by Lauren Smith
He thought back to the arguments he had had with Tate, who’d insisted on handling the majority of the paperwork and the accounts, just as his father had. Brock didn’t want to admit that it was possible. Tate’s behavior of late had been cold and secretive.
“I wonder…” He stroked his jaw thoughtfully.
“We need to find the books to be absolutely sure. They weren’t in your study.” Joanna started to stand, but Brock caught her wrist and pulled her back down.
“Eat first, lass. Then we can investigate.”
She needed to regain her strength and wouldn’t do so without eating. Only when Joanna cheekily flashed him her empty plate did he let her stand up.
“Can you dress yourself? Or do you need help?” He meant the question innocently, but when she fluttered her lashes at him, he suddenly had other thoughts.
“If you assist me, I rather think I’ll end up with no clothes on at all.” She laughed sweetly, and it made his chest tighten, and he found himself smiling for the first time in days.
“Why don’t you go change? I want to have a word with Mr. Tate. Then I’ll have the coach prepared.”
The heat in her eyes dimmed a little, and she nodded in understanding. He headed to his study, not surprised to find Tate already there.
“My lord?” The older man rose to his feet and glanced over Brock’s shoulder as though expecting someone. Joanna, perhaps? Brock kept firm control of his temper and his emotions. He had to let Tate keep thinking he wasn’t suspected of anything. Not yet. There had been no more attempts on Joanna’s life, but he needed Tate safely away so he could be sure while he investigated the estate account books.
“Tate, my wife has accounts with some Scottish banks. I would like you to go and make some withdrawals for me. I believe you’ll need to take some signed letters to Edinburgh to begin the process. I’ll have them ready this evening. Would that be all right?”
Tate swallowed audibly. “You wish for me to leave?”
“To retrieve some of my wife’s money, yes. She has a trust, you see, and you need a letter from her asking for a withdrawal.”
“But shouldn’t I stay and help you here? What with Lady Kincade falling ill…” Tate’s hesitancy only made his guilt seem more likely, but Brock kept calm.
“We will manage for a few days without you. You may hire a coach and stay at an inn along the way.” Brock opened a drawer in his desk and retrieved a pack of banknotes he’d tucked away for emergencies and necessities. He thumbed several off the top, at least fifty pounds, far more than was needed, and gave the money to Tate. Tate’s hands folded over the slim slips of currency.
“Very well, my lord. When should I leave?”
“This evening should do. When you return, we’ll have much to do.” Brock clapped him on the shoulder, perhaps a little too hard.
“Thank you,” Tate said before Brock turned and left. He went to the stables and called for the groom to ready his coach. It required some service, but it would do. He was not going to let Joanna leave his side until he was positive that she was feeling like herself again.
And in the meantime, he would figure out what exactly Tate was up to and why.
21
Joanna climbed out of the coach and looked about the village. It was only three miles from Castle Kincade, and it was larger than she expected. There was a milliner’s, a modiste, a blacksmith shop, a bookstore, and a market with quite a few inns. Boxes full of brightly colored flowers sat just beneath every window. Purple florets bloomed from Scottish thistles mixed with the red bog myrtles, Scottish bluebells, and the bright-yellow gorse blooms.
Brock noticed her studying the flower boxes as they passed by a window full of their fragrant scents.
“They keep the midges away.” He chuckled and nodded to the bog myrtle.
“Midges?” Joanna hadn’t heard the term before.
“Aye, you were lucky not to have seen a cloud of them yesterday while we rode. Wee biting beasties.”
“They’re insects?” She cringed, not liking the idea of a cloud of tiny insects swarming her at all.
“They aren’t everywhere, mainly around the livestock and in the fields far from towns. The females are the ones that bite you. Bog myrtle has a honeyed scent, which confuses them. They canna smell a person whilst they’re near this plant. The Kincade gardens are full of it, so you needna worry about feeding the midges, lass.” He winked, and Joanna gently poked a finger in his ribs to tease him back.
“This is a lively town,” she admitted, surprised to see the bustle of people and the relative quality of the buildings. She’d expected it to be more rustic, but it was far more like a small city than a village.
“Farmers come here to sell livestock, make breeding arrangements for their horses, or to buy whatever else they need. And since it’s near a trade route, you have others stopping by on their way north or south.” Brock offered her his arm as she gazed up at him. He was taller than most men and cut a striking figure among the men and women walking down the row of shops.
“It’s a darling place.” She smiled at a little girl who held her mother’s hand as they passed Brock and Joanna. The little girl waved a chubby arm at her.
“I suppose it’s small and rustic compared to what you’re used to,” he said with a hint of concern.
“I rather like it. To be honest, I never really was fond of the bustle of life in London or Bath,” Joanna said softly. “I much preferred Hampshire but we rarely stayed in the countryside.”
“Oh?” Brock paused in front of the milliner’s shop, and she joined him at the window, gazing at the fancy hats resting on pedestals in the window. The poke bonnets with delicate lace, the shining satin ribbons, the intricate embroidery. They were just as well made as English ones.
