Anna couldn’t resist pulling up an Internet search for Isobel Teague and the accident that had claimed her life. Not that she needed a reminder of how beautiful Isobel Teague had been. The year Isobel had left television and made her first big blockbuster film, Katharine had worn her hair like Isobel’s and imitated her makeup and elegant, ethereal style. Seeing The Royals of London had helped spark Katharine’s interest in community theater and set her on a collision course with Henry.
For all the thousands of images the Internet had of Isobel, though, there was nothing about her daughter. Nothing apart from the initial speculation around her birth.
“What did you mean about Moira’s face being damaged? Is there something physically wrong?” Anna finally asked as Elspeth browned the flour-dusted chicken in a pan.
“The doctors call it facial palsy. The nerves in half of her face were injured, either at birth or in the accident. She’s had three surgeries already, so it’s much better than it was, but I don’t think it will ever completely match the other side. Och, heavens, look at the time! They’ll be here any minute, and I have grease on my blouse and slippers on my feet! Would you be a love and soften the apples in butter for me and keep an eye on that chicken, Anna? Mind it doesn’t burn.”
Dropping the wooden spoon into Anna’s hand, Elspeth hurried out, her limp light but more pronounced than it had been earlier, as if she’d already been on her feet too long. Anna glanced down at her own casual jeans and sweater and realized she hadn’t put on so much as a smudge of lipstick or eyeliner that morning. And her hair. Stooping to look at herself in the glass door of the oven, she groaned. She looked about twelve years old, eyes huge and tired in her narrow face, her hair curling every which way since she hadn’t made any attempt to tame it with a blow-dryer or flatiron.
On the other hand, the fact that Connal MacGregor was Gregor Mark was oddly freeing. He’d already seen her looking her worst, and he’d been married to Isobel Teague. Nothing Anna did to herself was going to impress him, not when women had no doubt been dressing up for him since the instant he’d hit puberty. Anna had already had her trust crushed to sand by one man like that—Henry—and she was done playing those sorts of games.
Shifting her attention back to the stove, she pushed all thoughts of Connal MacGregor from her mind. A moment later, she had lapsed into autopilot, humming the same tune Elspeth had been humming all day and losing herself in the delight of preparing food for someone else, of working to make someone happy. The sweet, tangy scent of caramelizing apples mingled with the skin-crisping scent of frying chicken, and the light tang of roasted onion potatoes drifted in the air. She filled a glass with wine and took a long, deep draught. A bracing draught. But it had been a good idea of Elspeth’s to invite Connal and Moira to dinner. How unreasonable could Connal MacGregor be with his daughter in tow?
At the very least, he would have to remain polite.
Despite her efforts to reassure herself, Anna’s optimism faded when she opened the door a few minutes later. Connal loomed on the stoop, his hands protective on his daughter’s shoulders and his eyes wary and cold on Anna.
His smile must have been pure acting. Even so, it packed an unexpected punch. “You got here all right last night, then,” he said. “No worse for the accident, I take it?”
“Um, no. Thank you.” Anna smiled right back at him, and then her expression grew genuine as she turned to the child who stood looking up at her, wide-eyed and solemn.
Elspeth had been right: Moira was beautiful. Slight for her age, with waist-length blond hair that had the perfect amount of wave, bright eyes in her father’s unusual, stormy shade of blue, a high, straight nose, and cheekbones that, even covered in the last fullness of childhood, showed the promise of being high and sculpted. She resembled, as Elspeth had said, her very beautiful mother, except that the left eye didn’t quite close when she blinked, and the slight droop to that side of her face was just pronounced enough to trick Anna’s mind into being unsure what she was seeing when she looked at her.
“Hi, Moira.” Anna stepped aside to invite them in, careful not to stare as she offered a hand for Moira to shake. “I’ve been eager to meet you ever since last night. I wanted to apologize for scaring you with my horrible driving.”
Moira shook her hand and smiled but didn’t say anything. She scooted past Anna into the foyer at the same moment that Elspeth arrived at the top of the stairs.
