The Dog House (Harding's World of Romance) (16 page)

He shot out his lip and shook his head. “I only exaggerate my good points,” he said cheerfully. “And I am more than willing to try, but I can’t guarantee you a superb meal this way, whereas if I took you to the
Collingwood I could stake my inheritance on it.”

But Fiona’s mind was made up. The more she thought about it, the more she saw the appeal in an evening alone with Colin at Loch Murray.  She even had to admit that she was curious to see what it was like to live in a castle, although some part of her felt that she should be against it.

“I come from stubborn stock,” she warned him. “So don’t go listing all your favourite fancy dining places. This will be fun, trust me.”

He sent her a doleful look.
“Right. Slaving away in a kitchen when we could be sipping fine wine in elegant surroundings and letting others do it for us, to produce fare that could never compare with what my money can buy. There’s a reason I never learned.”

“Too busy?”
Fiona asked sarcastically. “It’s a basic need. Well, eating, not cooking, but you know what I mean. How can you be so helpless about something so important? How can you stand depending on others for your food?”

He stared at her blankly. “We all need other people for some things,” he said, obviously considering the question for the first time. “We can’t be self-reliant about everything. So I am willing to put my gastronomic trust in people who are experts in the field. I’m self-sufficient enough in other matters not to have a complex about that. Are you one of those people who
refuses to take help?”

Fiona thought this time. “Obviously people help me,” she said, thinking of Sarah’s help with Livingstone even as they spoke.
“With very important things, too. But cooking, Colin. That’s almost like needing help with breathing.”

“Which I will gladly take if I need it,” he said in his nonplussed way. “Well, forward the Light Brigade in that case. Although I suppose you do know how badly that decision turned out.”

“You are comparing me to an incompetent general,” Fiona pointed out. “British, at that, I might add. You don’t seem to consider the option that I’m one of your culinary experts.”

He raised his eyebrows in astonishment. “Are you?” he asked hopefully.

She laughed. “Not at all. But I can cook and I enjoy food. So half a league onward.”

They had long since reached the car park and were lingering by Fiona’s old car. “I’m afraid we’ll have to take both cars,” he told her. “Unless you want me to drive you back for another round of golf before we collect yours.”

She sent him a dirty look. “I’ll need my car before hell freezes over,” she said dryly. “I’ll just follow you.”

He nodded and started to walk towards his Range Rover, before he turned back toward her. “You do know that I live in a castle, don’t you?” he asked. “
D’you know, I don’t think I’ve ever felt the need to apologise for that before. I just don’t want you to arrive and then decide that it’s too upscale for you.”

“It isn’t upscale
, it’s full-on aristocratic,” she corrected him. “But I had heard that, yes. Does it have modern plumbing and electricity?”

He grinned.
“In most rooms, yes. Well, follow me, then. Although I’m not sure that this counts as your foray onto my territory.”

“It is your home, Colin,” she reminded him. “And a man’s home is his castle.”

“I really don’t think I can honestly say that I’m at home in my kitchen,” he pointed out. “I will recognise it though, if we stumble upon it.”

“Will there be any food there?” Fiona asked suddenly, her hand on the car door handle. “Or do we have to stop at Morrison’s?”

“Marks and Spencer’s, if it comes to that,” he corrected her, looking doubtful. “Doing groceries, how quaint. But now that I think about it, with my folks around McTavish keeps the pantry full. My mother can cook, at least.”

“Tell me
you aren’t speaking about a butler or valet or something,” Fiona said, starting to feel less comfortable with the arrangement.

“Manager,” Colin assured her. “
Which is sort of a broad term really. He’s the one who actually gets things done.”

She sighed. “Let’s get going before I start to have second thoughts,” she suggested.

Fiona was starting to feel like an imposter by the time Colin’s car signalled the turning into the long driveway of the castle, which passed by the gate-keeper’s cottage. The obvious need to tell the truth, to confess about Livingstone and her own cowardice in owning up to him, had never seemed clearer. She resolved to find an opportunity this evening to explain herself when the situation presented itself. Knowing Colin, he would probably laugh about it and she would feel ridiculous for having hesitated so long. It wasn’t as if she could match the cold, threatening tones of the letter she had received with the man himself.

Still she was glad that Livingstone wasn’t there to run after them
, she thought as she glanced at the cottage in passing. He was happy enough with Sarah and it would look better if she confessed before she was forced to by the situation. The garden looked rambling and neglected and somehow forlorn without the dog’s presence and she thought again how glad she was to have him, regardless of the complications he caused. Ideally, after her confession, he could be part of her excursions with Colin, if he liked dogs. It was hard to imagine anybody not liking the affectionate hound but that was something else that she should find out this evening.

This was her first official visit to the castle and it was even more impressive when approached correctly, rather than surrepti
tiously through the woods. The long driveway was lined with old hardwood trees, their massive trunks dark and stately while the turning leaves added a hint of colour.

The drive ended in a courtyard formed by a collection of old outbuildings which had at one point formed the working area for the estate, including a barn, stable and loose boxes and a few storage or maintenance buildings. All were cut from the same grey stone as the castle and all were kept in perfect condition, despite the fact that several looked
permanently closed-up now.

The loose boxes had been converted in
to a garage, and Colin pulled into one while Fiona left her car in the gravel outside. She was too busy admiring the architecture and fantastic preservation of the historical buildings to notice Colin gesturing that she move her car indoors as well.

“Oh, a bit of rain will help me clean it,” she laughed, leaving it where it was.

“It isn’t the weather I’m worried about,” he told her, crunching across the gravel to join her. “Do you remember that I mentioned we’d had troubles with a dog? He managed to damage a visitor’s car the other day and now I prefer to have my guests park in safety.”

