by Joanna Neil
She studied him, taking in his tall, proud stance. He wouldn’t bend under pressure, nor would he simply do what he felt other people expected of him, but he’d cared deeply for his brother, and surely his actions showed that he felt the same about Alice? He still hadn’t properly answered her question, though, had he? Why was he really here now, setting up a home for his brother’s children? Was it purely for love of Alice? Just how strong were his feelings for her?
Her mind skittered. Maybe deep down she didn’t want to know the answer to that. Already she had a leaden feeling in her stomach, as though she was weighed down by the possibility that Alice meant everything to him.
He walked across the wide landing and pushed open a heavy wooden door. ‘This is Cameron’s room,’ he said. ‘Perhaps he’d like to have the dark blue rug in here. It would certainly blend in with the decor.’
Cameron was sitting on the wooden floor, playing with his toy soldiers, lining them up on the battlements of a wooden fort, but he looked up as Izzy and Ross entered the room. ‘Is that for me?’ he said, breaking off to give a sudden sneeze, and looking pleased as Ross laid the rug down beside him.
Ross nodded, ‘Izzy thought you might like it.’ He looked closely at the boy. ‘Are you warm enough? You sound as though you’re coming down with a cold.’
Cameron nodded and sneezed again. ‘It’s better now that you’ve put the heater in here.’
‘Good.’ Ross glanced around. ‘I thought Izzy might know how to brighten the room up a bit for you. I’m not exactly sure what you’d want in here.’
‘An outer-space duvet,’ Cameron said. ‘Or a pirate one. And a table where I can do my drawing. That would be good.’
Izzy smiled. ‘There’s a boy who knows what he wants. Perhaps matching curtains, and a cushion or two with some of the colours picked out from the duvet and the rug would make it cosy?’ She looked around the large square room. ‘I expect a treasure chest would be just the thing for toys, and an upholstered wooden bench-type seat would fit in with the furnishing throughout the house.’
‘I think we have both of those in one of the old servants’ rooms,’ Ross commented, a thoughtful look coming into his eyes. ‘I’m not sure at the moment whether we have a suitable table, but I could find something in the antique shops, I dare say.’
‘It doesn’t have to be a table,’ Izzy murmured. ‘What about a small writing desk and a set of bookshelves? I imagine you must have those somewhere in the house?’
His mouth curved. ‘You’re right—we do. There’s a child-size desk in the study, and we have lots of bookcases around the place.’ He sent Cameron a questioning look. ‘How does all that sound to you?’
‘Pretty good,’ Cameron acknowledged, losing interest and turning back to his toy soldiers. As Izzy and Ross left the room he was imitating the sound of gunfire, and several of the ‘enemy’ were being knocked to the ground.
‘That’s Cameron sorted. One more to go,’ Ross murmured as they headed towards Molly’s room next door. ‘I wonder if she’ll be as easy to please?’
‘Pink,’ Molly said a moment later, when Ross asked how she’d like her room to be decorated. ‘Lots of pink.’ She had been playing with the dolls in her dolls’ house, but for now she seemed content to put them to one side.
‘Ahh.’ Ross tried to disguise a wince, and Izzy smiled.
‘We can do pink, can’t we?’ she said, giving his ankle a nudge with her foot.
‘Um…yes. I’m sure we’ll be able to come up with something along those lines.’ He looked to Izzy for support, his dark brows lifting a fraction, as though to say, You’re not serious?
‘Pink is good,’ Izzy said, looking around. ‘I can imagine dusky pink seating, pale rosewood furniture, and a pretty screen in the corner decorated with delicate flowers and leaves. And what about a touch of dove-grey in the curtains and bedspread? That would go really well with the rug, wouldn’t it?’
Molly nodded vigorously. ‘And that lovely pink-covered box seat from the big bedroom would be perfect in here.’ She frowned. ‘But Maggie said it was being used for blankets.’
‘You mean the ottoman?’ Ross queried. When Molly looked confused, he said, ‘The big box at the end of the bed? In the room across the hall?’
