Highland Bachelor 02 - This Laird of Mine (3 page)

Claire couldn’t think, couldn’t move as the scent of mint once again invaded her senses. Never in her life had she ever felt anything like his mouth on hers. Her nerves fired at the feel of his hard body against hers. Indescribable need and desire infused her core, potent and real. And she wanted to lose herself in that torment.

She gasped at the thought and jerked out of his arms. What was she thinking? What was she doing? The man was used to seducing vulnerable women.

“Darling,” she said, breathless. “We have guests.” She studied his profile. There was something compelling about his face, something she couldn’t tear her gaze from. In his eyes she saw not anger and vengeance, but a sense of purpose that sent a chill to her core.

“We understand,” Hollister said, pulling Margaret close to his side. “It was not long ago that we were newlyweds.”

Margaret smiled up at her husband as her hand drifted down to her slightly rounded abdomen. “Look at us now. Married not yet a year and both Jane and I are with child.”

“Now there is an interesting challenge,” Jules said, dryly.

Claire’s heart thudded in her chest at the prospect of Jules getting her pregnant. Why hadn’t she considered that before now?

Oblivious to her sudden terror, Jules turned toward the others, releasing her from his gaze. “My apologies. I forgot my manners. I was eager to greet my new wife properly. Each time I see her, it feels as though I am looking at her for the very first time.”

Claire forced a smile as she tried to recover not only from his bold words, but from that devastating kiss. She could not afford to lose her head over one moment of seduction. She had to remain in charge and guide his emotions where she wanted them to go, not the other way around.

But one thing was clear. Her husband would not here and now challenge her claim, at least not in front of his friends. Instead, he would taunt and torment her until she revealed her purpose.

Steel infused her spine.
Let him try.
She would instead mold him to her needs and desires until he proclaimed his love for her. Then the girls would be freed. Claire frowned as another thought occurred to her. What happened after he fell in love with her? She had not thought to ask the dark-cloaked and masked kidnappers who had invaded her life. It was one more thing she should have thought about before agreeing to their terms. Why had she not?

She knew the answer even as the question formed—because until this moment, Jules had been just a faceless entity, an end to a means. If she did what they asked, then Penelope, Anna, and Eloise would be safe.

At least that was what they had promised. Claire clutched her hands together, trying to control the horror that had been her constant companion these last two weeks. One moment she had been in her studio preparing paints. The next, the girls were gone.

All that remained in the room where she’d left them to prepare for their painting lesson was a note, warning Claire not to notify anyone that the girls had been taken or they would be killed.

The next day a darkly cloaked person had appeared, and she’d received the kidnappers’ demands. Marry Jules MacIntyre by proxy, make him fall in love with her, and then leave him. She had to break his heart. If she succeeded, the girls would be returned unharmed. If she told anyone what had happened, or failed in her mission, the girls would be killed, and their blood would be on her hands.

The dire warning was all the motivation Claire had needed. And for two weeks she had done everything that had been asked of her. She had married Jules. She had lied to his friends. She had worked her way into the edges of his life. Only one task remained.

At that moment, the aging retainer who had greeted them a short while ago appeared in the room. “Milord,” he announced in a gravelly voice. “Another message has arrived.”

“Put it on the desk with the others,” Jules said with a frown.

“The messenger said it was most urgent,” the old man stated, his face growing paler by the moment. When Jules moved to accept the tightly folded missive, the old man hesitated. “It’s fer the new mistress.”

Jules accepted the letter and turned it over, inspecting the simple white linen. He said nothing as he handed it to Claire, but he gave her an arch look that spoke volumes.

No one but the people in this room, the solicitor, and the kidnappers knew she was here. A chill went up her spine. Turning away from the others, she opened the missive and froze. Inside the folded paper were three thin slices of fabric from the dresses her wards had been wearing when they were taken.

A tremor moved through her, and it took every bit of her self-control not to give in to fear. She drew a sharp breath, trying to maintain her composure. The girls would be unharmed as long as she did what they asked.

