Wild Wicked Scot

by Julia London

  It was quite easy to see that Balhaire was prospering. It made no sense that Arran would jeopardize all that he’d built here to put James Stuart on the throne. What would he have to gain from it? Nothing! He had everything to lose.

  A thought suddenly occurred to Margot. She didn’t need to find proof that he was involved in treason. She had to find proof that he was not.

  And how did one do that?

  The same way, she supposed, one found proof of treason.

  When Margot returned to Balhaire, she was more confused than ever. She was so lost in her own thoughts that when she handed the reins of the horse to a stable boy and walked into the castle, she cared not a whit who saw her or whether they looked at her or not. She felt quite at a loss for what to do now. She hurried upstairs to the rooms next to Arran’s bedchamber and threw open the door—and very nearly startled Nell to death.

  “There you are, milady!” Nell said. “I thought you’d never return. What a day I’ve had! That man has come round again, and he says I’m not to enter the laird’s rooms without invitation. I says, ‘My lady is sharing those rooms, and I guess I’ll enter when she says!’ And he says—”

  “Nell,” Margot said, holding up her hand. “I would like to lie down a bit before supper.”

  “Pardon, milady. Are you unwell?” Nell asked.

  “A bit of a headache. It’s been rather a long day.”

  “Shall I fetch—”

  “No, nothing. I’ll ring for you when I need you.” She backed out of the room, pulling the door closed, and retreated to the master bedchamber. She closed the door carefully behind her, then stood in the middle of the room, her hands on her hips.

  She meant to have a lie down, but her gaze moved to the large chest of drawers. If a man had secrets to keep, he would keep them close. Margot moved hesitantly to the chest of drawers and, with finger and thumb, lifted the drawer pull and pulled it open. The drawer contained shirts. She grimaced as she put her hand beneath them, groping about, hoping to find something. And indeed, her fingers closed around a metal piece; she quickly withdrew it from beneath the shirts and held it up.

  It was a signet ring.

  Margot put it back and shut the drawer.

  She opened the next drawer and found more articles of clothing. A third drawer contained two hunting knives and a pocket watch. She closed that one and then came down to her knees to open a pair of doors at the bottom of the chest. She pulled on one door—it didn’t open. Thinking it was stuck, she gave it a stronger tug. The door came open, and inside, she found nothing but more clothing.

  She stood up and looked toward his dressing room. His study. Of course! She’d forgotten that small circular room on the other side of his dressing room.

  She glanced behind her and stepped into the dimly lit dressing room. She was aware of Arran’s things hanging around her, heavy with his scent. Scuffed boots on the floor. Plaids and coats, buckskins and lawn shirts hung from hooks and in a wardrobe standing open.

  Margot’s fingers trailed against his things as she moved through to his small, private study that adjoined the dressing room, and slowly, carefully turned the door latch. She held her breath, opened the door a fraction and peeked in. She was almost expecting to see him sitting there, his head bent over a ledger, his quill moving quickly across the columns. But the room was empty and the hearth so cold that the acrid smell of old smoke lingered. The only light came through a pair of windows that looked out to the hills.

  Margot stepped in and left the door open so that she might hear if someone entered the master bedchamber. Frankly, it would have been a miracle if she heard anything at all—the sound of her wildly beating heart filled her ears.

  Voices in the hallway caused her heart to stop beating altogether for a moment, and she jerked her gaze over her shoulder, holding perfectly still, straining to listen. The voices passed by—servants, by the sound of it. She glanced up at the mantel clock—it was a quarter past five o’clock. Nell would come in soon to help her dress for dinner. And God knew what Balhaire servant would pop in to ready things for the return of Arran.

  If she was going to look, she had very little time. Margot hurried to his desk and quickly opened two drawers. Nothing. There were only a few items on his desk—the estate ledger and some correspondence that had come from one of the clansmen. She was feeling anxious now and started to leave the room, but noticed a small cabinet set apart from the desk and up against the wall. She leaned over and pulled on the door. It was locked. Margot squatted down beside the door and pulled again, just to be sure. Yes, the door was locked, and her heart began to beat mercilessly against her chest.

