That prejudice, Brice supposed, explained why Lord Lochaber never replied to any of their invitations and never issued any of his own. Brice had seen a veritable procession of Highlanders coming and going from the castle every year, but apparently, if one wasn’t of the Clan Kinnaird, one wasn’t fit for Lochaber’s regard.
Only that didn’t answer the question of how Mother had managed to see the interior. “How did you finagle an invitation, then?” He tipped his head toward the castle again.
Mother turned up her lips, though it was hardly a smile. Not compared to what she used to have done, before Father . . . “I was not always an English duchess, Brice. Always a Lowlander, but they were willing to forgive that much. At least long enough to invite us to dine with them once or twice. It’s as lovely inside as you would think—positively medieval. Though I can’t think I would ever want to live with cold stone surrounding me always.”
“Well.” In consideration of her aching muscles, he turned them both away, back toward the walking path. “I obviously should have come with you and Ella the summer the earl was away. So I could have seen it for myself.”
His mother laughed. Not so bright, not so free, but a laugh nonetheless. He had heard precious few of them from her over the past months. “We never went there that summer. They always came here. And besides, you would have been bored senseless, with no boys your age about.”
“Young men, you mean.” He bit back a grin as he said it. He’d thought himself a man at seventeen, to be sure. Though praise to the Lord that he’d never had to prove it. He hadn’t had to manage stewards and solicitors and tenants and rents and . . .
He missed his father. Missed walking through the village at Midwynd with him, cataloguing repairs that needed made, inquiring about the tenants’ ailing mothers and wayward sons. Missed seeing the measured wisdom alight in his father’s eyes. Missed knowing that he was there, always there, ready to answer questions and pat backs and smile encouragement.
Mother gripped his arm. “There are invitations awaiting us and replies to the ones we sent out. After breakfast, we should go through them. Plan our stay.”
Brice nodded. His mother had still been in first mourning throughout the Season, so he and Ella had gone through his sister’s debut summer on their own. Only now was Mother accepting and giving invitations—though it was other plans he felt most compelled to make. Plans about what he would do once they went back to England. How he would draw out Lady Pratt and prove—and thereby halt—her hunt for the Fire Eyes. Put an end to that nonsense once and for all so he could focus on the estates.
Heaviness gripped his chest. It wouldn’t be so simple. He knew that so clearly that words might as well have sounded audibly, so perfectly did they settle in his mind. Just like they had when Brook had been kidnapped last year. And like that dreadful day when the silent but echoing Go had sent him outside to meet his father, crumpled on the steps so near where they now walked.
Maybe one of these days, the Lord would send the warning when he could actually do something about it.
By the time Brice found his sister and their guests, they had all taken their separate breakfasts and the sun had burned the mist from the face of the loch. He followed the girls’ laughter to what Mother had always called the morning room—east-facing, with golden sunshine spilling in, nearly as bright as his sister’s laughter.
He paused outside the door just long enough to thank the Lord for hearing it again. Too long Ella had been nearly silent, all of her mirth dampened by grief. Bringing Geoff and Stella Abbott along to the Highlands had been a good idea, though. Their steward’s children had grown up alongside them, knew how to brighten their moods. He rather wished they wouldn’t both be heading off to far and sunder parts of England in the next few months.
Sucking in a fortifying breath, Brice fastened a smile onto his lips and strode in just in time to see Abbott balance himself on one foot, arms up and tugging back as if holding an imaginary fishing pole.
“And then the beast gave a mighty tug and sent him splashing into the river.” Abbott flung himself onto the divan amidst another shout of laughter from the girls.
Brice’s smile went more earnest. “You ought to include that tale in your first sermon, Abbott. Complete with reenactment.”
His old friend laughed, too, and took a more proper seat upon the cushions. “Perhaps I shall, Your Grace. An altered account of how Jonah ended up in the belly of the great fish. My new parishioners will be on the edges of their pews.”
“If you do, I’ll be sure to travel all the way to Bristol to hear it.” Aiming his steps for the larger couch on which the girls perched, Brice chose a seat in between them. “And how did the bells sleep?”
His sister tilted her head, putting it into the path of the sunlight that obligingly set fire to the locks she stubbornly denied were red. “Well enough, once we made it to our beds.”
“Up talking half the night again, I suppose.” To be expected—Miss Abbott had been away at school these past few years and was just back for a few months before accepting her new post. Much like her brother. Still, they would think him ill if he didn’t tease. “Ella and Stella, the two little bellas—”
“Oh, Brice, stop.” Ella groaned and clapped her hands over her ears, even while Miss Abbott chuckled.
As if he could leave his and Abbott’s old rhyme unfinished. “Ding-donging their way through the day. They ring and they chime at any old time—”
“And oh, how very loudly they play,” Abbott finished for him, grinning.
“Thank heavens you both have something besides poetry to fall back on.” Ella leaned into Brice’s arm, covering a yawn with her hand. “I may need a nap before the sport begins this afternoon. I hope Mother won’t have scheduled us any evening engagements quite yet.”
Miss Abbott grinned and reached for her needlework. “Oh, I don’t know, El. I’m rather looking forward to the balls and fêtes.”
