"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" she cried out and shot to her feet, spinning to face him with annoyance well writ on her features. "You gave me a fright!"
If Blane had been entranced by her before, he was struck dumb now.
God in heaven.
Her eyes were like the veriest sea, whipped foam green and bright. Looking into her eyes was like staring into another world, a world of fairies where magic was possible. He cleared his throat again and forced himself to speak and not act like a besotted boy.
"What are you doing in here?" he asked, although it was damn obvious.
She looked down at the bath and looked at him with a frown, as she though doubted his common sense.
"That is to say, where is Una? She is the one who usually tends to my chambers." Una was ancient and sweet, a woman who had been in the castle for years and who Blane had known since he was a boy. She often left sweets for him on his pillow as if he were still a child.
"I dinnae know this Una person," the angel said. "But this is my duty now, to see to your chambers. I am new to the castle."
Aye, because surely if she had been anywhere at all in Campbell Castle before, surely he would have seen her. Blane continued staring at her, but when she only returned his gaze, rebellious and unafraid, he had to smile.
"I'm sorry, lass. I dinnae mean to interrupt your duties."
"Verra well." She nodded quickly, turned and walked out of his rooms with the bucket clenched in one fist. Her soft shoes squelched with water with every step.
When she disappeared, he released a hot and slow breath, and also released the control over his body he had kept while in her presence. When she turned to him, he realized she was not as young as he thought, but she was still young. And too old to be tending to his chambers. Were they trying to throw her to him like a lamb to the slaughter?
He scoffed; likely they knew he was too honorable of a man to interfere with the women in the castle who did not want him, still... He tumbled back to the moment when the water splashed over her face and throat, dowsing the front of her dress and making the material cling to her skin. She was beautiful, and more alluring than any of the women he had seen in a long time, possibly ever.
He dropped his gloves on the table and began to strip off his clothes, making a mental note to ask about the girl when he had the next opportunity.
***
The chance came sooner than Blane thought it would. Barely an hour later, he left his rooms after his bath, his sore muscles soothed by the hot water, and made his way toward the kitchens. He was hungry but did not feel like waiting for one of the maids to bring his meal to him.
He strode down the castle's winding hallways, half-expecting to see the green-eyed angel again. But he was disappointed at every turn of his path.
"There you are, Blane."
His mother’s voice called out to him from behind, and he waited for her to catch up. She was loveliness itself with her thick red hair twisted down her back in a fetching braid. He watched her grace as she approached him, wondering again for the thousandth time how it was that both his father and his uncle had loved her. If he were to be honest with himself, he could see that she would suit his uncle better, her ambition and sporadic cruelty that his father clearly saw and sometimes wondered aloud at.
"Mother." He greeted her with a respectful bow. "How are you this morn?"
"Fine enough." She shrugged off his inquiry with a pretty motion of her shoulder and came abreast of him. He continued walking but took shorter strides so she could keep up with him. "I wanted to talk with you about Effie," she said.
Blane kept his face carefully blank. Effie was the daughter of Conall Ferguson, a minor lord with little property, and from the chiefless Clan McFarlane. She was a fine enough girl but, though blonde and blue-eyed instead of red haired with amber eyes, she reminded him too much of his mother for comfort.
"What of her?" he asked.
"You know that I think you and she would make a fine match,” his mother said with an annoyed twist of her mouth. “She is very beautiful and would make lovely grandchildren with you for me to love."
"I dinnae think of her that way, mother, and well you know it." Blane wasn't yet ready to marry. So far, no woman had caught his eye, although he briefly thought of the girl who had been in his chambers yet an hour before.
"You can grow to like her in that manner," his mother pressed. "When I first met your father, I dinnae see him in that way either. Your uncle and I already had an agreement but we..." She paused in a way that seemed significant to Blane. He had heard versions of this story since he came of age, how his mother had not meant to be with his father, but circumstances made them mates in life when she would have chosen differently. Namely, if his uncle Duff had been made Clan Chief. She had chosen the winner of that battle, 'twas not the winner who had chosen her. "...well," she tapered off without finishing her tale. "Let me simply say life does not always give us the gifts we desire."
"Perhaps.” He nodded thoughtfully although he did not agree with her. Unlike his father, he did not want a gift meant for another. "Thank you for giving me something to think on," he said, instead of continuing his objection to her interference in his future. He thought again of the young lass who had been in his rooms and the fire that flashed so temptingly in her eyes.
“Good.” His mother went on. “That’s all I ask, for you to think about Effie Ferguson as your future bride. A girl such as that would fit right in here at Campbell castle.”
Blane nodded and pretended to listen but the more his mother went on about Effie, the more he thought of the young lass who’d knelt so beautifully in his rooms. He wanted to know more about her, starting with her name, and his mother was just the person to give him the information.
From lifelong experience with his mother, he knew that to find out a thing from her, one had to come at it aslant. He linked his hands behind his back and walked slowly at her side, and listened patiently while she enumerated all of Effie's glorious qualities.
