Rose In Scotland (20 page)

“That might be best,” Hugh agreed reluctantly, accepting that in the inexplicable way of women, Caroline was now eager for a chat. “I will send him word first thing tomorrow morning. I had planned to do so, in any case.”

“It will be good to see him again.” Caroline sounded contented as she brushed her fingers through the hair dusting his chest. “What is he like? It is odd; he is my grandfather, but you know him so much better than I do.”

Reluctantly at first, uncertain what details to share, Hugh began speaking of the man he had come to admire more than any other man he’d ever met. He spoke of the general’s intelligence, his bravery, and the compassion he showed to the men who served under him. In the process he revealed a great deal more of himself than he ever had, a fact he wasn’t even aware of until Caroline was pressing a gentle kiss to his shoulder.

“Poor Hugh,” she murmured, her eyes full of sympathy as she gazed at him. “It can’t have been easy for you, serving a king who had done you such a disservice. I only wonder that you stayed with the army as long as you did.”

Hugh gaped at her in horror, realizing belatedly what he had let slip. He had been speaking of the campaign in the southern colonies one moment, and in the next his feelings of ambivalence and resentment were spilling out of him. He’d spoken of things he’d never told another living soul, and his sense of embarrassment was compounded
by the odd sense of relief he was experiencing. It was as if a wound long infected had been lanced, and the poison could at last seep out. It was a startling revelation, and one he impatiently brushed to one side.

“It was all I knew,” he answered her observation curtly. “All I had. There was nothing for me in Scotland, and so I stayed. Too long, it seems,” he added, remembering what had greeted him upon his return.

“Why do you say that?” She studied him curiously. “Had your father died while you were away?”

Hugh’s lips twisted bitterly. “No, he was not dead. He was worse than dead. He and my brother Andrew had been charged with treason and transported to a penal colony. It is doubtful I shall ever see them again.”

Her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Hugh, I am so sorry …”

“As if that were not enough, the king I had bled and killed for had taken my land,” Hugh continued, not caring now that she should know the truth he had been so careful to keep from her. “Loch Haven was seized and sold at auction to some rich merchant from York. That is why I sought out your grandfather. I was hoping with his connections he might be able to help me recover what was taken from me.”

She bent her head, her attention focused on the broad plains of his chest. “I see,” she said softly, not looking at him. “That explains why you married me. I’ll own I was curious.”

He was at a loss to know what to make of that. He slipped a hand under her chin and lifted her
face to his. “Does it matter?” he asked, studying her somberly.

She hesitated, then shook her head. “No,” she said, her gaze meeting his. “It is not as if there was any pretense of love between us, after all. I married you to secure my freedom, and you married me to secure your land. It seems a perfectly straightforward arrangement to me.”

He frowned at her cool tones. “Aye,” he agreed. “So it is.” He remembered his earlier troubling thoughts, but decided now was not the time to bring the matter to her attention. Later, when they were both feeling less raw, he would broach the subject again and decide what was to be done. In the meanwhile, he was determined not to make love to her again. He might desire her, but that did not mean he wished to trap either of them in a cage that had no way out by getting a child on her.

“It is early, dearest,” he said, gently easing her down beside him. “Close your eyes and go back to sleep. We’ve a busy day yet ahead of us.”

He could feel the stiffness in her, and thought she would argue. Instead she finally relaxed, the tension easing from her as she lay her head on his shoulder.

“As you wish,” she said, her tone giving away nothing of what she was thinking. “Good night, Hugh.”

“Good night,
annsachd,”
he replied, holding her against him as he drifted into an uneasy sleep.

T
wo nights later, Caroline sat before her dressing table adding the finishing touches to her toilette. She and Hugh were expected at the home of Sir Henry Gillmore, an old friend of her grandfather’s. He was also a member of the Privy Council, and she wondered if Hugh meant to enlist the baronet’s help in regaining his seized estates.

Not that the wretch would tell her if he was, she brooded, dabbing rose-scented oil behind her ears. Since the night he’d made such passionate love to her, he had retreated behind a facade of civility, never speaking to her unless it was to issue clipped commands or utter the most commonplace of pleasantries. Attempts on her part to bring the conversation to a more personal level usually met with stony silence, and in the end she abandoned the attempt. He might have his pride, but she had hers as well, and she refused to lower it by attempting to fix the attentions of a man so clearly indifferent to her.

