by Julia London
“Aye, of course ye will.”
She frowned a little and shook her head. “I donna think I will. Pity, that—I rather like what we do.”
“Donna be silly, Finella,” he said dismissively. “A man must have his physical pleasure or he shall fall ill.”
“Perhaps,” she said thoughtfully. “And perhaps ye will find yer physical pleasure with another, aye?” She winked at him. “I best be about me work, milord,” she said, and opened the door. With a small smile over her shoulder, she slipped out.
Payton frowned. Finella was mistaken—he’d be back. He’d never been able to abstain for very long and where else might he go? He might have had a rough go of it lately, but he’d be his usual randy self before long.
He was certain of it.
So certain, in fact, that he had another dram of whiskey to numb his mind and his heart before he headed back to Eilean Ros.
The sun was sinking behind Ben Cluaran when Payton and Murdoch arrived home. The house was dark, save the flicker of candles in two rooms on the ground floor.
Young Willie met him on the drive, but Payton sent the boy off to have his supper and stabled Murdoch himself. He then walked up the long drive of his house, staring at the dozens of darkened thick-paned windows that were eerily like his mood. They were like windows into his life, he mused—black and empty, devoid of light.
He silently cursed himself again for his singular, crushing weakness—his inability to remove Mared Lockhart from his mind, to keep from brooding about her and the emptiness within him. He’d thought of little else but her since the night she told him she’d never love him. He was a man obsessed with his failure to win her heart and the inexplicable feelings for her that ran as deep as Loch Ard. Aye, and here he was again, a bloody fool, wondering about her, wondering what she’d done today, her first day as a servant. Did she dine with the others? Had she sulked in her rooms all afternoon?
His obsession was particularly maddening because he was not a foolish man—he knew that one person’s desire could not change the desire of another. That was the way of love—sometimes, two hearts beat as one. And sometimes, one heart beat for two.
It annoyed him enormously that while he was intelligent enough to understand that, he could not, no matter how hard he’d tried, rid himself of that useless, but tenacious little glimmer of hope. He hated that wee bit of hope. Abhorred it, loathed it. He wished for all the world that he could smash it to tiny pieces and never hope again.
In the foyer, he put his hat and gloves aside and reached for the three posts in the silver tray Beckwith had left for him. He felt a grumble of hunger in his belly, and put the three letters in his coat pocket and strode down the corridor to the dining room.
It had been formally laid for one. That was Sarah’s doing—she had determined that a man of his stature must dine in luxury, regardless of how many dined with him. Payton thought it a tremendous waste of time and effort, but he had allowed her this custom, and now it seemed that Beckwith would continue it.
A fire burned at the hearth, undoubtedly refreshed every half hour until he dined. The table was set with cloth and a seven-pronged candelabrum in the middle of the table. Two crystal goblets—one for water, one for wine—accompanied a setting of bone china, silver flatware, and a small crystal tot for a bit of port or whiskey after his meal. Payton strode to the sideboard, pulled the bellpull, poured a tot of whiskey, and tossed it down. He closed his eyes, relishing the burn of it down his throat.
He had scarcely taken his seat before Jamie appeared, carrying a tray laden with three silver-domed platters which he laid on the sideboard. He moved to light the candelabrum, then stepped back and bowed. “Shall I serve ye, milord?”
“Please,” Payton said idly, and Jamie removed his plate from the table, took it to the sideboard, and began to fill it with food. Beckwith entered, a crystal decanter of wine in one hand, a pitcher of well water in the other. He filled Payton’s glasses as Payton glanced through the post.
One in particular caught his eye. The Right Honorable Laird Douglas, Master and Despot of Eilean Ros.
He stared at the missive as Jamie put the plate before him.
“Will ye require ought else, milord?” Beckwith asked.
“Ah…no,” he said, distracted. Beckwith nodded, stepped back, and quietly quit the room. Jamie stepped back, too, but stood still and silent beside the sideboard, should Payton require anything.
