Highland Bachelor 02 - This Laird of Mine (13 page)

“It seems like a lot of work, not to mention the expense, to celebrate something that has already happened,” Claire said.

“The entire event will be a gift from Nicholas and me.”

“You’ve already spared no expense in order to repair the estate. We should wait for Jules to return before anything more is done.” Claire dipped her gaze. “I have not known Jules as long as you, but I do know he is a proud man. The changes that have been made in his absence will be difficult for him to bear.”

Jane held out her hand. “Mercy, don’t you worry about that. Nicholas and Hollister will take care of everything. They will enter into some sort of arrangement with Jules that will keep his dignity and his pride. But that’s for the men to accomplish. Margaret and I have something to show you.”

Claire stared at Jane, not moving, still unsure, so Jane grasped her hand and pulled her toward the door. “Come,” Jane said.

Surrendering to her fate, Claire allowed Jane to lead her from the kitchen and through the house, up the stairs, and into the master’s chamber. Claire swallowed a thick lump in her throat. This was the first time she had seen Jules’s room, even though Jane and Margaret assumed she slept there. Her heart hammering as she invaded Jules’s sacred domain, Claire allowed Jane to guide her toward the great bed in the center of the room. The linen hangings were tied back. On the quilted comforter lay a dress. Jane lifted the magnificent emerald gown up for Claire to admire. “Isn’t it lovely?”

Claire peered at the exquisite damask silk. “It’s the finest gown I have ever seen.”

“Good,” Jane said with a broad smile, “because I purchased this gown for you to wear tomorrow night when Jules returns from Edinburgh.”

Claire shifted her gaze from Jane to Margaret, who stood near the bedpost. Margaret nodded. “We’ve invited several guests to attend the banquet, people who used to come to Kildare Manor over the years, but have strayed away from Jules’s company.”

“In order for Jules to be a successful laird, we need to relaunch him into society as a competent landowner and leader of his clan.” Jane’s expression grew serious. “A wedding feast gives us the perfect opportunity to celebrate both his marriage and his claim to his lairdship. Please say you will help us? Without his bride, we cannot do this.”

Claire shuddered as fear gripped her. Closing her eyes for a moment, she imagined herself in that dress, greeting her husband with guests all around them. He wouldn’t be able to run away with so many people expecting him to play the roles of groom and laird.

A host of questions crowded her thoughts. Could she play the role of wife and seducer? Could she be everything Jules needed her to be in front of his friends and his peers? Could she set aside her own agenda and help him be the laird his friends hoped him to become? Could she give him something that might help him in his future without her? The thought brought with it a twist of pain.

His future without her
.

Despite the hurt she would cause him, he would go on. He would be the laird of the MacIntyres, and he would assume his proper place in society if she did what Jane and Margaret asked of her now.

“Yes.” The word was a whisper of sound that cut through her pain.

“You’ll do it?” Jane asked with a look of hope on her face.

Claire nodded and suddenly found herself hauled into Jane’s embrace. “Thank you, Claire. We will make this a night to remember, just you wait and see.”

“Thank you for the lovely gown.” Claire was certain she would remember this night every day for the rest of her life. The memory would be steeped in sadness and pain. She would yearn for a husband she could never truly have, for all the moments of his life she would miss, and she would ache with loneliness that could never be assuaged, not because of what she did for her girls, but because she realized in that moment that she was utterly and hopelessly in love with Jules.

She drew an uneven breath, at last recognizing the truth. She loved Jules.

The words repeated, ran together, and stabbed deep. She had searched her whole life for this feeling, and only when her life had been turned upside down with threats and treachery had she found what she’d searched for all along.

Merciful heavens, it was so unfair. Visions of Jules came to her, whispering, insinuating their way into her heart, gathering the air around her until it filled her with all the joy and hope and the splendor of what was possible.

Love.

Love was a gift not to be taken for granted. It was precious and fragile, elusive.

But how could she ever indulge in her newfound feelings without sacrificing the girls? She’d never had any doubts that they would be killed if she didn’t do exactly what she’d been instructed to do—to break the heart of the man she loved. She would break her own as well. Claire released her breath in a painful sigh. She moved away from Jane and Margaret’s puzzled stares to the window.

Her heart was beating so quickly she could hear it in her ears. Was there a way to keep what she had suddenly found? Could she tell Jules the truth? Would he be able to help her rescue the girls? Or would the kidnappers make good on their threats to kill the girls immediately if she so much as uttered a word to her husband?

“Claire, is everything all right?” Jane asked from behind her.

She would take that risk with her own life, but not with Penelope’s, Anna’s, and Eloise’s. Claire clasped her trembling fingers before her and turned around, suddenly finding the courage to go forward, despite the pain and anguish that pulsed through her with every thudding beat of her heart.

