Lion of Caledonia: International Billionaires VII: The Scots (23 page)

Once she came, she never left.

And since he and his mum had never been able to stand each other for more than a day or two, Cam had left instead.

“Granny liked a lot of stuff too, huh?” His son ran along the walls of the outer room where his mother had once spent hours knitting and crocheting. Rob’s small hand skimmed the top of the antique stuffed sofa his mother had brought from Cam’s childhood home. Then slapped the side of the oak table he remembered his father lying his wallet on every evening when he came home.

“She did.” Leaning on the wall by the door, he took in the last of his mother. The soft rose wallpaper she’d chosen, the lacy cushions, the frilly doodads covering the side tables and windowsills. “She liked pretty things too.”

Rob stopped. Glancing around, he frowned. “Jen didn’t seem to have many pretty things.”

A wall of grief and betrayal crashed inside, washing all the thoughts of Martine and his mother away. “She only brought a few of her things, I suppose.”

“Maybe that’s why she left.” The frown dropped, replaced with satisfied resolve. “She just went to her old home to get her pretty things.”

Before he could figure out a response, his son raced into his granny’s bedroom and right to the armoire. Following along, he strolled into the room. He stared at the oak canopy bed his mother had brought with her when she’d moved here. Striding to the bedstand, he plucked up a framed photo of his father, then himself. He inspected the line of other photos of various relatives he knew little about.

It was time. Time to say goodbye to all this and along with it any lingering regret he had about his parents.

They’d both been disappointed in him, yet they were both gone. Gone for good and along with them, the expectations he’d never been able to fulfill and never wanted to. Even now.

“Da!” His son’s voice vibrated in apparent alarm. “The ring!”

“What ring?” He ambled to the armoire that contained the treasure and stared over his boy’s shoulder at the mass of jewels. His mother must have a thousand rings in this mess and at some point, he’d need to have someone sort through this and figure out the value so he could get some damn insurance.

Because he might have his son’s agreement on getting rid of Martine’s stuff, but not this treasure. Not for now.

“The ring, Da.” Rob’s gaze filled with dismay. “It’s gone.”

Cam frowned. “Which one? There are quite a lot of them.”

“The red one.” The boy turned back to run his palms across the mound of diamonds and gold. “The one that ye put on your book.”

“Come on with ye.” Crouching, he started to sift through the jewels. “It’s here somewhere.”

“Naw.” The one word was definite. “I remember. Jen dropped it on the top the last time we were in here.”

Jenny.

A clutch in his gut made his blood run hot. Then cold.

“It’s got to be here,” he muttered.

“Not unless ye came in here after.” His son stared at him. “Did ye, Da?”

“I didn't.” As far as he knew, no one had been in this room since he’d locked it up the very next day after he’d found Rob and Jenny huddled by this armoire.

Jenny.

In his room. In his bed.

With the keys left so trustingly on the bedside table.

Jenny.

He couldn’t believe it, wouldn’t. “Help me look.”

They both dug in, sifted and sorted. The necklaces in one pile, the bracelets in another. The rings—the emeralds and diamonds and pearls—the rings built and built into a solid stack.

With one ring missing.

His blood ring.

His mother’s prized possession.

The ring she often gazed at with wistful eyes as he’d stood by her side, a child trying to get her attention.

“It’s not here,” Rob whispered in distress.

A memory stirred. Some phone calls. A couple of lawyerly missives from some rich English goat. English like his Jenny. And not three weeks after he’d rebuffed the latest offer, she’d shown up on his doorstep, conveniently there to be hired.

The guy had wanted his ring.

The blood ring.

Apparently, that guy had hired his Jenny to get it.

Cam stood, a shaking, slithering, shocking realization running through his aching veins. She hadn’t come to this place for some unknown reason. His Jenny had come to this house for a specific reason that had nothing to do with him. She’d come for his ring.

“Da?” A tug again, this one tearing open his heart. “What are ye going to do?”

“I’m going to find the ring.”

The requests had come from an anonymous source, the solicitor obscuring his client’s name and whereabouts. But Cameron Steward had been a superlative investigative reporter at one time and he’d bet he hadn’t lost any of those skills.

Because he intended to find and confront the woman who pretended to want him to get something from him.

Exactly like Martine.

“
M
iss Fellowes
. A moment.”

Jen turned from digging along her grandmother’s bed of Bourbon and Austin roses to stare at her grandfather’s lawyer. A gleam of sweat glistened on his brow and his shoes were dusty. Not surprising, since the gardens were in a state of upheaval and he’d likely had to climb over mounds of mulch and stone to get to her.

“Mr. Briggs.” She stood and brushed off the clumps of dirt caking her jeans. “This is a surprise.”

