Elias In Love

by Grace Burrowes

  Dunstan’s silence left the decision to Elias. If the meeting went as expected, Elias would be on a plane for Scotland by this time tomorrow.

  “Lead on, Mr. Maitland,” Elias said. “We’ve much to discuss, and you’re entirely correct. One does not conduct business in the street.”

  Maitland led them to the same conference room—no flowers today—and offered them coffee, which both Elias and Dunstan declined. The offer for the farm was fair, possibly even more than fair, and the terms were exactly what Elias had expected to have to bargain, wheedle, posture and negotiate for.

  Cash in hand, or the next thing to it. A lot of desperately needed cash.

  “That is a very reasonable and attractive offer,” Elias said. “Dunstan, what are your thoughts?”

  * * *

  “Violet, hello,” Jane said. “They’ve gone to their meeting. What is that?”

  “A suit of very nice clothes,” Violet said, knowing very well who they were. “May we talk in your office?”

  A legal assistant had greeted Violet, the sort of compact, competent woman who was likely running the practice, did her employers but know it. She watched this exchange with a professionally unreadable expression.

  “Come along,” Jane said, taking the clothes from Violet. “You are a menace, did you know that? I’ve craved red peppers since I got up this morning. This is your fault.”

  “Red peppers are cheerful and bold, like you. They’re good for us, and I like them.”

  Jane closed the door to her office, a tidy space sporting a bouquet of daisies next to a picture of Dunstan and Jane in their wedding attire. She hung the suit on a hook on the back of the door, and then stuck her head out the door.

  “Kathy, please hold my calls.”

  “Got it, boss.”

  When the door was closed, Violet sniffed at the flowers, which was stupid. The scent of daisies was not pleasant.

  “I kept Elias’s shirt,” she said. “He can come and get it if he needs it so badly. I wore it to bed last night—for the scent.”

  “Pathetic,” Jane said. “Elias and Dunstan wore their kilts to this meeting. I have no idea why, but suspect it’s a Scottish guy thing. Were you hanging on to the suit?”

  “Nope,” Violet said, taking a chair across from Jane’s desk. “I needed something to do after you left yesterday and because the endless list of things I should be doing held no appeal, I decided to clean the powder room downstairs. I never use it myself, but Elias did the first day I met him. I wonder if he misses those clothes.”

  Or had he left them with Violet on purpose, like the sunglasses in her shoulder bag? Though what was she to do with a man’s suit?

  “You’re sparing me a phone call,” Jane said. “The cop shop called. They’ve picked up Elias’s former caretaker on a non-support warrant. He was also charged with fleeing and eluding, which means trying to get away from the officer with the warrant. This guy thought they were after him for arson, which is a very bad felony.”

  “Arson?” Maitland had used that word, too.

  “Seems he was stealing from your woodpile one fine and frosty morning, and the joint he was smoking dropped. Your woodpile is apparently surrounded by woodchips and tinder and this genius fled then too. He thought you’d seen him, and took off for the nearest girlfriend’s couch.”

  Relief cut through Violet’s upset. “What about Elias’s alpacas?”

  “He says Zeb told him to sell them, and he did—then sent the check to Zeb, who might have already expired.”

  “Elias will be pleased.” Elias probably wouldn’t much care, given the magnitude of the other problems he faced. “If he can find that check, it will help with immediate cash flow problems, assuming the check is still good. Did Elias say when he’d be back?”

  And should Violet just go before he returned?

  “Dunstan told me the meeting shouldn’t take long,” Jane replied, moving the flowers to the windowsill. “These things stink almost as badly as your dogs, at least to my pregnant nose. Did you want to wait until the guys are done with their meeting?”

  What Violet wanted was impossible. “I did not. I wanted to drop off the clothes and run like a rabbit with two farm dogs in pursuit.”

  Jane opened a drawer and set two chocolate kisses on the desk blotter, then pushed one across the desk to Violet.

  “No farm dogs here, Violet. Just us women in love, some chocolate, and a stash of peppermint tea.”

