuke
her for entering into an engagement with Jack. She was furious to be scolded and felt strangely protective of Jack and indignant about Jeremy’s criticism. She was not sure she could be civil to him at dinner tonight.

  The sun was becoming too hot and she had forgotten her parasol. She walked through the walled garden where the scent of the roses hung heavy on the still air, and through an archway into the wild garden. Here she remembered there was an ancient swing strung in the dappled shade, beside an overgrown lily pond. Lucy and Robert’s children were too young to play on it yet. It must have been there when Robert and his elder brother had spent their childhood at Methven. Jack too.

  The seat of the swing was a rough piece of wood, mossy but dry. Mairi sat down on it, and the rope creaked a little beneath her weight. She rocked backward and forward gently, remembering the rhythm of it from her childhood, remembering the thrill of hurtling through the air and feeling so wild and free and out of control. She wondered when she had lost that sense of lightness. Archie had left his fortune to her out of guilt and it had enabled her to do so many things, but sometimes it felt more of a burden than a gift. She remembered the wicked thrill that had coursed through her when Jack had asked her to ride with him to Methven. She loved riding and she had wanted to take a risk and go with him, but sense and self-control had won out instead. It seemed she had built walls around herself without even realizing it.

  She shivered a little in the heavy air. It had been a while since she had felt that terrible loneliness and oppression of spirits that stalked her now. The sun had gone in now and the birds were quiet. A distant rumble of thunder echoed off the mountains. Through the lattice of the branches above her head she could see that the sky was gray with clouds piling one on top of the other. The storm had come sooner than she had expected.

  She slowed the swing and it came to a stop with a creak that now sounded loud in the silence. Already the first fat drops of rain were pattering on the leaves over her head. She was going to have to run for the house or be soaked. The wooded shrubbery was now plunged into a gloom so deep that she tripped over a root and almost fell. The air felt sultry beneath the trees.

  There was a sharp rustle of leaves away to her right and, spinning around, she thought she saw the figure of a man before he disappeared in the stygian darkness. She quickened her pace and heard again that betraying flutter of leaves and the patter of footsteps on old, dead leaves. Whoever was following her was coming closer.

  She felt the first stirrings of panic. She disliked thunderstorms at the best of times, and now she could feel her fears playing on her mind and mingling with her stifling sense of isolation— even though she was a bare few hundred yards from the house. She told herself that she was being foolish and made for a gap in the trees where the wood opened out onto the lawn. The leaves beneath her feet were slippery with rain now and the thunder rumbled closer. She could feel her gown sticking to her with an unpleasant combination of sweat and rainwater and always over her shoulder she had the sense of being watched. As the trees thinned, a figure stepped out onto the path directly in front of her so suddenly that she screamed. A moment later she realized that it was Jack, on his way back from the stables. She felt enormously relieved that his was the figure she must have seen through the shrubbery. She also felt a complete fool. Jack caught her arm, steadying her, a heavy frown on his brow.

  “Mairi? What in God’s name are you doing here? Has something happened—”

  “No,” Mairi said. Her teeth were chattering. Another long tumbrel of thunder rumbled closer. “I was on the swing in the wild garden. I didn’t realize the storm was so close.”

  As they reached the edge of the lawn, there was a fierce fork of lightning and the heavens opened. Rain poured down relentlessly, hitting the gravel of the path and bouncing back. Within seconds Mairi’s shoes were soaked and the rain was running in rivulets down her neck.

  “This way.” Jack grabbed her arm, half pulling, half carrying her toward the little summerhouse in the corner of the walled garden. She jumped violently as the thunder crashed directly overhead and Jack had to drag her through the doorway into the room beyond.

  He led her over to the cushioned bench that ran around the walls and drew her down onto the seat. The air in the little summerhouse felt warm and dry and the beating of the rain on the roof was soothing.

  “We’ll be perfectly safe here,” he said. His gaze appraised her thoughtfully with a hint of amusement in the depths. “I’m afraid you look very bedraggled. Elegant Lady Mairi has vanished.”

  “It doesn’t signify,” Mairi said. She was shivering, although she was not cold. Another vivid flash of lightning illuminated the summerhouse interior, followed by a crack of thunder that sounded as though it were splitting the mountains in two.

  “I had no idea you were so frightened at storms,” Jack said. The amusement had gone from his eyes now and he looked concerned.

  “It’s a stupid thing to be afraid of,” Mairi said crossly.