Claire met Jane’s concerned gaze and nodded. “If we are to have a party, then we will need a room that can accommodate all of our guests.” This time it was Claire who took Jane’s hand and pulled her from the room, down the hall, and up the stairs until they stood before the boarded-up chamber Jules had barred her from entering on their first day together.

“The old ballroom?” Jane’s eyes went wide as she pulled her hand from Claire’s. “Jules has made it clear to anyone who knows him that no one is to enter that room.”

“Well, I am not no one. I am his wife.”

Jane smiled. “I knew I liked you.”

Claire pulled on the boards she had loosened, setting them against the wall until she cleared a large enough hole to step through. “I’ve made a few changes to the room over the last few days.” She stepped back and allowed Jane and Margaret to precede her into the chamber.

“Jules hates this room. He—” Jane broke off as Claire pushed open the shutters, allowing the golden daylight to fill the chamber. “Sweet Mary, who painted the ceiling? Jules does not have the funds to hire a painter, especially one of this caliber.”

“It’s beautiful,” Margaret said with awe, then turned to Claire. “You did this, didn’t you?”

A rush of fear and pride brought the sting of tears to her eyes. “Yes,” she admitted, desperately wanting their approval.

She waited breathlessly as both women leaned their heads back and studied the beginnings of the elaborate painting she had planned. At the center of the room, Claire had painted the ceiling in perfect perspective so that the flat surface opened up into the illusion of a three-dimensional dome. After learning of the sorrow that had befallen not only Jules, but this room, she had wanted to transform it, make it appear as though it opened up into the heavens above.

“How on earth did you do that?” Jane asked, her voice tight with reverence.

“I paint,” she said simply.

“You do far more than paint,” Margaret said with a laugh. “How did you manage to make the ceiling look as though it had sprouted arches and pillars? It looks three stories high.”

“The technique is called quadratura, and unites architecture, painting, and sculpture into one form. I taught myself how to paint this type of mural by imitating the work of the Italian painter Andrea Pozzo.”

“Does Jules know you possess this talent?” Jane stared at Claire now.

She shook her head.

“Good.” Jane smiled. “It will be a fabulous surprise for him.” Jane’s gaze shifted back to the ceiling and the compilation of angels and stars and flowers. “When you are finished here, I would love to commission you to paint something, anything at all, at Bellhaven Manor.”

Margaret let out a gasp, clutched her belly, then laughed. “The baby,” she said in the way of an explanation. “This one kicks like a mule.” She smiled fondly at Claire. “I suspect it will be many years before Claire ventures outside of Kildare Manor. She’ll be busy with her own babies before long.”

Claire tried to laugh, but the words were like arrows, driving deep. She would never have babies with Jules. She wouldn’t even be around long enough to finish the ceiling completely—that task would take two years or more.

“You’re right, Margaret. Then let’s enjoy this beautiful ceiling, show it off to our guests, and plan for the perfect wedding feast tomorrow evening upon Jules’s return.” Jane laughed, a cheerful sound, but to Claire it sounded like a hollow echo in an empty room.

Tomorrow they would celebrate a wedding that was real, but a marriage that had been doomed from the start.

Claire clamped her hand over her mouth to stifle an agonized moan. She would give anything to make this marriage real.

T
h
e Doric
. The name of the inn circled in Jules’s mind like a tiresome nursery rhyme as he stepped into the darkened interior of the building on Market Street. Loud voices, smoke, the smell of bodies, whiskey. And people. Too many people. The impressions came at him at once as he searched the dark interior for a hooded figure.

He hadn’t expected to find the person that night. Jules frowned as he scanned the tables in the center of the room and the booths in the corners. The person he sought could be anyone, anywhere in this room. With a muttered curse, he made his way to the long wooden bar on the left-hand side of the room. He pushed his way through the crowd to the man behind the bar.

“I need some information,” he shouted above the noise to the man a person’s length from him. When the innkeeper paid him no heed, Jules placed a gold coin on the bar.

The innkeeper narrowed his gaze and shifted to where Jules waited. “’Bout?” He scooped up the coin.

“A patron. A person in a dark-hooded cloak who comes here often to meet with James Grayson,” Jules said, lowering his voice slightly to keep the conversation between the two of them.

The innkeeper shook his head. “Ye don’t want tae tangle wit’ that one.”

“Why?”

“She’s nothin’ but trouble.” He said, wiping an imaginary spot on the bar with a ragged, brown towel.

“Does
she
have a name?” A female? An unsettling feeling lodged in Jules’s gut.

The innkeeper looked up and searched the room. “Don’t know it.”

“Is she here now?” Jules persisted.

“Haven’t seen her fer a week, maybe more.” The innkeeper’s expression turned pensive.

“She wouldn’t happen to have red hair?” he asked the question that lodged in his throat.

