Taken by the Laird (26 page)

He said naught after that, but his features darkened ominously, and Brianna knew that he was considering the ramifications of that portrait and the small lock of hair hidden behind it.

Hugh picked up his brandy and went to the staircase.
Simon Parker,
for God’s sake!

He wondered what other treasures Amelia might have left for him to find—if he’d ever allowed himself to look.

The servants had cleared away all her belongings from his other houses, but his staff at Glenloch had been reluctant to spend any time in Amelia’s bedchamber. As had he, but for an entirely different reason.

He entered her room, opening both wardrobes and pulling out every drawer. He dumped the contents on the bed and pawed through them, looking for other keepsakes, other clues of what had been in her mind.

He knew what a miniature in a locket and a lock of hair meant. She’d been in love with Parker, and he with her. But Hugh knew her father would never have allowed the match—just as Brianna’s guardian had refused her first choice. An obscure baron was nearly as bad as a merchant’s son.

Christ, he should have known there was more to Amelia’s distance and despondency. She had loved another man. No matter how Hugh had tried to please her, his wife would never have been happy in their marriage.

He took a long pull of his brandy, then rubbed a hand over his face. Simon Parker would have made a perfectly fine husband, although he wouldn’t have been accepted into the society Amelia’s family valued so highly. Had she wed Parker, the daughter of an earl would have become a merchant’s wife.

And spared him years of misery and blame. Of guilt.

Hugh sat down on the bed, his stomach clenching painfully. Their fathers had likely known of Amelia’s preference for the other man when they’d arranged the match. Not that it would have mattered, for marriages among the titled elite were arranged every day by their parents with little regard to the parties’ preferences. And Lord Benning would certainly have discounted any tendre his daughter might have had for the untitled Mr. Parker. It was astonishing that they’d ever had the opportunity to form a bond.

What a young fool Hugh had been. He’d felt attracted to Amelia on sight, for she had been beautiful and charming, and a little bit mysterious. Now he understood what had caused that aura of mystery about her. She’d been keeping a significant secret, and it had made her miserable.

“She was in love with him,” said Brianna from the doorway. “That was why she—”

“I realize that.”

“But you didn’t know it at the time,” she said. “You…You loved her, didn’t you? And you thought you failed her.”

Hugh stood abruptly. “You’re damned right I did! What else should I have thought? That she was pining for another man—”

Bile rose in his throat and he pushed past her, walking away, fleeing down the stairs and through the scullery. He jammed his arms into the sleeves of his greatcoat and slammed out the door to head toward the stable.

He didn’t want to think about Amelia or the grief she’d caused. He wanted to punch something.

There were taverns in Stonehaven, and likely any number of sailors or fishermen who would be happy to indulge in a boxing match that would leave both combatants bloody. And exhausted. It was exactly what he needed to burn out the frustration he felt. The pain.

It was well past dark, but the moonlight reflecting on the snow gave enough illumination for him to see his way. He entered the stable and lit a lamp, then saddled his horse, mounted, and started down the northern road. Passing out in some rundown tavern in Stonehaven was a far better option than having to face the truth in Brianna’s eyes and in his own heart.

Brianna’s tongue felt thick in her mouth. Naught had progressed as she’d expected. As she’d hoped.

She wrapped herself in the plaid blanket and curled up on her bed in dejection, holding the drawing of the sailing boat in her hand. Hugh had ridden away, and ’twas likely he would not wish to see her again. Not after the way she’d confronted him with his feelings toward Amelia.

As though
she
knew anything. ’Twas up to Hugh to come to his own conclusions, and not for her to tell him how it had been. How could she know what had occurred between them? She had not even been there. She didn’t actually know Amelia’s true feelings for Mr. Parker.

Why hadn’t she kept the locket to herself? It could have dangled at the side of Amelia’s dressing table for months, or even years. Or she could have disposed of it before Hugh ever had a chance to see it. Then Brianna might have had a chance to make their marriage a success. To show him that no matter what had happened between Hugh and his first wife, Brianna was the one who loved him now.

Her tears flowed freely.
This
was why she’d wanted to return to Killiedown Manor, where everything was clear, and she had no worries about losing what was important to her. Losing Hugh.

