My One True Highlander Read online

  “I dunnae dine with my pinkies sticking up in the air.”

  She glanced at her hand and curled her fingers back into her palm. “I do what is considered proper. And in my opinion you have no grounds to criticize my behavior. Kidnapping someone is far worse than drinking with a straight pinkie—which is proper etiquette, by the way.”

  That only made him grin again, the insufferable man. “If ye’d stayed in London where ye belong,” he commented, “ye could be wielding yer cups and glasses however ye chose, with nae a soul to criticize ye.”

  “Ha!” she bit out. “That shows how little you know.” With that she returned to consuming her breakfast, which he seemed for some reason to find fascinating. Perhaps utensils were foreign to him, after all.

  “And ye’d nae be ruined, with but one way to save yer reputation.”

  That stopped her for a moment, stopped her breath and her heart. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, my lord,” she said, even though she had a very good idea. He thought they needed to marry? No! He was a mannerless, kidnapping barbarian, and she—she had plans, blast it all. Plans that didn’t include the Scottish Highlands or marrying for other than love. Not now, when she could afford to be both unemployed and unmarried.

  “If ye mean to wound me by pointing oot how little I ken aboot London, ye might as well save yer breath, yer ladyship.”

  She set down the fork and knife and touched the napkin to the corners of her mouth, willing her fingers not to shake. “That, Lord Maxton, is a splendid idea,” she returned, deliberately misinterpreting his comment. “Until you tell me why I’m here and what you mean to do with me, I’m finished chatting with you.” She folded her hands into her lap.

  The viscount sat back. “Despite the fact that I’ve dragged ye off, tied ye to a chair, and locked ye into a room, ye reckon that threatening me with yer silence will move me to tell ye all my evil plans?”

  Tilting her head, she met his gaze. “As a point of clarification, you untied me, provided me with a bath and clean clothes, and sat with me while I ate breakfast. You didn’t kidnap me.” She paused to take a breath. “In fact, I think you had no idea that any of this was going to happen until you saw me sitting in that chair with a sack over my head. And the question I demand you answer is what you mean to do with me now that I’m here.”

  “Ye’ve some wits aboot ye,” he said, reaching over to collect her knife and fork before he pushed to his feet. What ye need to ken, lass, is that this is all my doing. I’ll swear to that on a stack of Bibles. And now that ye are here, I reckon I’ll do what’s right.”

  “And what might that be?” she demanded, even though she didn’t want to hear what she very much thought he meant to say next. “You’re letting me go, I presume?”

  “Nae. I’ve decided I’ll marry ye.”

  She gasped as he spoke the words aloud; she couldn’t imagine a circumstance where she would have been able to stifle the sound. “No, sir, you will not! I refuse!”

  His humorless smile appeared again, more offputting than friendly. “Ye can refuse fer now; it’ll take a few days fer me to get a license. In the meantime, ye can stay in here and consider what I’d have to do with ye if I couldnae count on yer cooperation. Ye may nae like the idea, but it’s the best way fer both of us to stay alive and protected. I’m nae the biggest fright in the Highlands, lass.”

  “I’m afraid I must disagree with that, Lord Maxton.”

  * * *

  At least Maxton hadn’t nailed boards over the windows, even if he had nailed them shut. At least, Marjorie reflected, she had daylight and a view. She’d dragged a comfortable chair over nearly the moment he’d locked her in again. Now, as she sat sipping the cold dregs of the tea that he’d left her, she had to concede that this particular corner of the Highlands was very … picturesque. Mountains capped with snow, a river running past jagged rocks while old, twisted trees climbed up the far bank, deep greens broken by shrinking patches of brilliant white—she’d never seen anything so rugged and wild.

  She wanted to walk out into it. As firstly she remained a prisoner and secondly no one had appeared with shoes, however, that didn’t seem likely to happen. Nor did she have any idea how long her present circumstances would last—or now, if this would ever end. She should likely be cowering in terror, fainting, demanding a physician to tend her—but while likely a fitting reaction, it didn’t seem particularly useful. And in truth, while she felt angry, annoyed, frustrated, and supremely uneasy about what her future might hold, she was more angry than anything else.

