Scotsmen Prefer Blondes (Muses of Mayfair) Page 12

  His hands were warm, even through her gloves. They were also hard — but the hardness of a support beam, not a prison wall.

  “What shall we do?” she asked.

  He lifted her hands to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “I’ve thought of an option, but you may not like it.”

  “If you say we should marry, I’ll poison your tea myself.”

  “Bloodthirsty wench — you can be the Borgia to my Caesar and we’ll rule the world together,” he said, the grin on his face and his mixed time periods drawing out her laugh.

  “I rather fancied myself a Scheherazade.”

  “The power behind the throne? Or do you intend to tell me stories until I free you?”

  “Both,” she said, twining her fingers through his.

  “A thousand and one nights,” he mused. “And here I thought I could only ask you for one.”

  “One night for what?”

  He kissed her fingers again. “One night to exorcise the passion between us. If you still want to leave at the end of it, then I’ll cry off. But I wager one night won’t satisfy us.”

  She pulled away. “You’re mad.”

  “Not mad, brilliant.”

  “Mad,” she emphasized. “Mad to want me, mad to even suggest this. You’ve already seen my passion. But you’ve said yourself you need propriety.”

  “Propriety can hang. And you’re more proper than you claim you are.”

  The lingering heat of his touch felt like a brand on her ink-stained fingers. If he knew of her writing, he would never find her proper again.

  “I’m not proper, Malcolm. I’m really not.”

  “Does this have something to do with The Unconquered Heiress?” he asked.

  The floor dropped out from under her. He sounded curious, not angry — but how could he only be curious, if he knew what she had done? Had Ferguson spilled her secret?

  “Did Ferguson tell you about that?” she asked.

  “He only said I should ask you about it. The heroine does seem to resemble you.”

  She tried to keep her voice steady. “It’s a satire of the ton. Why someone chose to make me the heroine, I don’t know.”

  His face was still open, trusting. “I know why. You have more personality than any woman I know — in the book, you leap off the page.”

  His praise sent a swift jolt of satisfaction through her, but she couldn’t acknowledge it. “You read the book?”

  “Hasn’t everyone?” he asked. “So if you are holding out on marrying me because of whatever the truth is about what happened between you and Lord Kessel, you should know I don’t care at all.”

  In the book, Lord Grandison, the character she’d modeled after Kessel, killed his first wife, then abducted the heroine and tried to force her into a marriage. It was a darker version of real life — Kessel’s wife had died in childbirth, but he had not been subtle in his attempts to gain Amelia’s hand. It was only after Alex had prevented Kessel from dragging Amelia onto a balcony at a party that the baron’s “courtship” stopped.

  “Nothing happened with Lord Kessel. He wanted to marry me. I refused. And Alex didn’t try to press me into it, unlike his rather enthusiastic willingness to toss me into a marriage with you at the first sign of trouble.”

  Malcolm’s eyes narrowed. “How close did Kessel come to forcing the issue?”

  “Not close enough that you need to worry,” she said. “I don’t love him, if that’s what concerns you.”

  He snorted. “Unless the writer got your character utterly wrong, I guessed you didn’t love him.”

  “No, that bit’s right. But still, Malcolm, the whole ton knows about it. And they also know I’m headstrong, impulsive, prone to meddling, and all sorts of other unfortunate attributes. Don’t marry me if you don’t want to be saddled with that.”

  They’d stood throughout the conversation, rivals sizing each other up before making the first move — but Amelia saw on Malcolm’s face the moment he decided to go in for the kill.

  “Have you slept with a man in the last three months?” he asked.

  Her jaw dropped. “Of course not.”

  “Good, no cuckoos in my nest. Any secret children? Bigamist marriages? Radical politics?”

  “No.”

  “Gambling debts? Penchant for spirits?”

  “I don’t gamble, and you drink more than I do.”

  He grinned and retrieved his whisky, lifting it in her honor. “Then you’re proper enough for me. Now, will you give me one night?”

