She released him like rubbish and her gaze clashed with Ewan's. “Good evening, Captain Fraser.”
Then she tucked the blade in the band at her waist, wiped her hands together, and walked away, putting her back to them with the confidence of a woman who could clearly handle her own.
Clemmons tried to twist after her. “I'd like to take her knife and—”
Ewan grabbed the man's shoulders and pulled him back. “Ye'll do no such thing. I say ye keep from this place lest ye go missing yer bollocks.”
“I'd like to see her try.” Clemmons spit on the ground and uttered a few more choice words Ewan chose to ignore.
The main room was cooler than the bar area, the lights dimmed and shadows settled heavy in corners where the sun had long since set. Ewan had his response from Freya, though he'd hoped for a different outcome.
In his time with the Black Watch, Ewan had learned not only to uncover secrets, he’d also found everyone had them.
Everyone.
Most especially a madam who traveled to the country regularly. Freya had her indiscretions, and uncovering them would expose a weakness he could exploit.
He grimaced inwardly at the distaste of doing the very thing he'd been taught to prevent. But then his thoughts flashed to his mother, left alone in their country manor. She'd never been the same after his father's death. Neither of them had.
Ewan imagined her as he'd left her, sitting on the porch with her frail hands folded tightly over one another, as if she could hold in her fear of losing him. Except he'd felt it - from the moisture visible in her wide gaze to the tremble in her voice and the ferocity of her fragile hug.
He needed to ensure she was all right, and Freya would help him. No matter what it took.
CHAPTER TWO
It was almost dawn when Freya made her way up to her private room within Molly's. It was set far enough back in the establishment to afford her peace, away from the bustle of conversation and the primal sounds of pleasure. God knew she’d heard enough of that through the last two years.
A figure leaned against the door, fading into the shadows.
“Shouldna ye be downstairs?” Freya asked.
A rustle of cloth sounded and the figure straightened so the soft predawn light fell over the brunette's pretty face. Truly in this light, Alli looked younger than her twenty years. Young though she may be, she'd quickly made her way into Freya's trust before Molly's was even in existence.
Alli widened her silvery blue eyes with excitement. “What happened in yer private meeting with Captain Nay?”
Alli fanned her lashes, thick and black as her silky hair. Those lashes had won over many a disgruntled customer, ruffled feathers easily smoothed by the time a new girl could be brought round to see to his needs.
“Captain Nay?” Freya pulled the key from her pocket and cast Alli a questioning look.
“Aye.” Alli squared her shoulders and stood at stiff attention, her face set in an exaggeratedly severe expression. She turned her palm out, as if rejecting an offer of drink. “Nay, thank ye, lass – I'm fine with my tea tonight. Nay, thank ye, lass – I’m fine with my own company and a lonely bed tonight.” The pantomime ended with a casual shrug. “Captain Nay. All the girls call him that. Ye dinna know?”
Freya shook her head with a laugh and unlocked the door. “I apparently hadn't paid it much mind.”
Alli followed her into the large room. “Then surely ye paid a mind to how mighty handsome a man he is.”
“We of all people should know how deceiving beauty can be. Especially exceptional beauty.” Freya set the dagger on the small table beside the door.
“So ye did notice.” Alli put a hand over her mouth to cover a laugh, a habit borne of a crooked eyetooth that left her self-conscious.
Freya made a sound in the back of her throat, partly a hum, partly a scoff, and pulled her father's watch from the small pocket in her skirt. A habitual glance at the scratched glass face indicated it was seven in the morning, meaning it was six. For all the pride her da had in the old piece, it was perpetually ahead of schedule.
She laid it gently inside the china bowl she kept on the table just beside the blade.
Except for those two small reminders of home, Freya's room was as functional as the office housing her other life, the one filled with ledgers and figures and names.
The room consisted of a curtained bed, a wardrobe, the table by the door, another table to hold the ewer of fresh water for bathing, and a massive mirror tall enough for her to see herself from foot to brow. It had been a very necessary, very costly expense for the new madam in town when she'd started her operation two years prior. An appealing madam was a popular procuress.