  Marrying her? It would have been gallant, she supposed, coming from someone who owned a sense of nobility or decorum. Marjorie didn’t believe for a second that Graeme, Viscount Maxton, was motivated by either of those things. If it wasn’t for her benefit, though, it had to be for his. As his wife she wouldn’t be able to speak against him in court, which might indeed save him from imprisonment. It wouldn’t save him from her brother’s wrath, though perhaps he hadn’t considered that. She would make certain he did.

  There was also, of course, her money. She had an admittedly limited view of this house, but what she had seen looked quite shabby. An influx of thousands of pounds would make a tremendous difference. Perhaps it made sense to him, then, but she had no intention of going along with it. She’d spent far too much time and effort and education to end up as some odious man’s purse. For heaven’s sake, London fortune hunters were the only aristocrats who’d deigned to speak to her, and thus far she’d sent them all away.

  He’d said he wasn’t the most frightening thing in the Highlands. And whatever that thing was, he’d also implied that by marrying her, he would be saving her from it. At first she’d thought she would be ransomed to her brother in exchange for some of his money. Or perhaps cattle, or sheep. Highlanders did like their sheep. But Maxton hadn’t been talking about a ransom, clearly. Was it somewhere else she might be sent, then? Someone else who’d decide to marry her without her having any say in the matter? Men. Highlands men, especially.

  Silently, because a lady didn’t utter such words aloud, she cursed her brother. Not because he’d written her, but because he’d only bothered to send the one letter. When they’d met in London better than three months ago and Gabriel had told her of his unexpected inheritance and given her Leeds House, he’d promised to write more often. If he’d done so, she might have known that clan Maxwell seemed to be at odds with him. She might have known not to make the journey north to surprise him, for heaven’s sake.

  Something behind her rustled, and she whipped her head around, half expecting to see more foxes, or perhaps a wildcat, invading the bedchamber through some hole or other. A folded sheet of paper slid into the room, however, through the narrow crack beneath the door. Marjorie stood, her heart skittering. Did she have an ally?

  Moving as quietly as she could in her broken shoe, she hurried over to retrieve the note. Her hands unsteady, she unfolded it—to see a child’s uneven, untidy printing sprawled across the page. “Dear Lady Marjory,” she read to herself, “I am vary sory I helpt my brothrs kit nap you. And please do not be mad at Graeme, becuz it was Brendan and Dùghlases faults, mostly Brendan. I hav baby rabits in my room to. Do you want to see them? Youre friend, Connell Maxton.”

  Well, the spelling and grammar were both atrocious, but at least someone had apologized for dragging her into this mess. And it confirmed what she’d suspected—that the lion-maned oldest brother hadn’t planned on her being there—though that didn’t seem to have stopped him from taking advantage of her presence. Marry her? Ha. She’d jump out the window first.

  Even more importantly, did she now have an ally? She pressed her cheek against the cool wood of the door. “Are you still there?” she whispered.

  “Aye,” young Connell’s hushed voice returned. “Did ye get my note?”

  “I did. And—”

  “Write me back,” he interrupted.

  Marjorie closed her mouth again. However serious
and precarious her situation, to the eight-year-old this was clearly a game. And an ally was an ally. “I don’t have anything to write with,” she whispered back.

  The stub of a pencil rolled beneath the door. She picked it up, frowning as she turned the boy’s note over. Just how desperate was she, to be willing to use a child? And how ridiculous was she, to turn away possible help because she would have preferred that it came from someone tall and handsome and considerably more mature?

  “Are you going to wait for my response?” she whispered.

  “Nae. I’m supposed to be doing my lessons,” came back. “Graeme filled two damned pages with arithmetic problems. If I dunnae do them, it’ll be nae supper fer me. Before sunset I’ll knock three times, then two times. Then ye’ll ken it’s me, and ye can send the note under the door.”

  At least that would give her time to decide how dastardly she was prepared to be. “Very well,” she said, and a moment later heard his light footsteps retreating.