She pressed her face down on the bed, weeping with the knowledge that she would soon have exactly what she’d wanted from the moment she’d left Claire’s gravesite a lifetime ago. And yet it had only been a matter of days. Little more than a week. Was it even possible to fall in love with someone in such a short time?

She feared the answer was yes, for she loved Hugh as he must have loved Amelia. Without reciprocation.

‘Twas painfully ironic.

Deriding herself for the foolish revelation that had decided her fate, she wept until her eyes burned and her ribs ached. There was no point in trying to talk to him.
He was ending his smuggling business, and said he did not intend to remain at Glenloch. When morning came, she would leave Castle Glenloch early and alone, for she could not face a farewell that was sure to be painful. For her, at least.

Her decision made, Brianna fell into a deep but restless sleep.

The furious momentum that drove Hugh toward Stonehaven slowed only when he was more than halfway there, when the need to do some damage finally receded. He was not an aggressive sot like Jasper, who went looking for trouble whenever frustration or boredom took him over. Beating the stuffing out of some drunken sailor was not going to change anything.

His marriage to Amelia had been doomed to failure from the start. With her heart engaged elsewhere, she’d been uninterested in the warmth and affection Hugh had been so keen to give.

He might have been an inexperienced lover when he married her, but he hadn’t been entirely incompetent. He’d known how to give and take pleasure, but Amelia’s cold indifference had baffled him. There hadn’t seemed to be anything he could do to alter her disinterest or her martyred response to his attentions.

God, what a naïve fool he’d been.

He halted in the middle of the road, swung his leg over his saddle, and slid off his horse. Walking to the edge of the road, he turned to look out at the sea crashing below him. The temperature had increased slightly and the clouds were thickening and obscuring the moon.
He could feel another storm coming, and he knew a few more inches of snow was going to delay his return to Glenloch.

Which was perfectly fine. He had no interest in facing Brianna and yet another failed marriage. She still spoke of returning to Killiedown, as though that would make everything all right, as though a retreat to her aunt’s house would nullify all that they’d shared. That it would somehow cancel out their marriage.

Hugh let out a hard breath at the thought of going back to London while the Lachann Sinclairs of the district were free to pursue Brianna. There wasn’t a man with eyes in his head and an appreciation of a naturally sensual woman who would be deterred by a bill of divorce. If it could even be granted.

He jabbed his fingers through his hair and started to pace. It would be up to him to put forth the petition for divorce, but what kind of man could do such a thing to Brianna? She was an innocent, caught up in a situation that was out of her control. All she’d wanted was to get back to Killiedown, a free and independent woman.

Bloody hell.
He didn’t want her going up to Killiedown without him.

And yet he had done naught to suggest he wanted to keep her with him. He’d gone along with her desire to go to Killiedown, and would already have taken her there if not for Kincaid’s murder and the questions that had followed. He’d shouted angrily at her—at
Brianna
—when she’d shown him the evidence of Amelia’s perfidy. At Brianna, the one who’d done naught to elicit his anger.

He put both his hands against the flank of his gelding
and hung his head between his arms as the leather folio he’d stashed in his wardrobe came to mind. The words written there were real, and they were final. Brianna had spoken her vows from the heart, without referring to any written document. She had promised to take him with his faults as well as his strengths.

But Hugh had been miserly with his own words. He’d merely promised to take her to wife, and said naught about his expectations in marriage.

Because he’d wanted no marriage. He could not face dealing with another wife who would feel cheated by the life he could give her. But Brianna was nothing like Amelia. She was the most audacious woman he’d ever met, full of spirit and life.

He should have said that he…

Christ,
he should have said he cared for her. He loved her. He wanted her at his table every morn, sitting across from him at the chessboard, riding him on his sofa, moaning beneath him in his bed. He needed her, needed to convince her that they could make a very agreeable life together, even without children.

Bachelorhood was vastly overrated.

Brianna had been right about his feelings for Amelia. He’d cared for her, but his feelings had been met with disdain. Now he had some grasp of her cold response to him. ’Twas naught that he’d done or neglected to do. He’d had no ability to please her, for she’d loved another.

