The Mammoth Book of Scottish Romance

by Trisha Telep

  “Not necessary but, besides the ambush, quite enjoyable,” he said, laughing. He grew serious then and stared at her intently. “Did it please you, Cat? Did I please you this time?” Had it not been obvious to him? She’d melted in his embrace, her body played by his touch and his hands and his mouth. As though she’d spoken the words aloud, he continued. “What happened between us that first night should never have happened. Will you be able to put it behind us and forgive me?”

  Tears burned in her eyes but she dashed them away. She nodded, believing for the first time that they did have a chance at happiness together, something completely unthinkable just days before. He kissed her, pulling her close and holding her to him.

  “When will Dougal and Jamie return to free us?”

  Cat drew back, surprised at his words. Did he know or was he seeking out information? His mischievous smile told her that he did indeed know.

  “In two days,” she answered, watching his expression change into something dark and enticing and wicked.

  “Time enough to begin …” he said, as he began kissing not just her mouth but her neck and then her shoulders and then … and then …

  By the time his brothers arrived two days later, she could not move a muscle. His possession of her body complete and that of heart begun, she almost wished she’d told them to wait three days before returning.

  Four

  With the excuse of seeking out the good wine from the storage room below, Padruig pulled on his trews and climbed down the stairs to that chamber. Instead of heading for the barrel of wine, he sought the hidden door behind a storage trunk. Making his way through the tunnel and along the stream, he climbed up to the path and returned to the front of the house where his brothers waited.

  Giving no warning, he grabbed and tossed Jamie to the ground and then managed to land a solid punch to Dougal’s jaw before they realized he was there. The feel of it was satisfying, for he was certain that Dougal had been the one who sent him to his knees during the kidnapping.

  “What the hell?” Dougal said, rubbing his face.

  “That was for agreeing to carry out her foolish plan without telling me about it,” Padruig said. Dougal shrugged as though kidnapping your brother and laird was a commonplace thing.

  “Did it work?” he asked. “That’s all I want to know.” He crossed his arms over his chest and angled his head while waiting for Padruig to answer.

  “Come back in two more days and I’ll tell you,” he answered. Those were all the words he was willing to say right now.

  “I was right, Padruig. Just admit it,” Dougal pushed.

  Padruig did not answer. Instead he walked away, retracing his path back to the tunnel. He heard his brothers laugh as he did, but he cared not. The entire clan would know soon enough that he’d claimed his bride, even if it was four months late.

  After entering the storage room and finding the wine, he climbed back up to the loft with it. Cat lay as he’d left her – replete and exhausted from his attentions. A purely male sense of satisfaction filled him now as well, knowing that he’d seen to her pleasure countless times already and would again now that they had two more days of privacy away from the world. As he climbed on to the wide surface of the bed, she stirred, reaching out and resting her hand on his stomach as he moved closer. He stirred, well his flesh did, and she welcomed him between her thighs with a delicious sigh he was coming to crave. When they could speak again, Cat reminded him that his brothers would arrive soon. Unwilling to confess that he could have escaped her at any time through the hidden door in the cellar, Padruig smiled and suggested that he remain kidnapped for two more days.

  But it was four more days before the laird and lady returned to their keep.

  Together.

  Kissingate Magic

  Annette Blair

  The matchmaking fairy of Kissingate,

  Every year capitulates

  And brings a pair who hesitates,

  A love meant to be.

  She’s the shape-shifting fairy of Kissingate

  Nudging an intractable young prelate

  Who lost what he could never see straight:

  A love meant to be.

  Kissingate, Scotland, 1846

  One

  Jacey Lockhart, hidden in the midnight shadows, fixed her hungry gaze on Gabriel Macgregor, the most formidable of the ghosts she had come home to face.

  Gabriel the guarded – named for the bright angel, when he should have been named for the dark – lowered his head to avoid an old oak barn beam, the hint of a smile in his eyes … until he saw her.

  The knave stepped back, stretched to his full towering height, and squared his shoulders to a stunning span – Lucifer, face carved in unforgiving angles.