“Here you both are,” Elspeth said, holding the handrail with one hand and maneuvering the walker onto the stair below her as she stepped down. “I’ll be with you as soon as this leg of mine will get me there. Anna, would you mind getting their coats in the meantime?”
Anna bent close to Moira’s ear as Moira shrugged out of a purple jacket that was still cool to the touch from the soon-to-be-April chill. “I hear I have you to thank for tonight’s dessert,” she whispered. “Elspeth told me apple butterscotch pie is a particular favorite of yours.”
Moira nodded, but again she didn’t speak.
“Well, I can’t wait to try it. I’ve never met one of Elspeth’s desserts that I didn’t want to dive into face-first.” Anna turned to Connal who had already removed his own coat and stood holding it. Beneath the glittering chandelier, the light all seemed to dance around him, and unfortunately, he hadn’t gotten any less gorgeous overnight. Really, a photo of him and Brando together would have been all the advertising the glen ever needed to bring tourists in by droves.
The thought made Anna pause. Because, of course, Connal himself would be a draw, wouldn’t he? Moira’s disfigurement would have been difficult for any child, but for the daughter of Isobel Teague and Gregor Mark, the standard would be different.
“Is something wrong?” Connal asked.
Anna exhumed her smile again. “Nothing at all. Shall I take your coat as well?”
A hint of genuine laughter lit his eyes. “Forcing yourself to be polite, are you? Yes, by all means, take my coat.”
Anna blinked like an owl at that hint of humor. That faint smile. Because that smile was clearly Gregor Mark. Not quite at full wattage, but it didn’t lose a thing translated off the screen.
No. She didn’t need to be thinking thoughts like that. Practically snatching the coat out of his hands, Anna hurried to the front sitting room to throw it with Moira’s across a wingback chair upholstered in faded blue brocade.
By the time she returned to the foyer, Elspeth was already downstairs and leading Moira and Connal straight through to the dining room where Anna had set the gatelegged Jacobean table earlier. The contrast of the dark wood in the room made Moira look even more delicate and fey.
Anna went out to the kitchen to get the soup, and when she came back, Connal had seated himself under the portrait of some long-dead kilted Murray ancestor opposite the only empty place setting. Slipping into her chair, Anna avoided looking at him by setting herself the task of coaxing Moira into conversation.
“So what’s it like growing up in a fairytale castle in a fairytale valley, Moira? I hope you at least managed to snatch up that tower for your bedroom.”
“She would have if it hadn’t meant moving three stories of overflowing bookshelves. The whole tower is a library,” Connal said, “which we both share, except that Moira is flooding it with so many of her own books that she seems determined to boot me out.”
“A literal tower of books?” Anna smiled at Moira. “That sounds like my idea of heaven. Do you know, I used to adore Andrew Lang’s fairy books when I was about your age? I still do, but I haven’t read any of the fairy stories from Reverend Kirk. Have you?” She cupped her hand over her mouth and leaned close to Moira, saying in a lowered voice, “I don’t suppose there are any actual fairies here in the glen, are there? Because I’ve spent my whole life trying to see one in America, and I haven’t had any luck at all.”
“Moira knows nearly every bit of fairy lore ever told. Don’t you, duck?” Connal gave Moira an encouraging smile. “She helps Elspeth m
ake up the stories about Reverend Kirk’s fairies for the museum.”
Moira gave a quick nod and bent to concentrate on spooning her soup into her mouth.
“The stories with the clever pencil drawings?” Anna asked, remembering the placards she’d seen in the museum earlier with sketches of sprites and pixies and fairies and short fanciful descriptions about the thimbles, cups, and walking sticks that supposedly had once belonged to the Reverend Kirk. “Are those made-up stories? Because sometimes with what Aunt Elspeth says it’s hard to know what might be true.”
Moira studied her longer this time, one small brow puckering toward the other while the other remained fixed in place. She gave another quick, jerking nod.