“No doubt so she can put all the ladies to shame and set the peerage abuzz.” Brice arched a brow at the girl, still not quite able to believe she was grown and would soon be instructing the children of some of those ladies in their schooling. “Admit it, Miss Abbott—you mean to be another Jane Eyre, using your position as governess to secure a favorable match with some rich widower.”
“Never.” But she knew how to grin at his teasing, and how to dismiss it with a stitch upon her sampler. “Miss Eyre didn’t set her sights nearly high enough. If I’m going to be grubbing, it’ll be for a title, not just riches—neither of which I’ll find at my first post, so the peeresses are safe, for now, from my competition.”
Brice winked at his old friend. “And lucky they are, for you will outshine them all.”
“Always the flatterer.” But she grinned. She may know when he exaggerated, but she knew him well enough to appreciate the good wishes behind it.
“There you all are.” Mother bustled into the room, her hands full of envelopes and unfolded letters—that particular determination in her eyes that always struck when she was in a scheduling frenzy. “I’ve invitations from the Sutherlands, the Carnegies, the McIntoshes . . . I daresay no one expects us to accept them all this year, considering, but we must choose which to honor.”
As the discussion began, Brice was for the most part content to leave the weighing of each invitation to Mother and Ella, putting in only a phrase here or there in agreement or disagreement. But when his mother paused and cleared her throat before lifting one of the last pieces of paper, he knew to pay attention.
“This is not pertaining to our time in Scotland, but rather for our trip home next month. We’ve been invited to a house party in Yorkshire.”
“Brook?” But Ella frowned even as she said it. “I cannot imagine she would be ambitious enough to host a house party with the babe still so young, and she still so determined to eschew the help of a nurse.”
Brice chuckled. “I cannot imagine her father actually agreeing to another house party
at Whitby Park.”
“Oh, true.” Ella toyed with one of the scarlet curls spilling over her shoulder. “I suppose I don’t even know if they’re visiting Whitby in Yorkshire now or are still in Gloucestershire at Ralin Castle.”
“They are in fact in Yorkshire for the autumn.” Mother waved a separate paper. “And invited us as usual to visit with them on our return from Scotland. But the house party is hosted by their neighbor.”
Silence fell so quick and thick that Brice could not blame the Abbotts for the questioning glance that passed between them. He cleared his throat. “Lady Pratt, you mean?”
At Mother’s nod, Ella huffed. “Well, I don’t know why you even bothered bringing that one up, Mama. Of course we’ll refuse it.”
“No.” Brice thought he deserved credit for saying it at a normal volume, when he’d wanted to leap to his feet and shout. “No, we must accept.”
Ella looked at him as if he were a dunce. “Are you daft? It has barely been a year since Lord Pratt kidnapped Brook—his widow oughtn’t to be hosting a party, much less inviting us to it, when she knows well we take our stand with the Staffords.”
“Now, Ella, her first mourning has passed, and you know these things have relaxed in recent years.” Mother ran a hand over the black of her frock. “Though as for the other . . . I do rather side with your sister, Brice. I feel no inclination to spend a week in her company, not at the very house where the lady’s late husband held our Brook prisoner.”
“You needn’t. I’m certain Whitby would welcome you all to stay there instead, but I, at least, will go to Delmore.” And since he didn’t want to argue about it, he stood, tugging his waistcoat back into place. “Do excuse me, everyone. I have some correspondence of my own to go through now.”
He ought to have known escape wouldn’t be so simple. He barely made it into the hall before Ella came racing up behind him, grabbing his arm. “Brice, what in the world are you thinking?”
Darting a glance over his shoulder to see whether their guests or any servants lingered nearby, he pulled her a few more steps along before answering. “What do you mean?”
“What do I . . . ? You know very well what I mean! You were there when her husband was killed, right alongside Brook and Stafford. They are convinced she blames them for his death and will seek revenge—why would you not assume she’ll do the same with you?”
“Shh! Do you want to worry Mother more?” He tucked Ella’s ivory hand into the crook of his elbow and propelled her out the door at the end of the hall, into the autumnal garden.
“You can’t think her innocent in all that. You can’t.”
“On the contrary.” He was convinced she had been involved in each and every step of planning Brook’s kidnapping and potential murder, was convinced she would do anything to get her hands on the diamonds she thought rightfully hers. “And I intend to prove it.”
Ella tugged him to a halt, her brown eyes wide with outrage. “How? By flirting a confession from her? Even you aren’t so charming, and if you think you are, then we need to have a serious conversation about your hubris.”
Flirtation may play a role in his plan, but a confession did not. Catherine Pratt would never give one—he knew that. He would have to catch her in a new crime. Like attempting to steal the gems she well knew he had. The ones she had watched Brook drop into his hand a year ago.
He might as well provide her the opportunity. “If she intends revenge, I would rather she try to take it on me than on the Staffords—they’ve little Lord Abingdon to consider now. But you needn’t fear, Ella-bell. I’ll be prepared for anything she might try.”
