Some Like it Scot (Scandalous Highlanders Book 4) (28 page)

As the mingled MacLawrys and MacDonalds trooped around the side of the house to the servants' entrance, Ranulf led the way into the foyer. “Laird Torriden, my wife, Lady Glengask, and our guest, Lady Elizabeth MacColl.”

The wording was as deliberate as it had been when Bear had used it a week earlier, and against him. As a guest of the MacLawry, Elizabeth would be protected by the might of the clan. And that might was considerable. With her very distant connection to the MacDonalds, that protection should be unnecessary, but Bear was being hostile about something. Before he relaxed his own guard, he meant to know what it was.

The viscount immediately stepped forward to bow at Charlotte and take Elizabeth's hand. Kissing her knuckles, he favored the young lass with a bright smile. “Lady Elizabeth. You're the reason I've come all this way. I'm so pleased you're still here.”

Hm. Perhaps Bear
did
have something to be concerned about, if Torriden was after Elizabeth himself for some reason. But her engagement to the Duke of Visford had been announced, because he'd checked the London newspapers himself to be certain. To his knowledge no MacDonald had protested it.

Elizabeth smiled, but retrieved her hand quickly. “I don't understand, my lord. I know we're both part of clan MacDonald, but I haven't seen my father's side of the family—or the Highlands—for years and years. Why are you looking for me?”

“The dining room's this way,” Bear put in, gesturing. “Mayhap ye can tell the lot of us why ye've come here in such a hurry.”

“Certainly.” Torriden offered Elizabeth his arm as they all headed for the informal dining room. “I'd heard, of course, that you've been living in London. What I'm hoping is that you might have some information for me.”

“What sort of information?” she asked, sitting beside him at the long table.

Ranulf took the chair at the head of the table, keeping Charlotte directly on his left, and Munro on his right. His brother's behavior continued to baffle him, and he wanted to be close enough to grab hold of him if that became necessary. With Elizabeth about to leave the MacDonalds for the MacLawrys, Bear should have been going out of his way to be welcoming to Torriden. And he should have tried to take the seat on Elizabeth's other side. And he should have disliked the immediate attention with which the viscount favored his nearly betrothed, not the man's presence itself.

None of it made much sense, and he disliked the feeling that he'd missed something. Up in the Highlands, missing things got people killed. “What can we do fer ye, Torriden?” he asked. “I figured to settle any negotiations between our clans by letter.”

“Ah. Yes. I nearly forgot.” The viscount pulled a letter from his breast pocket and handed it down the table. “My presence here isn't about Lady Elizabeth and your brother. Not directly.”

“Nae? Then what—”

“I wanted to know, my lady, if you've had any contact with your half sister, Lady Catriona. She vanished a week or so before you fled London. We're to be married.”

 

Chapter Thirteen

Elizabeth's surprised, half-panicked glance caught Munro as he willed her to keep her wits about her. All the while he had to work equally hard to keep his seat and not go smash pretty Lord Torriden in the face. Of all the damned things he'd speculated over, Cat being promised to another man hadn't been one of them.

“My sister?” Elizabeth stammered. “Cat? She's missing? What happened?”

Thank Saint Andrew.
“I didnae ken ye had a sister, Elizabeth,” he said aloud, putting a frown on his face.

“I do. My half sister, Catriona. She's five years older than I am.” She took a swallow of tea, looking as though she wished it was something stronger, and faced the viscount. “I've corresponded with her over the years, but I have no idea where she might be. Please tell me what happened.”

Munro wanted to hear that, himself. This would have been so much easier if Cat had trusted him enough to tell him that she was betrothed, and that for some reason she didn't want the marriage. Now he had to scramble to catch up, and hope that Elizabeth didn't unintentionally say something to give the game away.

He looked at Torriden all over again. Too pretty by half, he decided, and a year or two younger than himself. All manners and sticking out his pinkie when he drank from his cup of tea. What was it about him that Cat had disliked enough to flee her home and family for a broken-down ruin in the middle of a rival clan's territory? Whatever it was, the idea that this … dandy had a claim on
his
woman didn't sit well. At all.