Quickly, she refolded the letter, slipped it into her bodice, then turned back to the others. Pasting a nonchalant smile on her face she said, “’Tis a message from my relatives, wishing Jules and me well on our recent nuptials.” The lie was bitter on her tongue.

Jules’s unamused gaze shifted from her face to her bodice, then back again. He stepped closer to her and offered her a wry, evil grin she knew was meant to intimidate her. And it did.

He lifted his hand to stroke the side of her neck, down to the edge of her bodice, only a hairsbreadth from where she had stashed the letter. The feather-light touch sent chills over her.

Her heart pounded. Obviously, whoever had abducted the girls was watching her. They would know if she did not do as they asked. With an over-bright smile she leaned into his touch. There was no time like the present to get started toward her goal.

J
u
les stared at the woman before him. He had intended to deny Claire’s claims privately, then send her away. He had created her. He could uninvent her just as easily. He would simply fabricate some reason for her slipping into the night. But with his senses still reeling from the kiss they had shared, he could do no such thing.

Instead, he reached for Claire’s hand, led her to a chair, and bade her sit while he talked with the others—Nicholas and Jane, Hollister, and Margaret. David joined them as well after settling the horses in the stable.

For a moment Jules ached at the sight of Jane and her gently rounded belly. “You look well, and happy,” he said to the only woman he would ever love.

Jules quickly forced his emotion deep inside himself. Jane had chosen another. Contentment with her husband shone in her eyes as Nicholas moved behind Jane and pulled her against his chest.

“We are so happy to see you, Jules. Especially in light of your secret courtship, engagement, and marriage,” Jane said with a soft smile.

“We were quite concerned after we learned your father and brother both passed away three weeks ago. It could not have been easy to lose them both so suddenly,” Nicholas said as he narrowed his gaze on Jules. Did Nicholas still see him as he was seven months ago—weak and physically diminished from his imprisonment in gaol and sorrowful after losing Jane’s hand to him?

Jules felt none of those things. He had worked hard over the last several months to rebuild the strength that prison had robbed from him. He was in the best shape of his life, if truth be told. And sorrow? That emotion had shriveled in the darkness of his prison cell each and every day that he had waited for his father to come and release him, until finally it had existed no more.

“Let us not talk of the past,” Jules said, perhaps a bit too brightly, for his words brought a frown to Jane’s lips. “Sit, relax.” He turned to Fin. “Will you bring us some tea and refreshments?”

The aging servant nodded, and was gone only a short time before he returned with the tea. Fin hesitated for a moment as he looked from one woman to the next. A frown pulled down the corners of his mouth.

“Why not allow Lady Kildare to serve her guests?” Jules said, interpreting Fin’s hesitation of uncertainty as to which woman should serve. At that suggestion, Fin’s frown vanished, and he proceeded toward Jules’s supposed wife.

Jules paused at his own admission. His gaze lingered on Claire as she accepted the task of pouring the tea and serving freshly baked scones to their guests. Who was this pretender? This interloper in his life?

The woman was unknown to him, but he could not fault her impeccable manners as she finished her task and returned to her chair. She met his gaze. Her large almond-shaped eyes, their color a mixture between brown and gold, challenged him to publicly renounce her in front of his friends.

He met her gaze with a nod of thanks for treating his friends well for the moment, yet a growing restlessness surged inside him to get her alone and ask her what she was about. Why was she using his friends to get close to him? And why had she assumed the identity of a woman who did not exist?

She dropped her gaze to the delicate teacup in her hands—a teacup he had purchased only a day ago from a widow in the village with funds he had secured by selling every carpet in the manor house. That cup didn’t belong in her small hands; she’d no right to make it seem appropriate. But even as she sipped serenely, Jules could see a vibrant energy that exuded from her wide eyes to every line of her svelte and attractive form. She set down her cup, then reached up to brush an errant strand of copper hair away from her high, chiseled cheeks set in an oval of perfect porcelain skin.