"That's very nice mother." She made the girl sound like a brood mare he was reluctant to buy but could be talked into taking on a trial basis. "I'll consider everything you've said."
"Thank you." She patted his arm.
By then, they had made it to the kitchens. The smell of the morning meal, still fresh, lingered in the air and made his stomach rumble. But he had a more important hunger to fulfill.
"By the way, mother, what happened to Una? I expected her to be in my chambers today."
His mother made a dismissive motion. "Oh, she has decided to take the retirement your father offered. She is now with her grandchildren in a little cottage in the village. Your father spent far too much money setting her up there, but you know how he is with his pets."
Pets. Una had kept Blane company when, as an only child and too high born to play with according to the other children, he had been lonely. As much as she spoiled him like one of her own children, he also thought of her as a friend.
He tightened his jaw instead of uttering the reprimand he had no place giving. Despite her rudeness, she was his lady mother, after all. "So, who will be the maid to my chambers now?"
"Oh, 'tis some child. The youngest whelp of Duncan and Bethia Greer. They traded her to us so they could keep their land. She is of little use in the kitchen being so young." The clang and noises of the kitchen sounded around them and the delicious smells rose up and tempted Blane with the reason he was there in the first place. But he had a more important purpose.
"If she is too young for the kitchen, why is she not too young to be my chambermaid?"
"She will do fine with you," she said with another careless wave of her hand. "You have few enough demands, and this way she will ease into the responsibilities of the castle. She is eighteen years old, not so very young. Pretty enough to lure a good and useful man to the castle a bit later on though." Her eyes swept over him, considering, and Blane saw something in her that surprised him. Envy.
The girl was very
beautiful. Anyone with eyes could see that. And although his mother was far from ugly, her youth was long behind her. "I know you will leave her to her duties, unlike some in this castle." She didn't have to name his uncle Duff for Blane to know what she alluded to.
Like Blane's father, Duff was still in the prime of his manhood, virile and with tremendous appetites. But unlike his father, Duff often planted his seed where it was not wanted. Blane and his father had tried to prevent more of that foolishness from happening, but Duff was sneaky. If he was determined to have his way with whatever unfortunate woman was in his path, God help her.
"I see," Blane said. "Well, I will keep that in mind in case I see certain persons hovering around my rooms without apparent purpose.”
"Good." His mother patted his arm again. "Now, go and eat something, dear boy. I swear the entire castle can hear the rumbling in your stomach." She raised up on her tiptoes to kiss him, and Blane swept her up into his arms with true affection. She may have been a flawed woman, but she was his mother, and he truly loved her. As he was sure that she loved him.
"Very well, my lady mother," he said once he released her to fall solidly back onto her feet. "After I leave here, I will go off with my man to check on the tenants in the south. Send word if you need me."
"Of course." Then she swept out of the kitchen, the gold threads in her gown catching the light falling through the windows.
Blane watched her for a moment and thought of her words about life and unfulfilled desires.
Had she ever loved his father? Or Duff?
And if love was something neither of his parents had known, did that mean Blane would never have that in his own life?
With an aggrieved sigh, he shook away those thoughts that belonged in the ruminating hours of dusk or dawn, and went to find the cook, Mrs. Harris.
He found her with a platter of breakfast already made for him and tucked near the fire to keep warm. She fussed and teased him, piling even more meat and cheese on the platter when he told her how far he’d ridden that morning.
“You need food to keep yourself strong,” she laughed, squeezing his muscled arm in a way that set the younger kitchen maids giggling.
With Mrs. Harris chattering away with him and the young children who spent the day helping out in the kitchen, Blane ate his breakfast and laughed with them, talked with them. While he sat and ate and enjoyed their boisterous company, he was still very aware that the kitchen servants had likely been listening closely to the conversation he’d had with his mother and that they likely knew even more than Lady Davina about what was going on in the castle.
Blane gave an internal shrug about it all. There was nothing he’d said that was secret. The only thing he did not want known, at least not yet, was his interest in the wee Greer lass. She was young, and mayhap already tired of the lords of Campbell Castle trying to get her into bed. He well remembered her fiery words and stormy eyes. And hoped that she was at least a little interested in getting to know him a little better, no matter what dangers his uncle had already tried to put her in.
Chapter 2
Even the next day, Blane still couldn't get the angel from his chamber out of his mind. Despite the fact that she was supposed to be his new chambermaid, she hadn't come back to his rooms while he was there. But things had been tidied, his clothes laundered and neatly put away. Even the evening fire was well tended and had not been allowed to go out while he saw to his duties. He just wished he had been able to see her.
His angel. Although he had no right to think of her as his. Not yet.
"You seem preoccupied, Blane." His father's voice was a pleasant rumble from only a few feet away. His long hair, black and without a single streak of gray, streamed back from his handsome face in the light wind.
The two men rode on the moors, cooling down after a hectic ride where Laird Alastair soundly beat Blane in a race to the top of the hill. The horses huffed in the early morning air, and the sound of their hooves on the ground was a quiet thunder.
"Only a little, father," he said, throwing the Laird a smile.