This may have been an opening to launch the discussion but it certainly wasn’t the one that Fiona had been hoping for. Instead she kept her voice light as she indicated the already-battered state of her vehicle. “I don’t think a scratch or two more will make much difference to the value,” she pointed out with an attempt at a laugh.
“Unless the dog pokes right through one of the rusty patches.”

“Are you sure?” Colin
asked, genuine concern in his voice. “I’d hate to feel responsible if something happened to your car.”

“Is this for the sake of my old hatchback or so that my car doesn’t disfigure your impeccable estate?” she asked with sudden suspicion.

At least this made him laugh, breaking the mood. “Do you still think I’m that shallow?” he asked, taking her elbow to lead her along a gravel path between the buildings.

For once Fiona chose her words with tact. “I think I wouldn’t be out of line to suggest that some of your friends and acquaintances might find my vehicle either objectionable or at least worthy of a derogatory comment,” she said.

He blinked a few times. “They’d laugh at it, you mean?” he interpreted. “A bit of teasing isn’t always to be taken seriously, you know.  They give me a hard time when they can too. And I’m fairly sure that some good-natured ribbing among friends cuts across classes. Or are you going to accuse me again of living in a bubble, unaware of how terribly serious everybody is outside of my circle?”

“I haven’t changed my mind about that bubble comment,” she told him. “I mean, you can’t even cook for yourself.”

“And I maintain that you live in an equally protected bubble,” he returned mildly. “A world of academics and great thinkers that are as far removed from the mainstream mindset as my group. Speaking of which, you have at least made great efforts to try out my social scene today and I appreciate it. Even if you alienated half of them.”

Fiona shot him a quick glance to see if he seemed at all upset but his eyes were teasing. As for the comment about a protected bubble, she realised how very little he knew of her personal life back in Edinburgh, but she didn’t feel comfortable enough to set him straight.
Her family’s poverty, her father’s drinking habits and the blame he laid on the British seemed too far removed from his world, where even her university life put her in a different circle. She was what she had made of herself, leaving the past behind, and she wanted him to judge her for who she was now, not for where she had come from.

So instead she remarked graciously, “You’ve also done your share of adjusting for my world with the chippie and the walks.
And you’ve done a better job of fitting into mine than I did into yours.”

“We’ll both just need to keep practising,” he said cheerfully, his words giving her a rush of pleasure. He wasn’t giving up on her just yet, and somehow he wasn’t bored with her despite the hours and hours it had taken her to get around the golf course.

By now they had left the cluster of outbuildings and were approaching the castle, which loomed regally above the perfectly-trimmed lawn. With the early autumn chill in the air and the clouds blowing in, the glow of soft lights through the window of the entrance hall looked inviting rather than imposing and Fiona couldn’t help feeling excited at the prospect of an evening in a real castle.

“
McTavish must still be working,” Colin observed, noting the lights in one of the ground-floor rooms as they walked up three steps to the main doors.

Fiona froze. “You’re sure that it can’t be your parents?” she asked, having heard enough joking remarks about their severity to be sure that she didn’t want to meet them, at least not like this.

He dismissed her fears with a shake of his head. “Everything my father does is planned in advance,” he told her dryly. “A spontaneous change of plans such as leaving Skye early is out of the question. Besides, their car wasn’t in the garage. Now, welcome to Loch Murray and please make yourself at home.”

Fiona laughed hollowly.
At home in a castle. That was as much of a stretch as feeling at home with a golf club. But she was surprised at the contrast between the austere exterior of the building and the homier, lived-in feeling inside.

She decided at once that the décor had been chosen by somebody other than Colin.
The cold flagstone floors and high walls were softened by rugs and decorations that seemed to have been collected from around the world. The lights were warm and cosy and a fire was crackling in a large hearth when Colin led the way down the entry hall to a large living area.

In front of the fire two large but comfortable-looking sofas had been drawn up with a low polished table already set out with a tray of crackers and cheese and two empty glasses.

“You were expecting me to suggest this?” Fiona demanded suspiciously, seeing the set-up. “Or are you always prepared to bring somebody home?”

Colin merely laughed. “We do have cell phone coverage out here,” he told her. “I warned
McTavish that I was bringing company home with me. Simple hospitality, my suspicious companion.”

She felt her cheeks redden. She had sounded awfully possessive there and she tried to compensate, realising that it wasn’t so m
uch a question of jealousy as insecurity about her status with Colin, whether this was starting to feel like a real relationship to him or whether she remained an intriguing new play thing for a spoilt bachelor.

“As long as you don’t think that a tray full of cheese counts as supper,” she said with forced cheer. “You aren’t escaping your cooking lesson any more than I could beg off the golf after the driving range.”

“Fine,” Colin said with a heavy sigh. “But let me first offer us a glass of something by the fire. I must say that a long afternoon out of doors without the habitual drink and snack at the club has left me famished.”

Fiona was hungry too, although something in her body’s awareness of Colin seemed to keep her appetite somewhat in check. She didn’t know if it was nerves or hormones or simply the vague fear and hope that they might find themselves naked again at some point
and she didn’t want to have eaten too much.

She sank down into the sofa while Colin walked over to a liquor cabinet against the wall. The warmth of the fire after the afternoon outdoors left her suddenly very relaxed and she made herself sit upright again for fear of getting sleepy. She looked around the grand room with curiosity, and had to admit that despite the cleanliness and order, it still conveyed the feeling of a real house which people
lived in and she could imagine it filled with children playing games and adults drinking sherry on a stormy evening.