  And friendship, the most precious bloom to grow in any woman’s garden.

  “I’ll wait then, if you don’t mind. I want to say good-bye in person. Elias has done the best he could, the best anybody could. I’ll have fond memories, and—”

  Jane opened the drawer again and got out a whole bag of kisses. “People in love should stuff a lot of chocolate in their pieholes, so they don’t say stupid things, about fond memories, and saying good-bye. I won’t even charge you for that advice.”

  “Thanks. You mentioned peppermint tea?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  * * *

  “It’s a more than reasonable and attractive offer,” Max said, before Dunstan Cromarty could lawyer-piss on the parade. “It’s my best offer, too, and the only one I’m prepared to make.”

  Take it or leave it in other words, because if Max didn’t close this deal, at this meeting, on these terms, his investors would walk. His bills would not be paid, and that was unacceptable.

  “I understand your position, and I have a counter-offer,” Brodie said, which was not among the options Max had given him.

  “Make it quick, Mr. Brodie, because this is not a complicated situation.”

  “Elias, might I have a word with you in the hallway?” Cromarty asked.

  “Mr. Maitland, you’ll excuse us?” Brodie said, rising. The inflection, even making allowances for a Scottish accent, was a question, but Max wasn’t being given a choice—as usual. They went strutting out the door, leaving Max in a room without flowers.

  At least Bonnie and Derek weren’t arguing down the hall. The voices from the other side of the closed door were hushed, rapid, and… arguing? Maybe Brodie had committed that most frequent of client inconsiderations and failed to be straight with his lawyer.

  Max gave them a very long five minutes, then opened the door. They stood nose to nose, fists on hips. Bonnie was goggle-eyed at her desk, and Max had the odd thought that he ought to get himself one of these kilt get-ups. His grandfather had been born in Scotland, and Max’s mom had pictures of the old guy in a plaid skirt.

  “I don’t have all day, gentlemen. Are we doing this deal or not?”

  Cromarty shoved Brodie on the shoulder—a good, hard shove, not exactly contemplated by the bar association’s Rules of Professional Conduct concerning client contact.

  “We are doing this deal,” Brodie said. “It wants only an explanation, and your consent, Mr. Maitland.”

  “I’m all ears,” Max said, gesturing back toward the conference room.

  “Max?” Bonnie called. “You had a call from Mr. Sutherland. He’d like you to call him back as soon as your meeting is over.”

  Well, of course. And for the next few years, while Max shepherded the Hedstrom project through all manner of hazards and challenges, Sutherland would be demanding a call back at the most inconvenient times, creating artificial deadlines, and stomping all over schedules and budgets Max had lost sleep creating.

  “Thanks, Bonnie, and if you go to lunch, please lock the front door behind you—though I don’t think we’ll be that long.”

  Brodie grasped Max by the arm, and hauled him into the conference room, while Cromarty closed the door.

  “Are all Scots this physical?” Max asked, brushing out the wrinkle on his sleeve.

  “Aye,” Brodie said. “The ladies prefer us this way, just as they appreciate a man with the balls to wear a kilt. Sit down, Mr. Maitland, and pay attention, for I too have an offer I will only make this once. Do you happen to know which city ha
s the dubious honor of being the oil capital of Europe?”

  * * *

  “They’re back,” Jane said, “letting the curtain fall into place. Put the chocolate away.”

  Violet did no such thing. She went to the window, and caught sight of two big, drop-dead gorgeous, dark-haired men, swinging along in their kilts and sporrans, arguing about something—or perhaps, given that it was Dunstan and Elias—having a friendly discussion.

  “They don’t look like a pair of guys who just committed treason against true love,” Jane said.

  They looked scrumptious. Dunstan wore his kilt well, with a certain confidence. It fit him beautifully, and he was entirely at ease in his Highland attire.

  Elias, though, was breathtaking. The tassels of his sporran bounced with each step, the buttons on his coat winked in the mid-day sun. Whereas Dunstan was confident, Elias was splendid. Exuberantly male, uncaring what breeze might come along and tease at his pleated hem. He had places to strut, deeds to derring-do.