The man shook his head. “Nay, ’tis a dark color. Maybe black or dark brown. And the woman is older, maybe in her fifties? Hard tae tell beneath that cloak.”

A sense of relief washed over Jules. He hadn’t realized how much he hoped the mystery person was not Claire. “Why is she trouble?”

The innkeeper remained silent.

Jules waited for an answer.

“’Cuz people she talks tae end up dead. And people who ask lots of questions tend tae end up that way as well.” The innkeeper ducked his head and started scrubbing at the wood in front of him again.

“Anyone else know anything about her?” Jules pressed his luck, asking one last question.

“They are all dead.” The innkeeper stopped and met Jules’s gaze. “Watch yerself. Stay alert.”

Jules tossed down a second coin. “Thanks for the warning, but I’ll be fine.”

Disappointed that his questioning hadn’t brought him any answers, Jules headed out the door and continued down the cobbled street. At least he knew the hooded figure was a female, and by the innkeeper’s account, deadly. As that thought formed, so too did the suspicion that the woman might be responsible for Grayson’s death.

Frowning into the darkness, Jules walked back toward the main part of town, wishing now he’d thought to bring his horse rather than leave the beast stabled at the inn on Melbourne Street where he’d spent the last night.

The moon was only a sliver in the sky, and the silence of the night was palpable. Through the darkened shadows, Jules kept his pace slow and deliberate as the sound of footsteps echoed behind him. One set of footsteps was joined by a second, and then a third. Jules reached for the sword at his side only to have his hand clutch air. It was then he realized he had left his sword back at the inn with his saddle and his horse.

He quickened his pace and turned a corner. A small circle of light illuminated the street. Jules followed the source to a lantern hanging from the side of the hackney coach that waited near the curb.

Before he could take a step toward it, a hand gripped his shoulder and whipped him around. Three men stood before him, their faces twisted in a mask of hate, and death lived in their eyes. “Give us yer money.”

Jules had no intention of giving them the last of what he so desperately needed, but before he could so much as respond, the men were upon him. Two gripped his arms. Jules wrenched his body left and right, forcing the men to stagger against the motion. While off balance, Jules brought his knee up and caught one man in the groin. The attacker howled and released Jules’s arm.

His breath ran harsh in his throat as he shot his fist forward, connecting with the face of one of his attackers. But while his hand was extended, the third man clipped Jules on the side of the head, sending him staggering backward. He did not fall, but the blow left him dizzy and disoriented. Yet knowing he could not hesitate or he would be overpowered, Jules brought his leg up and kicked the second attacker in the gut, sending him backward like a rag doll.

The dizziness combined with the motion sent Jules to the ground. The first attacker charged, coming at Jules with a kick. He clenched his jaw as a stab of pain shot through his side. Recovering quickly, he grasped the man’s foot, taking him to the ground.

They wrestled there with the cobbled street biting into his side, his back, until Jules freed his arm and with all his strength let his fist fly into the man’s face. A moment later, his opponent went limp.

Jules rolled, came up instantly, his coat a-tumble, his feet planted against the cobbles. He staggered across the street to the hackney, leaving his assailants behind.

“Sweet merciful heavens, what has happened?” For a heartbeat Claire couldn’t catch a breath. She hurried into the late afternoon sunshine to greet her husband as he rode his horse up the drive to Kildare Manor. His face was bruised and pale. He alighted from his horse, unfastened his saddlebag, then handed the tired animal over to Joseph, who had stayed on with them, overseeing the stable.

“I found the truth.” He set down his saddlebag and waited for her to join him in the graveled courtyard. A smile crooked one corner of his mouth.

Instinctively she reached out for him, and he took both of her hands in his. She looked up into his battered face. “Did you have to beat it out of someone?”

He shook his head. “Thugs in the street tried to rob me.”

Claire tightened her grip on his hands as she looked past the black-and-blue welt on the side of his cheek and beneath his right eye. “We need the physician.”

“No,” he said, looking at her, really looking at her as though he had never seen her before. “You are really quite lovely,” he said in a husky voice, and his eyes filled with the same sense of wonder she felt.

“Thank you.” Tears stung her eyes, but she didn’t care. “Does that mean . . . ?”

He released one hand and brought his fingers up to brush a tear from her cheek. “I . . . I don’t know anything about being a husband.”

“And despite my name, I am most likely not the wife you intended.”

“We could take this slow, just start out by being friends?” Despite the words, he pulled her close. His gaze moved down her body, his smile purely sensual.

Claire laughed. “We bypassed friends a long time ago,” she said in a dizzying rush of excitement. In that moment all the pain and fear and grief of her lifetime melted away. He believed her. Believed in them.

A nagging truth threatened to ruin the moment, but she forced it away. She wanted this moment so badly. Just once in her life she wanted to feel as though she controlled her destiny. Today she could pretend and forget all else. Today she would indulge herself in fantasy and give herself something to remember for when she was gone. She stared up into his face, memorizing everything about him, about this moment, how it felt to be accepted.