  Young Connell had already proven to be a valuable source of information today. Through the boy she’d learned that Graeme hadn’t ordered her kidnapping. Even more surprising, the barbarian wrote out arithmetic equations for his brother’s study. Heaven help them all if that man was solely responsible for educating his brothers—though that did explain everyone’s liberal profanity.

  Marjorie sat at the writing desk and pulled a fresh sheet of paper from one of the drawers. If she did decide to make use of Connell Maxton she could certainly blame it on his oldest brother; whether Graeme had been behind her kidnapping or not, he was the one who’d decided what to do with her. And he’d been exceedingly rude and arrogant about it.

  As handsome as he was, if he’d been more patient and considerate, he might—might—have had half a chance of winning her affection. Or at least she could pretend that. Because she could imagine kissing him, and enjoying it. That had more to do with how … alone she’d felt than with his supposed charms. And it was only in daydreams, anyway.

  Grimacing, she set pencil to paper. Manners, etiquette, propriety—she’d spent years mastering all the rules and nuances necessary for survival in proper Society. But this concerned morality, and she remained fairly certain that she and Society had some disagreements in that area.

  The fact remained, though, that she needed to return to Society, because her house sprawled in the center of it, and she needed to live in that house, with those people around her—and the longer she went missing, the less likely any of them would be ever to accept her. All they would need was an excuse to dismiss her as ruined, or scandalized, as if being the sister of an upjumped duke wasn’t enough to earn their scorn. But the wife of a probably destitute Scottish viscount? That would finish off her chances as surely as the news that she’d been kidnapped in the first place.

  She hid the letters old and new beneath the remaining blank papers in the desk, and slid the pencil into an old-looking, empty vase on one shelf. In her opinion it hardly qualified as a weapon, but it had been something Maxton didn’t seem to want her to have. Perhaps he worried a crow might fly down the chimney, giving her the opportunity to tie a message to its leg and send it off for help.

  Her door rattled. Marjorie jumped, nearly pulling the vase onto the floor. She had hours to wait before Connell and his secret knocks, but before she could convince herself that the youngster had been too excited to wait for sunset the heavy thing swung open. It wasn’t the boy.

  Chapter Five

  “So am I to have no expectation of privacy?” she blurted, sidestepping away from the vase.

  The broad-shouldered, russet-haired lion strolled into the room. “Were ye up to someaught that required privacy?”

  “No. That isn’t the point.”

  “I cannae decide if ye’re a madwoman, or just relentlessly contrary,” he muttered, hefting the cloth sack he carried from one hand to the other.

  If he meant to put that thing over her head again, she would punch him in the nose. “Am I causing you some difficulty?” she asked, allowing the sarcasm she felt to color her tone.

  “Damned right, ye are. Sit doon.” He gestured at the chair she’d dragged beneath the window.

  Marjorie folded her arms across her chest, mostly so he wouldn’t see them trembling. “I will not be blindfolded again, you oaf. Not to be dragged to the altar, or anywhere else.”

  One straight brow lowered, and he looked at the sack in his hand as if seeing it for the first time. “It’s shoes,” he said, eyeing her again. “So ye arenae fearless.”

  “Point me to anyone who is, and I’ll show you a fool.”

  “Meaning me, I suppose. Sit yer arse in the chair.” He dragged his free hand through his auburn hair.

  “I told you that I don’t like to be loomed over.”

  With an even more exasperated glance, Maxton grabbed the back of the other hearthside chair and dragged it over to face the one she’d placed earlier. Then he dropped into it, lifting both eyebrows as if daring her to find something else about which to complain.

  While she might have rightly pointed out that a gentleman wouldn’t seat himself before a lady, she kept her mouth shut. Neither of them thought him a gentleman, and reminding him of that might also remind him of other things men who weren’t gentlemen might do with a captive female—other than announcing they were to be married, that was. A shiver ran up her spine, not unpleasantly. Trying to ignore why her mouth had suddenly gone dry, she seated herself with every ounce of grace she possessed and folded her hands on her lap.

  He set the bag between his booted feet. “Give me yer foot,” he ordered.

