“You’d best not be implying that I couldn’t do you in,” Rose said.
“I fear that you’ve vanquished me entirely, but not in the way that my supposedly loyal squire fears.”
“Sorry, Laird,” the Squire shouted. The youth cleared his throat and paused before adding, “Then, ye’re well?”
“Damnation and a dark moon,” Ram swore. “Aye, you -“ Biting his tongue and restraining his temper with skill honed by long practice, Ram took several breaths before he spoke again. “Other than doubting my competence, is there a reason you have disturbed me despite my orders to the contrary?”
“Yes, sir,” the Squire snapped. “Gormal and Dingwall commanded me here. Your First discovered ye’re location right fast, after only a few inquiries. He said that Duff’s brawn be only skin deep. Conall had to do no more than –“
“And why,” Ram growled, “have you come?”
“You’re late for Clan Court, Laird,” the Squire said.
Had that much time passed? It seemed more like minutes than hours. “Could my people na wait and show a bit of patience?”
“Well, after about three quarters of an hour various groups of claimants began trying to solve their disputes with fists and soon someone drew their blade and –“
“We shall be with you momentarily,” Ram said.
Well, not so momentarily. He donned his plaid in a trice and then helped Rose fasten her gown. She sputtered while Ram retrieved her hair pins and passed them over. He watched her trembling hands put her hair up and whispered “beautiful” and “breathtaking” every few seconds. She gave up more than finished, halting with her hair in glorious, just-fucked disarray.
He said, “Allow me to assist, my lady,” and moved to gather and repair her coiffure, not because he wished to, but more because he didn’t want every man who saw her imagining her naked and writhing and… Damn. The vision ran through his head as a memory now. If he didn’t get her out of here luath he’d say to hell with his duty and spend the rest of the day the way he’d spent the last three hours. Yes, speed mattered.
He extended his hand and when she trusted him with hers, he bent his head to kiss her fingers. He dared not do more before leading her into the bright light of reality where duty and his squire awaited. When Ram ordered his squire to escort Rose to her bedchamber, the lad knew better than to grumble aloud, although the expression in his eyes grumbled for him.
Ram suspected that his own eyes roared as he stalked towards the castle when something deep inside wanted him, everything deep inside him, wanted to follow Rose and finish his proposal to confirm their future.
He ignored his wayward impulses and headed for Clan Court, telling himself that after today’s events, their future was inevitable. No man of honor would or could do less than wed her now. Nothing and no one could alter their course.
Nothing. No one.
CHAPTER EIGHT
No one and nothing–save for the loss of everyone and everything.
That eve, Ram stood in his study with Dair MacKenzie, trying not to look addlepated as he gaped at the note in his hand. He’d asked for the meeting to tell the other laird that he couldna wed his daughter. Dair must have suspected his intent, for Ram barely uttered a word before the other laird reached into his pocket and pulled out an old, tattered paper, saying that Ram best read it afore he made a choice that cost him and his people their home, their heritage and their honor.
Ram didna dispute that the handwriting was his Da’s because he’d studied his father’s business records and personal papers. ‘How?” Ram asked, unable to be more articulate. “Why?”
“As young men and new lairds, ye’re father and I were close–as close as you and the ‘lovely lairds’ are today. You knew that, didn’t you?”
Ram nodded.
“My father betrothed me to Bridget, a lovely lass with chocolate eyes and hair that didn’t know if it wanted ta be brown or blonde.” Ram looked up sharply and Dair nodded. “She were the youngest daughter of the laird of Clan Ranald–a true wedding of power for the purpose of building alliances. Your grandfather betrothed your father to Alice Burns, a strong-willed, opinionated lass who were the only daughter of a merchant as rich as Midas.”
Ram stalked over to seize the whiskey decanter, lifting it to his lips for a mighty gulp. He closed his eyes to await the bracing burn before nodding again.