“You are not invincible. No one is.” Her voice cracked, shook. No doubt her eyes were seeing their father, collapsed and broken when he had seemed so infinitely strong. “And you are in no better position to take such risks than are Brook and Stafford. Perhaps you’ve no infant son, but that is part of the point, isn’t it? You are all we have. You are Nottingham.”
All true . . . and if something went wrong, if something happened to him—worse, if something happened to Ella or Mother—he would never forgive himself. But the Lord had not released him. Every time he prayed about it, he received the self-same answer he had gotten before Father’s death—that he must draw Lady Pratt’s attention away from the Staffords. “The Lord will keep me safe.”
“Brice . . .”
The cool autumn air swirled around them, and a golden eagle circled overhead. Brice gripped his sister’s hands. “Trust me in this, Ella. Lady Pratt is vicious and is not above hiring thugs to do her dirty work—it is wiser to take the offensive than to wait for her to spring some trap on me.”
He knew from the glint in Ella’s eyes that his claim did nothing to put her at ease. But she pressed her lips together against further argument. For the moment.
He had no doubt she’d have more to say about it, though, once she’d had time to form her words.
He only hoped she kept Mother out of it. She had enough to suffer, with the loss of Father still so fresh in her heart. She didn’t need to be worrying about losing her son too.
Three
Lilias Cowan paused outside the study door long enough to draw in a fortifying breath. To wipe her hands on her skirt and to roll back her shoulders. She had learned long ago that if one wanted the Kinnaird to listen, one had to be strong—a task not always so easy in the face of his tempers. But when her rap upon the door earned her a gruff “Enter,” she strode in as if she planned to ask for no more than an afternoon off.
As if she weren’t about to suggest that he go back on his own word, twice over.
Douglas Kinnaird glanced over at her, his brows still in the perpetual frown he had worn the past fortnight, ever since he found Rowena sobbing into the stones. Granted, he was never one for abundant smiles, but never in her life had Lilias seen him so grave for so long. What more proof did Rowena need that her father loved her, worried for her? Even Lady Lochaber’s good news of a coming child had earned only a fleeting smile from him.
“What is it, Lilias? I’ve work to do.”
Sometimes she searched his face looking for the boy she had grown up with. There was no hint of him today. There seldom was. But she believed he was still there, somewhere under the years of hurt and determination. She dredged up the same smile she used to give him when they were skipping rocks across the face of the loch. “Aye, I know ye have. But we need to speak o’ Rowena.”
He didn’t just sigh, he hissed out his breath and flung his pen to his desk. “Is she with child, then?”
“It’s too soon to say.” With the Kinnaird, careful meant bold. She strode to the chair opposite his desk and sat, not upon the seat but on the wide arm of it, to keep herself higher. “But we all know it’s a possibility.”
He grunted.
She angled her head and prayed he couldn’t see how she dreaded speaking of this. “How could ye take his side, Douglas? When he hurt what’s yours?”
He spat out a Gaelic curse and shoved to his feet, paced to the window. At least this one offered no sight of Gaoth, so it wouldn’t sour his mood more. Not like her proposal would. “It was a valid question, Lil—she’d been hanging on him for months. How was I to know she didna invite him and then regret it? I was scunnered, too blinded by the rage at first to see . . .”
“Oh, aye. And isna that a familiar refrain?”
He spun, but the fury died away quickly, as it always did when someone had the gumption to call him on it. “Ye think I want to promise her to him, when he would treat a Kinnaird in such a way? I’ve no choice, ye ken. He ruined her. Possibly got a child on her. The only security I can give her is marriage.”
“Marriage to that monster is no security, Douglas. It’s a death sentence, and she willna do it.”
He snorted and turned back to the window. “She hasna backbone enough to refuse. Just like her mother, going where’re the wind blows her, that one.”
“Ye’ve the wrong of her.” Lilias st
ood, fire burning away any weakness now. She’d been there from the day Rowena was born, even from before that day. She knew her better than anyone on Earth. Loved her like her own. “Ye just canna get it through that thick skull of yours that some people are made strong by a soft hand, not a heavy one.”
“Like Nora? What did a soft hand get me with her, hmm? I tried it for a decade, and look what happened. And Rowena’s just like her.”
“No.” Much as Rowena failed to realize it, it wasn’t true. “She’s half yer blood too.”
He pivoted again and folded his arms across his chest. “What is it ye want, Lily? Other than to berate me for rearing my child as I saw fit?”
She took time enough to moisten her lips, to tuck back a greying curl that had slipped loose. “She willna marry Malcolm. If it’s a stand ye want from her, ye’ll get it on this. But he’ll not let her go, not if he can help it. Especially not if he thinks she’s with child.”
He arched his brows and waited.
She stood. “We’ve got to get her away from here, before the question can be answered.”
“Too many Highlanders have been sent away from their homes—”
“Why must everything go back to the clearances with you, Douglas? This isna the English forcing a Highlander from his croft. It’s a father protecting his daughter!” She huffed out a breath, dragged in another one, and stomped her way to his side. “Ye dinna want to give her to Malcolm, do ye?”
The tic in his jaw was answer enough. It spoke even louder than his “There’s no other way.”
The Reluctant Duchess Page 3
