The words sounded easy and amusing, but she didn’t mistake for one second the steel behind them. “No matter the circumstances,” she retorted, “I would never endanger young Connell in that way. I’m not the barbarian here, sir.”
“That’s good to know,” he returned, eyeing her again. Whatever he looked for, she hoped she left him wondering. “Ye’ll find a bellpull by the bed,” he went on after a moment, “should ye need to summon me.”
“Summon you?” she repeated, seizing on the words. “Are you the butler, then?”
“I’m the man ye’ll be dealing with. The only one.”
“Well, how pleasant for both of us.” She took another turn about the room, not about to sit in his presence. “I don’t suppose you’ve considered that I have no change of clothes or even a hairbrush? Not to mention the fact that I just spent hours racketing about in the back of a filthy wagon in the rain.”
Gray eyes assessed her from toe to head, the slow lift of his gaze making her heart skitter. With boarding school, and finishing school, and then serving Lady Sarah and her cats, followed by months of being ignored by everyone in Mayfair, she’d never had many dealings with men. By the time she’d received Gabriel’s letter, she’d actually begun to anticipate the inevitable crowd of fortune hunters. At least a man who needed her income would have reason to be polite to her. Even a fortune hunter, though, wouldn’t look at her the way Graeme Maxton did—with the gaze of a predator assessing his next meal.
“The room across from ye has a bathtub,” he said after a moment. “We’ll fill it fer ye once I’m finished here. And there are a few things in the wardrobe that might suit ye. Nae as fancy or grand as what ye’re accustomed to, I imagine, but they’re clean. And dry.”
She nodded, expecting him to leave and lock her in again. Instead he remained in the middle of the bedchamber and continued looking at her. “Don’t expect me to thank you, Mr. Maxton,” she finally said, as the silence began to stretch on. “I’m not here because I chose to come visiting and got caught by the foul weather.”
“Nae, ye arenae here because ye decided to come calling,” he agreed. “Until I decide what’s to be done with ye, though, ye might consider trying to be more pleasant.” He inclined his head, the gesture graceful but not looking terribly practiced—as if he didn’t bow often, or willingly. “I’ll fetch ye when the tub is full. And if ye’re going to keep snapping back at me, it’s Laird Maxton. I’m a damned viscount, m’lady.”
A moment later she was alone again, locked into yet another room with nothing but the clothes on her back, a small tray of food, and deep dark night out the pair of windows behind her. With a shudder she pulled the heavy green curtains closed. For all she knew those men still stood outside, watching her from below.
A viscount. Him. She never would have guessed that in a hundred years. Callused hands, worn clothes, his plainspoken, rude manner—the only aristocratic thing about him was his arrogance. If he was what passed for nobility in the Highlands, she’d be doubly happy to return to London.
A tear ran down her cheek, and she brushed it away. Tears wouldn’t get her out of this mess. And screaming out her frustration would only convince her captor that she should never be allowed out of this room.
Hm. Perhaps Lord Maxton’s comment had some potential. Perhaps being polite and pleasant and demure would gain her some trust. If so, Graeme Maxton had given her the key to his own downfall. Because the moment they turned their backs, she meant to escape. And no aggravating, arrogant man—handsome or not—would be able to stop her.
Chapter Four
As usual during the short days of a Highlands autumn, Graeme rose well before sunrise. This morning as he finished shaving and cleaning his teeth he wondered why he’d bothered to go to bed at all. He damned well hadn’t slept enough to make it worthwhile.
The source of his unrest was likely dreaming away the morning in the bedchamber beside his. And while the idea annoyed him, they’d all be better off if she remained sleeping. He needed to figure out what to do about her when he couldn’t send her on to Dunncraigh, and wouldn’t simply return her to the Cracked Hearth. And while he could keep her prisoner here for the moment, that came with its own set of additional problems—and expenses.
For one damned thing, he was going to have to hire a female to look after her. A lady required someone to brush her hair, help her dress, and myriad other things he couldn’t even imagine. Mrs. Woring the cook would never do; he trusted her to keep her mouth shut about their unwanted visitor, but the woman regularly beat venison into submission. A gentle hand, she did not have.