  It was a challenge phrased as a request. If she refused, they’d still be at an impasse. Their wedding was only four days away. He seemed perfectly willing to go through with it — which meant her only choices were to cry off herself, or use this night to prove their unsuitability.

  “What will you do with your one night?” she asked.

  “You will need to change your clothes. And trust me.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Amelia took his bait. He had known she would. Her desire for freedom was even stronger than her passion for him — giving her the chance to use the latter to win the former was a challenge she couldn’t refuse.

  While she went upstairs to dress, Malcolm waited in the great hall. He flung himself into one of the chairs at the long, immovable table that had stood on the dais for centuries. The great hall was empty, but in a few days it would host the feast for his wedding.

  He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the coat of arms and crossed swords hanging on the wall above him. His wedding feast was yet another step on the path all his ancestors had taken. With a woman like Prudence, it would have been civil enough. But with Amelia...

  With Amelia, it would be something else entirely. He wouldn’t be able to stay cool with her. Every time she laughed, she unleashed the man he might have been, if the yoke of an earldom hadn’t settled on his shoulders.

  Malcolm swung his feet up and rested them on the table. He needed to stay focused. She was destined to be his wife. And she would remain his wife, even when the passion inevitably cooled and duty took its place.

  But it would be nice if they were happy on their wedding day, even if love was too much to ask.

  And even if love was too much for him to offer. He liked her better than he planned to like his wife. But the deep, soul consuming love that poets wrote about — he couldn’t give her that. He had to save it for his land and remember what mattered most.

  He scowled up at the sword on the wall. He would have preferred to fight his enemy on a battlefield. A decisive battle, ending in one party’s destruction, would be so much easier than fighting the forces currently remaking his country. This shadow war, played out in Parliament and the papers, would take him a lifetime to fight — and he couldn’t let himself be distracted from it.

  But he couldn’t live like a monk, either. If he had to be distracted occasionally, Amelia was the woman he wanted in his bed. And he would prove that she wanted it too. She needed laughter and adventure — not the bleak, boring days of a spinster.

  A moonlit ride and a bit of larceny, previously arranged with Ferguson, would surely appeal to the strong desires she tried so hard to control. Tonight, he would show her everything he could give her.

  And if she took it, he was sure their marriage was one battle he could win.

  * * *

  Watkins was in Amelia’s room, knitting as she normally did while waiting for Amelia to return. But the covers weren’t turned down, and Amelia’s dark blue riding habit hung in place of her nightrail.

  “Are you riding with his lordship?” Watkins asked, jumping up to take Amelia’s shawl.

  “I don’t know what I am doing. He said you knew — that he had arranged it with you before dinner.”

  “Yes, my lady.” Watkins’s cheeks were red. “I hope you don’t overheat in the velvet, but he wanted the darkest habit you own.”

  It was hideously improper. Amelia fidgeted with the cameo at her neck. “No, Watkins.
I should retire.”

  The maid pursed her lips, but she had never been as open with her mistress as the Scottish servants were with Malcolm. It had never occurred to Amelia to ask Watkins’s opinion on anything other than this hairstyle or that reticule, but something — the castle, the wine at dinner, the earl awaiting her favor — made her reckless. “What do you think, Watkins?”

  Watkins dropped one of the riding boots she had started to put away. “I beg your pardon?”

  “What should I do?”

  Watkins paused, weighing her words. “I think it’s romantic, my lady. His lordship seems nice, nicer than most, and you are engaged to him. Wouldn’t it be lovely to sneak away for a ride?”

  The maid’s voice held a wistful note. Amelia felt suddenly, horribly ungrateful. She didn’t want to marry — but her choices were still more numerous than those of most women of any station.

  She couldn’t give her choices away to someone else; life didn’t work like that. But she could make the most of them.

  “Very well. I shall go,” she said.

  Watkins beamed. “I will have you ready in only a few moments, my lady.”