  Despite her resolve, Jacey wanted to catch the next train back to Essex, though she couldn’t seem to move.

  Here stood the father of her child, and firm between them, the lie she told denying it. In one stroke, she’d saved and destroyed him.

  A horse shuffled in its stall, freeing hay musk into the air, breaking the silence, hazing the past, and allowing her to breathe.

  As forbidding as her nemesis appeared in lantern light, dressed entirely in black, the tiny white lamb tucked into his frockcoat humanized him, the contrast bringing his cleric’s collar into conspicuous relief. A rogue’s heart, a vicar’s trappings, and no one seemed to know, save her.

  His face, lined and bronzed by age and parish responsibility, gave him a mature, patrician air. His hair, a tumble of sooty waves, thick and lush, showed grey at the temples. No ghost, but the bane of her existence in the flesh, more vitally masculine than ever.

  He’d always been proud, even when they were children – he, a poor vicar’s son, she, the heir to a fortune. But she’d reversed their roles. Now, a disinherited outcast, she stood, once again, before the boy who adored her, then hated her, with all his heart. “Gabriel,” she said, wishing her voice didn’t tremble and her body didn’t remember.

  Two

  Gabriel wondered if the sum and substance of all his dreams, good and bad, could hear his stone cold heart knocking against his ribs. “Jace,” he said, his rasp awkward.

  He cleared his throat, but Suttie stepped up and kissed him on the cheek. Suttie, the ageless puppeteer whose gypsy wagon they’d once chased giggling down the High Street. “Welcome, both of you,” Gabe said, his voice working, again, hope suddenly alive.

  Suttie beamed. “I see you found the surprise I brought.”

  Found her? He thought. He couldn’t take his eyes off her.

  “Aye, Gabriel, I’ve come home. I’ll stay in Suttie’s wagon.”

  Gabe’s chest ached for hiding his joy. “You’ll both stay at Kirk Cottage. No argument, now.”

  Suttie beamed; Jacey looked terrified.

  “Please, Lady Lockhart?” Gabe begged in the way Jace once commanded, for a piece of butterscotch pie, but the words evoked her fall from grace. “I apologise,” he said. “That was thoughtless.”

  “Aye, it was.” Jace turned to Suttie. “Can I stay in your gypsy wagon? I’ll take the morning train back. I shouldn’t have come.”

  Gabriel gave the lamb to Suttie, placed his hand against Jacey’s back to propel her towards the vicarage, her body heat curling like a spiral around his icy heart.

  Inside, she stepped from his touch. “I won’t stay. I cannot.”

  If she left again, she’d never come back. The thought of losing her forever cut deep. Gabe turned to build up the fire in the hearth to chase away the damp, warm the lamb, and gather his wits.

  Jacey, here, in his house, where he pictured her nearly every day.

  His Jacey. As beautiful as ever. More.

  No, not his. Never again. That was past.

  He was a vicar now, in control, unemotional, his passion a vice overcome. Long-buried. Dead. He turned to his guests. “Mackenzie’s asleep, so I’ll ready your rooms.”

  The lamb bleated. “She’s hungry,” Jace s
aid.

  “I planned to make a bottle.” He felt big, clumsy beside Jace and remembered a time it didn’t matter.

  “Did her mother die?” she asked.

  Gabriel took the lamb like a shield. “She’s a twin and a runt.” He stroked its neck and the mite closed its eyes in ecstasy.

  Jacey watched transfixed, yearning in her emerald eyes. Seeing it, he might once have lowered her to the grass and—

  The fire snapped. They stepped back, released by the sound.

  “I’ll fix a bottle—”

  “I’ll get you a bot—”

  They spoke together, stopped together.

  Gabe set the lamb on its wobbly legs and fetched the supplies Jace would need to feed it then he headed out to get their bags, Suttie beside him.

  Three

  Jacey watched him go and released her breath, a victim of the soul-deep longing that led to her downfall. Five years and she hadn’t come to terms with it. Getting herself with child, without a husband, she’d disgraced her mother, a true Lady of the Manor.

