Scotsmen Prefer Blondes (3 page)

He was overstating it. The look Alastair threw him said they all knew it. No one could evict the MacCabes except Malcolm himself. But his tenants were starting to trickle away on their own, driven by economic policies that ruined the small crofters’ livelihoods.

And if none of the other Scottish landlords would stand for their tenants, Malcolm would try to stand for all of them.

Alastair rose, leaving his unfinished whisky on the table beside him. Duncan beat Douglas to the abandoned glass, draining it with a careless laugh. Alastair sighed, then looked back at Malcolm. “I will marry you to whomever you choose. But at least take care to make it a choice, and not just a business transaction.”

He left after that pronouncement, taking his cursed wisdom with him. Malcolm didn’t want to hear it. He didn’t want to hear it from the twins, either. He left them to the decanter and slipped out onto the terrace. In the dark, in the chill of early autumn, he could be alone with his thoughts.

And if his duty felt distinctly joyless in that moment, he ignored it.

CHAPTER THREE

The gentlemen never joined the women in the drawing room after dinner. Alex had stuck his head in to say that the other men were adjourning to Malcolm’s study, and that for his part he was off to bed.

“I must apologize for my sons,” Lady Carnach said for the third time in an hour as she and the other mothers looked over their cards. “We do not entertain guests often enough for them to remember their manners.”

One would have to be a complete boor to fail to join the ladies after dinner, but Amelia didn’t interrupt the older women from the corner where she and Prudence sat embroidering. Dinner, after all, had not gone well. Who could blame the men for avoiding more of the same?

“It’s no matter, Louisa,” Lady Harcastle said, smiling tightly. “Prudence will still be here in the morning.”

Prudence scowled and jabbed her needle into her linen.

“I do hope so,” Malcolm’s mother replied, although Amelia detected doubt in the soft cadence of her voice.

“You know how it is with young people,” Lady Harcastle continued. “They sometimes need a few days to remember their duty, but they do in the end. We all went through the same experience during our debuts, if I recall.”

Amelia’s ears perked up at that, but she didn’t say anything. She’d sat on the edge of her mother’s conversations with Lady Harcastle for over twenty years, and knew that showing interest in the older ladies’ gossip was the quickest way to end it.

“You may have doubted, but I didn’t,” her mother said, tossing a card to the table. She, Lady Harcastle, and Lady Carnach were playing whist, with a dummy hand to make up for the lack of a fourth player, and the ratafia flowed freely now that the men would not be joining them. Prudence and Amelia sat nearer to the fire, which made Amelia feel somewhat overwarm even though the extra light was welcome.

She forced herself to believe that the flush on her face was caused by the fire. It couldn’t be related to the strange fluttering she’d felt since dinner, when she looked up occasionally and caught Lord Carnach watching her over his wineglass. It was travel fatigue, or indigestion, or perhaps typhus.

Yes, typhus. Better to believe she was dying than that she’d inadvertently solicited the interest of the man her friend needed to marry.

Lady Harcastle frowned at her hand. “Just because you made a love match doesn’t mean you can still lord it over us, Augusta. And with an earl to boot — how unfair.”

Her usual venom seeped into her voice. There had been a time, years earlier, when Lady Harcastle was quite charming. But she’d grown more difficult in recent years, and Amelia didn’t understand why her mother still tolerated the connection.

Augusta took a long draught of ratafia, then sighed. “The fun of lording it over you was lost when Edward died.”

Amelia’s father had been dead a decade, but her mother’s voice was still pained. Amelia looked down at her stitches. They were uneven, but she couldn’t pick them out again; the linen was more hole than cloth. She stabbed at the fabric and wished she could steal some ratafia without her mother noticing. Really, it was no wonder Prudence wanted to escape Lady Harcastle — the woman was the worst.

“I am sorry, dear,” Lady Harcastle said. Guilt replaced the venom, as though she had been sleepwalking through their earlier conversation and had just awoken to the reality of what she’d said.

Amelia’s mother waved her glass. “It’s been years. And for all that I loved him, I would rather have lost him than my sons. I don’t know how you’ve survived it, Mary.”