  It took longer than a few moments, but not much. The buttons on her pink silk evening gown were difficult, but Watkins worked quickly to undo them. She helped Amelia into a heavier petticoat, and then Amelia stepped into her full riding skirt. She watched in the mirror as Watkins fastened the gold frog clasps on the military-style riding jacket, wishing she knew why she was dressing for an outing when she had assumed they would stay inside.

  She remained silent as her maid removed her pearl-tipped hairpins and quickly braided her hair. Watkins wrapped the braids around Amelia’s head, securing the braids to her scalp before covering them with a dark blue bonnet. This was all so absurd — and yet, she was so curious about what Malcolm intended that she couldn’t back down, even if she knew it would be safer to evade him.

  After Watkins guided her feet into her riding boots and handed her the black leather gloves, Amelia took her riding crop from the maid’s outstretched hand. “Did the earl have any other instructions for you, Watkins?”

  The maid smiled. “My lord said not to wait, my lady.”

  Outrageous. But their supposed engagement made Watkins think this was a display of love, not a scandal. Perhaps the castle and the MacCabe staff had addled her wits too. Amelia left her to straighten the room, tapping the riding crop against her leg as she walked down the hallway toward the stairs to the great hall. Her thoughts were suspiciously vacant, as though she couldn’t pin any of them down long enough to examine them.

  Perhaps she knew that if she thought for more than a second about what awaited her, she would run. But would she run away from Malcolm? Or would she run to him and demand whatever he offered?

  When she entered the great hall, Malcolm rose from his chair on the dais. As he walked to meet her, his dark greatcoat swirled around him. He hadn’t changed, but the coat over his severe black trousers and Hessian boots matched her dark attire.

  “I was beginning to think you might not come,” he said, taking her arm.

  Her fingers curled lightly over his coat. “I was beginning to think I shouldn’t have. I must say riding was not the entertainment I assumed you were offering.”

  He gave her a cheeky grin as he led her out the doors to a pair of waiting horses, held in place by a yawning groom. “I’m sorry to disappoint your wicked desires, darling.”

  Amelia sniffed, feigning offense even though her grin gave her away. “May I ask what you intend for us to do tonight?”

  Malcolm tossed her up into the saddle, then leapt onto his own horse and gathered his reins. He dismissed the groom and waited until the man had rounded the side of the castle in the direction of the stables before answering her question.

  “I thought you should see more of the estate than you have so far. And there’s no better way to introduce you to it than through one of the oldest traditions in the Highlands.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “Reiving,” he said with dark smile as he dug his heels into the sides of his stallion.

  Malcolm almost reached the top of the steep hill leading down into the village before she managed to nudge her horse forward. From what she knew of Scotland, raiding, or reiving, had been stamped out by the English decades ago. Malcolm was so bound by duty — why would he still practice the sport?

  She didn’t ask, though. Instead, she focused on the fierce, illicit thrill of riding out into the night. The moon was mostly full, and Malcolm held them to a pace that allowed them to see potential obstacles in the dim white light. Stars twinkled in glorious swaths across the sky. She liked London well enough, but she was glad to be away from the gritty soot and endless noise.

  She glanced over at Malcolm. Had every previous MacCabe looked so commanding? With the moon casting a glint in his silver eyes, he looked like he could lead an assault on the gates of hell, smiling in the face of the devil himself.

  Amelia shook her head hard, trying to clear the visions. Her inner thoughts were incorrigible. And she needed to stay focused if she wanted to discover why Malcolm was doing something as out of character as conducting a nighttime raid.

  “Where are we going?” she asked after they passed through the village.

  Malcolm held a finger to his lips. “Quiet,” he whispered. “We will be in enemy territory soon. You can’t risk our necks by talking loudly.”

  “If I promise to whisper, can you tell me where we are going?” she asked.

  “We are stealing sheep.”

  “Why are we stealing sheep?” she asked suspiciously. “Surely you do not need the money.”

  Malcolm chuckled. “It’s not about money. Scots lairds steal from each other for revenge, to send a message, or even to entertain themselves.”