‘Yes, that’s the one. It has little wooden arms either side and I love it.’ Molly’s eyes widened in expectation. ‘Could I have it for my toys, and for a seat? The blankets could go somewhere else, couldn’t they? Please?’
‘I don’t see any reason why not.’ He gazed down at her. ‘Anything else?’
She shook her head so that her curls quivered. ‘No, thank you. I’m going to play now, if that’s all right?’
Ross reached down and tousled her silky hair. ‘That’s fine, poppet. I’ll be downstairs with Izzy if you need me.’
He led the way along the landing and down the stairs. ‘Shall we go through to the kitchen?’ he suggested.
‘Okay.’ She followed as he led the way. ‘Just for a few minutes, though. As I said, I shouldn’t stay too long.’ It would be all too easy to get carried away, wandering through the rooms of this fascinating building. It was far different from what she remembered, and that must be on account of Ross’s renovations over the years. For all that he had asked for her help, he seemed already to have a sure touch when it came to creating a luxurious, yet comfortable home.
‘Of course—just as you like. I imagine you’ve had quite enough for one day and could do with some relaxation.’ Sending her a fleeting glance, he asked, ‘How is it that you came to be working this morning, anyway? I thought you had the weekends off?’
‘I do, mostly. This is my weekend on call with the Mountain Rescue team, though. We had to go and help a woman who slipped and fell while she was out walking. She took a tumble down a slope and landed on rocky ground. I think she’ll be all right, but she broke her leg and had to be stretchered back to the ambulance. It was lucky for her that we found her reasonably quickly. I gave her pain medication and managed to stem the bleeding before we took her back to our A&E unit.’ Her mouth made a downward curve. ‘I don’t think she’s having a very good end to this year, but maybe she’ll be on the mend by the time the new one comes in.’
‘Let’s hope so. It’s interesting that you go out with the team,’ he said. ‘I had a call from the Mountain Rescue chief the other day, asking if I’d like to join them. He remembered that I had some experience of rescue work. I said I’d think about it, depending on how much time I would have to put in and whether I could make arrangements for Molly and Cameron.’
By now they had reached the kitchen, and the room came as another surprise to Izzy. This, too, had been completely refurbished, with magnificent oak-fronted cabinets and deep shelving units bordered with decorative carving. As a centrepiece there was the huge range cooker that she remembered from long ago. To one side of the room were wine racks, filled with an assortment of bottles in colours ranging through green, red and brown to clear glass.
‘I don’t think I’ve seen that label before,’ she murmured, looking more closely at the bottles. The designs were exotic, with beautiful Old English script overlaid on a watermark background of a castle in the glen, hinting at the richness of the wine within.
‘They’re our own label,’ he told her. ‘From what I’m fancifully calling the Glenmuir Winery. You should sit down at the table and try a glass or two.’ He waved a hand towards the chair by an oak table to the side of the room. ‘What do you fancy? We’ve a full-bodied elder-berry, sweet and bursting with flavour, guaranteed to make you long for more, or there’s oak leaf wine—dry, with a champagne flavour. We add raisins to that, and lemon juice to help bring it along. Maggie’s favourite is the raspberry and bramble wine…light and fruity.’
She sent him a startled look. ‘You’re serious? Is this a new venture?’
He nodded. ‘When I came over the other year I saw how many wild fruits we had growing on the estate and suggested that we might have a
go at fermenting a batch. They turned out pretty well, so I’m looking into starting up a wine-making business. After all, we have acres of land here, just asking to be planted.’
He drew a bottle from the rack, placed it on the table, and then reached for a couple of wineglasses from an overhead cupboard. ‘Of course I’m not sure how people around here will respond to it. I doubt I’ll be able to rely on them as customers. I’m facing a bit of resistance in trying to win them over to my side, one way or another. Even Maggie has a fairly sceptical view of my motives, but I think she feels she needs to look out for the children.”