He treasured these mornings with his father, the early hours before Alastair had to dive in earnest into his duties as Laird. Alastair had always made time for Blane, for his wife, even though Blane's lady mother didn't often entertain her husband's desire for early morning socializing. But Blane loved it. His father was the kind of man he wanted to be, the kind of father, and if things went the way they both expected, the kind of Laird.
They'd spent the hours before sunrise riding the far edges of the Campbell property around the castle, his father pointing in the direction of the clans who threatened to encroach upon their lands but so far hadn't been bold enough to do so. "Get ready," Laird Alastair had told him. "Do not be complacent, even if they do not move against us while I breathe, there is no guarantee they will nae come after our lands when I am dust. Always be aware and wary."
Every day, his father had some such lesson for him, instructions and examples of how to be a Laird the people respected, his enemies feared, and his family loved.
"So what is this little thing you have on your mind, then?" his father asked.
She was too delicate of a matter to mention. Despite the fact of her being his chambermaid, he had only seen her once. But his preoccupation with her had only grown.
Blane felt a bit foolish about it all.
"Uncle Duff," Blane said instead, revealing the other matter that lay heavy on his mind. "Every day it seems he grows more bitter. There is hate twisting inside him, father."
"'Tis well I know it, my son. But there's naught I can do about it. I thought of banishing him because I fear he plots against me, but he is family. My father loved him."
Their father, the much honored but long dead former Laird Edinburgh, had been the one to organize the jousting tourney with the Lairdship of Edinburgh as the prize. That didn't seem like love to Blane, unless of course, he'd favored Duff over Alastair and expected him to win the tourney and Lairdship which had eventually gone to the twin younger by only a few minutes. But Blane knew those long gone days were barbaric and much less civilized than the days they lived in now. Men had different ways of showing their caring than to have their sons fight each other for something they could have agreed to share, or at least peacefully decided the winner of.
Blane carefully handled the reins between his fingers while the horse rocked sedately beneath him. "My honored grandfather is dead, my Laird," he said to his father.
"But his spirit is with us still, Blane. No matter the ill-will Duff harbors against me, I will not heave him from the castle and the only home he has ever known."
Blane smothered a sigh of frustration. His father was a brilliant man and astute in most things, but where his brother was concerned, he was as blind as a newborn pup. Just about every day, Blane wished that Duff had left the family stronghold years ago to find his own way instead of lurking around the castle like a spider, weaving complex webs of distraction and deceit that left everyone on edge. His uncle’s bitterness at the loss of the Lairdship sometimes soured the very air at Campbell Castle.
"Very well, father. I will nae mention it again for the rest of this morning."
Despite the seriousness of what they discussed, his father threw his head back and laughed. “Thank you for this morning’s respite then, my son.”
Then his father chuckled again and shook his head as if it all had been decided, which Blane supposed it had. They would continue to ignore Duff until he did something that warranted true and lasting interference from his father or from another man who was tired of Duff having his way with innocent maids and leaving them to fend for themselves with an unplanned and fatherless babe.
Perhaps, another time when his father was more amenable, Blane would bring up the problem of Duff once more. For now, he changed the subject and began to speak of more pleasant matters.
They rode back to the castle with a clearer air between them, laughing about the sheep that had stamp
eded over old McCallister's fence, nearly trampling the old man himself. Soon, they were back at the castle, riding through the crisp morning where the mist was just lifting from the highest turrets and allowing the flags on top of Campbell Castle to show themselves.
Blane laughed and joked with his father, still keeping an eye out for dangers around them, because as his father always said, there was no good that would come from being complacent, even if things appeared sweet and peaceful.
As they rode through the gates of the castle with the heavy sound of the latches falling closed behind them still ringing in the air, the thick fall of red hair caught Blane's eye. He paused in mid-speech as he recognized the angel.
She leaned over the edge of the well, pulling up a bucketful of water with the thick rope. From where he sat atop his horse, Blane could hear the water splashing mightily in the bucket. He stared at her slender shape, marveling at the strength in her slender arms and the way she pulled the bucket from the deep well, not spilling a drop.
"'Tis time for you to choose a wife, my son," his father said with humor in his voice.
Blane looked over at him in surprise to see his father's indulgent smile. The Laird looked meaningfully between Blane and the angel, but Blane refused to take the bait. Still, he couldn't help the way his eyes drifted back to her. The sun haloed her reddish brown hair like an Alder tree in fall, so beautiful it made his eyes sting.
"Aye," he said, still staring at her.
"I know your mother is set on Effie for you. Do you have another in mind?"
Effie again. Blane made a dismissive sound, absolutely unwilling to even consider the Ferguson girl although she was obviously pretty enough to suit his mother. "Mayhap," he said in response to his father's question.
The Laird chuckled but said nothing else on the matter, for which Blane was supremely grateful.
After Blane left his father in the stables talking with the horse master, he headed for the gardens in search of the yellow roses he knew his mother liked. Mayhap a vase of them would cheer her up and make her too happy to make plans for him that included Effie Ferguson.
Historical Hearts Romance Collection Page 44