  After her babe’s birth and death, she got a job at Briarhaven School, Essex, England, where she lived, taught needlework, and hid from the past.

  Surprisingly, she came back to life, found her self-respect, and with the help of Suttie’s letters, knew that before she could have a future, she must face her past.

  Yesterday, Suttie had come for her. She’d set boldly forth to face the world she left behind, and ended trembling in a vicarage kitchen.

  To calm herself, she warmed a pan of milk and rinsed a lambing bottle. She couldn’t leave; she’d come for Gabriel’s step-daughter, her motherless niece, who slept upstairs, the child she planned to take and raise. Only Gabriel stood between her and success.

  Some things never changed.

  Jacey sat by the hearth, coaxing the lamb into her lap by making use of its grip on the nipple.

  First, she’d have to face a condemning village, Gabriel among them, a flock who considered him a saint and her a sinner. But he was human. Flawed. Jacey knew better than anyone.

  Oddly enough, she’d forgiven him, but not herself.

  Four

  In the kitchen after bringing Suttie and her bags upstairs, Gabe stopped at the sight of Jace, while his old enemy, lust, returned for just looking at her.

  He backed away and sat at the round old table, with its scarred slab top and legs big as tree trunks, not sure what to do with his hands.

  “Where’s Suttie?” Jace asked, her voice a wobbling croak.

  “Fell asleep while I showed her the room. I threw a blanket over her. Is she getting old, our Suttie?”

  “She certainly doesn’t look it. More stubborn than anything, I think. We shouldn’t have arrived so late, but Suttie insisted on driving through. I’m glad we didn’t wake you.”

  Gabriel quit the table and dropped down beside Jace to stroke the drowsing lamb’s lanolin-soft wool. Instantly, he saw his mistake. Too close, he thought. Oh, God, Jacey.

  The mite roused at his attention and suckled as if it hadn’t eaten in a week, until it pulled on air-bubbles, and Jace tried to wrest the empty bottle from its grip. When Jace won, his hand slipped and grazed her breast.

  He froze at the contact, their gazes locked, a primitive energy rising hot and thick between them – an intangible yet undeniable force, savage in its intensity.

  Jace bit her lip, drew blood. Did her body betray her as much as his? Gabriel lost his breath to lust, molten and heavy. He’d controlled passion for years, with his wife’s staunch approval after their sorry wedding night. But a minute in Jace’s company, and passion, like Lazarus, rose from the dead.

  Trapped. By weakness. His strength lay in denying passion – a hard-won lesson. But around Jacey, desire overcame determination, and strength became a wisp of smoke where once burned a zealot’s fire.

  Jacey. Jace. Home. His Jace.

  No, and again, no.

  She’d made him call her Lady Lockhart when he wanted to call her Jace, like the rest of her friends did, except for the day he came home a new-minted vicar, when he finally called her his.

  Once again, he felt like that runny-nosed boy with torn clothes and dirty nails. Why, when his clothes were new, his home comfortable and clean, elegant even? Why, when Jace’s grey dress, mended and pressed to a pauper’s shine, must once have been blue?

  Trapped. By passion. By Jacey. Gabriel wanted to swear, to rage, to pull her into his arms and kiss her until she gave passion back, as Jacey surely could. If only he wasn’t the only man who’d experienced her passion.

  Gabriel crossed the kitchen to get as far from captivation as possible. He couldn’t be near without taking her in his arms, any more than he could bear the reminder of her betrayal, and his foolishness.

  “I’m looking forward to time with my niece,” she said, her rush of words pulling him from pain but shivering him to his bones. He gazed at her, looking for no greater significance than her words betrayed. “You mean, my daughter,” he said, foolishly desperate to stake his claim.

  Jacey rose with the lamb in her arms. “Step-daughter,” she corrected. “I hope she remembers her real father.”

  He’d face any and all demons, real or imagined, for Bridget. “Her father died before her birth. Her mother and I married before she turned two. I’m the only father she knows.”

  “I’m her aunt, kin by blood.”

  “Blood, as we know, does not always tell.”

  Jace stepped back under the weight of his verbal blow.

