A Highland Duchess

by Karen Ranney

  Emma stood, walked across the room and pressed her hand against the closed door. A kind manner could hide a perfidious heart; she knew that only too well. She turned and looked around the room, searching for something she might use as a weapon. The poker in the fireplace tools would do nicely.

  She would never again be caught unawares.

  Rain sheeted the glass, creating an intimate and watery prison. The only good thing about this entire situation was that she couldn’t be married as long as she was a prisoner.

  How quickly would her uncle ransom her?

  When a knock sounded a quarter hour later, she stood at the door with the poker in hand, more than willing to defend herself.

  It wasn’t the thief, however, but a young maid holding a tray.

  “Begging your pardon, miss,” she said, bobbing a curtsy, “but I’ve been told to bring you something to eat. I’ve bread and cheese, and some of Cook’s biscuits.”

  Emma wasn’t hungry but didn’t think it necessary to explain to the young girl that the circumstances of her abduction had stripped her of any appetite she might have had.

  “Thank you,” she said, pulling the door open and propping the poker behind it.

  Anthony had admonished her at least once a day not to thank the servants. They are there to do your bidding, Emma. Thanking them undermines your authority.

  She’d never argued with him. Yet to say thank you was a small thing, an inconsequential rebellion, and therefore one she continued.

  The maid disappeared, bobbing yet another curtsy. London servants were more jaded than that young girl, making Emma wonder if she’d come recently from the country. Or from Scotland?

  The maid knocked again. This time when Emma opened the door it was to find herself face-to-face with Ian.

  Since leaving her, he’d changed. He was no longer dressed in solid black. Instead, his shirt was white, his gray trousers dry and pressed. He no longer wore boots but well-polished shoes with elegant silver buckles. His hair had been dried as well, no longer falling forward across his brow. If she’d met him anywhere but in her sitting room, she would’ve thought him a peer of the realm, or at the very least a gentleman of the merchant class.

  Instead, he was a thief with immaculate manners, and a taste for gentrified life.

  “I’ve brought you a nightgown,” he said, and only then did she realize that he held a folded garment in his hands. He halted a few steps into the room.

  She took the precaution of stepping to the back of the door, the poker once more in her hand.

  “You have the most horrified expression on your face, Emma,” he said. “Why?”

  “Is your mistress in residence?” she asked.

  He frowned at her. “Mistress?” He placed the nightgown on the end of the bed before returning to the door.

  “A ménage à trois? Is that what you think I have planned? If you hadn’t been married to the Duke of Herridge, I might have asked you where you got such an idea.”

  She gripped the poker tighter.

  “I’m not the Duke of Herridge,” he said, his voice strangely kind.

  She was trembling in earnest and it had nothing to do with the chill she felt or the residual dampness of her clothing.

  “The garment belongs to my mother,” he said. “She has never worn it. It was delivered after she returned to Scotland. I’m certain she would not have any objection if you took advantage of that fact.”

  “I’m in mourning,” she said.

  Amusement danced in his eyes. “Must a widow wear everything in black?”

  “I really have no intention of discussing my garments with you.”

  “Even your . . . ” He was obviously struggling to find an acceptable word.

  Emma remained silent, enjoying his discomfiture. “Everything,” she finally said.

  “Would the world know if, for one night, you didn’t wear black??”

  Instead of answering him, she asked a question of her own. “What would your mother say about my being here?”

  “She’d be horrified,” he said, smiling. “You see, I haven’t had a very long history of abduction. No doubt she’d have some recommendations. She comes from a long line of border reivers.”

  He turned and without another word left the room, closing the door firmly behind him. She knew, and yet couldn’t say exactly why she knew, that if she wished to leave this room, or this house, there would be no barriers to her doing so. He would simply stand aside, his dark eyes revealing nothing.

  Kindness, however, often masked a cruel nature. Another lesson she’d learned from Anthony.

  She took the precaution of locking the door.

  Emma moved to the bed and stared down at the nightgown. It wasn’t black, and at this moment she didn’t care. She could remain dressed in her damp clothing but that didn’t seem reasonable. She could easily catch cold, and the very last thing she wanted was to be ill while a captive.

  Turning, she glanced at the door and then back at the bed, then moved the desk chair to the door and wedged the back beneath the handle.

  Slowly, she began to undress, placing her dress on the chair by the window, hoping that it would dry overnight. Once attired in the pale blue nightgown—silk, by the touch of it—Emma sat on the edge of the bed.

  What was she to do?

  Today she’d been informed she was to marry again, but she couldn’t face that horror right at the moment. Instead, she thought about her abduction, how Ian had struck her uncle in her defense, how she’d been so startled by that act that she allowed him to grab her and escape from her own home.

  A home that wasn’t truly a home, just as he’d said. But if the town house wasn’t home, then what was? Not her childhood home of Graviston Park. Her uncle now owned that as well. Certainly not Chavensworth; it had gone to Anthony’s cousin. Even if the great house had not been entailed, she would never have returned, willingly, to Chavensworth.

