Seduced by the Scot

by Eaton, Jillian

  “Ye dinna see what ye thought ye did.”

  “I saw you naked in bed with your mistress.” Her head tilted. “Was that not you?”

  He gritted his teeth. “Aye, that was me. But Allison isna me mistress!”

  “She was before,” Brynne pointed out matter-of-factly.

  “Ye know that I ended things between us long before ye and I were married.”

  “It didn’t appear as if things were ended when you had your leg on her–”

  “I realize what it looked like.” He pressed the heels of his hands to his temple. Squeezed. “I do. But I dinna know how or when she climbed intae bed with me. I swear it.”

  “It is partially my fault, I suppose,” she mused, not bothering to give his pitiful excuse so much as a sliver of consideration. Ice had begun to seep into her veins. She welcomed the coldness of it; a frosty balm to soothe the burn of Lachlan’s betrayal. “You asked for my loyalty, but you never promised your own. I made an assumption that I shouldn’t have, and now I have to pay the price for my naiveté.”

  Unbidden, she thought of the Dowager Countess of Crowley and what her chaperone had said on the night that Lachlan proposed.

  “…at least you will have followed your heart. I shall pray that will be a comfort, when nothing else is.”

  Yes, Brynne had followed her heart.

  But there was no comfort to be found here.

  “I am leaving,” she said evenly. “Today, if I can arrange transportation. Tomorrow at the latest.”

  Some women might have stayed. To meekly abide by their husband’s command, regardless of the wrongs he’d committed. Or to fight for his affection like a stray cat begging for scraps. She would do neither. Her pride–and the bloody, shattered thing beating feebly inside of her chest–refused to allow it.

  Lachlan stared blankly at her, as if she had announced that she’d decided to turn into a unicorn. “Ye canna just leave.”

  “What possible reason do I have to stay?” she scoffed. “The children are gone, the castle is falling apart, and I am wed to an adulterer. An adulterer who is more loyal to these fields of–of dirt than he is to his own wife. You’re not married to me, Lachlan. You’re married to the damned distillery. There is nothing for me here.”

  “I’m here,” Lachlan said softly. His eyes, those gold-flecked orbs that she’d first fallen in love with under a sky filled with stars, pleaded with her to stay. He even held out his hand, fingertips stretched towards hers.

  For a moment, she almost relented.

  For a moment, she almost forgave the unforgivable.

  And that frightened her so much, that she did the only thing she could think of.

  She tried to hurt him as much as he had hurt her.

  “You are not enough, Lachlan.” It was a testament to the depth of her own agony that she didn’t flinch when she saw the raw, vulnerable quiver of pain in his gaze.

  Coverlet on the floor.

  Sheets tossed carelessly over naked bodies.

  Touching. Nuzzling. Kissing.

  Her chin lifted a notch. Above it, her gaze was as frigid as the Arctic. “You will never be enough. And if you ever loved me at all, you will let me go.”

  He did let her go. For six miserable months he threw himself into his work at the distillery, doing more in a single day than three men could in two. From sunrise to sunset, he dug posts for fencing and hung barbed wire (a particularly nasty American invention intended to keep out even the strongest of boars) until his palms were blistered and his fingers were bleeding.

  Then when the workers headed for the pub, sweaty and stinking and ready to quench their thirst with a pint, he went to the castle and tackled another sort of job altogether.

  It shamed him that he’d asked Brynne to live in this place. Having run feral through the halls since before he could remember, he was accustomed to the crumbling walls and the holes in the ceiling and the cobwebs in the corners. Hell, he couldn’t even see them anymore. Not until he made himself look at the dark, dingy rooms through the eyes of his wife. And felt a deep, burning embarrassment for having brought her here. For asking her to leave everyone and everything she knew behind, and then taking her to a place where rainwater was collected in buckets. On the inside of the house.

  He ought to consider himself fortunate that she hadn’t turned on her heel and fled back to London the first time she saw her new home. But she’d fought through it for as long as she was capable. Until she came up against a wall that, in her mind, was too hard to knock down and too high to climb. What other choice did she have but to walk away?

  After the initial wave of hurt and fury had subsided, he was able to understand that. To see it through her perspective. To acknowledge why she’d given up the fight.

  And to realize that he never would.

  Brynne had been strong for as long as she could. While he’d chased his own dreams at the sake of her comfort, she’d done her best to make a life for them here. A home for them here out of peeling plaster and scurrying mice and screaming children. Until it became too much. Until she had to lay down her proverbial sword. A sword that he’d since picked up, because now it was his turn. His turn to fight for both of them.

  He’d given it six months and a stone of his own weight. Probably a pint of his own blood as well, if he counted all the times he’d accidentally sliced his flesh open on that damned wire. But now he was ready to reclaim what was his. To take back what he had lost and take control of what might be. What would be, when he and Brynne were back together where they belonged.

  If not for the bloody pigs and all that had followed after, they might be there already.

  He arrived at Hawkridge Manor on the first night of yet another annual house party. His world may have stopped when Brynne left, but it was apparent that this world–this world of glamour and wealth and prestige–kept spinning no matter what…with Brynne at its center, once again playing her role as the perfect daughter, perfect hostess, perfect lady.