And perhaps, if she were truly fortunate . . . to be loved.

“Are you certain you do not need a physician?” she asked as they turned to go into the house.

He shook his head, then stopped and stared at the house. His body tensed as his gaze moved along the exterior walls, now free from the brambles and grass that had engulfed the manor before he’d left. “I was only gone for five days. What in heaven’s name happened to Kildare Manor?”

Silence stretched between them as Claire listened to the gentle rush of the breeze and the soft lapping of the water against the shore of the loch in the distance. He released her hand and turned to face her. “Was this your doing?” He wasn’t angry, only surprised.

“All of us pitched in. The manor . . .” she hesitated trying to find the right words. “Kildare Manor has come back to life.”

The tension in his body eased. He reached for her hand once more. “More than the house has changed, Claire, and hopefully for the better.” The smile he offered her was filled with hope. He retrieved his saddlebag from the ground, hooked it over his shoulder, then took a step forward. She remained where she stood, suddenly feeling the weight of her lies crash around her feet.

“There is something else you should know before we go inside,” she said, her voice raw.

“What is that?” She saw the uncertainty in his eyes. “Some deep dark secret you’ve been keeping from me?”

Her stomach plummeted.

She must have turned ghostly white, because a quick smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “I was joking.”

Claire found her voice. “The others—Jane, Nicholas, and all—have invited several people to the manor. They have planned a wedding feast and celebration of you being the new earl . . . tonight.”

“Guests here?” His brows rose in surprise. “I can’t remember the last time anyone came to call for any purpose other than tragedy.” He fell silent a moment, then touched her chin, tilted her face, and forced her to meet his eyes. “’Tis all right, Claire. Something had to change. You were right, the house was dead, along with its keepers. Past keepers,” he corrected.

She saw a transformation in his eyes from the angry laird he had been when she’d first arrived to the strong and confident man before her. He looked at her as if she truly mattered to him. Her heart sped up.

“Shall we go see what miracles you all have wrought?” They started up the walkway together, and halfway there, he reached for her hand.

Hidden amongst the trees, a hooded figure watched as Claire and Jules entered the house. The dark figure balled her fists as frustration and rage rose within her. She desperately fought to control her temper.

Jules was in love with Claire, and yet she did not leave him. Now it was time for her to break Jules’s heart. Claire would pay for not following orders. There was no mistaking that look in his eyes. Did the girl not see what she had accomplished? Or, had she changed her mind?

Claire had been warned what would happen if she didn’t do precisely what the woman had laid out for her. Yet her orders were being dismissed. The woman smothered the venom rising within her. No matter. She would regain all the power and her revenge soon enough. There would be no more waiting and watching. No more bribery. No more force. Only action.

The woman stepped back into the woods, where she had tethered her horse. Swinging up into the saddle, she noted that the sky was leaden, clouds rolling, scudding with the wind. She lifted her head and smiled as a gust of moist wind touched her cheeks.

A storm was coming to Kildare Manor.

Jules smiled as he looked about his study. The swords no longer dominated the space. They still remained, but now seemed to blend into the serenity of the still-sparse chamber. His desk had been moved to the opposite side of the room so that he could look out the window onto the newly threshed field.

He’d been gone only five days, and the place looked better than he ever remembered it looking, despite his desperate lack of funds. When he had returned home, he hadn’t seen anything but Claire. All else had faded from view but the voluptuous vision that had come toward him in the drive. He’d had to clamp his teeth together to keep from calling out to her. And then he’d seen the look of concern in her eyes, and his heart had raced in his chest and swelled with pride.

She was
his
.

Jules no longer tensed at the thought of a wife. His bride. His home. His new life. What had he ever done to deserve all this? A week and a half ago, he had only wanted to be left alone. Now he couldn’t imagine a life without Claire. The part of himself that had been so empty before felt suddenly filled. And he realized his love for Jane had never been the all-consuming sensation Claire evoked.

With a sigh of contentment, he sat in his chair behind the big desk and awaited Fin. He’d asked one of his new servants to send the steward to him there.

Waiting for the retainer, Jules smoothed his hands across the spotless surface of the desk. They’d not only tamed the outside, they had applied fresh paint to the walls, swept out all the mice and cobwebs, and polished what furnishings still remained in the house to a shine.

“Milord.” A knock at the door brought him out of his ruminations.

A young woman opened the door and curtsied. “Master Fin fer ye, milord.”

“Thank you, Betsy,” Jules replied, unable to keep the grin from his face. He had servants. And food in the larder. And a home, thanks to Claire, his friends, and the slightly bent, aging man before him. Jules stood and gestured Fin toward the chair he had just vacated. “Sit, please.”