He was right about the locals. The talk in the village was all about the new Laird—an incomer who didn’t belong. ‘Maybe that’s because you’ve been away for so long,’ she murmured. ‘After all, you weren’t even educated here. Your father sent you away to school.’
‘That’s true. I dare say that’s helped to provoke the feeling among the community that I’m an outsider.’ He shrugged. ‘Whatever the reason, I’m back now, and I have to do what I can to win them round.’
He smiled. ‘Try this one,’ he said, uncorking a bottle. ‘See what you think. If you aren’t completely bowled over, I’m an impostor from the Lakes.’
She sent him a fleeting glance. Had he read her mind? She shook the thought away. It was common knowledge that he would have to prove himself around here. Why was she worrying about the outcome?
He poured the rich ruby liquid into a glass and handed it to her. She sipped slowly, savouring the wine on her tongue before swallowing. A sweet, warm sensation enveloped her and she took another sip. She blinked, and then looked up at him.
‘I think you must be the genuine article,’ she murmured. ‘This is delicious.’
‘I’m glad you like it.’ He poured more wine into the glass. ‘Have some cheese with it, and crackers.’ He laid out a selection of food and pushed a plate towards her, coming to join her at the table, taking a seat opposite.
‘I don’t know how you manage to pull it all in,’ she said. ‘You seem to have a lot of ideas and various projects on the go, and yet you’re without an estate manager. How are you going to keep everything going?’
‘Now, there you have me,’ he said. ‘Let’s just say my plans are fairly fluid at the moment. A lot will depend on Alice and the children and how much support they need.’
She drank her wine, and tasted the cheese and crackers, and found after a while that she was oddly replete. A warm and comfortable feeling was enveloping her, with a general light-headed sensation that made her believe all was well with the world.
Ross excused himself to go and check on the children, but he was back just a short time later. ‘Molly’s still playing with her dolls’ house, and Cameron’s just launched a major offensive with his toy soldiers, so I think they’ll be occupied for a while. Would you like to come and look at the grounds out back? I’ve been tidying up the kitchen garden whenever I’ve had the chance, and I’ve been thinking about a tree-planting scheme to break up the winds that blow across the north pasture in wintertime.’
She stood up and went with him to the kitchen door. ‘Do the children know where we’ll be?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘I told them we might be looking out over the loch. They know to ring the bell that clangs outside if they have a problem of any kind.’
‘That’s a good idea.’ She went with him to fetch her soft cord jacket from the cloakroom, shrugging into it as she walked out with him.
The cool air outside came as something of a surprise as she left the warmth of the kitchen behind. Her head swam a little with the after-effects of the wine, and Ross must have noticed because he put an arm around her, steadying her as he led her along the footpath towards the kitchen garden.
‘I knew you’d appreciate the wine,’ he said with a smile. ‘It has quite a kick if you’re not used to it.’
‘You must have known that when you kept filling up my glass,’ she accused. ‘It’s just as well that my on-call time finished an hour or so back, isn’t it? At least I don’t have to think about it again until morning.’ She glanced at him, wondering how it was that the Buchanans were blessed with such strong features—the square jaw, the beautiful grey-blue eyes that looked at you and made you feel you were the only person that mattered in the whole world.
She tried to shake off that heady sensation. It was all in her mind, wasn’t it? ‘It looks as though you grow most of your own fruit and vegetables, here,’ she murmured, gazing at long rows of planting.
‘Well, we have a team of gardeners,’ he said. ‘It helps that they’re all very good at what they do.’
They walked away from the kitchen gardens and around the side of the castle to a raised terrace, bordered by stone pediments and wrought iron balustrades, where they stood and looked out over the loch. The view was stunning. ‘This is my favourite place,’ Ross said softly.
‘I can see why.’ She gazed out at the gently rippling water, letting her glance move over green-clad hills and distant mountains shrouded in mist. ‘It’s so peaceful here. You can look out there and forget your troubles. It’s so serene. I don’t know how you can have stayed away.’
‘You’re right,’ he said, wrapping his arm around her and drawing her close against the faint breeze. ‘I often stand here and think perhaps things could have been different. It appears to be timeless here. I could have simply whiled away my days, looking out over the water and letting my thoughts drift.’