  She stood up and looked wildly about for something to pry open the door, but seeing nothing immediately, she remembered the knives in the bedchamber. She swore under her breath, raced across the room to his chest of drawers, retrieved one of the knives and ran back again. She slid the tip of the knife in at the lock and tried to jiggle it open, using both hands to hold the knife and steadying the cabinet with her knee.

  She thought she could feel the doors begin to give when she suddenly heard a ruckus in the corridor.

  “Water to bathe, Fergus! I’ve the dust of the road in my throat and in my ears.”

  Margot gasped almost soundlessly at the sound of Arran’s voice. She hadn’t expected him back until much later.

  “Aye, now,” she heard him reaffirm to a distant voice.

  She stared with horror at the knife in her hand. She sprang to her feet and looked around the small study.

  But there was no place to hide.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ARRAN OPENED THE door to his chamber and barely had time to register Margot’s presence before he was knocked a step backward by the force of her leaping into his arms. “What the devil?” he asked, catching her.

  “I’m so happy you’ve come back!”

  “Did you think I’d deserted you?” He gave her a wry smile as he eased back from her strong hold on his neck.

  Margot answered by taking his face between her hands and kissing him fiercely.

  His blood began to stir, but then the events of the day nudged back into his consciousness. He pulled her arms free of his neck and set her down a few inches from him. “To what do I owe such an enthusiastic welcome?” he asked wryly. And what was she doing, skulking about his chamber at this time of day? She ought to have been in her sitting room or her dressing room. He was suspicious of her—even more so now, having heard what he had in Coigeach—and moved deeper into the room, looking around.

  “I missed you,” she said earnestly. “How was your journey?”

  “Tedious.” That was the most civil thing he could say for what he’d endured today. At a meeting of four Highland chieftains—all of them known Jacobites—Arran had been accused of colluding with the English.

  It was as absurd as it was insulting. He’d been married to Margot for more than three years. As he pointed out to those men, if there was any colluding to be done, any betraying of his fellow Highlanders, would he not have done it when he was actually on speaking terms with her? Instead, he’d spent several years without his wife, working to make Balhaire prosperous so that it might sustain the many Mackenzies who lived there. “I’ve had quite a lot more to occupy me than one man’s claim to the throne, aye?”

  “Aye,” Buchanan said. He was a mountain of a man whose unruly beard was a more fiery-looking ginger than that on his head. “But suppose a man who openly trades with France could earn even more money by keeping the English in his sporran? Would he no’ do so?”

  “And betray his clan and his country?” Arran asked tightly. “I’m no’ a greedy man. I earn what I have—I donna need to betray my land and my people to line my coffers.”

  “And yet ye canna deny that the sudden appearance of Lady Mackenzie is puzzling?
” MacLeary had asked slyly. “Just as we’ve begun to hear rumors of it from England?”

  “What is between me and my wife is none of your affair,” Arran said stiffly. “She’s come to Balhaire with nothing more than a desire to repair the marriage she abandoned.”

  The men had snorted at that. Several remarks were made about a woman’s place. Arran’s blood had boiled, but he’d kept his temper. He was a traditional man in some respects and held certain expectations for any wife of his. But he’d never been one to view a woman as his personal property, and that Margot hadn’t met his expectations could not be helped by him. He could no more put thoughts in her head or force her to a course of action than he could these men.

  “You can understand our concern, Mackenzie,” said Rory Gordon. “Dunn has warned us all that there is talk of forfeiture of our holdings for conspiring with Stuart.”

  “The crown has no legal grounds for it,” Arran argued.