“Well, I never really cared for all the balls and the dinners—or the gossip.” They started walking again and paused only when they reached the bookshop. “I miss the dancing, I suppose. But being here… Things feel real.” She laughed a little, knowing she sounded like a fool. “That doesn’t make much sense, does it?”
Brock leaned against her from behind as she opened the bookshop door, and the press of his warm body made her burn with hunger. Yet she yearned for other, deeper things as well.
They entered the shop together, the musty smell of the books a comfort she had missed. The scent brought back memories of her curled up in bed, reading late into the night by candlelight, or the sunny afternoons in the gardens where she read until she drifted to sleep on a blanket beneath a tree, only to wake when she heard the steady hum of a fat bumblebee exploring a nearby flower. Reading had become a way for her to lose herself and forget the sorrows and the worries of her day. But now reading was a bridge between her and her husband. It was a way for them to find each other.
“I think it makes perfect sense,” Brock said as they walked down an aisle. “But you don’t have to give up dancing. I’m fond of it myself.” He shot her a cocksure grin. “I’ll even teach you cèilidh dancing.”
She looked up at him, wanting to ask a question that had been on her mind since they had danced over a week ago. “How did you become such a good dancer?”
His lips twitched. “Shocked to find a barbarian Scot has more skill than those English popinjays?”
“Well, yes, exactly. Although I would never call you barbaric,” she answered with a smile.
“Oh no? What would you call me, then?” He cornered her against the nearest bookshelf, and her body lit up with fresh desire. What was it about bookshelves that seemed to turn her and Brock into primitive creatures only focused on making love?
“Er…” She tapped her index finger on her chin, pretending to think. He curled one hand around her waist and leaned in, lowering his head, almost kissing her. “Exquisite, intense, brooding…sweet, protective, thoughtful.” There were a dozen words she could put to him that would tell the story of what sort of man he was. But even those words were only the beginning.
�
�Is that all?”
“I’ve only started…”
He moved a hair’s breadth closer, and she knew the inevitable kiss would be worth the wait. The pull between them in that breathless instant before their mouths met was magnetic, an ancient force as old as the moon and tides. Her pulse skittered, and she closed her eyes. The heady sensation of his searching lips made her exhale in quiet joy. When he kissed her like this, it felt like the first caress of the morning sunlight when she pulled back the bed-curtains after a long, dark night in bed.
The kiss slowly burned her at the edges, making her feel alive. The warmth of his mouth welcomed her tongue as the kiss deepened. His hand on her waist tightened, yet he didn’t do anything more than kiss her, albeit most sinfully. If she’d dared to do this in London or Bath, even with her husband, the scandal would have spread within hours, but here in this beautiful rustic village in a musty little bookshop, warm with summer sunlight…it seemed right.
It was perfect. He was perfect. And he was all hers. The swell of joy inside Joanna was unstoppable. She smiled against his lips, her lungs filling with laughter, and it made him smile as well when their lips broke apart.
“What is it?” he asked, still smiling as he pressed his forehead to hers.
“You…this… I’m so happy, Brock. I wish…I wish you could feel my joy.” She meant that with every breath inside her. She would have given anything for him to feel what she was feeling.
He played with a loose strand of her hair around one of his fingers “I feel it too, lass. I was worried about bringing an English lady to my home. It isna like the life you’re used to. I feared you would come to hate it—and me.” He whispered his confession, and it fractured her heart with fine splintering cracks.
Hate this man? Her warrior? Her protector? Her Scottish lord? She saw so much of his people’s past in him, the nobility of the soul that sometimes vanished from the men and women in English ballrooms. Here with him, she saw the people of Scotland and the ghosts of Culloden in his gaze. Yet he held no hatred toward her, no fury, only a plea for her to see. To understand. To love. To love the man he was and the place he called home.
I love him. I love him, and it cannot be undone. Come what may, he owns my heart, now and always.
“I love this place…and…” She held her breath before adding, “And I love you, Brock, my fierce badger.”
His gaze softened in a way that made her melt into him. There were some smiles that existed in a secret place in one’s heart, smiles that came to the surface only during moments of the purest joy. In that moment, she’d won such a smile from Brock, a smile that she wanted to burn forever into her memory.
“Oh, my sweet lass. I wish I could buy every book in the store for you.”
He didn’t say it, didn’t tell her that he loved her, but he hadn’t shied away, hadn’t denied her feelings. That at least was a start.
“Let me buy you books instead.” She reached for the first title she could find behind him. When she lifted it up, the gilded letters on the spine flashed in the sunlight.
“The Lady of the Lake by Sir Walter Scott. He’s one of us,” Brock declared proudly.
“You know it?” she asked.
“I do.” His gaze turned distant as he began to recite from memory.
Aloft, the ash and warrior oak,
Cast anchor in the rifted rock;
And, higher yet, the pine tree hung
His shattered trunk, and frequent flung,
Where seem’d the cliffs to meet on high,
His boughs athwart the narrowed sky.
Highest of all, where white peaks glanced,
Where glistening streamers waved and danced,
The wanderer’s eye could barely view
The summer heaven’s delicious blue,
So wondrous and wild, the whole might seem
The scenery of a fairy dream.
