‘I won’t even comment on your footwear.’
She managed to smile again at that. It was faint but it was there.
And then there was silence. It was so deep and so long that Dougal opened the door again. He stood uncertainly on the doorstep. He made to say something but didn’t. The silence lengthened. Finally he was dragged inside again by Maggie.
Maggie, at least, must understand the value of silence, Alasdair thought. The last light went off inside. Even if, as Alasdair suspected, Maggie was still lurking, she was giving them the pretence that they were alone.
The night was still and warm. The numbers of nights like this on Duncairn could be counted on less than a man’s fingers. Everyone should be out tonight, he thought. The stars were hanging brilliant in the sky, as if they existed in a separate universe from the stars he struggled to see back in Edinburgh. The tide was high and he could hear the waves slapping against the harbour wall. Before dawn the harbour would be a hive of activity as the island’s fishermen set to sea, but for now the village had settled back to sleep. There was no one here but this woman, standing still and watchful.
Trying to make her mind up whether to go or stay.
‘Can I have the dogs?’ she said at last, and he blinked.
‘The dogs?’
‘At the end of the year. That’s been the thing that’s hurt most. I haven’t had time to find a job where I can keep them, and I can’t see them living in an apartment in Edinburgh with you. If I stay, I’ll have twelve months to source a job where they can come with me.’
‘You’d agree to keeping on with the marriage,’ he said, cautiously because it behoved a man to be cautious, ‘for the dogs?’
‘What other reason would there be?’
‘For the company? So Duncairn Enterprises will survive?’
‘That’s your reason, not mine. Dogs or nothing, My Lord.’
‘Don’t call me that.’
She tilted her chin. ‘I need something to hold on to,’ she said. ‘I need the dogs.’
He stared around at the two dogs with their heads hanging out of the window. Abbot was staring down at the road as if considering jumping. He wouldn’t. Alasdair had been around this dog long enough to know a three-foot jump in Abbot’s mind constituted suicide.
A moth was flying round Costello’s nose. Costello’s nose was therefore circling, too, as if he was thinking of snapping. He wouldn’t do that, either. Risk wasn’t in these two dogs’ make-up and neither was intelligence.
‘They’re dumb,’ he said, feeling dumbfounded himself.
‘I like dumb. You know where you are with dumb. Dumb doesn’t leave room for manipulation.’
‘Jeanie...’
‘Dumb or not, it’s yes or no. A year at the castle, no insults, the dogs—and respect for my privacy. The only way this can work is if you keep out of my way and I keep out of yours.’
‘We do still need to share the castle.’
‘Yes, we do,’ she agreed. ‘But you’ll be treated as a guest.’
‘You mean you’ll make the porridge?’
Her expression softened a little. ‘I kind of like making it,’ she admitted.
‘So we have a deal?’
‘No more insults?’ she demanded.
‘I can’t think of a single insult to throw.’
‘Then go home,’ she told him. ‘I’ll be there before breakfast.’
‘Won’t you come back now?’
‘Not with you,’ she said flatly. ‘I’ll follow separately, when I’m ready. From now on, Alasdair McBride, this is the way we do things. Separately or not at all.’
* * *
How was a man to sleep after that? He lay in the great four-poster bed in the opulent rooms his grandmother had done up for him during the renovation and he kept thinking...of Jeanie.
Why hadn’t his grandmother told him of her plight?
Because he’d never asked, he conceded. Eileen had known of the bad blood between the cousins. Revealing the mess Alan had left Jeanie in would have meant revealing even more appalling things of Alan than he already knew.
So she’d let him think Jeanie was a gold-digger?
No. Eileen wouldn’t have dreamed he’d think Jeanie was mercenary, he conceded, because anyone who met Jeanie would know that such a thing was impossible.
Except him. He’d met her, he’d judged her and he’d kept on judging her. He’d made the offer of marriage based on the assumption that she was out for what she could get, and he’d nearly destroyed his chances of success in doing it.