He did not choose her, but he could not deny that she was beautiful, despite the tight chignon that pulled her hair off her face. Perhaps the woman had a pleasant form—if her colorless gray dress did not conceal too many faults. The virginal gown marked her as a cosseted, easily dismissed woman of society—a society he wanted no part of.

Jules closed his eyes and took a deep breath. If this woman wanted to be part of society, then why attach herself to him? All he desired was to rebuild what his father and brother had destroyed. He wanted to be left alone to deal with the estate and try to carve out a living for himself. It wasn’t that much to ask, was it?

He opened his eyes and, almost against his will, his gaze returned to his “wife’s” eyes—eyes that sparked with intelligence. The thought brought a moment’s pause as her gaze connected with his. She did not look like a schemer. In fact, she looked very much like someone he and his friends might actually befriend.

She did not react to his bold stare. Instead, she folded her hands in her lap. What secrets lay behind those wide, golden eyes? Why would a woman of her obvious good breeding and education pretend to be the wife of a man she did not know?

He tried to look away from her and the mystery she presented, to shift his attention back to Jane, but something about this woman drew him in. Despite her horrible dress, and her severe hair, she had a presence that was hard to deny. It was as if she were unaware of her own energy, or how the slightest shift of her movements could fix any man’s attention.

Jules frowned. What was he thinking? The woman was a fraud. She wanted something from him. Why else would she pose as Claire MacIntyre? He needed to figure out what that “something” was, and quickly, before she attached herself to his friends and his life.

He moved to Claire’s side, offered his hand to help her stand. She set her cup aside and accepted his outstretched fingers. When she stood, he slipped his hand about her waist, drawing her against his side. She startled at the contact, but did not object. Instead she tossed him a half smile and released a light laugh.

Jules forced a look of fondness mixed with hunger into his expression. The hunger part was easier to feign as his supposed wife’s soft body pressed against his own. It had been years since he had held a woman this intimately. He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath of lavender mixed with vanilla. The combination sent a jolt of fire to his loins. He snapped his eyes open, no longer having to feign desire for the woman in his arms.

“Friends, if you will forgive us, Claire and I have much to discuss. We have been apart too long.” Jules did not wait for an answer from his guests as he guided Claire toward the door and out of the chamber. He shut the door behind him, then guided his “bride” to the main hallway, then up the stairs.

“Where are we going?” Claire asked with only a hint of distress in her voice.

“To your new chamber.”

She stiffened, but did not break her stride. “The master’s chamber?”

“No, you will have to earn your way there, my dear.” Annoyance tugged at him as he drew her down another hallway and toward the rear of the manor. He could not merely send her away, not with his friends here to witness such an act. He was obliged to play along with this farce for a time.

At the end of the hallway, he waved the woman at his side up another spiral stairway and into the tower room. She came to a stop in the middle of the tiny, dusty chamber, so different than the one downstairs, while he moved to the hearth and lit a single candle with a strike from the flint and steel.

Pale, golden light illuminated the room, making it appear less neglected. The only furniture in the chamber was a small, sagging bed. She could find some comfort here. Jules frowned and pushed the thought away. He turned back to the woman. She clutched her hands together, her nervousness palpable. She exuded fragility and weakness.

“You no longer need to pretend with me, Claire. If that is your real name.” Jules gazed into her face, searching for the duplicity he was sure to find in her large, golden eyes.

She held his gaze. Met it boldly. “My name is Claire. And I am your wife.”

“Yet how can that be? I never stood before the minister. Have you, Claire?” The sound of her name lingered on his tongue longer than it should have. He had pulled that name from the air when he had created his false wife, not from anyone he had ever known or cared to attach himself to.

“Ours was a wedding by proxy, or have you forgotten what you requested of your solicitor?”

Jules frowned. “Of what do you speak?”

She returned his frown. “Our marriage arrangements.”

Jules stared down at her. She was as good a player as he had ever seen upon the stage, he would give her that. “We,” he paused, allowing the word to hang between them, “never had anything between us until this day.”