She hadn’t seen him after last week, the day after the reading of the will. They’d met to review a list of her new acquisitions. That was the word the solicitor had used.

Acquisitions.

She thought of it as a huge list of crushing responsibilities.

“My apologies for interrupting you.” He glanced around, noting the work crew planting new shrubs on the side of the arbor. “You’re making some changes, I see.”

She’d spent most of her childhood in the gardens with old Mr. Phillips, her grandfather’s main gardener. He’d taught her to nurture, to be patient, to love the seeds and flowers and greenery. Over the years, she’d dreamed of how she’d make these gardens more friendly than stately. More welcoming than impressive. Mr. Phillips, though, had followed her grandfather’s preference for rigid formality, telling her he knew where his bread was buttered.

They were both gone now. Her grandfather and Mr. Phillips.

So she could do what she liked.

It was a freeing thought. A terrifying one.

She could do anything she liked at any time. She could sell the Bath house or live there in luxury. She could take a trip to America or Timbuktu. She could become a leading patron of the arts or hole up like a hermit in the gardener’s hut where Mr. Phillips had lived out his days.

Terrifying didn’t quite cover the consternation and confusion swimming inside her head.

Along with it had come the bittersweet yearning to have Cam and Robbie by her side. Helping her figure this out. Making her laugh when she felt baffled at all the choices. Showing her how this experience was a great lark of an adventure she needed to enjoy.

But that wasn’t to be. She’d left that and them behind.

She had enough on her plate now to keep the dreary, depressing emotions at bay. At least, during the day.

“I am making some changes.” Dropping the shovel to the ground, she pulled her gloves off. “Some things I’ve wanted to do for a long time.”

Her grandfather’s solicitor—no, strike that, hers—winked. “I’ve heard quite a lot about it from your relatives.”

She laughed, amazed she didn’t care. Not one little bit. “Have you?”

“Yes.” He shifted his satchel in his hands. “I handled it for you, however. They saw reason, exactly as they did last week.”

Edward had made some noise the first few days, but when told he’d lose everything their grandfather had willed to him if he contested, he’d slunk off. Her other relatives had followed suit and she had been left alone in the cavernous house she’d never called home.

Overwhelmed with the immensity of it all.

Agitated about the choices.

Scared she might make a complete mess of everything.

When she’d laid her head down on that first night after the will had been read, her brain had buzzed in a furious swarm. She’d pushed her hot forehead into the cool of the goose-down pillow, trying to quiet her mind, and one shooting conclusion had rushed in.

Flipping over, she’d stared at the ceiling of her childhood bedroom and knew.

The gardens. They were hers now.

If she did nothing else, she wanted them the way she’d always dreamed.

“Thank you for taking care of the situation.” Jen looked back at Mr. Briggs after surveying her new project. She’d hired a new team of gardeners after dispensing with any rebellion from the old. She’d been pleased with her own determination. “I’ll do what I like here.”

“Excellent. Your grandfather would be proud.” He beamed, then reached into his satchel. “He wanted me to give this to you after the family matters settled down.”

She took the manila envelope. A hard object poked out from the middle. “What is it?”

“A letter from Lloyd.” The solicitor gave her a gentle smile. “And a gift. He wanted to make sure you were the only one here when I gave it to you.”

“Why couldn’t he have given it to me himself?” She frowned at the cover, no writing or suggestion of its contents penned on it.

He shrugged. “Lloyd had his ways.”

“Yes.” She sighed. Her grandfather had always done as he pleased and she shouldn’t be surprised he had his own ideas of how to end things. A sudden desperate desire to know what was inside seized her. “Was there anything else, Mr. Briggs?”

“No.” He turned to go, then stopped. “Jennet.”

She took one more glance at the envelope, before looking at him. “Yes?”

“Your grandfather spent a long time deciding who he wanted to give his estate to.” Pushing his glasses up on his nose, he stared at her, his gaze steady. “I think he made a brilliant choice.”

A blush of pleasure and pride and bewilderment heated her throat. “Thank you.”

“Take care of it.” The solicitor marched away, his last words thrown over his shoulder. “But I can see you already are.”

Rushing into the vestibule, she brushed off the new housekeeper she’d hired yesterday and raced up the stairs to her small bedroom. She sat on the bed and slid a trembling finger under the lip and flipped it open.

A red leather box dropped onto her lap. The gold trim glistened in the soft English sunshine spilling from the window.

It was a ring box.

Slowly, Jen took it in her hand. There was a clever little band clasping the box closed. Taking a deep breath in, she snapped it open.

The ruby ring.

The ring her grandfather had claimed as his. The ring she’d been sent to steal. The ring she thought he’d been buried with over a month ago.

“I don’t understand,” she murmured to the room and the lingering ghost of her grandfather.