  Where did she belong?

  Ian made it to his library before he began to swear. He closed the door, leaned both hands against it, then clenched his fists into palms, bruising his knuckles against the hard wood. If he could have disinterred the Duke of Herridge at that moment, he would have gleefully pummeled his corpse.

  At the moment, however, he was more annoyed at himself than he was the dead duke.

  He rounded his desk and sat behind it, extracting a piece of his stationery and loading the nib with ink. He closed the letter with:

  Your niece will be surrendered upon receipt of the mirror. A man will call upon you in one day, sufficient time to obtain the mirror from Chavensworth.

  Rest assured that the Duchess of Herridge is being cared for and will suffer no harm.

  He sat back. He’d never written a ransom note before but it seemed to cover the matter suitably. Of course, he’d never abducted a duchess before, either, both actions entirely out of keeping with his nature and his inclinations.

  He’d send the note by messenger tomorrow morning, instructing one of his staff from Lochlaven to ensure it was done with some anonymity.

  At least no one would expect Emma to appear anywhere. She was in seclusion, in mourning. All that he had to do was ensure that no one in his home knew who she was, or if they did discover her identity, that they not speak of it.

  Most of his employees had come from Lochlaven, returning home when their taste of London was surfeited. He’d counted on their loyalty many times before tonight. Patterson, however, was a different story. The majordomo was so stiffly English that it was a wonder the man had deigned to be employed by the Earl of Buchane and the Laird of Trelawny. He knew he had to keep Patterson suitably occupied and ignorant of Emma’s identity.

  Until Emma’s uncle retrieved the mirror and returned to London, she would be his guest. In the mean
time he would ensure that her stay was as comfortable as possible, that no further talk swirled around her.

  He banished the thought that perhaps it wasn’t altogether wise to feel protective of the Duchess of Herridge.

  “Is there no sign of her?” Peter, Earl of Falmouth, asked.

  “No sign, Your Lordship,” the majordomo said, standing in front of Peter’s chair with head bowed. “Nor of the carriage.”

  “No one knows in which direction it traveled?”

  “We were unable to discover that, Your Lordship,” the majordomo said. “Would you like us to keep looking?”

  “No,” Peter said, holding his hand to his jaw. “The rain has gotten stronger. I doubt there is a soul abroad who would’ve seen the carriage at this point. You say you didn’t get a good look at him?”

  “Your Lordship, I was not in the front hall when they left.”

  “And you have no idea how he got into the house?”

  Neither the majordomo nor any of the footmen ringed behind him had any idea. But then, he knew that anyone who would allow a stranger to come into his house wouldn’t admit to it.

  “Shall I send for a physician, Your Lordship?” the majordomo asked.

  “No,” he said. His jaw felt as if it were broken, but it wasn’t, merely sore. He would have a mark on his face for days, courtesy of the stranger who’d stolen his niece away from the house.

  If she didn’t marry, then he’d be unable to pay his blackmailer. The young fool would talk. Someone might begin to think that the man was more than a sot and there was some truth to his assertions.

  The very last thing he could afford was a bit of inquiry. He had to find Emma, and marry her off with all possible haste.

  Chapter 5

  The knock on the door roused Emma from a surprisingly deep and restful sleep. She rolled over onto her back, blinking several times before realizing where she was.

  She’d been abducted. Should she have slept quite so well? For that matter, should she be as ravenously hungry as she was?

  The knock came again, and she sat up, tossing the covers aside. After moving the chair, she unlocked the door cautiously and opened it, peering around the edge. It wasn’t Ian but the same young maid who’d brought her a tray the night before.

  “I’m to tell you, miss,” the girl said, “that the master would like you to join him for breakfast. I’m to make it in the form of an invitation and not an order.”

  She repeated the words with such diligence that Emma knew she’d been coached.

  Perhaps it would be better to request a tray in her room. Or were prisoners given such flexibility?

  At home, she wasn’t. Even if she did not feel like facing the day, she was expected to be at breakfast when the bell rang every morning, to share the time with her uncle, to pass the minutes in conversation of some sort.

  One day, perhaps, she would have a single establishment of her own. She would be the one to dictate if she came down to breakfast in the morning or chose to take her lunch in the evening. There would be no one but her to decide how she might spend her days.

  “You need to give me a few minutes to get dressed,” she said.

  “Then I’m to take you to the garden, miss.”

  “The garden?”

  “The master eats in the garden on fair days.”

  “A moment, then,” Emma said.

  The maid bobbed a curtsy and left.

  Emma did not call her back to help her dress. She’d disrobed the night before; she could certainly dress herself this morning. For the first time in her life, however, she had no choice of garments to wear. In her armoire at home there were at least a dozen dresses suitable for half-mourning, some with touches of white about the collar and sleeves. One or two were ornamented with jet beads or delicate little ruches across the bodice. Small touches of femininity to remind her that even though she mourned, she was alive.