  “Which of these noble goals are we pursuing tonight?” she asked.

  “Revenge, of course. And a bit of entertainment.”

  “Revenge for what?”

  “Someone spoke ill of you. And I’ll have him know I don’t allow such talk about my wife.”

  She frowned. “Who could have spoken ill of me? I haven’t met any of your neighbors.”

  He turned off the road onto a smaller, rutted track. “You have. Our good friend Ferguson insists that you’re a harpy. If he weren’t a duke, perhaps I’d have murdered him for it. Stealing his sheep will have to suffice.”

  Amelia choked back her laugh and lowered her voice. “If I’d known we were stealing from Ferguson, I wouldn’t have even bothered with dinner. We could have gone at once.”

  “You really are a bloodthirsty wench, aren’t you? Maybe not a Borgia, though. You don’t have the subtlety for poisons.”

  “Well, you seem to be more of a general than a politician,” she pointed out. “Neither of us is precisely subtle.”

  They rode for half an hour, overtaking the occasional man walking home from the village. Everyone who greeted Malcolm called him “laird” rather than “my lord” — in this corner of Scotland, at least, the old traditions still held sway. And Malcolm seemed to know something about all of them, as though they were extended family rather than faceless tenants.

  Eventually, they crested a small hill and Malcolm called a halt. A pasture lay next to the track they rode on, stripped nearly bare by the sheep huddled in the center of the enclosure. A low stone fence prevented their escape.

  “Shall we jump it?” she asked.

  Malcolm shook his head. “Not when you’re on a horse you don’t know and with little light to guide you. Wait a minute and I’ll make a gap.”

  If she were a stronger woman, holding true to her plan to stay unwed, she might have taken offense at the sudden protective note in his voice. But the thrill of the escapade was weakening her. She recognized his intention then — this wasn’t about revenge, or entertainment, or sheep. He wanted her to weaken for him.

  But she couldn’t resist an adventure that felt like someth
ing out of one her stories.

  Malcolm slid off his horse to create a gap in the stones. He worked with the ease of a farm hand, piling stones to the side as though he opened and closed fences every day. Amelia wanted the hedonist she sometimes glimpsed in him, but she had to admit that his duties did have some benefits — watching the muscles of his shoulders ripple under his coat as he heaved the rocks aside was far more appealing than listening to some society dandy inhale yet another pinch of snuff.

  When he finished, he jumped onto his horse, gesturing for Amelia to go through the fence ahead of him. She looked out over the dark field. She had seen sheep on her family’s country estate in Lancashire, of course, but she had never tried to herd anything. Stealing sheep from Ferguson entertained her, but even with her enthusiasm, she wouldn’t be a useful partner across any serious distance.

  “Is no one guarding them?” she asked.

  “No. Sheep are turned loose in the summer and someone moves them when they need a new pasture. But there are no serious dangers to the sheep. The wolves disappeared in this area centuries ago.”

  “How far do we have to take them?” she asked. She already envisioned accidentally driving the sheep off a nearby cliff. She didn’t want to inadvertently murder them, even to get revenge on Ferguson.

  Malcolm pointed at a fence in the far corner of the pasture. “This is the very edge of Ferguson’s holdings, where his land abuts ours. If we move them through the fence into our pasture, I’ll send a herdsman tomorrow to retrieve them and take them to the other side of our estate.”

  “Won’t Ferguson be able to steal them back just as easily?” she asked as they rode across the pasture to the opposite fence.

  Malcolm dismounted again and started pulling down a portion of the fence. “Have you met Ferguson?” he said. “He excels at business, but he knows nothing of sheep. He won’t notice they’re gone, and since he failed to mark them, he can’t claim them. If he spent half as much time on his sheep as he does on his wardrobe, he’d be rich.”

  She laughed. Ferguson was rich beyond imagining, but the wealth came from his recent English inheritance, not his mother’s Scottish lands. “I’m surprised you’re friends with the bounder.”