Freya pulled at the pinching shoes she wore and immediately settled a couple inches lower once her feet were free of the restraints. The balls of her feet ached like she'd worn through the thin skin and worked her way into the hard bone beneath.
“Shouldna ye be downstairs?” Freya asked again while she untied her stockings and slipped the fine silk off her legs.
Alli rolled her eyes with the same exaggeration she'd demonstrated while playing Captain Fraser earlier.
Captain Nay, indeed. The thought brought a smirk to Freya's lips.
“Ye know it's no' ever busy now.” Alli folded her arms over her simple chemise. Aside from the russet-colored velvet cinching her narrow waist, she didn't wear the same lavish clothing as did the other girls. But then she wasn't on sale like they were.
“I was planning to finish reading the book ye lent me,” Alli said. “But then I found something even more enticing than knowing if Juliet would take the poison - ye meeting privately with Captain Nay.”
Freya chuckled and turned her back to Alli. “Verra well. If ye're here, ye might as well be of assistance.”
The click of the door told Freya the other girl had closed it. A soft tug jostled Freya's lower back and immediately the pressure around her hips lessened. “Tessa saw ye walking to yer office with him,” Alli said. “According to her, the good captain couldna keep his eyes off yer backside the whole way there.”
“Couldn't he?” Freya murmured. He’d certainly kept his eyes lifted to her face in so saintly a manner, it lured her to want to tempt him.
So he was not immune after all. She indulged in an arrogant smile.
“Aye, and when ye attacked that bugger we all hate, he couldna keep his eyes from ye then either,” Alli spoke as she plucked the laces of Freya's corset free, one liberating inch at a time. Were Alli not such a good backup when Freya needed her at Molly's, she'd employ the girl as the lady's maid she'd always intended to be.
But then whores and madams made significantly more than lady's maids, and Alli was happy with her position.
Despite her nimble hands, the unlacing of the corset dragged on for several painful breaths and cramped heartbeats, as if the idea of freedom from the merciless grip left Freya even more starved for air.
Corsets - implements to lift the bosom and tighten the waist to give the rump a rounder, higher appearance. A womanly discomfort men were unaware of in their pursuit to admire pretty things made all the prettier solely for them.
“When ye put yer blade to the bugger's gullet, Captain Nay reached for his own weapon,” Alli went on in a giddy rush. “I mean, I know the men dinna have their weapons inside, but he reached for the place on his belt where his pistol loop hung. Like he meant to protect ye.”
The corset sagged open and Freya pulled in a deep breath, letting her chest expand to its full capacity. Free, and open with a kiss of sweet cool air flowing between the nearly transparent shift and her skin. Alli patiently pulled the corset away from Freya's body. It peeled away like the excavation of a full ribcage from a skeleton.
“Well,” Alli huffed. “I found it to be verra romantic even if ye're no' impressed with it.” She worked out the laces from Freya's skirt next.
Freya pushed the fabric off her hips and pulled away the shift to flutter to the
ground where it joined the rest of her garments. Her body remained lined with the print of her constraints, a line above the knee where her stockings tied, the crinkle of reddened skin at her waist from the squeeze of her corset, the painful pink of her toes greedily splayed out on the cool wooden floorboards. She wanted to sigh with her liberation.
“I can take care of myself.” Freya left the clothing for Alli to tend to and strode naked to the washbasin. “I havena needed a man to save me all this time.” Freya lifted a square of linen from the water and wrung out the excess. “I dinna need a man now.” The chilled cloth slid against her skin, invigorating her tired, hot flesh. She closed her eyes and settled it over her face. Her aching temples pulsed beneath the tent of cool, wet linen.
“So what did he want?” Alli asked from across the room.
Freya pulled the cloth from her face and reached for a large, luxuriously soft sheet of linen from a small pile beside the ewer. “He wanted me to check on his mother next time I go to the country.” She scrubbed at her weary body until her skin was pink and the markings from her clothing had begun to fade.