At first she feared she’d disappointed him in the marriage bed, and that their heated lovemaking hadn’t been as pleasurable for him as it had
been for her. But then she would catch him watching her with such naked longing and desire that she did not know what to think. One thing she did know, was that she refused to endure his black moods much longer. He might bite off her head for her pains, but she was determined to know what the devil was bothering him.

“Oh, my lady, what a sight you look!” Helene exclaimed, clasping her hands together and beaming at Caroline like a delighted parent. “You are beautiful!”

“The gown is beautiful, Helene,” Caroline corrected, pleased nonetheless by the maid’s effusive praise. “Madame Clare is to be commended for her skill with a needle and thread.”

“Oh, no, my lady,” Helene insisted loyally, stepping forward to hand Caroline her fan. “ ’Tis you who do the gown proud!”

Caroline smiled in gratitude before giving her reflection one final glance. What would Hugh think when he saw her? she wondered, patting an errant curl into place. Would seeing her dressed so elegantly remind him he had wed a flesh-and-blood woman, and not some untouchable stone statue? She was debating the possibilities when the door opened and Hugh stepped inside, halting abruptly when he saw her.

“Good evening, sir,” she said, a hopeful smile touching her lips as she turned to greet him. “Have you come to fetch me? I do hope I haven’t been keeping you waiting.”

He gazed at her in heavy silence before speaking. “No. I have come to tell you the general has
arrived. He is in the drawing room and asking for you.”

Caroline shot to her feet. “Grandfather is here?” she exclaimed. “Why did someone not tell me?” She rushed past Hugh, her trepidation forgotten as she dashed down the stairs. She ran into the drawing room and threw herself into the duke’s arms with a glad cry.

“Grandfather! Oh, Grandfather! It is so good to see you!” she said, giving him an exuberant hug. “I have missed you!”

“So I gather.” The duke chuckled, gingerly unwinding her arms from about his neck. “Have a care of my cravat, dearest. My valet will give notice if you crush his masterpiece.”

Caroline gave a soft laugh, savoring his closeness for another moment before stepping back. “But what has kept you?” she asked, catching hold of his hand and guiding him to the settee. “We were expecting you in London days ago!”

“Business, my dear, business,” he replied, smiling secretively. “And I had no desire to intrude upon the newly married couple. Be somewhat
de trop
, eh?”

To her chagrin a rosy blush darkened Caroline’s cheeks. “What are your plans for the evening?” she asked. “Hugh and I are promised at the Gillmores’, but I’m sure they would understand if we sent our regrets.”

“No such thing, child,” her grandfather insisted, his white brows meeting in a frown. “An obligation is an obligation, and ought not to be set aside for convenience’s sake. Besides, old Dillydally has invited me as well, and I must say I am looking forward to seeing the fellow again.”

Caroline thought of the stern and pompous baronet, who was widely known for the air of grave majesty he affected. “Dillydally?” she repeated, her lips twitching in amusement.

“A name from our youth,” the duke explained with a wave of his hand. “He could never make up his mind about anything, not even what coat to wear. Ought to have known he would end a politician.” He turned on the settee and surveyed Caroline with every indication of approval.

“You are looking dashed well,” he said, giving her hand a paternal pat. “You look just like a queen. Doesn’t she, Sergeant?” He addressed his remark to Hugh, who had just walked into the room.

His silvery-green eyes rested briefly on Caroline before moving on to the duke. “Aye, general, that she does,” he said, his voice lacking any inflection. “Are you ready to leave now? I have a carriage waiting outside.”

Her grandfather accepted the unspoken command with a grumble. “Always were one to keep tightly to a schedule,” he muttered, accepting Caroline’s aid as he rose to his feet. “Tell me, my dear, is he always such a tyrant? If he is, you must tell me; I shall give him a sharp talking-to, and make no doubt.”

Caroline’s gaze met Hugh’s and then she glanced away. “It is all right, Grandfather,” she said, her voice mimicking Hugh’s cool tones. “You must remember I have lived the last several years with Uncle Charles. I know well how to deal with tyrants.”