Yet Payton hardly noticed him, for he was far too interested in the letter. He unfolded the paper and read:
To the Right Honorable Laird Douglas:
Greetings and salutations from Miss Lockhart, your indentured housekeeper. I thought you should know that I have taken the liberty of closing several rooms in the north wing.
Please know that I have indeed considered the possibility that you believe, for the sake of appearances, it is important for a powerful and rather self-impressed laird such as yourself to keep all the rooms of his enormous house open for Scots far and wide to admire with awe. Yet I must point out that at Talla Dileas, where we have no such grand perceptions of our importance, we find that rooms gone unused for long periods of time require peat or coal that we can ill afford, as well as the use of chambermaids who might be employed in something infinitely more useful than the tidying of big, empty rooms.
I have, however, noted a few rooms which should be kept open because they clearly reflect your tastes and sensibilities; chiefly, the billiard room, for it is very stark and plain, and the north drawing room, which appears to have been used for torture during an earlier period of Douglas history.
ML
Payton bit back a reluctant smile of surprise at receiving such a bold missive from his housekeeper and read it twice more. Aye, he’d long since known the lass had the grit of the gods. She was not, it would appear, the least bit disheartened by her situation.
When he had finished his meal, he rang a bell for Beckwith. “I’ll have a port in my chambers.” He quit the dining room, walking purposefully down the corridor and taking the stairs two at a time.
He entered his suite through the dressing room and stood in the doorway for a moment, peering closely at his surroundings. His dressing room was, much to his disappointment, perfectly put together—his clothing had been put away and his toiletries had been cleaned and placed neatly on the basin. Even the wardrobe was closed and polished.
His housekeeper, it seemed, was doing more than shutting down half of his house.
Payton continued on to the master bedchamber, shrugging out of his coat and waistcoat, which he carelessly and uncharacteristically tossed onto the floor in his wake.
The master bedroom was also insufferably neat. He sighed as he untied his neckcloth and opened the collar of his lawn shirt and looked around him. There was a fire burning in the hearth and the thick woven rug had the look of being recently swept. The curtains had been drawn and his books stacked in an orderly fashion on the bookshelves. The bed had been neatly made after his thrashing about last night…. Ah, but it was the bed that brought a small smile of satisfaction to his face.
When Beckwith arrived with his port, he was sitting in one of two leather wingback chairs before his hearth. Beckwith put the tray on a small table between the chairs, then looked to Payton for further instruction.
“Send Miss Lockhart to me,” he said simply.
“The housekeeper, milord?” Beckwith asked uncertainly. “Is there something amiss?”
“Ye must be blind if ye canna see it, Beckwith. Look around ye, then.”
Beckwith glanced around the room again and shook his head. “I beg yer pardon, milord, but everything seems in perfect order.”
“Then perhaps ye have no’ remarked the bed,” Payton said, sweeping his arm grandly in that direction.
Beckwith looked at it. He seemed to be studying the thick mahogany posters and the canopied top, not the red silk coverlet that Payton’s grandmother had embroidered in gold.
“What is
the matter with ye, Beckwith?” Payton clucked. “’Tis no’ turned down for the night.”
“Aye, of course. I shall do so immediately—”
“No, leave it—I would prefer that she do it. She is the housekeeper after all, aye? ’Tis the housekeeper’s duty to prepare this chamber for the night.”
“I shall send her at once,” Beckwith said.
As his butler walked out of the room, Payton smiled and helped himself to a glass of fine French port.
He heard her knock a quarter of an hour later and bade her enter. She walked into his room, her enchanting face inscrutable.
“Miss Lockhart,” he said and sipped his port, turning his gaze to the hearth and letting her wait.
A mere moment later, she cleared her throat. “Ye sent for me, milord?”
He turned; she was standing in the middle of his bedchamber, her arms folded, the fingers of one hand drumming impatiently against her arm. He casually looked her over, head to toe. She was, he thought, as he let his gaze linger on her body, the most alluring housekeeper he’d ever seen. Except that the gown fit her poorly and did not enhance her lovely curves. But it was deep black and matched the color of the thick braid at her back; her green eyes seemed to leap off her face in a sea of so much black.