  Jack laughed. “We all have our weaknesses,” he said. “It’s actually a relief to discover that you possess some. Most of the time you seem frighteningly indomitable.” He put his arm about her and drew her close and Mairi allowed her head to rest against his shoulder. She felt warm and safe.

  They sat there quietly while the rain beat on the roof and the thunder rolled overhead and away toward the sea. Gradually the sky lightened and the rain eased and the birds began to sing again.

  Mairi got slowly to her feet. She felt unpleasantly damp with her muslin gown clinging to her and her hair in rat’s tails sticking to her neck, but she also felt happy and cherished.

  “Thank you,” she said, smiling.

  Jack did not smile in return. He looked at her for a moment and it felt as though he had steel shutters behind his eyes. She felt the chill, felt the distance open up between them.

  “It’s over now,” he said. He walked across to the door and flung it open. “You had better get back to the house and into some dry clothes before you take a chill.”

  His broad back was turned to her, his manner so similar to the way he had turned her out of his room at the Kinlochewe Inn that Mairi almost flinched. Once again he was locking her out. She got to her feet and without a word slipped past him out of the door and walked away across the lawn toward the house.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE STORM HAD gone by the evening, leaving the sky a faded blue. The roads were awash, though, and would probably be impassable the following day, a piece of news Jack received with bad humor since it meant that Jeremy Cambridge would in all likelihood be obliged to stay a further night at Methven. His mood improved slightly at dinner when he saw Mairi covertly rearranging the place cards so that Jeremy was seated as far away from her as possible. He wondered if they had quarreled. She had not mentioned it to him. In fact, she had spoken to him very little since that afternoon in the summerhouse.

  Remembering their encounter, he found that he had lost his appetite. He put his knife and fork down slowly. The salmon was delicious and the cook would be rightly offended to see it returned almost untouched. Truth was, he knew he had behaved like a cad again that afternoon. He had not noticed the slow degrees by which he and Mairi had slipped toward a closeness that was more emotional than physical and then suddenly he had been brought up hard against it that afternoon when he had comforted her during the storm. He had recoiled from the intimacy of it. He had felt something akin to panic, and that was not an emotion he welcomed.

  He glanced down the table toward Mairi. She was seated next to Robert and they were talking animatedly. She looked the same as she ever did, poised and elegant. Yet the hairs on the back of Jack’s neck prickled as though there was something wrong.

  Mairi looked up and for a brief second her eyes met his and he saw beneath the gaiety something so dark and lost that he felt a pang of pure shock. It was powerf
ul enough to have him half rise from his seat before she blinked and her gaze moved on and she was talking easily to Lady Methven about growing cabbages, of all things. Jack subsided into his seat, feeling disturbed in some way he could not quite explain, as though something had happened but he had missed its significance. The footmen cleared the covers. The meat was brought in, then the desserts. The conversation ground along; he talked about Canada with Christina MacMorlan, who proved a surprisingly astute conversationalist, and about the Edinburgh shops with Dulcibella, who did not.

  It was later, much later, when the gentlemen had taken their brandy and rejoined the ladies for tea that Jack realized that Mairi was missing. Lucy, when applied to for her whereabouts, was anxious.

  “I think Mairi has retired for the night,” she said. “She was not feeling well.”

  Jack hesitated. This was one of those moments when his instincts were telling him very firmly to do anything other than get involved. Which did not explain why he found himself climbing the main staircase and knocking on the door of Mairi’s bedchamber. Jessie was there laying out Mairi’s nightgown, a very pretty concoction of ribbons and transparent lace, as Jack was quick to notice. “Her Ladyship went out for a breath of fresh air, sir,” she said, in answer to Jack’s inquiry. “I think she meant to take a walk on the battlements.”

  That, Jack thought, should have been quite sufficient to lay his fears to rest. There was no reason why he needed to pursue Mairi to make sure that she was safe. His very solicitude annoyed him. He went into his own room and picked up a book, but after two pages he threw it aside with a smothered curse. Reaching for his jacket again, he let himself out into the corridor and took the stone staircase in the north tower that led up to the battlements.

  It was cool outside with a freshness to the air that had been missing earlier. A tiny white sickle moon was rising over the mountains. It looked ridiculously romantic. He saw Mairi at once because the pale yellow of her gown reflected the faint starlight. She was standing halfway along the battlements, her palms resting on the stone balustrade, looking out over the garden. As Jack drew closer to her he saw that her shoulders were slumped and her head bowed.