Her answer seemed to amuse her grandfather. “You do, eh?” he asked. “And how is that?”

She gave her husband a pointed look. “Why, Grandfather, ’Tis simple—you ignore them.” And with that she sailed past Hugh, her nose held high in the air.

She is a goddess
, Hugh thought, pride and desire warring within him as he followed his wife’s progress about the crowded ballroom. When he’d walked into her boudoir to find her looking like something out of a dream, it had taken all of his will not to throw her on the bed and make love to her. It was a sensation he had become depressingly familiar with over the past two days—a sensation that was growing almost impossible to resist.

“Looks like her grandmother,” the general observed, his gaze following Hugh’s. “Those are her rubies she’s wearing. Tildie willed ‘em to her before she died. Good thing she did so, else that scoundrel Charles would have sold them off by now.”

Hugh merely grunted, not bothering with a reply. He had already noticed the fortune in blood-red stones draped about his wife’s neck and dangling from her ears. He would have to have been blind not to, and the sight of them only seemed to emphasize the vast difference in their stations in life. Given the current state of his finances it was unlikely he would have been able to buy her so much as a single stone, and there she was dripping in them. It was something he had best remember, for his own sake.

“Glad to see her looking so well,” the general continued, sounding thoughtful. “I’ll own I was a trifle worried. Not that I thought you would
do anything ungentlemanly, mind,” he added before Hugh could speak. “You’re the finest man I know, else I would never have entrusted her to your care. I know you would sooner face a firing squad than lay a harsh hand upon her.”

Hugh thought of the night he had made wild love to Caroline. Would the general consider that a harsh hand? he wondered, trying not to squirm like a schoolboy facing his headmaster.

“It is good of you to say so, sir,” he said, his voice sounding wooden even to his own ears. “I appreciate it.”

“Not at all, Sergeant, not at all. Only the truth, after all. You’re a good man, and I know you will do what is right. That is what I wish to discuss with you.”

“What is right, sir?” Hugh asked, his eyes narrowing as a man in a purple and gold jacket made an elaborate bow in front of Caroline. Hugh recognized him as being one of Westhall’s crowd, and he disliked the attention he was showing his wife.

“I have been thinking.” If the general noted Hugh’s distraction, he did not say. “At my age there’s not much one can do but look back, or look forward. I’ve always thought dwelling on the past to be a dashed waste of time. What’s done cannot be undone, eh? Just as the poets say. But the future, the future, Sergeant MacColme, is another matter entirely. And it is the future that most concerns me.”

“What about the future, General?” Hugh relaxed when the overdressed fop moved away from Caroline.

“The future of my family, and yours,” the general
replied, and something in his tone brought Hugh snapping to attention. It was the tone the general used when he was planning something audacious.

“My family?” he repeated warily.

“Your brother and father—I have been thinking about them,” General Burroughs said, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “I have a friend in the Admiralty, capital fellow. I mentioned the sad fate that had befallen them, and he said he did not see why something could not be arranged to bring them home. A parole, perhaps, or even a full pardon, if all was well.”

Hugh’s heart began pounding. “A pardon?” he asked, wanting with all his heart to believe ’twas possible, but afraid of the crushing disappointment were it not so.

“A parole, more like,” the general warned, stabbing his finger at Hugh. “But it could be done, it shall be done—if you would do but one thing for me.”

Hugh thought of his father and brother, home again at Loch Haven where they belonged. “Anything,” he said fervently, his eyes burning with tears. “I would do anything, General.”

“Excellent. Then you can give Caroline a child.”

Hugh stared at him in blank shock, certain his ears had failed him. “I beg your pardon?”

“A child,” the general repeated, as if Hugh was the greatest simpleton to draw breath. “Someone to carry my blood into the next generation. Oh, I know what you’re thinking,” he said, holding up a hand to halt Hugh’s sputtering protest. “Yours is but a marriage of convenience,
and will end in a year’s time; I am aware of that. But I know Scottish divorce laws, you see. I know that when properly handled, anything, even the matter of offspring, can be easily dealt with.”