Alli gave a delighted little squeal. “If that isna the kindest thing I've ever heard!”
“I said nay.” Freya pulled open her wardrobe. The delicate scent of violets greeted her, fresh and welcome and tinged with memories of home. She tried not to glance to the far right, past the colorful assortment of scanty silks and velvets and lacy beautiful things, but she could not stop her gaze from drifting.
There, hanging like the skins of a shed life, were the dresses she’d worn when she first arrived in Edinburgh with their prudent silhouettes, high necklines, and fittings not so damnably tight. The gowns of a lady. The gowns she wore when she visited her home.
She grabbed a clean shift and pulled it over her head. It whispered down her skin in a contented sigh.
“How could ye say nay?” Alli asked, her voice pitched with disbelief.
“Because I have a family to protect too, in case ye've forgotten.” Freya closed the door against the two sides of her life.
Alli's reproaching appearance sobered. “I know. It's just sad.” She peeled back the corner of Freya's made bed.
“That soft heart of yers will get ye in trouble one of these days, Alli.” Freya slipped between the cold sheets and jutted her icy toes toward the heat of the warming pan at the base of her mattress.
“Then even my soft heart is aware of something ye hadna considered.” Alli pulled the blankets over Freya's shoulders and looked down at her, expression as stern as that of a mother. “What have ye done to keep yer family safe?” Alli asked. “What would ye do to ensure they stayed safe?”
The chill of the sheets was no longer pleasant. It seeped into Freya's skin, through her blood down into her bones.
“I would do anything,” Freya whispered.
“Then so might he.” Alli drew the heavy bed curtains closed against the light of a rising sun.
Freya lay in the darkness long after the telltale sounds confirmed Alli had left and locked the door behind her. Despite the careful observation Alli made, she was either very wrong or very cautious in her wording.
Because if Captain Fraser was willing to sacrifice as much as she had for his family, there was no 'might' about it. He would do anything to ensure the safety of his family.
***
It took Ewan the better part of a day to glean any information on Freya. Not because there wasn't any to be had - there were always secrets to be had - apparently, he'd found the only saintly madam in all of Scotland.
Viper though she may be, Ewan was hard-pressed to find a man or woman in Edinburgh who would speak ill of the famed madam of Molly's. She gave blankets to the sick, fed the poor with remains of food from her establishment, and took in women whose husbands were killed in the war - not as whores if they didn't want to be, but as maids while she educated them to something better. Even the lasses at a nearby church grudgingly spoke praises through pursed lips.
She was a woman Ewan had not expected - admirable, considerate, giving, respectable. Surprising.
So much so, Ewan had appealed to his colonel earlier that day to be granted leave to see his mother again. And again the request was immediately denied. Much as he had expected.
All the greater disappointment when it pulled him in a direction he did not want to go.
Ewan strode through the doors of Molly's with the late afternoon sun still burning bright in the sky. His stomach gave a sick twist at what he intended to do. This was not why he'd joined the regiment in the first place. He'd meant to be a good man, to undo the sins of his father and protect his mother.
Several girls lingered inside Molly's, lounging near the bar. They quickly brightened at his appearance, like dolls brought to life with eyes sparkling and glossy lips pulling back into smiles.
He nodded at them in greeting but briskly approached the bar. “Tessa, I'd like to speak with Freya if she's free.”
The blonde behind the bar quirked a grin at him, amused. One of the ladies gave an excited giggle.
“Aye, I'll send one of the girls to fetch her.” Tessa nodded to the giggling girl with a hard look of reproach that softened when she turned back to him. “Will ye be wanting some tea?”
Ewan shook his head. The idea of tea made the twist in his stomach wrench even tighter. “Nay, thank ye.”
The girl smothered a laugh once more before being run off with the snap of a bar towel.