  His barb, born of self-preservation, hurt him as much as it did her.

  Ashamed of his callous words, he claimed the lamb, but couldn’t calm. He wanted to take Jace into his arms, soothe her, and he wished to the devil he didn’t bloody well care how Jacey Lockhart felt. “I’ll show you to your room.”

  Preoccupied by his demons, Gabriel took the stairs first, realized he should have let a lady precede him, though this lady had been disowned, her title stripped, if only in word, by her own mother.

  Then, again – as she had often reminded him – neither was he a gentleman.

  He stopped to let her pass.

  Five

  Jacey leaned against the bedroom door. “No more tears,” she whispered. “Look forward not back.”

  She squared her shoulders and saw a familiar silver dresser set, her sister Clara’s hair things. Jacey covered her heart. Gabriel had given her his dead wife’s room.

  Jace traced the engraved initials on the hairbrush twice before she sought with her gaze the connecting door to Gabriel’s bedroom.

  Hope flared, but she squashed it. His choice of room meant nothing. This had been her sister’s bedroom, after all.

  Gabriel had been unbending and unforgiving, proof he didn’t want her here. He acted the way he did the day she convinced him that her child … the day she lost him forever.

  “Forever,” she repeated, for her own sake. He’d also been Gabriel, more devilishly handsome than any man of the cloth – any man – had a right to be. He could never be hers, because to save him, she’d destroyed him.

  Tired of regrets, Jacey sat on the edge of the old four-poster, stroked the faded coverlet on which Gabriel’s mother had stitched primroses, when she was seven and wished the woman was her mother, too.

  Only society could claim her own mother. For hugs, Jacey came to Kirk Cottage, more a home than Lockhart Keep, the ancient stone fortress on the hill. Gabriel had been the boy she made bow and scrape for fun. Back then, he did anything she asked.

  Jacey wasn’t sure when her disdain for the scabby-kneed peasant turned to something more. She remembered that after he’d come home a new-minted parson, life was bliss. Then it was hell.

  She rose and worked her shoulders before putting on her nightdress. She’d aged, too, she saw in the mirror, but she’d not yet reached Gabriel’s advanced age of thirty.

  Life goes on, she thought. It can be good, or not, depending on what we make it. Tomorrow she’d
meet her niece, and eventually she’d give the child a happy life, for Clara’s sake.

  Jacey took the note Suttie sent her from her bag, and read it, again:

  Suttie, I need your help. My step-daughter is sullen and sad. Since her mother died, she rarely speaks, never laughs. A man like me, alone with a daughter to raise; it’s killing me not knowing what to do for her. You made me smile when I was young and sad. You always knew how. Come with your puppets? A motherless four-year-old who never laughs; how can you resist? Come soon, my friend. Your Faithful Servant, Gabriel Macgregor.

  He wanted Suttie but hadn’t expected his past to come with her.

  Jacey didn’t want Bridget sad and unhappy. When she read the letter, she knew she had to come, lay old ghosts to rest, and get on with raising Bridget for Clara.

  Behind the humble village cleric hid a stubborn, hard-headed and arrogant man, who would, in fact, be shocked to his black stockings to hear it. She imagined he could be difficult for a wee girl to live with.

  In the note, Jace saw his plea, not only for the child, but the writer. He didn’t know he’d asked for help, but Suttie did, and so did she.

  Six

  Thinking she should look in on Bridget, she threw on her old wrap, still tying it when she hit the hall, and headed towards the spare room, but stopped. Another door stood ajar, wide enough for her to see Gabriel bent over a wee figure settling her in for sleep. Jacey’s heart cried out to see and meet her niece, but she’d wait for the child’s sake.

  Gabriel tucked Bridget in, whispered a word, kissed her wee head. When he straightened, Jacey read concern in an expression as clear and open as it had once been for her.

  He saw her and tried to mask his emotions but failed. Rounding the bed, he came out into the hall, while Jacey stood rooted, knees weak. She had never been more aware of Gabriel as a man of the cloth as when his pastoral attire revealed so much of the flesh and blood man beneath.