  Emma slipped into the bathing chamber attached to the bedroom, performing her morning chores before beginning the uncomfortable task of outfitting herself for the day ahead. Her chemise was still a little damp from the night before but she ignored the discomfort. She left the top three eyelets in her corset unlaced, a small concession to comfort. Her petticoat was damp as well, and looked sadly bedraggled, as did the small at-home hoop she’d been wearing last night. The skirt came next, the black looking almost rusty in the morning light, then the bodice, fitting too snugly, perhaps, because she didn’t tighten her corset as well as her maid might have.

  When she was finally dressed, she was left with the problem of her hair. On top of the bureau was a silver handled military brush resting on an ornate silver tray. She’d never used such a personal object belonging to a stranger but had no choice at the moment. There was a mirror above the bureau but she brushed her hair without looking at her image. She simply had to trust in the fact that she was clean and presentable. Any additional concern about her appearance would be vanity, and she’d never been overly vain.

  What did her appearance matter? She had no control over it. She could not dictate why her cheekbones were higher than those of her peers and more pronounced, or why her eyes were that shade of blue, odd enough to be noticed in a crowd. She had no ability to change the shape of her nose or the angle of her chin or the curve of her ears. She was, simply put, just who she was.

  True, there were times when women of her acquaintance augmented their good qualities, and attempted to confuse the eye so lesser traits were not noticed. A smudge of kohl just below the cheekbones made them look more pronounced. A tiny vertical line of white near the nose made it appear more patrician. There were unguents a woman could use on her lips to make them more prominent, and drops for the eyes so they appeared radiant and sparkly.

  She’d never used any of those artifices. This morning she didn’t even have her reticule and the little pot of rose salve she sometimes used to offset the paleness of her lips.

  Perhaps it was better that she didn’t look in the mirror.

  Whatever her appearance, she was ready, and the ferocious growling of her stomach—rude and unpardonable in the best of circumstances—drove her from the room.

  As she closed the door behind her, the maid stepped out from an alcove, smiled brightly, and bobbed yet another curtsy.

  “There you are, miss,” she said, and with that, smartly turned on her heel, leaving Emma to follow.

  Last night she’d thought this a hallway, but it was a column-lined corridor overlooking a courtyard. She walked to the waist-high wall and looked down.

  A walkway of crushed gravel stretched from one corner of the courtyard to the other, creating an X. Where the two paths intersected sat a small round table, its bright white cloth undulating in the soft breeze.

  “The master is waiting, miss,” the young maid said, turning back impatiently. Evidently, the master could not be made to wait.

  Emma was tempted to inform the young maid about the kind of person she served. A bounder, a cad, and although she didn’t know his behavior well enough to fit the label of rake to him, she didn’t doubt that it applied as well. Any man who invaded a woman’s bedroom should certainly be called to task for his actions.

  However, she kept silent, having had years of experience at biting back words that more wisely should be left unsaid, and followed the girl.

  The house was not as grand as hers, yet it was certainly not ill-appointed or lacking in beauty. The banister was truly a lovely thing, with its sweeping wood curves and heavily carved balusters. She followed the maid down the stairs, noting the niches along the way that held bits of statuary that looked quite old.

  The maid led her down a covered walkway lined with a series of columns, reminding her of the Roman ruins in Bath. She stopped beside one arch and stepped aside, motioning to Emma to precede her.

 
Secluded from traffic sounds, lined with tall trees swaying in the gentle breeze, the courtyard was a small and perfect green oasis. A profusion of Sweet William, Hypericum, and another bed of strange plants greeted her.

  Emma hesitated at one, bending down to examine one of them more closely. A long, strong, straight stem ended in a bulge, and above it bloomed a purple spiked flower.

  “It’s a thistle,” he said.

  She looked up to find Ian standing on the gravel walk.

  “A thistle?” she asked, straightening.

  “A symbol of Scotland,” he said. “A little bit of my home, brought to London. Besides, the butterflies seem to like it.”

  In the morning light he was even more handsome than he’d been last night, and despite the fact that she was the Duchess of Herridge, she felt unaccountably shy, incapable of sitting and eating breakfast across from this incredibly handsome man. Nestled in her unaccustomed awkwardness was wonder that she could feel so terribly young once again.

  “Will you join me?” he asked, leading the way down the path.

  On the table two small covered silver domes glinted in the morning light. Beside them sat a book, open but turned upside down, as if her abductor had been engrossed in it prior to her arrival.

  Who was he?

  He pulled out a well-padded chair that looked as if it belonged in the dining room.

  “It’s a bright and sunny day,” he said. “I always think the air so much clearer after a storm, don’t you?”

  She only nodded as he assisted her with the chair. Despite the fact that last night had been chilly, this day was temperate, hinting at warm.

  “I am torn between wanting to ask if you rested well and being aware that the question is not one normally uses to begin a breakfast between strangers.”

  “I slept well,” she said. “Thank you.” In fact, it was odd how well she did sleep. As restful as a baby. There were no sounds from the streets, no cautions in her mind.

  “Then as your host, however unwittingly,” he said, smiling, “may I tell you that you certainly look well rested. Quite lovely, in fact.”