He put the port aside and stood. “Come here,” he said.
She arched a brow. “Where?”
“Come here,” he repeated quietly.
Mared obliged him by taking a small step forward.
“Closer,” he insisted.
Eyeing him warily, she reluctantly moved to stand before him. Payton looked down at her gown, then at her eyes. The dark green irises shimmered with the firelight, but he could see something more there. Apprehension, certainly. Curiosity, too, perhaps.
“The gown does not fit ye well.”
She shrugged indifferently.
He studied the gown a moment longer, then grabbed a handful of the black wool at her hip and pulled it taut across her belly. “It should be taken in here,” he said.
Mared did not look down, just watched him steadily. Payton let go of the material and slid his hand up her rib cage, to rest beside her breast. “And it should be let out here,” he said, looking her in the eye as he brushed his fingers across the mound of her breast. “And here,” he added quietly, his fingers skating across the other breast.
Despite the slight blush that rose in her cheeks, Mared lifted her chin. “Is there anything else?”
“Aye,” he said, letting his fingers rest on the bodice of her gown, watching her eyes. “It’s so tight that ye donna seem to be able to breathe.” He moved his hands to the buttons of the gown at her neck and casually undid the first button. “I would prefer that my housekeeper be able to breathe.”
Mared’s brow knit into a slight frown, but she otherwise did not move, did not blink.
A small smile tipped one corner of his mouth and he unbuttoned the second button, and the third. When he unbuttoned the fourth, his knuckle grazed her bare skin beneath the wool garment. Her lashes fluttered slightly and she quietly drew a long breath.
He shifted closer, just inches from her, taking in her scent as he lazily unbuttoned the fifth button. The fabric opened to show a bit of white chemise. Payton caressed the warm skin just above her cleavage with the back of his hand. His body was responding to the feel of her skin and the scent of her, and for a moment, he forgot his resolve to be free of her. He was aware of only the blood heating in his veins, and he leaned close, so close that his lips grazed her temple, and whispered, “Can ye breathe?”
Mared turned slightly, so that her lips were near his neck and responded in a whisper, “I beg yer pardon…but was there something ye wanted, then? Or did ye call to complain about the fit of my housekeeper’s gown?” And with that, she turned her face away from him and stepped aside, forcing him to drop his hand from her décolletage.
Payton chuckled low in his throat as she casually buttoned her gown. “I sent for ye, Miss Lockhart, because I had hoped that after our brief discussion this morning ye plainly understood yer duties. Did I no’ make myself perfectly clear?”
“Of course I understood, milord,” she said, fastening the last button. She turned to face him, her arms folded across her middle, her brows forming a vee above her eyes. “Ye could no’ have been any clearer, on my word.”
“Apparently I could have. Look around ye, Miss Lockhart, and tell me what it is ye have forgotten.”
She glanced around the room and suddenly smiled. “I donna believe Una has forgotten a thing,” she said with sunny confidence.
“Una?”
“Aye. I asked Una to tend yer chamber,” she said airily, knowing full well, judging by the glint in her eye, that it was not what he’d intended.
But Payton merely narrowed his eyes. “Then Una has missed something.”
“What?” she asked, glancing about once more.
Payton groaned. “Look at the bed.”
She looked at the bed.
“The bed, Miss Lockhart. Ye were to turn down the bed, aye?”
She blinked; her smile faded a little and she turned to look at him. “The bed? That’s it? That is why ye summoned me, to turn down yer bed?” she demanded disbelievingly.
“Would ye suggest I allow a blatant oversight to go unremarked? Come now, what sort of housekeeper will ye be if I ignore yer every failure?”
“Failure?” she cried, but quickly checked herself. She forced a smile to her face that belied the clench of her fists at her sides, and with a dismissive cluck of her tongue, she advanced on the bed with determination, grabbed the coverlet, and flung it backward. She lifted the pillows and punched them all. Twice. And rather hard at that. And then she laid them down again and neatly folded the coverlet so that he might slip smoothly into the linens. “There ye are, milord!” she chirped as she moved away from the bed. “Yer bed is quite turned down!”