The silence grew, became absolute. Amelia looked up and saw her mother flush. Augusta was often blunt, but perhaps it was the ratafia that had added an edge to her voice. Augusta reached out a hand toward Lady Harcastle, but the other woman evaded her touch.

“I haven’t survived,” Lady Harcastle said, in a voice turned raspy with buried emotion. “If only Prudence...”

She broke off, looking over at her daughter. Prudence stood abruptly and thrust her embroidery into her workbag with all the fire she hadn’t displayed for Carnach at dinner. “If you will excuse me, Mother, I have the headache.”

Lady Harcastle nodded, covering her eyes with her cards. Amelia followed her friend from the drawing room, not waiting for permission. Amelia was only a few steps behind, but by the time she touched Prudence’s shoulder, she knew the woman was already in tears.

She didn’t say anything, just pulled out her handkerchief and wrapped her arms around Prudence. She was half a head taller, and she felt Prudence’s tears on her shoulder as she glanced down the hall. There was no one about to find them, although she suspected the mothers would hear Prudence if she became much louder.

She patted Prudence on the back, waiting for her to calm down. When her sobs subsided into sniffles, Amelia squeezed her gently. “Is this about your brothers, or something else?”

Prudence stepped back, wiping her cheeks with Amelia’s handkerchief. “Both — or neither. I don’t know, Mellie. It’s been almost three years since they all...”

She still couldn’t say the words. Prudence’s father never should have let both sons buy commissions, not when the estate was entailed, but he wasn’t stern enough to turn them down. When they died together, fighting under Wellington at Talavera, the news had caused Lord Harcastle to have an attack from which he’d never recovered.

Three years later, Prudence was no longer in mourning, but only at her mother’s insistence. She was the only one left. And with the estate passing to a distant cousin, marriage had moved from a priority to a necessity.

Amelia held her hand and tried to reassure her. “If you want to marry Lord Carnach, I will support you.”

She didn’t like it, but she would. Prudence shook her head. “I don’t want to marry Lord Carnach — at least, not really. Can you picture me as a political hostess?”

“No,” Amelia said. “But are you sure? You were eager this afternoon.”

Prudence sniffled again. “I was eager to escape London and settle this marriage business. But I had nothing to say to him. And I know he looks better than I had any right to expect. But I didn’t feel the slightest desire to kiss him. All I could think of at dinner was how I would have to someday — and how I would rather run away to Egypt than do that.”

“You’d rather run away to Egypt than do anything,” Amelia pointed out.

“True. But the more I thought of living here, of giving up...everything in London, the more I panicked. It was awful.”

“It was awful,” Amelia agreed.

Prudence smiled just a little. “That is not very supportive.”

“You said it first. But perhaps if your mother wasn’t there reminding you of how all her hopes rest on you, you could relax long enough to talk to him.”

“What can I do about that? Ask her to leave? If it were as simple as that, I wouldn’t be considering Carnach’s proposal.”

“No. But you need to spend some time alone with Carnach — or, at least, without your mother.”

“There’s no hope for it,” Prudence said. She tried to return Amelia’s handkerchief, but Amelia looked at the damp fabric and let her keep it. “Carnach and I would not suit each other. I thought I was ready and that the time had come to abandon my silly fantasies. But perhaps not.”

Prudence sucked in a breath, choking back another sob. Amelia patted her shoulder, waiting. When Prudence spoke again, there was an edge of resentment to her voice. “It’s so unfair, isn’t it? That my mother would rather sell me to Carnach than let me find my own way?”

Amelia would have used a stronger word than unfair. “It’s not your fault that you’re all she has. And surely there’s someone better suited for you than Carnach.”

“I used to think that,” Prudence said. “But if there is a man who is meant for me, I cannot keep waiting for him to realize it.”

“Still, you shouldn’t agree to be Carnach’s hostess just because you need the funds. The man seems to be looking for a broodmare, not a companion.”

Prudence giggled a little through her tears. “He did not impress you, did he?”

Carnach had impressed her — too much.

“The earl is better suited to be a villain than a hero,” Amelia declared.

“Does he still have lemon cakes, though?”

Amelia smiled. Prudence’s humor was back.