  “I am not sticking my foot up in the air.”

  “One day I hope ye’ll realize how far I’ve been bending over to be kindly to ye, yer grandness,” he drawled.

  “And one day I hope you’ll realize that nothing you do can possibly convince me that marrying you is in my best interest.” A bit harsh, perhaps, if she needed his goodwill, but for heaven’s sake, telling her that he was being kind, while he kept her prisoner?

  Uttering something unflattering-sounding in Gaelic, he slid forward, dropping from the chair onto his knees. It was a vulnerable position; light gray eyes beneath unexpectedly long lashes lifted to meet hers, something secret and enticing in his gaze.

  Stop it, Ree! she ordered herself, but by the time she realized she should have kicked him somewhere sensitive and fled out the unlocked door, he’d already slid a hand around her ankle and grasped it quite firmly. Brushing the folds of her skirt aside with his other hand, he drew her foot forward to rest on one of his bent knees.

  “This is … not proper, sir,” she gulped, her cheeks heating.

  “Well, which is less proper, then?” he retorted, taking the heel of her walking shoe and pulling it off her foot. “Me touching yer foot, or ye wearing broken shoes?”

  As utterly certain as she was that it was the former, Marjorie hesitated to answer. Men didn’t kneel in front of her, much less touch her legs and pull off her shoes. The sensations running up the back of her legs and along her spine had nothing to do with being captured, and everything to do with a man—this man—touching her.

  He set the broken shoe aside and, still holding her ankle in one hand, dug into the sack with the other. The shoe he produced was old, the burgundy satin across the top frayed on one side. Despite that, the quality of it was obvious, from the faded gold embroidery around the ankle to the tight, precise stitches above the short heel. Lowering his gaze, he slipped it onto her foot.

  “Well?” he prompted after a moment. “Do ye reckon ye can stomp aboot in that?”

  This seemed to have much less to do with shoes than it did with him attempting to make her … trust him? To agree to marry him even after her vehement protests? Was that it? She flexed her toes. “A lady doesn’t stomp. But yes, it seems to fit rather well.”

  He switched his hand to her other foot and replaced that shoe as well, moving far more slowly than she knew to be necessary. Ma
rjorie didn’t like it, didn’t like the intimacy of it or the way his touch made her heart beat harder. This man was actively ruining her life; she should be trying to kick him in the face, not fighting against … lust or whatever it was that made her want to run her fingers through his disheveled hair.

  Realizing she still sat there with one foot in his big hands and resting on his knee, she yanked free and firmly set both feet on the floor. “Don’t expect me to thank you, Maxton. My shoes and I would be perfectly fine if not for you.”

  Reaching out, he tugged down the hem of her skirt. “I dunnae expect yer gratitude, yer gloriousness. I’m only glad my rough hands didnae scratch yer delicate skin.”

  That prompted an unbidden image of his palms sliding up her bare legs. She shook herself, wondering if perhaps she had a fever. She had been driven about in the rain, after all. “I don’t find you at all amusing, sir. I have shoes to wear, but unless you mean to release me, I would prefer if you didn’t keep barging in here to harass me.”

  He straightened, still looking up at her. “Och. I’m harassing ye now, am I? By agreeing to wed ye and save yer reputation?

  “And your purse, I would imagine,” she retorted. “I’ll risk being ruined, thank you very much.”

  Maxton inclined his head. “If that’s how ye feel, I’ll leave ye to converse with yerself. It’ll give ye a taste of how a ruined lass spends her days, nae doubt. And hopefully ye’ll appreciate yer own loftiness more than I do.” Dropping her discarded shoes into the sack, he stood. “I brought ye someaught to read, but now I’m thinking it might be too plain fer ye. Best I leave ye to prance aboot on yer pedestal alone.”

  Marjorie shot to her feet. “Something to read?” she repeated aloud, the prospect of another half-dozen hours of solitude abruptly pushing at her. Corresponding with the boy could occupy her for a few minutes, but it didn’t remove her from a locked room the way reading could.

  He faced her again. “Aye. Someaught to read.”

  “Let me have it, then.”