“The joint betrothal party were held here and ‘twas clear from the start that trouble loomed. MacKay and Bridget met with the force of a lightning strike. When Mac had to introduce his own betrothed to a guest, he groped to recall her name. The band struck up the first dance, announcing ‘twould be for the betrothed couples. Mac and Bridget turned to each other like night turns into day. And when I led Bridget onto the dance floor Mac looked like night fell for a second time.”
Ram took the decanter over to the window, wishing like Hell that he was outside, taunting David and Hugh into the kind of bare-knuckle brawl that helped clear his head.
“The double wedding was set for three days hence,” Dair said. He didn’t have to explain to Ram that travel was so difficult in the Highlands that such festivities would be grouped together to save the guests trouble–and to reduce the numbers of feuding clans encountering each other along the journey.
“Mac came to see me the next day, asking me to trade brides,” Dair snarled, pounding a side table for emphasis–not that he needed any aside from his expression. “I responded, logically and honorably denying his most dishonorable request. Then your sire, the man I loved like a brother, broke down and begged–groveled, I tell you!”
Loyalty prompted the instinctive response that the document in Ram’s hand decried. “’Tis a bloody lie. Your memory has grown feeble.”
“I grew too disgusted to tolerate his pleas and left the room. That night, when I retired to my chamber, I found Mac awaiting me. He asked, ‘Will this do?’ And he handed me this note. I read it and bade him look at me. I stared into his eyes and read his intent. He meant every word. I couldn’t fathom it then and I can’t fathom it today, but your Da meant every word of this pledge.”
Ram felt ill. Physically ill. His Da never made a promise he’d refuse to keep.
“I didna collect on the promise whilst your father was alive and didna ever intend to collect upon it. I married Alice and as ye know, we’re still wed today. She’s given me a pair of fine braw lads and a lovely lassie. ‘Tis nae a love match but we care for each other and we bloody well respect each other, which is more than many couples can claim. The might of my warriors combined with the force of my wife’s fortune created a stronger clan than marriage to any Ranald.”
That first sentence promised the only safe port in a stormy sea. Ram clung to it until Laird MacKenzie’s next words jerked it away.
“I gave into your father’s disgusting plea and his outrageous bribe because he and your mother fell in love so instantly that it had ta be fate. Only a stupid man tries to fight the inevitable. So, I gave in without ever intending to collect, until fate tried to punish me for my generosity by repeating the past with my daughter cast as the love-crazed bride. This pledge gained your father a happy marriage with a woman he should have lost. Now, ‘twill do the same for my daughter — or it will gain her a fine estate in need of a laird as a dowry that will have the lads battling for her hand.”
Ram couldn’t speak. Hell, he couldn’t even blink.
“You’ve a choice, Laird Ramsay–take my daughter and keep your land or take the Sassenach and lose everything else for yourself and your people,” Dair said.
Ram read the note again, his black eyes boring into it like he could will the words to rearrange themselves. But he couldn’t, of course. It still read: I, MacKay Sutherland, as future laird of the Sutherland Clan, acknowledge that I owe Alasdair MacKenzie, future laird of the MacKenzie Clan, a debt that can never be fully repaid. Therefore, upon my assuming my duties as laird, I agree to give, surrender or turn over to Alasdair MacKenzie for
his sole ownership and enjoyment, all that I own or will ever own, inclusive of all Sutherland land, wherever situate. This promise shall survive my death and bind my heirs.
After several readings, the text remained the same and the handwriting was still his father’s familiar script. This was more than one of his father’s oft-urged exceptions to his grandfather’s creed about a laird putting duty and clan first. This note created a debt that Laird MacKenzie was calling in. Ram could disclaim the obligation, shoulder the dishonor, and prepare for an all out feud. ‘Twould engulf the region, costing lives, misery, agony, stress and distress from his people and their allies–for generations to come. Nothing lingered in the Highland memory or marked the Highland soul like a feud–except possibly the taint of dishonor. There was very little Ram would not do to preserve his father’s honor.
“If I wed Flora,” Ram asked, “will the promise then be fulfilled?”