But then Prudence sighed. “Villain or hero, I cannot toss aside his offer. Not that he’s formally made one yet — but as much as I may hate the circumstances, Mother is right. I’m not likely to do better.”

“You shouldn’t accept Carnach’s suit just because of her,” Amelia insisted. “We’ll find another way, I promise.”

“We likely won’t. But I thank you for the charade.”

Amelia didn’t like the defeat in Prudence’s eyes. It would be a relief if Prudence didn’t give herself over to Carnach’s ambitions, but it didn’t solve her problems. “Do you want me to spend the night in your room?”

Prudence shook her head. “I need to think. You know I can’t with you thrashing about and stealing the covers.”

“I do not steal the covers,” Amelia protested.

Prudence pecked her on the cheek. “Whatever you wish to believe. You’re the one who creates fictions, not me.”

She danced out of the way before Amelia could poke her in the ribs. As she walked away, Amelia sighed. Prudence’s step was lighter than it had been when she left the drawing room, but her dilemma was far from solved.

That left Amelia alone in the hall. She wouldn’t return to the drawing room. The mothers were laughing hysterically about something, and the sound of it wafted through the open door — the ratafia was doing its trick. Going back there would be like walking into a den of drunken hyenas. They were sure to gnaw on the bones of Amelia’s shortcomings as a late-night snack.

It was too early to retire, though. She would rather cut her hand off with her needle than take up her embroidery again. She could go to her room, but her writing desk wasn’t unpacked.

She wandered down the hall, away from the staircase, slipping past the drawing room door toward the rooms beyond it. Somewhere there was a library, and while Lady Carnach had not given them a full tour yet, she had claimed it was lovely.

Amelia found it on the third attempt, after stumbling across a well equipped but disused music room and another, smaller salon. None of the candles were lit, but the moon was nearly full. The light streaming in through the uncovered windows was bright enough to illuminate the room. Lady Carnach promised loveliness, but this was something else altogether. It was a magical space, this room, the kind of library she dreamed of having.

The size of it dazed her. The room was long, narrow, and two stories tall, with multiple doors to the hall and an equal number of French doors giving out onto a stone terrace overlooking the back gardens. Thick Aubusson carpets in the blues and greys of the MacCabe coat of arms warmed the chilly floors, complementing the comfortable chairs arranged in clusters by the windows. A small balcony circled the room, accessing the second level from a spiraling wooden staircase in one corner.

She walked down the first wall, running her hand over the books neatly arranged on the shelf. She loved the feel of book spines — some cracked with age and use, others smooth and sleek, like the book was a work of art. The light was too dim to make out the titles, but there were hundreds, likely thousands, of books in the room. It would take a lifetime to read them all.

By the time she reached the window, she was already in love. She never felt this passion for people — never let herself feel this passion, after she had realized the threat it posed to her independence. But books — books were safe. She could let herself long for this room.

Amelia lit a candle on one of the tables, shielding the flame as she looked around the room again. The books were well ordered, and it took only a few minutes to find a section of recent novels shelved between memoirs and poetry on the far wall. All the latest volumes were there. Either this library was a showpiece to impress guests, or at least one person in the castle was an avid reader.

She skimmed her fingers over the titles. Her light glanced off the gilt lettering. There were novels by Ann Radcliffe, Horace Walpole, and a wide variety of anonymous or pseudonymous authors. And there, near the end, was a slim red-bound book:
The Unconquered Heiress
.

Amelia lifted the volume from the shelf and turned it over in her hand. It had journeyed all the way from London to the Highlands and found its way into this library. She felt a brief flare of pride. And then, as always, annoyance.

Where her name should have been engraved, there was the lie that protected her: “A Novel by A.S. Rosefield.”

She frowned at the letters. If the ton knew of her writing, she would likely be cast out. She didn’t want to be ruined. But how would it feel to see her real name on the cover instead?

Would it give meaning to all the lonely hours she spent weaving stories in her room?

Someone rapped on the French door to her right, startling her. The glare of her candle obscured the person who demanded her attention. She moved closer, unconsciously gripping her book like a club, and saw Lord Carnach watching her through the glass.