  “They look fine,” Violet said. “Elias did what he had to do, and I understand that.”

  “You’re an idiot,” Jane retorted, jamming the chocolate into the drawer. “Elias is a bigger idiot.”

  The men came into Jane’s office a moment later, their expressions solemn. Gone was the animation Violet had observed through the window. Elias didn’t, in fact, seem glad to see her.

  “I wasn’t expecting you,” he said.

  Dunstan back-handed him in the belly. “Tell her, ye daftie. Tell her, or I will.”

  “Tell me what?” Violet asked.

  “He was brilliant,” Dunstan said. “Damn near conjured the ghost of Rabbie Burns right there in the conference room. You’d think Maitland had never heard of Aberdeen, when half the Texas oil families have vacation homes there.”

  “What are you two talking about?” Jane demanded.

  Elias crossed the room to stand very close to Violet. She caught his scent, a little floral, a little spice, blended with high quality wool.

  “What bothered me most,” he said, “was the idea of leaving you here, your sworn enemy in plain view across the road. Maitland has the entire world to develop, why should he choose your valley, right now, to build his little boxes?”

  “It’s a beautiful valley.” Elias was a beautiful man too—also attractive as hell in his kilt.

  Or out of it.

  Jane drew Dunstan from the office, kissing his cheek as they went.

  “I couldn’t leave you here to contend with him, so I found a reason for him to go far, far away for at least the next few years.” Elias’s eyes were very blu, and very serious.

  “You didn’t sell your farm? What about the castle, Elias? The legacy, the family, the—what have you done?”

  Violet had sat up half the night, wrapped in Elias’s shirt, wracking her brain for fresh options, and coming up with only nightmares. Her valley turned into suburbia, her mortgage accelerated.

  Her heart in Scotland.

  “Maitland’s people have money,” Elias said. “I have a project requiring money. More to the point, I have a pressing need to get Maitland out of your valley. We negotiated a ninety-nine-year lease of the castle, and Maitland’s people will take over the refurbishment at their expense. Brodie Castle will become a state of the art business conference destination, surrounded by scenery, history, sights to see, salmon rivers to fish, world-class golf courses, and locals needing decent employment.

  “Jeannie will sit on the board of directors,” he went on, “to deal with the local council, and to explain all things Scottish to Maitland and his investors. When she’s had enough of that frolic, another family member will succeed her. She’s pleased to be able to see the project through, in fact.”

  Elias was pleased with this arrangement too.

  While Violet couldn’t quite grasp what he’d done. “You let your castle go?”

  “I still own that castle, but I found it a patron, so to speak, for my lifetime and beyond. A century is nothing in the life of a castle, and Maitland’s people will make money on the arrangement. Aberdeen has a great deal of wealth, much of it American. Maitland will know how to finish out the castle so the Americans leave as much of their money in his hands as possible. Dunstan, for once, could find no fault with my plans.”

  “You like that too, having out-smarted your cousin.” Violet liked this plan—liked it a lot.

  Elias draped an arm across her shoulder. “I liked sending Maitland packing. I liked finding a means to fit out the castle that didn’t deplete family resources. I love, however, being able to look you in the eye, and ask if you’d like to put our parcels of land together, and do some agricultural preservation with me.”

  Oh, that sounded wonderful, but not wonderful enough. “Are you hiring me to manage your farm, Elias?”

  A second muscular arm draped itself across Violet’s shoulders. “I offer no coin, though coin will come along. I offer myself, Violet, as a partner in all things. I love Scotland, and it will always be the land of my birth. I love you more. You are my home. There will be travel, and complications, and frustrations, I know, but if you marry me, no difficulty will be insurmountable, no problem too great.”

  Violet looped her arms around Elias’s waist. The sporran prevented her from getting as close as she wanted to, so she pushed it aside.