  Buchanan laughed low. “And when have you known the English to mind legalities when on Scottish soil, aye? I take you at your word, Mackenzie. I’ve always known you to be an honest man. No matter how peculiar it seems that your bonny English wife has come back to her marriage bed at a time we are all looking round for the English spy.”

  “I will say it only once more—she’s nothing to do with it,” Arran had said evenly, his temper threatening to erupt. “Say what you will of me, but I’ll call out the next man who says a disparaging word against my wife.”

  “Mayhap the disparaging word should no’ be said against the lady, but her husband,” Gordon said quietly.

  Arran had stood up, spoiling for a good fight. “Say it now, then, lad, and let us resolve it.”

  Gordon had shrugged and kept his seat. The men assembled there had remained silent. But they had eyed Arran with suspicion and had merely nodded when he took his leave of them. He’d thundered back to Balhaire, veering off the main road to Kishorn. There, he met with his cousin Griselda and discussed with her what had happened.

  Griselda, wise to the ways of the Scots, had frowned when Arran explained Margot’s return and MacLeary’s late-night call at Balhaire. “Aye, but she’s trouble, that one.”

  He could not argue Griselda’s suspicions, nor put down his own. “Nevertheless, will you do as I ask, Zelda?”

  “Aye, of course,” she’d said, and had seen him off.

  What to do about Margot, precisely, had plagued Arran on the return to Balhaire, and now here she was, as bonny as ever.

  Arran shrugged out of his coat and dropped it onto a chair. Margot was right behind him, picking it up and dusting it off with her hand. He looked curiously at her.

  “I should not like it to appear unkempt.” She suddenly smiled. “I rode down to the cove today,” she said lightly as she carefully folded his coat.

  Arran furtively looked around the room again. What the devil was she hiding? “Why?” he asked as casually as he might.

  “To take the air.” She leaned back against the chest of drawers, her arms crossed over the folded coat to hold it against her body. He studied her in that casual pose. Margot smiled sweetly.

  He glanced at the coat. “Mrs. Abernathy will want to give that a good cleaning.”

  “Well, then, I will put it away until she returns.”

  “Very well.” He moved to the chest to open one of the drawers for her, but as he reached around her, Margot said, “Actually, it should hang, shouldn’t it? To air it out.” She suddenly let the folds of the coat drop.

  But she’d just folded it.

  She wrinkled her nose at his look of confusion and said, “It smells of dirt.” She whirled about and walked into his dressing room. He heard her within, hanging the coat. She returned, strolling into the room with her hands at her back.

  Arran stood where he was, studying her. “You were never interested in riding or tidying things, aye? What other things have you a sudden desire to do?”

  She blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “Exactly what I asked.”

  Pink was slowly settling into her cheeks. “Nothing.”

  Diah, she was a horrible liar. “Nothing,” he repeated dubiously as he walked into his dressing room.

  He picked up a fresh coat and returned to the main chamber. His wife was leaning against the chest again, and now she was studying a fingernail. “Your friends are still here,” he said.

  She looked up, her expression almost hopeful. “My friends?”

  “The two fops who saw you here. How long will they be our guests, then? Or do they wait for you?”

  The hopefulness bled from her face. “For me? No.” She shook her head. “Frankly, I don’t know why they’ve remained. I hardly need an escort now that I have been safely delivered to Balhaire. My father is overly cautious.”

  One corner of Arran’s mouth tipped up in a wry smile. “Is he? I never thought him so. In fact, he seemed a wee bit incautious to me, making deals with Scots and God knows who else.” He looked at her pointedly. “Is that no’ so?”

  She shrugged. “I really wouldn’t know. My father is not in the habit of informing me whom he deals with. Quite the opposite, really. Unless, of course, he insists I marry one of them.” She arched a brow.

  “Then...you donna know anything you want to tell me?” he asked as he sat on the edge of the bed to remove his boots.

  Margot suddenly moved and knelt before him. “I don’t know what business my father has, if that’s what you’re asking.” She lifted his foot.