Keeping grand Lady Marjorie here only prolonged the danger to the lot of them, anyway. Whether she remained for one day or one week, her tale to the local constabulary wouldn’t change. Nor could he bribe her to keep her silence. Her impractical shoes—which he remembered with annoying clarity—likely cost more than he’d had to spare all year. And hell, aside from bribery, the only two other ways to keep a lass from speaking out against him were to kill her, or to marry her.
To marry her.
A knock sounded at his door. “Enter,” he called, jumping.
“M’laird,” Cowen said, stepping into the room, “she’s pounding at the door again. Nearly rang the bell off its hook, too.”
Graeme took a deep breath. Whatever he’d abruptly begun to contemplate, he needed more than two seconds to figure it out. “Likely she needs someone to open the damned curtains fer her,” he muttered absently. “Have a plate of breakfast made up, will ye? And some tea. Ladies like tea, I hear.”
“Aye.” The butler cleared his throat. “I thought to send Taog doon to the Cracked Hearth for a bite this morning.”
“That’s a good idea, Cowen. I’d like to know if I’m aboot to have half the Sassenach army riding doon into my valley.” And Taog the footman had a good portion of sense, so the lad wouldn’t be likely to gossip, or to miss any clues that the Maxton household was about to be in for a great deal of trouble.
“That was my thought, too.”
Graeme followed the butler into the hallway, then watched the older man hurry down the stairs on his errands. Five servants, Garaidh nan Leòmhann had, when back during his parents’ time the so-called Lion’s Den had boasted a dozen. He would almost rather have seen the house go up in flames—dead and ruined all at once. This way, the slow decline and ruin they’d been facing for the past dozen years or so brought a little pain with it every damned day.
The lass pounded on the far side of her door as he reached it. The lass who happened to be a damned heiress. And a privileged, spoiled Sassenach. But for what he required, that really didn’t matter. Graeme made a fist and pounded back. “I’m here, fer God’s sake!”
“You’re a very rude man,” she returned, her voice a little muffled through the thick oak.
“I dunnae recall claiming anything different. What do ye want? Ye’ll have yer breakfast in a minute.”
“I … I require some assistance.”
Clenching his jaw, ordering himself not to imagine her still in her night rail with her long dark hair loose over her shoulders, he pulled the key from his pocket, unlocked the door, and shoved it open.
Lady Marjorie was not wearing the night rail he’d scavenged for her, nor was her long, dark hair loose. And although he didn’t see what he’d imagined, the sight before him left him more unsettled than disappointed. She’d found the light blue muslin gown that had once belonged to his mother, the fit a little tight across her bosom. And she’d somehow tamed that hair into an elegant coil atop her head. If she was attempting to convince him that she was an angel and that her halo, however, she would firstly have to be other than a Sassenach, and secondly not be the physical representation of just how much trouble he’d likely found himself, whatever he decided to do with her.
He shook himself. “What assistance?” he demanded. “Ye look fairly decent to me.”
Her pale cheeks darkened to a soft rose. “I—yes. It�
��s the buckle on my shoe. I put them on the hearth to dry, and when I tried to put them back on, one of the buckles broke off.”
“Yer shoe.”
She frowned. “Yes, my shoe. Do you expect me to go about barefoot? There’s snow outside.”
“I dunnae expect ye to go aboot outside at all,” he countered. Just the thought of one of Dunncraigh’s men spying Lattimer’s sister on his property … The coolness between the Maxwell and himself would seem like a handshake compared to what would happen if that occurred. Of course if he had under his control the money to challenge the Maxwell’s stranglehold, the story would have a very different ending.
“I am not going barefoot,” she stated. “A lady wears shoes. It’s bad enough that this is a house dress I will have to pair with walking shoes. If I—”
“Fer glory’s sake,” he muttered. “Where are the damned things?”
“On my feet. I wasn’t about to admit you into my presence while my feet were naked. And your language, sir. If you please.”