  “Yes, Elias Brodie. I will marry you. I will manage your farm—our farms—and travel with you, and face the difficulties. I would love to see your castle, meet your family, and invite them to come see us. I would love…” She swallowed past a lump bigger than all of Damson Valley. “I love you. I love you, I love you… Elias…”

  They held each other for long, lovely minutes, until Jane came barging back in.

  “I need my chocolate,” she said, “and Dunstan was too polite to interrupt you. Elias, I hope you have honorable intentions toward Violet, or I’ll have to ask Dunstan and his fists to have a word with you.”

  “We have honorable intentions toward each other,” Violet said, remaining in Elias’s embrace. “You’ll be my maid of honor, right Jane?”

  “Depends,” Jane said, popping a chocolate kiss in her mouth as Dunstan joined them. “If you’re getting married soon, then yes, because I won’t be much farther along. If you’re going to drag your feet and spend months planning the wedding, then no. Your godchild is on the way, in case you’d forgotten.”

  Elias kissed Violet, a question in his eyes.

  “The wedding will be soon,” Violet said. “The wedding will be very, very soon.”

  Epilogue

  * * *

  “If I weren’t already married,” Elias said, “this is exactly the sort of place I’d love to say my vows.”

  In fact, the image on the computer screen was where he and Violet had said theirs vows, but a version of Castle Brodie as it might have been in the first earl’s day. Roses vined up the walls of the bailey, heather grew in thriving beds along the walks, windows sparkled in the Highland sun, and pots of blue and white pansies lined the front steps.

  Elias had the odd thought that Auld Michael and his Brenna would have recognized this version of the castle as their own too.

  “Maitland has a surprising eye for details,” Violet said, peering over Elias’s shoulder at the mock-up. “But then, he’s a developer.”

  “Or he’s listening to Jeannie,” Elias suggested, pulling Violet into his lap. “Are you ready to argue with me about the bees and the lavender?”

  “If you’re ready to argue with me about the milkweed.”

  They argued a lot. Violet was cautious and practical, Elias had the exuberant creativity of the tyro. He understood business, and he understood hard work, but Violet understood the land. Learning how to put all that together would take them a lifetime, and the journey was off to a delightful start.

  “We could compromise instead of arguing,” Elias said. “We have more than a thousand acres to bargain with. You give me five acres for lavender, and I wo
n’t fuss over planting milkweed in all the hedgerows.”

  The milkweed was for the monarch butterflies, the lavender was for Zebedee, who’d been right about more than Elias had been willing to admit.

  “Milkweed seeds are not cheap,” Violet said.

  “Neither will it be cheap to develop rain resistant lavender,” Elias said, “but think of all the gardens and gardeners who will benefit. Think of the marvelous honey we can sell, and how happy the bees will be.”

  Elias still had corporate clients, but he cyber-consulted for the most part, and could see the day when his focus was entirely on the farms and his family. Violet’s blog and website were growing, and within a year, they’d be selling honey, preserves, spices, and seeds from an online store.

  “I’m happy,” Violet said, kissing Elias’s cheek. “Are you happy?”

  She did this, periodically brought Elias back to earth with simple, direct questions. She also reminded Elias that they had decades to shape their property into the legacy Elias envisioned it becoming. No man knew for certain how long his time on earth would be, but increasingly, Elias was so pleased with his present, his future had ceased to worry him.

  “I’m very happy,” Elias said. “I think Dunstan and Jane are happy to have family in the area too, though if he doesn’t stop introducing me as the resident earl, I will—”

  “You will spoil our godchild rotten,” Violet said. “Marriage must be agreeing with me, because I’ve even spared a thought for Max Maitland. I think he was relieved to get out of the business of ripping up farmland, not that he’ll admit it.”

  Elias sent the computer to sleep and rose with his wife in his arms. “Maitland might have been relieved to get away from yet another housing development, but I don’t think he’s found his rhythm yet in Scotland. Jeannie’s reports are interesting.”

  Wee Henry had taken a shine to Maitland, of all the curiosities.

  “We might have to visit,” Violet said as Elias carried her up the steps. “But only after Jane’s baby has arrived, and the crops are off, and the—Mr. Brodie, where are you taking me?”