  He’d dressed for the occasion in formal attire, even though his invitation must have gotten lost in the mail. Tricky, those Highland roads. No telling when a mail coach was going to turn left instead of right and find itself halfway back to Glasgow before the driver was any the wiser. Might as well dump the letters and start again at that point. Which was as reasonable an excuse as any to explain why he hadn’t received a fancy beige envelope with the Earl of Hawkridge’s wax seal.

  Except when he tried to enter through the foyer and join the rest of the guests in the dining room where they were enjoying a seven-course meal, he was stopped by a portly fellow holding a paper list. A list, apparently, that Lachlan was not on.

  “I am sorry, my lord, your name is not here,” said the servant. A footman, by the look of him. “If a name is not here, I am not allowed to admit them.”

  “Give me that,” he growled, snatching the list.

  The servant immediately paled and took a step back.

  It wasn’t until Lachlan read to the bottom that he realized why.

  Underneath a long row of names, neatly scrawled in Brynne’s own handwriting, was a simple, damning instruction.

  Should he arrive, Lord Lachlan Campbell is not permitted inside under any circumstances.

  She’d known, he thought with a surge of annoyance and sliver of grudging admiration. She’d known that he’d come for her. That there wasn’t a bloody thing on heaven and earth that would keep him away. And she had planned accordingly.

  How sweet of the wee lass to believe that she’d succeed.

  “Are ye tae stop me then?” he asked the footman whom he towered over by at least seven inches.

  To his credit, the servant did not move from the doorway. “If I have to, my lord.” Then he lowered his voice. “Please don’t make me have to.”

  “I’ll go without a quarrel,” said Lachlan, holding up his hands.

  The servant smiled with relief. “Thank you, my lord.”

  “Aye.” With that, he wa
lked out the way he’d come in…but he had no intention of leaving. Instead, he waited, lurking in the bushes like some sort of besotted Romeo for Juliet to make her appearance. Excluding the part where they died at the end.

  Eventually, the dinner ended and the guests took advantage of the warm evening air, venturing outside onto the various walkways and terraces to drink their wine and smoke their cigars while they congratulated themselves on being invited to such an exclusive affair.

  The self-important bounders.

  There was no one on these grounds, with the exception of Weston, who loved Brynne as he did. Who cared for her as he did. Who saw her–the real her–as he did.

  These people didn’t know her.

  They just knew the person she pretended to be when she was around them.

  When she stepped out of a doorway and stood with candlelight at her back and moonlight on her face, he was temporarily stunned by her beauty. Six months without gazing upon her countenance and she took his breath as if they’d been apart for six years.

  Not another day, he vowed as he cut a silent swath through the shadows.

  Not another damned day.

  He caught her before she could descend the stairs. Enclosing her wrist between his fingers, he pulled her into an alcove out of sight of those who might wonder what Lady Brynne Weston was doing with the likes of Lachlan Campbell.

  “You,” she hissed, yanking free of his grasp and causing him to frown.

  “Well ye needna say it like I’m the villain,” he scowled.

  “Why?” Her hands went to her slender waistline, the tips of her gloves disappearing into heavy folds of pale yellow satin. “That is precisely what you are. I was under the impression that I’d made myself clear that we were through, Lachlan.”

  “Aye, that’s what ye said,” he acknowledged, and there was a part of him that still ached when he remembered the words she’d used. “But it’s not what ye meant. We all say things when we’re angry, little bird.”

  “Look at me carefully.” She tapped her chin, drawing his attention to her lovely face. Silky cream with golden brows and the barest hint of rose in those high, high cheekbones. “Do I look angry?”

  His first instinct was to say yes. But upon further consideration, he saw that all that white-hot fury from the day on the cliffs had faded and ebbed. In its place…in its place was a quiet, determined resolve that chilled him to the bone. Because it meant that whatever his Bry said now, it wouldn’t be spoken out of anger. Instead, it’d come from a place of calculated thought.

  And that was much harder to take back.

  “Bry–” he began, but she cut him off with a sharp jerk of her arm.

  “You need to leave. Right this minute.”

  “Or what?” he challenged.

  “Or I’ll shoot you.”

  She said it so calmly, so matter-of-factly, that he started to laugh.

  Right up until she reached inside a reticule he hadn’t even noticed she was carrying and withdrew the tiniest, most adorable pistol he’d ever seen. At least it was adorable until she drew back the hammer with a loud click that made the weapon sound much more deadly than it appeared.

  “Are ye going tae kill me?” he said incredulously.

  Annoyance flickered in her gaze. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Well that’s a relief tae–”

  “A bullet of this size would not cause lethal harm.” She straightened her arm and, to his horror, pointed the pistol right at the middle of his groin. “But I imagine it’s not going to feel very good.”

  “Bluidy hell! Let’s not leap tae any hasty decisions.” Holding up one hand to ward her off while the other protectively cupped his bollocks, he retreated a step into the inky darkness. “I came here tae have a productive conversation, Bry. Not tae have me bits blown off. What happened tae a lady’s civility?”