“What about other books?” Anna prompted. “I love Harry Potter, but I expect you’re probably past all that, aren’t you?”
Spoon pausing in midair, Moira gaped at her. “I love Harry,” she said, her words a little soft around the edges because her mouth didn’t quite open the same way on the left as on the right. “I’ve read the first book seven times.”
“Seven? Goodness.” Anna hid a smile. “And here I thought that with an entire library full of books to choose from . . . ”
“It wouldn’t matter if I had all the books in the world, I’d still love Harry.”
“Me, too, but can I tell you a secret? I’ve always loved Hermione better.”
“She is better!” Moira’s eyes shone. “Not just because she’s a girl. She’s smarter, and works harder, and she’s nicer.”
“All true. And she punches Malfoy in the face,” Anna said, glancing across at Connal.
“Not that we encourage punching people in the face,” Connal said sternly, though his eyes were filled with laughter.
Anna couldn’t resist quirking a brow at him. “Unless they bully other people and there are no policemen around—in which case, all bets are off.”
Connal’s smile turned rueful—and no less dangerous to Anna’s equilibrium. “I suppose I deserve that. I should have apologized the moment you met us at the door, but I was saving it for later.”
“Why do you need to apologize, Daddy?” Moira tipped her head to look at him.
“Because I was very rude to Anna last night when she had her accident.”
Anna found it hard to stay angry with him, no matter how much she wanted to. Although why she wanted to didn’t bear examining. Except that it was easier to resist a Connal MacGregor who wasn’t both kind and gorgeous.
She needed to resist him.
In fact, she was meant to charm him. Not the other way around.
She needed to remember how rude he’d been, and that he didn’t want to have the festival on his property. Also, there was something about the way he was hiding here in the glen that bothered Anna, the way he kept Moira hidden away.
Far from the damaged child Anna had pictured given what Elspeth had said about how Connal and the entire glen protected her, Moira was more like Rapunzel in her tower, locked away from strangers. The poor girl might seem close to happy and normal now, or as close as she could be to normal when the palsy made it a little hard to speak, but how long would she stay that way if no one gave her the confidence to face the world?
Connal MacGregor, however charming he might be when he wanted to put in the effort, was misguided, Anna decided. She didn’t realize she was staring at him until Elspeth kicked her beneath the table and bugged her eyes out.
Right. She was supposed to be smiling. Charming.
For the sake of the festival. For Elspeth’s sake.
First rule of negotiation. Don’t let your opponent get inside your head.
A Thousand Stars
he . . . remembers and cherishes
the memory of his forebears,
good or bad; and there burns alive
in him a sense of identity with the dead
even to the twentieth generation.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Thinking of Connal MacGregor as an opponent grew harder as the night wore on. He seemed determined to be fun and gracious, and the conversation circled around light topics and stories about people and places in the glen.
During the fish course, Anna tried to steer the subject toward the festival. Connal glanced at Moira and back again with a faint pucker between his brows and a pleading look. Then he went back to cutting his salmon without having answered.
With a clink against the porcelain, Elspeth set down her fork. “Moira, I have a new box of artifacts that arrived for the museum. Do you think you could help me sort and label them after dinner?”
Moira’s face lit up. “Can I write stories for them? And JoAnne can draw the pictures? Maybe that will make her less mad.”
“Of course you can, mite. The box is sitting right beside the computer. We’ll go have a look after dessert, shall we?” Elspeth said.
Watching Moira, Anna couldn’t help wondering if this was how she’d sounded at the age of ten. There’d been a time at that age when she’d had a romantic streak an ocean wide. She’d hung on every legend Elspeth had ever told her, imagining the landscape the way Elspeth described it. Imagining that knights always rescued maidens and that honor and valor were the most important things a man possessed.
She’d fallen in love with this glen and Scotland through Elspeth’s stories, and she still couldn’t quite believe that she was here at last. For a moment, watching Connal and Moira, she felt a sense of unreality, everything blurring around the edges. The feeling grew more pronounced as she brought in the main course and heard the two of them tell Elspeth about having spotted a piper playing his bagpipes beside the loch.