The viscount downed a proper-sized mouthful of steak-and-kidney pie, then wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin. “I don't know if you're aware or not, Lady Elizabeth, but the MacDonalds of the Isle of Islay have been estranged from those of us in Sutherland to the north. Your uncle Robert, the Earl of Islay, de—”

“I know who my uncle is. He took my father's title when Papa died.”

“Aye. And my condolences on the loss of Randall. He was a … unique soul.”

She nodded. “Thank you. And thank you for calling him unique rather than eccentric. I have heard some of the tales, you know.” Elizabeth took a breath. “But what did Uncle Robert do?”

“He arranged for your sister to marry me. He and the MacDonald evidently thought it would go a long way to mending some fences. But then she vanished. In the middle of the night, from what I heard. I thought she might have eloped with some young man she favored, but your uncle doesn't seem to think that's the case.” His smile looked more like a grimace. “I'd hoped she might have contacted you, since you both left your homes at approximately the same time.”

“The lass said she didnae ken where her sister is,” Munro interrupted, jabbing a fork into his luncheon. “Asking her the same question five times'll only get ye the same answer five times.”

“Bear,” Ranulf cautioned from his left shoulder. “Did ye think to look in London? Mayhap she went to find her sister, nae realizing Lady Elizabeth had come north.”

“I have a number of relations in Town,” the viscount returned, “but while they said a redheaded figure was rumored to have been seen in the vicinity of Derby House, they actually thought it might have been a secret beau of yours, my lady, sweeping you away to Gretna Green before you could be married off to awful old Visford.” He cleared his throat. “I am assuming I may refer to him as awful, since you did flee London.”

“You may refer to him as anything you wish,” she stated, her voice a bit unsteady. “I intend to have nothing further to do with him.”

“So there was no redheaded lad accompanying you?”

“No. That would have been horribly scandalous! And my sister isn't a lad, anyway, so I don't see how that would matter even if it was true.”

Munro decided he needed to give Elizabeth a bit more respect. She certainly knew how to whip a polite conversation about to her advantage. That
was
the sort of thing a lady learned how to do in London, but she did it well, and for a damned good cause.

The viscount's cheeks colored. “I didn't mean to imply anything. I had heard that your sister…”

She faced him directly. “That she what?”

“That … she has red hair. I thought she might have donned a disguise. I see that is not the case, though.”

Munro knew Cat hadn't just begun wearing trousers when she'd found Haldane Abbey. She had a reputation for dressing as a man, and he had more than a suspicion that had prompted some of her concern about being seen as mannish and unsophisticated. The Sutherland MacDonalds apparently knew about her choice of wardrobe, as well, and bloody Torriden thought it would be insulting to come out and directly say that Catriona wore trousers. The buffoon. Any lass with legs as shapely as Cat's could wear any damned thing she pleased, as far as he was concerned. And he meant to be the only one to see them up close, anyway.

“No, it isn't the case,” Elizabeth agreed. “I'm sorry you had to come all this way to hear I cannot help you.”

“I am not sorry,” the viscount countered with his charming smile. “At the worst, I've been able to meet my betrothed's sister. At best, perhaps she will find her way here, looking for you.”

The big grandfather clock in the foyer began chiming, and Munro abruptly realized it was noon.
Damnation.
He'd told Cat he would be back at Haldane two hours ago. And he now had several reasons for wanting to see her again, first among them being why she'd decided it would be better for them both if he didn't know she'd already been promised to another man. She didn't seem to be playing at this, but he did have his own code of honor. He'd never bedded another man's woman—until now, apparently. And he didn't mean to stop, either.

Conjuring a grin that felt hard around the edges, he pushed to his feet. “Pretty as all this talk is, I reckon ye dunnae need me fer it. I've some work to see to.” Not waiting for permission or denial, he walked around the table for the door and stepped into the hallway.