His hand stroked her arm and she laid her head on his shoulder, snuggling into the warmth of his body. Every part of her was content, loving this moment of deep quiet and calm. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to be standing here with him.
Except that it wasn’t, of course. A cool wind blew across the loch, stirring the soft tendrils of her hair, and she looked up at him, blinking to bring her gaze back into sharp focus.
This was Ross Buchanan who was holding her close, shielding her from the cold. The same Ross Buchanan who had encouraged Alice to spend time in the castle and forget that her family was his sworn enemy. What was she thinking of, letting him ply her with wine and lead her out here to this beautiful place, a spot just begging for sweethearts to pledge eternal love? This was madness, being here with him.
She eased herself away from him, her head clearing rapidly in the cool breeze. ‘I should go,’ she said.
His glance moved over her. ‘Are you sure?’
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
‘All right. I’ll gather up the children and drive you back to the cottage.’
He didn’t seem at all put out by her need to leave. Had she imagined the intimacy of his warm embrace, the way he had held her so tenderly? He’d just been keeping her warm, steadying her because the drink had gone to her head, hadn’t he? Anything else was pure supposition on her part.
CHAPTER FIVE
‘BYE. Thanks for the lift home.’ Izzy raised a hand, waving as Ross turned the car on the drive and headed back along the road.
She walked inside the cottage, her mind busy turning over the events of the last couple of hours. At least she was able to think more clearly now that the mist in her head had begun to dissolve. That fruit wine was sheer sin masquerading under a veil of innocence.
‘Did I just see Ross Buchanan drop you off outside?’ Her father confronted her as she stepped into the kitchen.
She sent him a startled look. ‘Oh, hello. I didn’t realise that you were here. Is your car at the front of the house?’ Perhaps her faculties weren’t as fully restored as she had hoped. ‘I didn’t see it out there.’
‘That’s because your mother dropped me off. She’s gone over to the village shop, but she should be back soon. We just came by to bring you and Lorna a hotpot that she made. You know how she worries that you might not be feeding yourself properly.’
Across the other side of the kitchen, Lorna signalled that she had put the hotpot in the fridge. ‘I’m going upstairs to get r
eady for nightshift at the hospital,’ she said. ‘I’ll leave you two to chat for a while.’
Izzy nodded acknowledgement, then smiled at her father. ‘I love Mum’s hotpots. I’m sorry that I wasn’t here when you arrived. Have you been here long?’
‘Only about five minutes. Lorna said you’d nipped out for a while, but we weren’t planning on stopping. We’re on our way to go and visit your gran—but I just wanted to make sure that your roof wasn’t leaking. I thought I’d take a look to see if my temporary patch was holding up.’
‘Thanks for checking. It seems to be working all right…At least, we haven’t had any damp patches on the ceiling so far. I think the roofer will be coming along to fix it in a day or so. Ross said he’d asked him to make it a priority.’
Her father’s expression tightened. ‘I notice that you didn’t answer my question about him dropping you off. That was Ross I saw leaving, wasn’t it? I went to look out of the window to see if it was you or your mother returning, and there was his fuel-guzzling monster outside.’
‘He says it’s the best vehicle to have on these roads in the winter. He has to drive over to Inverness quite regularly, so it’s best for him to have a car that will be reliable and safe in snow and ice.’
Her father made a non-committal mumble at that, and she sent him a brief, considering look. ‘Yes, I’ve been over to the castle and he brought me back.’
‘So you’ve gone the way of Alice, have you? Spending your time up there? I thought you would have had more sense.’
‘I took the children back to him,’ she said, a wave of exasperation taking hold of her. ‘They spent the afternoon with us, and I promised I would return them safely.’ She gave a soft sigh. ‘It’s pointless to imagine that our paths will never cross. He’s a doctor, and I have to work with him from time to time. We’re not living in the Dark Ages, after all. It’s something that you just have to get used to.’