Graeme clenched his jaw, choosing to concentrate on the second part of the statement even while the first part had him conjuring more than her feet naked before him. Damnation. He needed to go visit Morag Polk or Juno Allen in Sheiling. Three younger siblings and a host of cotters under his protection or not, a man like him wasn’t meant to be celibate for … God, how long had it been? A month? No wonder he was imagining a proper English lass naked. Of course if he married her, he could damned well see her naked. Even a marriage of convenience—his convenience, in this instance—needed to be consummated.
“My language?” he repeated, fighting his way back to the conversation at hand. “Ye’re the one came to the Highlands, lass. Dunnae ye dare complain aboot our way of speaking.”
Color touched her cheeks again. “I meant the profanity. Not your … way of speaking.”
“Oh.” Had he cursed? He couldn’t recall, though odds were that he had. “Well, I reckon I’ll speak as I wish.”
She folded her arms over her chest, which sent his attention back to the snug fit of the blue muslin. “Physically I am your prisoner, Mr. Maxton. My mind and my opinions, however, remain my own.”
“That’s bloody fine with me,” he returned, lifting his gaze to her face again, using profanity deliberately. He was well versed in it, and that was damned certain. “Give me yer damned shoes.”
“I…” She made a sound very like a growl. “I will not surrender my only footwear.”
“God save us from the plague and Englishwomen,” he muttered, altering his grandfather’s favorite saying a bit to fit the circumstances. Old Uisdean Maxton would no doubt approve, given his well-documented suspicion of any Sassenach. “Cowen!”
The door opened so quickly that the butler must have been listening just on the other side of it. “Aye, sir?”
“Find me some lass’s shoes. I dunnae care if they’re milking shoes or dancing slippers, as long as they’ll fit our guest, here.”
Bobbing his head, Cowen backed out of the doorway and vanished again. Female shoes were a rare commodity at the Lion’s Den, but they’d managed to find a handful of gowns in the attic. The butler was a resourceful lad; he’d manage.
“Thank you.”
That captured his attention. “So ye’re a polite lass now, are ye?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow.
“I am your captive, sir. I’m hoping for kind treatment.”
She had no idea how very kind he was being to her, considering the purpose his idiot brothers had in mind for her, and how much blunt handing her over to Dunncraigh would likely earn him. In fact, the only thing that would likely earn him more would be to keep her for himself. That would definitely set him against Dunncraigh, but at least he’d have the income to make it a good fight. Could he do it, though? To her?
He certainly didn’t owe her anything; she was a foolish, self-important Sassenach who would have fared far worse if someone else had found her. As for him, an heiress would provide what he required. After she gave him an heir he could go elsewhere for sex, and he’d never looked for anything beyond that. He never would. “Do as ye’re told and I’ll be kind enough,” he returned belatedly.
A female with any sense would have curtsied and gone over to sit by the fire until he could fetch her breakfast. This one, though, stood her ground in the center of the room and continued gazing at him with those eyes the color of the midday sky. For Lucifer’s sake, he would be tempted to marry her whether she had money or not. “And what is it I’m to do, then?” she asked. “No one’s told me anything about why I’m here except to say that my brother and I are English and you’re all from clan Maxwell. Surely we aren’t the first Englishmen who’ve ever ridden through Maxwell territory.”
“That would be the problem, yer highness,” he said, wishing Cowen would hurry the devil up and find some shoes for the lass so he could go away somewhere and catch his breath and his wits. Just standing there in her presence he couldn’t seem to pull enough air into his lungs—and he couldn’t blame it all on his contemplation of a marriage. He’d gone bride hunting once or twice before, after all, only to be thwarted by Dunncraigh and one of his many sons and nephews. He hadn’t noted the lass’s appearance, then. Now, though, he couldn’t seem able to look away. That aside, Marjorie Forrester was someone the Maxwell didn’t know about. Nor would the duke, until it was too late. If Graeme found her physically attractive—and he damned well did—then he would count that as an unasked-for bonus. “Ye arenae the first English to cross our path. And the previous … visitors, we’ll call ’em, werenae very kindly.”