“On the day following the ceremony,” Dair said, “after you’ve exchanged vows and met your obligations as a husband, I shall give you the document as a wedding present. So are we agreed?”
“Agreed,” Ram said, finding the word nigh unbearable. Despite his misery, he straightened his spine and insisted upon confirming the deal. “So, I have promised to wed your daughter and seal the vows by acting the husband on our wedding night. In exchange, on the following day you will give me the document I now hold, the one containing the bloody pledge my father should never have made.”
“Yes,” Dair said, biting back the triumphant cheer he’d share later with his sons.
“Those are the only terms and conditions. No more and no less. Do you agree?” Ram asked.
Dair wanted to say no. He wanted to impose a raft of conditions requiring Ram to treat his daughter well, to respect her –even to love her, as ridiculous as that would sound coming from him, a man with no use for the emotion. The only exception to his disavowal of that troublesome emotion was his daughter–oh, and to some degree his sons, but that was different. Dair didn’t have much tenderness in him–by and large, he’d disciplined it out of himself. But everything left that ‘twas tender focused upon his Flora. How he abhorred thrusting her upon a man who wanted her the way he wanted pestilence, draught and plague.
But in this, Dair’s feelings mattered as little as Ram’s. The only feelings that mattered were Flora’s and she’d come to him this morn crying, overwrought, and very nearly destroyed. Dair asked if she’d take Ram forced and she replied that she’d take him any way she could get him. After recounting the whole tale to Flora and explaining his intentions, she’d danced a happy jig, jumping up and down and hugging him, saying she could always count on her father. And she always could. He’d be there to dry her tears, for there would be many. Yet he could give only one response–if he asked more or demanded more, Ram might very well balk for he was on the verge of it now.
“Just so,” Dair replied, holding out his hand for the document that the lad reluctantly surrendered. “Shall I call Flora in to advise that you have agreed?”
Ram’s brows raised and Dair silently cursed himself for the rare strategic error. Ram nodded and said, “Indeed. Summon Flora to tell her that I will pay the price for my parents daring to fall in love with each other.”
Dair sighed at his own stupidity and shouted for his daughter. Along with her brothers, Flora entered before Dair finished her name, prompting Ram to mutter, “It seems this is an expected announcement.”
Flora didn’t exactly run into the room, but she scampered, plowing ahead until she stood right before him. Her low cut gown of emerald green was surely intended to be fetching, matching her eyes and displaying her bosom. The effect backfired, reminding Ram of the plump ivory, roses and cinnamon mound he’d feasted upon so recently. It tightened his jaw and kindled the resentment shooting through his eyes.
“Yes, Ram?” Flora asked, placing a hand on his chest as she tilted her face upwards and fluttered her eyelashes.
“Your father offered an arrangement that a laird with a care for his people and heritage couldna refuse,” Ram said, in a crisp, cool tone that no lady wanted to hear from a man discussing matrimony. “I’ve not refused.”
“Oh,” Flora stammered, her happy glow fading to a glimmer, but stubbornly refusing to disappear. “That’s good then. We shall do very well together. I’ll make you happy, Ram. You’ll see.”
“Mayhaps, someday ‘twill grow to be congenial,” Ram said. “This, however, is not that day. Shall we set the event for the morrow and hold our leavetaking for the Highland Games by a day, Laird MacKenzie? I see no reason for delay.”
That had, indeed been Dair’s plan, until the last few moments when his keen senses picked up danger signals. Those instincts saved his life on many occasions and he respected them now, without question, and switched strategy. “If I kenned that ye were anxious for the marriage rather than the document I’d agree with ye.”
“’Tis all about the pledge, for you made that the stakes, Laird MacKenzie. You’ve made it so that it can be about nothing else. If you’d like to change that, you can do the honorable thing and return the bloody document that my father should never have written,” Ram said.
Seeing Ram’s expression degrade from resentment to hatred made Dair consider his request. Well, that expression and his danger instincts, which were now screaming in his head. Dair paused in the act of folding the document to tuck it inside his sporran.