He finished his words by brushing the backs of his knuckles over her cheek, and she trembled with a force of affection for him that was so strong it made her knees buckle.
If she had not already been so in love with him, his recitation of poetry would have done it. She was hopelessly in love with her Scot. This man who only ever touched her with kindness and passion. His tenderness was infinite, and it filled her with endless wonder and fascination.
“We must take this one, then,” she replied, blushing. He moved away a little and took the book, adoration in his eyes as he gazed at the spine.
“Any others?” Joanna asked him.
“Books? I’ve near read them all.” He laughed, the sound washing over her like rich brandy.
“Your favorites, then? We must have those.”
“Ach, but I want to know your favorites,” he said earnestly. “You choose the next one. And then I will do the one after that. We shall have a library built upon our favorites.”
For the next hour, she and Brock shared books and stories as they piled a massive stack on the counter for the owner to box up. The books would not all fit into the coach, so they would have to be delivered to the castle in a few days. Joanna snuck a few of their favorites into a small parcel and tucked it into the coach before they continued shopping.
After the bookshop, they bought some clothes at the modiste. Brock was insistent that she try on several dresses, and it took her an hour to realize he liked watching her face flush whenever she emerged from the curtain wearing something new. He insisted she buy a few of the ready-made gowns and order a few more to be made, particularly a riding habit. At one point, she saw him speak quietly with the modiste, a middle-aged Scottish woman named Agnes who blushed violently.
“What did you say to her?” Joanna asked as they arranged for the order to be placed on his account.
“That you needed a pair of breeches. ’Twill be much better for you to ride that way.”
“Breeches?” Joanna laughed, remembering his earlier comment that he would love to see her in them.
“I canna have my wife showing her pretty bare legs to all the men as we ride about, and I willna let my wife ride on a bloody sidesaddle. You canna enjoy riding when your spine is all twisted and you can barely stay on.”
She didn’t argue with him on that. The last few days she’d gotten so much more comfortable riding, both because of him and riding astride, that she would have dreaded going back to riding sedately on a sidesaddle. She would never be able to gallop or jump or do anything fun.
“Where would you like to go now?”
She studied the shops around them and saw one that carried toys in the window.
“That one!”
Brock followed her into the shop, which sold a mix of toys, lovely woven tartan shawls, and jewelry. She studied the dolls carefully, trying to imagine little Elsbeth holding something new and beautiful rather than the rag she’d been carrying about. Then she found a set of toy soldiers for Camden and some for the other boys from the other tenant families.
“Do you think they’ll like them?” She gestured to the large pile of dolls and other toys. She’d perhaps run a bit wild in the shop, but the thought of the children of the tenants having new toys to play with was incredibly important. It would give them some joy while they faced the hard times ahead until she and Brock could arrange for better housing and turn the crop yield higher.
“Aye, lass, you’ve too big a heart.” His rough voice matched the sweet fire in his eyes as he pulled her to him in a kiss that made the shopkeeper grumble and look away.
It was nightfall when they finished their shopping and stopped by an inn for dinner. The inn’s common room was full of men and a few ladies. A hush fell upon the crowd as Brock led her to one of the empty tables. Joanna felt a sudden tension thicken the air around them. Hard stares and dark-edged mutterings from some of the meaner-looking men made the hairs on the back of her neck rise.
“Pay them no mind, lass,” Brock said as he shot a fierce glare back at the men.
She couldn’t help but wonder what was
happening. During their shopping, none of the people had seemed upset, yet here they were. Why?
A tavern maid brought them two glasses of wine and two plates of beef stew and bread. Joanna enjoyed the simple fare, despite her worries about the tension around them. Brock ate silently, his congenial mood gone, and that only worried her more. They paid for their meal and headed outside, where she waited for him to have their coach readied.
A tall man, a little leaner than Brock, came outside behind her and walked down the side of the inn. He glanced at her once before he vanished around the corner. A voice rose up inside her, whispering for her to take care. She had always listened to that instinct whenever it made itself known.
She kept a vigilant watch as a dozen other men exited the inn and followed the first man around the corner. All of them quite clearly looked at her—this was not some casual glance. Trouble was brewing. She just didn’t know yet how it would manifest itself.
When Brock returned with the coach, she mentioned the men and her concerns. He pulled her onto his lap in the coach and kissed her.
“Dinna worry, lass. ’Tis nothing, I am sure.” When he set her down on the seat beside him, she saw him touch his boot, and she remembered after so many days of traveling with him on the road that he kept a slim dagger there.
They were halfway home when Joanna heard rolling thunder. Only it wasn’t truly thunder, but a herd of horses. Someone was following them.
Brock said with a growl, “Lass, I need you to remain calm and stay inside this coach. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she whispered, but her voice betrayed her, breaking on the single word.
Someone outside shouted in Gaelic, and the coach jerked to a sudden stop. If Joanna hadn’t been prepared, she would’ve been thrown forward into the wall opposite her. Brock slipped the knife from his boot, the blade gleaming in the moonlight as he opened the coach door and leapt out, leaving her alone. She heard their coach driver shout, and the sound was muffled a second later. Fear shredded her nerves, and she bit her lip, listening in the darkness.