Worse, he’d hurt her. He’d hurt a woman who’d done the right thing by Eileen. A woman Eileen had loved. A woman who’d agreed to a marriage because...because he’d told her of the charities Duncairn supported? Because she could spend another year acting as a low-paid housekeeper? Because she loved two dopey dogs?
Or because she’d known Eileen would have wanted him to inherit. The realisation dawned as clear as if it were written in the stars.
She’d done it for Eileen.
Eileen had loved her and he could see why. She was a woman worthy of...
Loving?
The word was suddenly there, front and centre, and it shocked him.
Surely he was only thinking of it in relation to Eileen—but for the moment, lying back in bed in the great castle of his ancestors, he let the concept drift. Why had Eileen loved her?
Because she was kind and loyal and warm-hearted. Because she loved Eileen’s dogs—why, for heaven’s sake? Because she was small and cute and curvy and her chuckle was infectious.
There was nothing in that last thought that would have made Eileen love her, he decided, but it surely came to play in Alasdair’s mind.
When she’d almost fallen, when he’d picked her up and held her, he’d felt...he’d felt...
As if she was his wife?
And so she was, he thought, and maybe it was the vows he’d made in the kirk so few hours ago that made him feel like this. He’d thought he could make them without meaning them, but now...
She was coming back here. His wife.
And if he made one move on her, she’d run a mile. He knew it. Alan had treated her like dirt and so had he. Today he’d insulted her so deeply that she’d run. This year could only work if it was business only.
He had to act on it.
There was a whine under the bed and Abbot slunk out and put his nose on the pillow. The dogs should be sleeping in the wet room. That was where their beds were but when he’d tried to lock them in they’d whined and scratched and finally he’d relented. Were they missing Jeanie?
He relented a bit more now and made the serious mistake of scratching Abbot’s nose. Within two seconds he had two spaniels draped over his bed, squirming in ecstasy, then snuggling down and closing their eyes very firmly—We’re asleep now, don’t disturb us.
‘Dumb dogs,’ he told them but he didn’t push them off. They’d definitely be missing Jeanie, he thought, and he was starting—very strongly—to understand why.
* * *
Why was she heading back to the castle? She was out of her mind.
But she’d packed her gear back into her car and now she was halfway across the island. Halfway home?
That was what the castle felt like. Home. Except it wasn’t, she told herself. It had been her refuge after the Alan disaster. She’d allowed Eileen to talk her into staying on, but three years were three years too many. She’d fallen in love with the place. With Duncairn.
With the Duncairn estate and all it entailed?
That meant Alasdair, she reminded herself, and she most certainly hadn’t fallen in love with Alasdair. He was cold and judgemental. He’d married her for money, and he deserved nothing from her but disdain.
But he’d caught her when she’d fallen and he’d felt...he’d felt...
‘Yeah, he’d felt like any over-testosteroned male in a kilt would make you feel,’ she snapped out loud.
Her conversation with herself was nuts. She had the car windows open and she’d had to stop. Some of the scraggy, tough, highland sheep had chosen to snooze for the night in the middle of the road. They were moving but they were taking their time. Meanwhile they were looking at her curiously—listening in on her conversation? She needed someone to talk to, she decided, and the sheep would do.
‘I’m doing this for your sakes,’ she told them. ‘If I go back to the castle, he can buy it from the bankruptcy trustees at the end of the year and it’ll stay in the family.’
Maybe he’ll let me stay on as caretaker even then?
That was a good thought, but did she want to stay as housekeeper/caretaker at Duncairn for the rest of her life?
‘Yes,’ she said out loud, so savagely that the sheep nearest her window leaped back with alarm.
‘No,’ she corrected herself, but maybe that was the wrong answer, too. That was the dangerous part of her talking. That was the part of her that had chafed against being part of Rory’s family business, doing the books, cleaning the fish shop, aching to get off the island and do something exciting.