Molly's was a different world in the daytime. The harsh light seeped through the heavy drapes to reveal cracks in the white plaster ceiling and the fraying of the silk cushions. The walls of sultry pink in the evening were a sad, faded red by day, with several pieces chipped at the corners.
“Captain Fraser.”
The austere purr pulled his attention back to the bar. Freya stood beside it, her brow lifted in expectation.
For the ugliness daylight revealed in Molly's, it unveiled even more beauty in the woman standing before him. Creamy skin beneath the peppering of freckles over her nose and cheeks, glossy red hair, pink full lips.
Her eyes weren't hard sapphires, but instead were soft, like a sunlit summer sky. She'd traded the cinched silk gown for a simpler blue cotton one, albeit the dress was lower cut than was proper. She'd also left off the wide skirts popular among women, so the fabric hung around the natural shape of her hips.
“Did ye want to speak with me?” She spoke slowly, as if she found him daft.
Given the way he was staring dumbly at her, it was no wonder. “Aye, in private,” he said at last.
She studied him for a long moment and heaved a delicately drawn out, long-suffering sigh. “Of course.” She did not invite him to follow her, but turned away from him and strode stiffly to her office. The lines of her long legs showed beneath the skirt of her dress, disappearing and reappearing with each clipped step.
Once again Ewan could not stop his gaze from sneaking over Freya's figure. There was something tantalizing about the shape of a woman's body beneath a gown, without the embellishment of a structured cage and coiled padding. Ewan's face went warm and he realized he was staring. Again.
Freya showed him into the office. A shutter was thrown open and allowed a stream of sunlight to slice into the room, revealing a sea of dancing motes in the air and the stillness of all else.
This time Freya did not sit down, nor did she offer for him to do so either. Instead she stood before the closed door like a sentry, her arms folded over the swell of her bosom. “Well, what did ye find out about me?”
Surprise choked him into silence. This was not how he had anticipated the meeting going, with a confrontation rather than slowly teased out secrets meant to lure her into acquiescence. He had planned a smooth shift from no into yes - this was an abrupt jerk.
“Ye're a good person.” He spoke before he realized what he was saying.
Freya gave a mirthless smile. “Ye seem surprised, Captain.”
“Ye're a madam.�
� He regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth.
Her gaze was no longer a sunlit summer sky, but a frosty winter morning. “And ye're a traitor to his country who intends to extort a woman to do his bidding.”
The word plunged into him like a white-hot blade and stabbed repeatedly.
Traitor. Traitor. Traitor.
Like his da.
No.
He was not his da. He'd joined the Black Watch to clear his family's name. To keep them safe. To be a better person than his da had ever been.
“I am no’ a traitor.” His control slipped and a bite of rage nipped at his words.
Freya did not back down. In fact, she stepped forward, once again on the scent of blood. The woman saw far too much.
“What did ye find?” she bit out.
It was a pity women could not lead an army. The madam of Molly’s would make an exceptional officer.
“Jacobite soldiers come into this place and dinna leave.” It was a rumor Ewan had heard, but one he'd rather use to convince her than his other discovery, the one he knew to be true.
The one that would scare her enough to say yes.
“Many men come into this establishment. Is there someone who tracks their entry and exit? Do ye think I'm collecting them for some nefarious purpose?”
He kept his shoulders squared. “I think ye aid the Jacobites.”
“I aid anyone who needs assistance.” She tilted her head, considering him. “What else?”
He wanted to stare at his feet, as he'd tried to do when he was a lad in trouble, as he'd done to avoid the image of his father's stiff form dangling from a rope. But he was not a lad. He was a man who had to own his transgressions, and he met her gaze when he said exactly what he knew would hurt her. “I know ye have a sister and ailing mother in the country, and that’s why ye go to Callander so often.”
Freya’s lips thinned. “What of them?”
Part of Ewan withered inside with what he needed to say. He clenched his fist against the rise of nausea. “It would be a shame if they somehow found themselves in trouble.”
The Madam's Highlander Page 2