Setting the gem on her blue comforter, she yanked the one piece of paper out of the envelope.

She’d know her grandfather’s handwriting if she lived another hundred years. The paper was familiar, too. The Fellowes crest, inherited from the ancestor who’d wrenched these Kent lands from a rebellious Saxon, glowed in embossed glory at the top of the damask stationary.

A tear streaked down her cheek and the grief she’d felt standing in the old family graveyard as they laid her grandfather to rest welled in her throat.

She sniffed. He brought up her mother again and with great fondness, she could tell by the underlying emotions circling in his words.

The words echoed in the air around her, as if he were still standing here, alive.

You’d both be right.

Looking at the sparkling ring, she took in a deep breath. For a moment, the old panic, the old fears and worries and anger, clutched inside. Her grandfather had held on to his prestige and his power with an iron hand. She’d fought to break free and not until he died did he give her what she’d wanted since she’d been five.

Acceptance.

The anger and pain banged inside her heart and then…

Then they were gone as she let them go along with the breath. She knew exactly what she was going to do with the ring.

Chuckling, she could almost hear her grandfather’s big voice booming into her ear.

His scrawling signature ended in a slight blob of black ink.

She closed her eyes. The last of her his ghost whispered from the room and dissipated away. He was gone now. For good.

But her love wasn’t.

Her love for a misty Scottish moor and loch. For a rambling old mansion and gardens that had come to life. For a rambunctious lad whose smile made her heart hurt. For a man who’d never asked for her love or even known he held it in his wide palm.

She’d lost her love just as surely as her grandfather had lost his love decades ago. Yet that didn’t mean she couldn’t honor the emotion and honor her heart for feeling it.

This was Cam’s ring. For now and forever.

And her heart was his too.

* * *

“
M
r. Steward
?” His housekeeper hovered at the library’s double doors.

“What is it?” Cam knew he snarled and he knew he shouldn’t. But the frustration had built during the last week until he couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“There’s a package, special delivery.” Mrs. Rivers crept into the room, a small box in her hands. “It came just now.”

“Who is it from?” Pacing to the window, he stared out at the morning drizzle fogging the panes.

“From, well, no one.”

He glanced over his shoulder and she skittered back at the look on his face. He realized he was frowning and didn’t much care. He didn’t much care about anything, except finding Jenny.

He needed to find her to yell. Roar.

And God help him, weep.

During the last week, since he’d figured out she’d taken the ring, he’d continued to fail at that one simple step.

Find Jenny.

Tre had tried to help, but had been as baffled as Cam. Even from his home base in London, his friend hadn’t been able to crack through the labyrinth of solicitors guarding the old English goat who’d wanted the ring.

Cam didn’t care about the damn ring.

He wanted to find Jenny. Find her and do what with her, he still hadn’t decided. Yet the drumbeat of fury and need wouldn’t allow him let this go. Not until he saw her and had his say.

The old English goat was the key.

He felt it in his gut.

“What do ye mean it’s not from anyone?” He prowled away from the window and toward the package now lying on his standup desk.

“Your son needs his lunch, so I’ll be getting to that now.” She shuffled out of the door.

Ignoring her, he stared at the plain brown box. His housekeeper had been right. The post tag listed no return, only the stamp of the post office.

Calehill Road, Ashford.

“Where the hell is that?” He didn’t know a soul from there, wherever
there
was.

He plucked the box from the table and examined it. Occasionally, he received an odd item or two from a fan, but they inevitably gave their name and asked for some kind of correspondence back. The package wasn’t big enough to hold a bomb or something he’d need to be worried about.

He shook it.

There was something heavy inside.

Finally, his boundless curiosity reared inside, overcoming his frustrated restlessness. Grabbing his knife, he cut the edge of the box and pulled on it.

A red ring box sat in the middle of a puff of tissue paper.

“What the hell?” Someone was sending him a ring? Anonymously?

A chug of heat hit his chest.

Jenny.

He flicked the box open.

Jenny.

His blood ring, the ring she’d taken, glowed as if something burned inside. Lifting it into his palm, he stared at the gleaming angles of crimson and rose before folding his fingers around the hard cut of the gem.

For a moment, everything stilled inside. She’d sent the gem back to him.

Then, a clanging jumble of disbelief and confusion roared to life inside him. Why? Why had she taken the ring from him, only to send it to him a month later? And where the hell was Calehill Road, Ashford?

Yanking his phone out of his pocket, he punched in Tre’s number.

“What are ye doing, dobber?”

“Where is Calehill Road, Ashford?” Cam demanded.

“What are ye talking about?” A rustling came from Tre’s phone, signaling he’d been writing.

“Tre.” He looked down at the ruby again. “Jenny sent me the ring.”