Well, she had done something exciting, she told herself bitterly. She’d met and married Alan and she’d had all the excitement a girl could want and more.
‘So it’s back in your box to you, Jeanie McBride,’ she told herself and thought briefly about her name. Jeanie McBride. She was that. She was Alan’s widow.
She was Alasdair’s wife.
‘At the end of the year I’m going back to being Jeanie Lochlan,’ she told the last sheep as it finally ambled off the road. ‘Meanwhile I’m going back to being housekeeper at Duncairn, chief cook and bottle washer for a year. I’m going back to taking no risks. The only thing that’s changed for the next twelve months is that the house has one permanent guest. That guest is Alasdair McBride but any trouble from him and he’s out on his ear.’
And you’ll kick him out how?
‘I won’t need to,’ she told the sheep. ‘I hold all the cards.
‘For a year,’ she reminded herself, wishing the sheep could talk back. ‘And for a year...well, Alasdair McBride might be the Earl of Duncairn but he’s in no position to lord it over me. For the next year I know my place, and he’d better know his.’
CHAPTER SIX
ALASDAIR WOKE AT DAWN to find the dogs had deserted him. That had to be a good sign, he told himself, but he hadn’t heard Jeanie return.
His room was on the ocean side of the castle. The massive stone walls would mean the sound of a car approaching from the land side wouldn’t have woken him.
That didn’t mean she was here, though.
He wanted—badly—to find out. The future of Duncairn rested on the outcome of the next few minutes but for some reason he couldn’t bear to know.
He opened his laptop. He didn’t even know if she’d returned but it paid a man to be prepared.
It paid a man to hope?
By eight o’clock he’d formed a plan of action. He’d made a couple of phone calls. He’d done some solid work, but the silence in the castle was starting to do his head in. He couldn’t put it off any longer. He dressed and headed down the great staircase, listening for noise—listening for Jeanie?
He pushed open the door to the dining room and was met by...normal. Normal?
He’d been in this room often but this morning it was as if he were seeing it for the first time. Maybe it was because last night he’d almost lost it—or maybe it was because this morning it was the setting for Jeanie. Or he hoped it was.
Regardless, it was some setting. The castle after Eileen’s amazing restoration was truly luxurious, but Eileen—and Jeanie, her right-hand assistant—had never lost sight of the heart of the place. That heart was displayed right here. The massive stone fireplace took half a wall. A fire blazed in the hearth, a small fire by castle standards but the weather was warm and the flame was there mostly to form a heart—and maybe to form a setting for the dogs, who lay sprawled in front of it. Huge wooden beams soared above. The vast rug on the floor was an ancient design, muted yet glorious, and matching the worn floorboards to perfection.
There were guests at four of the small tables, the guests he’d given whisky to last night. They gave him polite smiles and went back to their breakfast.
Porridge, he thought, checking the tables at a glance. Black pudding. Omelettes!
Jeanie must be home.
And almost as he thought it, there she was, bustling in from the kitchen, apron over her jeans, her curls tied into a bouncy ponytail, her face fixed into a hostess-like beam of welcome.
‘Good morning, My Lord. Your table is the one by the window. It has a fine view but the morning papers are beside it if you prefer a broader outlook. Can I fetch you coffee while you decide what you’d like for your breakfast?’
So this was the way it would be. Guest and hostess. Even the dogs hadn’t stirred in welcome. Jeanie was home. They had no need of him.
Things were back to normal?
‘I just need toast.’
‘Surely not. We have eggs and bacon, sausages, porridge, black pudding, omelettes, pancakes, griddle cakes...whatever you want, My Lord, I can supply it. Within reason, of course.’ And she pressed a menu into his hands and retreated to the kitchen.
* * *
He ate porridge. No lumps. Excellent.
He felt...extraneous. Would he be served like this for the entire year? He’d go nuts.