  “What is this?” he asked as she tugged on his boot to remove it. “Now you are removing my boots?”

  “Do you believe I have changed?”

  “No,” he said flatly. “What I believe is that a kelpie took my wife and now comes to me in her form.”

  Margot smiled. “I don’t know what a kelpie is,” she said, and yanked his second boot harder than the first. “But I am sincere.” She put his boots aside.

  “Mmm,” he said. “Well, then, leannan, now that you’ve done your wifely duty, you may retire to your dressing room. I mean to have a bath and dine in my rooms tonight.”

  “Then I’ll join you—”

  “I’d rather you no’,” he interjected. “I’m bloody well worn from the road.”

  Her brows dipped slightly. “But I thought—”

  “No, Margot. I’m tired, aye? I donna want to listen to a lot of nattering and questions tonight. Diah, I had enough of it today.”

  “Nattering!” she said. “I see.” She stood gracefully and walked to the door. He thought she would continue on through the door in a huff now that he’d made his wishes known, but instead, she yanked the bellpull so hard it was a wonder it didn’t pull free. She stood, her arms crossed tightly over her trim middle, glaring at him as her fingers drummed against her arm.

  “Off with you,” he said, and gestured to the door.

  The door swung open and a lad entered. He bowed to Arran, then to Margot, who never took her eyes from Arran as she spoke. “Please tell Fergus that after the laird has bathed, he will dine in private. Quite alone and at his leisure.”

  “Aye, mu’um.”

  “And then please do send my maid to my sitting room.”

  The lad nodded and darted out.

  Arran arched a brow at Margot. “Well, then? I know you heard me plainly, so I canna guess why you still stand there.”

  “Oh, yes, I heard you, Arran. But I’m not ready to take my leave of you just yet. I’m your wife. I’m the mistress of Balhaire, and I have a say. And moreover, you really must forgive me!”

  He shook his head. “For disobeying me?”

  “For leaving you!”

  An unexpected surge of pain shot through him. He thought of that day, of watching that chaise roll away from Balhaire, and how he�
�d felt a small part of him harden and die. The assumption that he should forgive her for having left him, or that she could demand it of him, rankled. He slowly rose to his feet and walked to where she stood. He slid his hand to the side of her neck and held her firmly so that she could not look away. “No one commands me, madam,” he said low. “Least of all you. I donna have to forgive you. I donna have to keep you. So mind your fool tongue before I throw you out on your arse, aye?”

  Once again, he expected her to flee—in tears, naturally—but Margot merely tilted her head to one side and said, “Is there more? Or is that all you have to say?”

  “Woman, donna push me. You’ll take your leave now,” he growled, and let go of her neck before he did something foolish...like kiss her as he was suddenly burning to do. “I am but a wee moment from tossing you,” he warned her.

  She smiled. But she turned to the door. “I’ll see that your bath is made ready,” she said, and yanked open the door, then walked through without shutting it behind her or looking back.

  Arran watched her go, the confident sway of her hips, her regal bearing. Damn her.

  * * *

  ARRAN EMERGED FROM his dressing room sometime later, with letters and bills of lading to attend. But he halted in his bedchamber, confused to find that a small table had been moved to the windows, which had been opened to a cool evening breeze.

  “What is this?” he asked Fergus, who was lighting the candles in a silver candelabra.

  “Lady Mackenzie,” Fergus said simply, frowning. He poured wine into a crystal goblet.

  Arran had forgotten the crystal goblets even existed. He’d brought them from Antwerp a year or so ago and had them put in the stores. Now he groaned at the sight of them. “I said I would dine alone. I donna want a fancy table in my chamber, aye? Does no one heed me?”

  Fergus paused in his task and looked up. “The lady...insisted,” he said, searching for the appropriate word.

  “Diah,” Arran muttered, and accepted the goblet from Fergus. “All right, then, you’ve made me king. Now go on about your business and, for the love of Scotland, leave me be, aye?”