“Da!” Flora squealed. “Don’t. You promised! And yes, we’ll have the wedding tomorrow and then –“
“NO,” Laird MacKenzie shouted. “We’ll not. And ye best keep a respectful tongue in your mouth lassie, or I’ll do what I should and return the document.”
Flora knew her father well enough to understand that he meant every word. She hushed and she hushed fast. She’d nae risk costing herself her only chance of marrying the man she’d loved since she was twelve when Ram spotted her in the upstairs hallway at MacKenzie Manor peeking down to watch a grand ball and crying because she was too young to attend. He bowed, took her hand and danced her around the landing. It became a tradition until she attended her first ball on her sixteenth birthday. On that occasion, her father and brothers all wanted the first dance but she pitched a royal fit until they gave in –as they generally did–and let her have her first dance with Ram.
“Papa,” Flora cajoled, “you’ve always said that your first instinct was most trustworthy and that ‘twas for the ceremony to be tomorrow, before we leave.”
“Trustworthy?” Ram snorted, having lost any inclination he ever possessed to be diplomatic. He was even blunter when he turned to the girl so anxious to destroy his future. “And Flora?”
She gave a fetching half smile. “Yes, Ram?”
“That wheedling whine may work on your father and your brothers, but you’ll find that it only inflames my temper,” Ram said, in a voice that dripped with icy disdain. “And you can cease these pointless efforts to ingratiate yourself with smiles and flirting. I shall meet my obligations under the arrangement, but I’ll nae do one thing more.”
“’Tis no way to build a marriage, Ram,” Graham observed. “You’ll want a child, surely.”
“A child?” Flora asked, giggling with a brittle edge, before she corrected her brother. “We’ll want many children. They bring light and life to a home.”
“You will need an heir,” Dair observed. “Otherwise, doesn’t it make the whole agreement rather meaningless?”
“The meaning for me,” Ram replied, “is twofold–it preserves my family’s honor and it protects my people. I expect your strategy in this anticipated my obligation in both regards.”
“Perhaps,” Dair said. “But ye’ve nae answered my question. Will ye not want an heir?”
“One could result from my singular performance of my husbandly obligation. That would be as unfortunate as ‘tis unlikely for my intention is to claim a bairn from my clan who has been rendered an orphan. Such tragedies occur, as all know, and
the little ones are generally absorbed by other family members,” Ram paused, brushed some imaginary lint from his kilt, and continued. “I shall adopt one and claim him as my heir. His blood will nae bear the taint of Clan MacKenzie.”
“We will hold the wedding at MacKenzie Manor at a suitable interval after the Highland Games,” Dair proclaimed. “And ‘tis the MacKenzie saying so.”
With the last phrase, Dair cut off the protest Flora opened her mouth to make. Even she knew that when her father spoke as the Laird his word was law. It wasn’t law for the Sutherland, of course, but Ram had no urge to argue.
“Who knows about this pledge?” Ram asked.
“Other than the people in this room, only my wife,” Dair replied.
“I prefer that it remain confidential,” Ram said.
Dair didn’t need to consider the request for long. Knowledge of the pledge would dishonor Ram’s family and diminish his father’s honor. ‘Twould remove one of the two reasons Ram accepted the arrangement, leaving only his obligations to his clan as motivation. Ramsay was too much his father’s son for Dair to believe that duty would overcome the shooting stars in his eyes. It hadn’t held Ram’s father. So, Dair nodded and said, “None of us will say a word and ‘tis the MacKenzie saying that.”
“Very good.” Ram shrugged as he headed for the door. “And whatever you arrange about the ceremony will be fine. “I’ve no interest in the particulars.”
Behind him, Ram heard Michael snort and say, “Sister you’d best reconsider. That’s nae the attitude of a man in love. ‘Tis more like that of a man in hate.”
The soft, lilting laughter that followed was in the wrong key.
“Dinna worry yourselves,” Flora said. “I know how to get round his temper for I’ve done it my whole life. We shall do very well together once I rid us of the English Menace.”
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