But he sat and read his paper until all the guests had departed, off to tramp the moors or climb the crags or whatever it was that guests did during their stay. The American couple departed for good, for which he was thankful. The rest were staying at least another night. Jeanie was obviously supplying picnic baskets and seeing each guest off on their day’s adventures. He waited a few moments after the last farewell to give her time to catch her breath, and then headed to the kitchen to find her.
She was elbow deep in suds in front of the sink. Washed pots and pans were stacked up to one side. He took a dishcloth and started to dry.
‘There’s no need to be doing that.’ She must have heard him come in but she didn’t turn to look at him. ‘Put the dishcloth down. This is my territory.’
‘This year’s a mutual business deal. We work together.’
‘You’ve got your company’s work to be doing. There’s a spare room beyond the ones you’re using—your grandmother set it up as a small, private library for her own use. It has a fine view of the sea. We’ll need to see if the Internet reaches there—if not you can get a router in town. Hamish McEwan runs the electrical store in Duncairn. He’ll come out if I call him.’
Business. Her voice was clipped and efficient.
She still hadn’t looked at him.
‘We need to organise more than my office,’ he told her. ‘For a start, we need a cleaning lady.’
‘We do not!’ She sounded offended. ‘What could be wrong with my cleaning?’
‘How many days a year do you take guests?’
‘Three-sixty-five.’ She said it with pride and scrubbed the pan she was working on a bit harder.
‘And you do all the welcoming, the cooking, the cleaning, the bed-making...’
‘What else would I do?’
‘Enjoy yourself?’
‘I like cleaning.’
‘Jeanie?’
‘Yes.’
‘That pan is so shiny you can see your face in it. It’s time you stopped scrubbing.’
There were no more dishes. He could see her dilemma. She needed to stop scrubbing, but that would mean turning—
to face him?
He lifted the pan from her hands, set it down and took her wet hands in his.
‘Jeanie...’
‘Don’t,’ she managed and tugged back but he didn’t let her go.
‘Jeanie, I’ve just been on the phone to Maggie.’
She stilled. ‘Why?’
‘To talk to her about you. You didn’t tell her you were coming back here. She thought you’d gone to the ferry.’
He didn’t tell her what a heart-sink moment that had been. She didn’t need emotion getting in the way of what he had to say now.
‘I thought I’d ring her this morning.’ She sounded defensive. ‘I thought... To be honest, when I left Maggie’s I wasn’t sure where I was going. I headed out near the ferry terminal and sat and looked over the cliffs for a while. I wasn’t sure if I should change my mind.’ She looked down at their linked hands. ‘I’m still not sure if I should.’
‘You promised me you’d come back.’
‘I stood in the kirk and wed you, too,’ she said sharply. ‘Somewhere along my life I’ve learned that promises are made to be broken.’
‘I won’t break mine.’
‘Till death do us part?’
‘I’ll rethink that in a year.’
‘You have to be kidding.’ She wrenched her hands back with a jerk. ‘It’s rethought now. Promises mean nothing. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have beds to make, a castle to dust, dogs to walk, then the forecourt to mow. You go back to sorting your electrics.’
‘Jeanie, it’s the first day of our honeymoon.’
‘Do you not realise I’m over honeymoons?’ She grabbed the pan he’d just taken from her and slammed it down on the bottom shelf so hard it bounced. ‘What were you thinking? A jaunt to a six-star hotel with a casino on the side? Been there, done that.’
‘I thought I’d take you out to see the puffins.’
And that shocked her. She straightened. Stared at him. Stared at him some more. ‘Sorry?’
‘Have you seen the puffins this year?’
‘I... No.’
‘Neither have I. I haven’t seen the puffins since my grandfather died, and I miss them. According to Dougal, they’re still there, but only just. You know they take off midsummer? Their breeding season’s almost done so they’ll be leaving any minute. The sea’s so calm today it’s like a lake. You have all the ingredients for a picnic right here and Dougal says we can use his Mary-Jane.’
The Earl's Convenient Wife (Harlequin Romance) Page 9