“Aye,” he drawled. “Perhaps ye might tend to my chambers yerself so that ye’ll no’ suffer any other failures.”
“Mmm,” she said, nodding thoughtfully. “Perhaps.”
“Mmm.” He was enjoying himself. He resumed his seat, sipped more port, then leaned back, propped one boot against the seat of the other chair, and gestured lazily to the bed. “Now make it up,” he said. “And turn it down again.”
“I beg yer pardon?”
“Make the bed,” he said, a little more forcefully, “and turn it down again.”
“Turn it down again! Why should I ever—”
“Ach, Miss Lockhart! ’Tis no’ yer place to question me,” he interrupted. “I am laird and master of this house, aye? Ye’ll do it again because I order ye to do it again.”
Her jaw dropped. A fiery spark filled her eyes. He could almost see the debate warring within her. Would she defy him? Bend to his will? Or pummel him as she had done when they were children? Frankly, it was all he could do to keep the smile of amusement from his face. “Do. It. Again,” he said quietly.
She started uncertainly, then stopped, then started again, marching forward, making the bed swiftly, then turning it down again, only this time, with several extra punches to the pillows.
When she had finished, she whirled away from the bed, sank into a curtsey worthy of a king, and with her head bowed, said with exaggerated deference, “I hope it is done to yer exacting satisfaction, milord.”
Payton shrugged indifferently. “I suppose it will do,” he said, and tossed the last of the port down his throat as she rose gracefully from her curtsey.
“Very good. Then if ye will excuse me, there is still work to be done,” she said and tried very hard to smile politely, but failed horribly. It was more along the lines of a furious glare.
“Ah! It would seem we’ve a wee problem with proper dismissal as well, for I’ve no’ given ye leave. Ye’ve no’ completed yer duties—I’ve left some clothing for ye in the dressing room. Ye may launder it.”
“May I!” she exclaimed with fa
lse cheer. “And may I launder it now, or on the morrow?”
“On the morrow,” he said magnanimously. “No need to overtire yerself.”
She whirled about, marched across the room—pausing to stoop and pick up his coat with a bit of a disapproving cluck of her tongue—then disappeared into his dressing room. She emerged a few moments later with his clothing stuffed under her arm like a pile of rags. “Will that be all, milord?”
Payton cocked a brow. “No. There is one last item,” he said. “A neckcloth.”
“I didna see a neckcloth in yer dressing room. Perhaps ye’re losing yer sight. It is a common affliction among people of a certain age.”
He grinned. “I can assure ye, Miss Lockhart, I havena reached such advanced years. Ye donna see it in the dressing room because it is here,” he said, and lifted one of the tails hanging down his chest and wiggled it at her.
“Mi Diah,” she muttered, shifted his clothing under her arm, and stalked forward. “And shall ye remove it, or shall I launder it while it still hangs round yer neck?”
“Hold out yer hand.”
She held out her free hand.
Payton gazed at the sprinkle of freckles across her nose, the slender taper of her fingers. Mared sighed again and wiggled her fingers indicating he should give her the neckcloth. He abruptly reached up and caught that hand with the wiggling fingers in his larger one. “Patience, lass,” he said quietly. “Ye must learn patience.” He rose from his seat, her hand still in his.
She looked at her hand in his and smiled impertinently. “I am indeed impatient—impatient for sleep, that is, a very deep slumber—which I am assured I shall have, given the amount of toil I’ve been forced to endure here, and in spite of the deplorable state of the housekeeper’s mattress. But a deep slumber will bring the morrow, and then I shall have only three hundred sixty-five days left in yer employ.”
With a wry smile, Payton raised her hand, which he still held, and pressed his palm against hers, lacing his fingers between hers, one by one. “Rest assured ye’re no’ alone in wanting the three hundred and sixty-five days to be done.”