“It was while we were walking over here,” Moira said in her slightly softened but careful pronunciation. “One of the MacLarens, we could tell by his kilt. Only he wasn’t very good.”
“But then they’re never going to be as good as the MacGregor pipers, are they, duck?” Connal winked at his daughter with his eyes dancing.
Moira shook her head, giving him back a lopsided smile.
The mental image of the piper at the edge of the loch sent goosebumps along Anna’s arms. At least, she hoped it was the piper and not Connal’s rich, low laugh or that smile of his that did odd things to her stomach. He had a trick, too, of watching whoever he was talking to like they were the only person in the entire room. She found it hard to look away.
“Whoever your piper was,” Elspeth said, “he’s in for a long month, poor laddie, if his wife’s kicked him out already.”
Anna passed Moira the platter of Elspeth’s delicious, home-baked bread. “Why would his wife kick him out?”
“MacGregor pipers have been famous for centuries—a MacGregor was Prince Charlie’s own piper at the Battle of Culloden. But the MacLarens like to take away our victories wherever they can. They practice day and night when there’s a competition coming up,” Connal said, taking the platter as Anna offered it to him in turn.
“So, of course, the MacGregor pipers practice harder,” Elspeth added.
Connal flashed a grin while he slathered a slice of bread in creamy butter. “And MacLaren and MacGregor alike, their wives get tired of the noise and the children not being able to sleep, so they boot them outside.”
“Aye, but then it’s a nuisance for the rest of us,” Elspeth said, nodding.
“I like hearing them practice outside,” Moira said. “It’s almost the only chance I get because Daddy won’t let me go to the Highland Games at Lochearnhead.”
“You might like hearing them, but half the cows in the glen gave sour milk last time there was a competition.” Elspeth exchanged a glance with Connal.
He avoided looking at Moira and turned to Anna instead with a slightly wistful grin. “I imagine the atmosphere at home would be even more sour for the poor lads than it is outside.”
That grin had a kick like a mule, and Anna gave herself a mental shake. She focused her attention on cutting her chicken and spearing a bit of softened apple coated in the Dramb
uie-flavored cream sauce to go with it. It was a relief to escape back out to the kitchen when she went to get dessert and tea. Then two slices of pie later, the sweetness of the creamy butterscotch drizzled apples, plum jam, and frothy meringue along with the soft drone of comfortable conversation punctuated by Connal’s deep laughter had begun to make her acutely uncomfortable. She jumped up again to clear the table.
Elspeth stood, too, holding out her hand to Moira. “Ready to go look at that box of new things? Maybe we can finish one or two stories, and you can take them back to JoAnne with you.”
Moira scraped her chair back and skipped away from the table, her limbs moving with uncanny grace and her hair flying like a banner behind her until she spun on the threshold to wait for Elspeth. The two disappeared down the hall together, leaving Anna and Connal all alone.
They stood looking at each other across the table as if neither knew what to say.
Anna busied herself gathering up the plates, cups, and saucers. “I assumed JoAnne was a local artist,” she said, thinking not only of the fairies and pixies on the museum placards but also the real historical figures the drawings brought to life, people who had—according to Elspeth’s wild imagination—had something to do with various artifacts. “Does she live with you?”
Connal nodded. “JoAnne Campbell—she’s Moira’s nanny. That’s why she’s furious about the festival. For Moira’s sake.”
“I thought she was a professional. She’s very talented.”
“Aye, she should be doing more to make a name for herself, but I’m hoping she’ll stay with us a few more years. I’m selfish.” Connal twisted his lips into a rueful smile. “Moira adores her, and I hate the thought of changing their relationship until Moira herself is ready for it to change.”
Anna stacked Moira’s cup and saucer with her own. She reached for Elspeth’s cup, but Connal beat her to it. She hadn’t even heard him moving.
Lake of Destiny Page 4