She did not acquiesce to his rebuttal. Instead, she straightened. Her spine stiffened. She might be a head shorter than he, but she stood her ground, met his gaze, then raised her brow in a coolly superior way. “I refuse to be offended by your lack of memory.” She leaned forward and sniffed him. “I smell no spirits about you, but your family does have a reputation . . .” She turned away.

He had no intention of being so easily dismissed. He reached for her hand and held her captive. “What is your name?”

“Claire MacIntyre, Lady Kildare.”

He frowned. “Before that.”

She lifted her chin. “Claire Elliot of Edinburgh. I was the only child of the notable Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist known for his philosophical empiricism. My mother was a commoner. They both died when I was fourteen.” She frowned at him. “Really, Lord Kildare, I would have thought you’d have checked on my background before asking me to be your bride.”

“No more games. Tell me the truth. Why are you here?”

Her gaze moved to where his fingers held her, then moved to his face. A faint flush touched her pale cheeks, and her eyes blazed, her anger obvious.

He took a slow step toward her, looming over her as his own temper stirred. “Answer me.” His nerves flicked at the soft scent of lavender, and he leaned back slightly.

She did not retreat from him, did not react in any way to his blatant intimidation other than to take a quick breath. “If you recall,” she said, her voice steely, “you sent your solicitor to me with your offer of marriage.”

Jules frowned. “My solicitor?”

“A Mr. James Grayson. If I recall correctly, he is located near Parliament Hall.”

“Grayson had no such orders.” Jules narrowed his gaze. He knew his solicitor well enough to know that he would never betray his client in such a way.

Damn, the woman was good at her deceptions. She had done her research well to discover his solicitor’s name and his place of business. He studied her eyes; at such close proximity and in the dimly lit room they gleamed like burnished gold, shadowed and mysterious. Her eyes gave him no insight into her thoughts.

“Your solicitor stood as your proxy at St. Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh. He then sent me directions to your friends so that they might escort me here, to you.”

Her breathing had quickened, but she seemed otherwise at ease with her lies. The air between them all but crackled. “That cannot be.”

“Oh but it is,” she said, her voice smooth.

“Let us pretend for a moment that what you say is true.” His own voice deepened. “Why would you accept the proposal from a total stranger, marry by proxy, then come to some unknown location to meet your new groom? What kind of woman does such a thing?”

“The kind of woman who has no other choice.” Her face paled and her expression closed.

Jules remained silent. He was not sure what he had expected her to say, but it was not that. “Why did you have no other option but to marry me?”

His anger ebbed and sympathy took its place for a moment before he forced it away. He clenched his hands at his sides as memory surged. There had been another time in his life when he had simply accepted a woman at her word. He had been filled with hope and possibility at the idea of finally having a mother in his life. But that illusion had taken him down a long, dark path. A path that ultimately led to his being accused of murder.

“Life for a woman is very different than it is for a man.” Claire’s eyes narrowed as she noted his change in demeanor, but she did not back down. Instead, her voice lowered, her tone as provocative as it was challenging. “With no family to support me, or wealth to my name, my options were few. When Mr. Grayson approached me with your offer—” She looked away. “Let us just say it was the lesser evil to marry you.”

The barb stung. “Are you certain about that?”

Her gaze returned to his. In her eyes he saw a momentary shadow.

“You cannot scare me, Lord Kildare. I know more about life and the vile places it can take a person than you ever will.”

At the unexpected response, he pressed his lips together. Was she a wanton, then? A fancy woman thinking to entrap him? She looked like an angel, but a comely appearance could hide a dark soul.

Jules clenched his fists at the direction of his thoughts. He could not lose himself to his past troubles. He had to stay focused on Claire—why she was here, what she intended with him.

He would not know until he did his own investigating. But before he spent the time and energy on his so called “wife,” he intended to speak with Grayson about her claims. Why would Grayson betray him, betray his creation of the “perfect” wife by finding a real woman to play the role?