“Out of curiosity, did you kidnap any of these so-called visitors? That might explain their lack of friendliness.”
Damned impossible woman. “Nae. Nae me personally, anyway. But I reckon ye’ll do fer the moment.”
Not him personally. He was trying to be flippant or sarcastic, no doubt, but Marjorie seized onto those particular words with all her strength. Her kidnappers—his younger brothers, she now knew—had been full of derogatory statements about her fellow countymen and her in particular, but despite his threats and arrogance and intimidating presence, Maxton seemed mostly to view her as … She wasn’t certain, but it made her breath quicken.
But he didn’t seem to have anything against the English in general, or her in particular. Her first thought after making that realization was that perhaps she could convince him, then, that setting her free would be to everyone’s benefit. She needed a plan first, though. He wanted to protect his brothers, and so she would have to figure out how to convince him that they wouldn’t be blamed for this—whether she meant to keep her word or not.
“Nae response to that, yer ladyship? Have I broken yer spirit, then?” he prodded.
Ha. Not likely. “My continued well-being would seem to be at your whim, sir,” she returned. “I wouldn’t call that level ground for an argument.”
A slight smile curved his mouth. “Ye do have a point.”
Arrogant man. Smiling at her as if he knew exactly how handsome he was and meant to use that to sway her weak little female brain into think him charming. Ha. And ha again. “I know I do.”
Another man, this one younger and taller than the one she’d assumed to be the butler, appeared in the doorway. The scent of the tray he carried made her stomach rumble, and for once she didn’t care how unladylike that might be. She should probably refuse to eat as a protest against her captivity, but if she starved herself she wouldn’t be in any condition to escape when an opportunity presented itself.
“Ye requested breakfast for the lady, sir,” the young man said, his clearly curious gaze fixed on her. “I’ve brought it while Cowen’s searching fer shoes.”
“Thank ye, Ross,” Maxton said, taking the tray. “Oot with ye.”
The young man fled down the hallway, and with one foot her captor hooked the door and pushed it closed behind him. “It isn’t proper for you to be in a room alone with me,” Marjorie stated, mostly to see how he w
ould react to that. By London standards she’d been ruined the moment she vanished from the inn. Of course by London standards she wasn’t qualified to be in any of their fine ballrooms and parlors, anyway. This man didn’t know that, though. And anything she could do to keep her distance from him had to be to her benefit. It seemed like it should be, anyway.
“So ye say,” he muttered, and set the tray down on the small table beneath the two overstuffed chairs. “Sit doon and eat.”
“I prefer not to dine with you standing over me and glowering.”
He sat down in one of the two chairs and with his boot kicked the other out for her. “Sit doon and eat,” he repeated.
“But I just said it isn’t proper for—”
“Ye’re a damned captive, lass. Ye dunnae make the rules here. And I’ll nae ask ye again. If ye dunnae sit doon, I’ll eat yer breakfast myself. And I’m damned hungry, so dunnae think I wouldnae do it.”
With a stifled sigh, dragging one foot a little so the unbuckled shoe wouldn’t come off and trip her, Marjorie sat at the table opposite him. A cloth covered the plate, presumably to keep the items beneath it warm, and she removed it to set it across her lap. Despite her hunger she poured hot tea into her teacup first, then dropped in one lump of sugar while he frowned. Hm. Was sugar dear here? Deliberately she took a second lump and stirred it in the tea. Then she found the fork and knife and cut herself a bite-sized slice of mutton.
“How long does it take ye to eat?” Maxton asked, setting an elbow on the table and his chin on his clenched fist.
Marjorie chewed and swallowed. “I beg your pardon?”
“The food’s better when it’s hot,” he continued, light gray eyes meeting hers and then lowering to the utensils in her hands. “At this rate it’ll be ice before ye finish.”
“I suppose you grab great chunks of meat in your hands and rip off mouthfuls with your teeth?”
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