Ranulf couldn't very well stop him from escaping, because his brother had locked himself into being polite. A polite host didn't leave the table in the middle of listening to the lamentations of a guest. Fortunately, Munro wasn't a polite fellow, and he'd never been expected to be one.

“Where's Gilling?” he asked, as one of the maids crossed the hallway.

“In the kitchen, with those MacDonald lads,” she answered, stopping to dip a curtsy.

“I'll thank ye to go tell 'im to get his arse to the stable.”

She grinned. “I shall do that, m'laird.”

“Thank ye, Gormal. And tell him to fetch me a half-dozen eggs, while he's at it. And a sack of tea.”

As he headed for the foyer the two deerhounds emerged from the morning room, where they'd apparently been banished upon the MacDonald company's arrival. He scratched Fergus and Una behind the ears, then glanced over his shoulder. A little disruption would serve that dandy Torriden right. Having one of the hounds take a nip out of his arse would certainly make
him
feel better.

“Go find Glengask,” he said, sending them toward the dining room. With a pair of happy woofs they galloped off.

Cooper was occupied in the dining room, so Munro grabbed his own hat off the rack behind the front door, along with his heavy riding coat, and headed outside. He wasn't precisely dressed for laboring at the abbey, but he didn't think he'd be doing much in the way of repairs today. If Cat had gone into hiding only to delay what she considered an obligation to marry Torriden, today would be a day for smashing things. If this was a game after all, if this lass was somehow unknowingly repaying him for breaking hearts by breaking his … No. No more conjecture. Today he needed some bloody questions answered, once and for all.

*   *   *

Catriona shivered as she dunked the wet cloth into the spring again, wrung it out, and then ran it down her bare legs. For Elizabeth she would have toted water inside the abbey and warmed it on the fire, but this way was much faster and much less effort—except for the icy cold of the water, combined with the chill air of a Highlands autumn.

Something crunched on the rise to her left, and she ducked lower. It was bad enough to be caught in men's clothes by a stranger. Being stumbled upon naked would be both mortifying and dangerous. When a doe wandered across the top of the hill, she relaxed again.

Bear liked her legs. He liked her arms, and her breasts—he liked those a great deal—and all her other parts. He didn't find her awkward or mannish, and when she lay naked with him, she didn't
feel
awkward or mannish. She felt … pretty. Lovely, even. And powerful. As much as she found delight in him, it aroused her at least as much that
he,
a man who'd likely had more lovers than he could count, found
her
exciting and desirable.

When she'd finished washing she dried herself with the blanket she'd brought along, and then dressed in her shirt and trousers again. Lord Glengask had mentioned that one of his coats was missing, but he hadn't asked about it while they retrieved Elizabeth's things. She was glad of that today as she shrugged into the heavy, oversized wool.

The doe had been joined by an amorous buck, and the two of them utterly ignored her as she stood to gather her things and make her way back around the abbey to the only accessible entrance. After a week of daily visits from Bear and Peter the hallway was nearly cleared of rubble, even if the ceiling did sag in several places. And now at the entrance to the kitchen she had solid walls and a door that she could bar.

No one could drop in on her through the ceiling, either, now that she and her two visitors had secured the open corner with tarps and lumber and some very heavy stones. Or someone could get in, rather, but not without a great deal of noise and effort. That was the main thing she liked about the door, as well; she would no longer be taken by surprise.

Shutting it behind her, she hung the cloth and the blanket in front of the fire to dry, set her musket beside her at the table, and opened
Robinson Crusoe
to read until Bear arrived. Before he'd discovered them she would have had to spend this time out hunting and foraging, but she'd snared a rabbit overnight and presently had it roasting over the fire, and Munro was bringing eggs. She still had the bread from yesterday, and the wild onions, too—which left her time to do … nothing. It was quite refreshing, actually.

If anything, reading again about the tribulations of Crusoe made her appreciate having iron pots and tin cups and her father's old musket. She'd managed quite well for herself, really, and her own Friday happened to be wild as the Highlands, and handsome, muscular, and very, very capable, as well.