  A muscle clenched in her jaw. “It disappeared when I walked into that bedroom. I am not going to warn you again, Lachlan. You’re not welcome here. I don’t want you anymore. And you need to leave. Now.”

  She may not have fired the pistol, but her words cut through him like a bullet. Words that he never dreamed his Bry, his beloved, the girl he’d loved since he was a lad, would be capable of saying. As hurt flared, followed closely by a red-hot flash of rage, he opened his mouth to tell her how wrong she was…but then the clouds over the moon shifted, and silver light illuminated the well of tears in those magnificent hazel eyes, and he gritted his teeth together.

  Brynne was hurting, too. Trying her best to hide it, but pain recognized pain. Wasn’t that one of the first things that had drawn them together? The English girl ignored by her family, and the Scottish boy tossed out of his school.

  “All right,” he said stiffly. “I’ll leave ye in peace, Bry.”

  But even as he turned and disappeared into the shadows, Lachlan knew that he’d be back. When the hurt settled and the pain wasn’t so fresh and they could have that civil discussion without fearing for his poor bollocks, he’d return.

  Brynne wasn’t a prize he was keen on giving up.

  No matter how much time it took to win her back.

  Chapter Twenty

  Present Day

  Hawkridge Manor

  “I remember everything.” As the past and the present converged to form a lump in Brynne’s throat, she swallowed with difficulty and forced herself to look directly into Lachlan’s eyes. She owed him that for what she’d said. For her part in the pain they’d caused each other. For her side of the marriage that had failed.

  Because it wasn’t just him.

  It was never just him.

  And she was a coward for letting herself pretend otherwise for the past eighteen months.

  Gazing at him kneeling in front of her, she wished (oh, how she wished) that they’d guarded their words more carefully. That they’d practiced more kindness. Not only with each other, but with themselves. And while she couldn’t go back and change the past, she was determined to take responsibility for it.

  “I was wrong, Lachlan.” She put her hand on top of his. “About so many things. I should never have kept our marriage a secret from my family. It wasn’t something to hide, it was something to be celebrated. And I should have listened to you that morning by the cliff. I was hurt, and angry, and I lashed out.”

  “Ye had good reason tae. Had I walked in and seen what ye had, I would’ve reacted much the same.” His mouth twisted in a humorless smile. “After I broke both of the bastard’s legs, that is. But I should have told ye about what ye would be walking intae when ye married me. The true state of things; not what I hoped one day for them tae be. The castle, and the children, and the distillery not yet turning a profit.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. “We both could have been more honest with each other. We both should have been. But in the end, my most horrible day with you was better than any day spent without you. Over these past eleven years, you’ve always been where I needed you, Lachlan. When I needed you most. You helped me become a stronger woman, capable of more than I ever thought possible.” The corners of her lips curved. “Certainly, I never envisioned myself retrieving toads from the rafters or changing nappies in the middle of the night.”

  “Aye, and it’s a wonderful mother ye will make when the times comes.” Again his gaze dropped to her belly, but this time it was with warmth instead of fear. “But ye are wrong about one thing. This isna the end, little bird. It’s just the beginning. For ye, and for me. For us.” He lifted her hand. Kissed the back of it. “We can start again. Knowing what we do now, there’ll be nothing tae stand in our way that we canna overcome together.”

  How tempted she was. But just as she couldn’t change the past, neither would she allow herself to forget it…or the lessons it had taught her.

  That sometimes loneliness was better.

  That pain, even with one you loved, was inevitable.

  And that you couldn’t lose your heart if you didn’t give it away.

>   It was ironic, really.

  Over the course of the house party, she’d urged Weston over and over again to seek out Evelyn Thorncroft because she’d seen the possibility of love between them. She had told him to risk everything for the sake of happily-ever-after, and if the letter he’d sent her was any indication, it had worked out splendidly. But she wasn’t going to follow her own advice for the same reason that she didn’t wear chartreuse despite recommending the color to Lady Nelson.

  What worked for one person didn’t necessarily work for another. Having pieced together a broken heart once, she wasn’t keen to do it a second time.

  Logically, she understood that there was no guarantee she and Lachlan would end up destroying each other again. However, there was also no guarantee that they wouldn’t. Which was why this time…this time, she was going to take the safer path.

  “I am having my solicitor go forward with the judicial separation, Lachlan.” When he stiffened, she tried to place a comforting hand on his shoulder, but her arm was knocked aside when he surged to his feet.

  “Why the devil would ye do that?” he scowled, a shadow rippling across the rigid set of his jaw as he took a step back.

  “Because that’s what we are.” Wanting even footing for what was to come, she rose as well, and took a measured breath meant to both calm any lingering anxiety and reassure herself that she was doing what needed to be done. What was right. What was necessary. And while Lachlan likely wouldn’t thank her for it now, he’d eventually realize–as she had–that they were better off apart. “We are separated. We’ve been separated. This will just…make if official.”

  “I dinna want tae make it official.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I dinna want tae be separate any longer. That’s why I came here. Tae make amends. Tae sort what needed tae be sorted. And we did. We have. I’m sorry for the mistakes I made, Bry. For the missteps I took. I’m not a perfect man–”