Such was not the situation with Brianna. Her past had been filled with scheming, untrustworthy “protectors” until her aunt had come along. Hugh sensed that Brianna was just as afraid to care, afraid to let herself
love him. And that state of affairs had suited him up until now.

Everything was different now.

He needed to get back to Glenloch and repair the damage he’d done. He’d been such a fool he hadn’t known enough to dispute her intention to leave him, or asked her to reconsider the life she wanted at Killiedown.

He had to make her see it as the mistake it was. Somehow, he was going to convince her to stay, going to convince her that he wanted her. That he loved her.

The snow started coming down hard, and Hugh noticed that he was covered with a thickening layer of icy crystals. He brushed them off and mounted his horse, then turned around to head south, toward Glenloch. The clouds had darkened the sky, so he proceeded carefully, averse to any misstep that might delay his arrival at home.

Sounds that were out of place woke Brianna.

She wasn’t sure what she’d heard, but it did not sound like Hugh coming up the stairs. It was likely the ghost rattling some windows in the attic, trying to get her to go wandering through Amelia’s bedchamber or some other closed-up room again.

It wasn’t going to work this time. Brianna had seen more than she ever cared to see, intruding on a dead woman’s privacy, causing more hurt and dismay than she ever intended.

Brianna could not tell how late it was, or how long Hugh had been gone. But the fire had burned quite
low. She got up from the bed, keeping the plaid blanket around her shoulders. Her throat felt sore, and her tears had dried on her face, so she rinsed her face and took a sip of water.

A strange creaking sound caught her attention. It wasn’t the usual kind of crash or moan caused by the ghost, but a stealthier sound that raised goose bumps on Brianna’s skin. Perhaps it was only a shifting of the foundation. Or a mouse scurrying across the corridor outside the nursery.

Hoping that she was wrong and it was Hugh returning home, Bree left the nursery and retraced her steps down the gallery, heading toward the north tower where his bedchamber was located, across from Amelia’s.

Quietly, she turned the latch and opened his door, but the room was empty, the fireplace untouched in hours. Shivering with the cold, Bree drew the blanket tightly around her but recoiled at another sudden, wholly different sound. Of course, it was coming from Amelia’s room.

Brianna stalked across the corridor to confront the ghost and tell it to stop bothering her, but when she pulled open the door, she saw naught. There was no shimmer of light, no hazy figure hovering over the dressing table or against the wall near the bed.

But the room had definitely changed.

Lifting the lamp before her, she rubbed her eyes, doubting what she was seeing. The wall had been pushed aside, and was standing ajar in exactly the same fashion as the secret wall in the drawing room. Glenloch’s ghost had hovered near this same wall in Ame
lia’s room every time it had led Brianna there, and had even disappeared through it.

Now Bree realized its significance.

She approached the wall-door and saw that it led to the landing and the stone staircase that stood behind the locked doors of the tower. “All right,” she muttered as she stepped into the ancient tower, “where are you?”

Surely the ghost was nearby, if it had bothered to lure her to the site.

But Brianna had no intention of going any farther, if that was the phantom’s intent. The tower—and obviously, the steps—was not sound. She started for the doors to see if they were unlocked again, but stopped in her tracks when she heard footsteps coming her way.

T
he voices belonged to two men, and neither of them sounded like Hugh. As they came closer, she could tell that it was Mr. MacGowan and the Marquess of Roddington. Bree slipped back into Amelia’s bedchamber with the intention of fleeing the room altogether, but she could not resist listening to their hushed conversation as they climbed the old stone staircase, speaking in whispered tones.

“Ye’ve got yer money, Marquess. Now see tha’ ye doona show yer face—”

“Me?” Roddington whispered harshly. “You are the dastardly one, MacGowan. First, poor Amelia. Now, Kincaid—”

“Ye were there wi’ me every step o’ the way, Roddy.”

Shocked by their interchange, Brianna hurried toward the door, but not before they caught sight of the light from her lamp.

“Judas priest, MacGowan, you told me she’d be gone!”

MacGowan did not stop to answer him, but ran through the passage to reach her.

Brianna did not wait for him. She turned and ran, dropping the blanket as she fled. She barely got out through the door of the bedchamber when MacGowan grabbed the back of her gown and yanked her back.

She cried out in surprise, falling awkwardly against him as he dragged her into the room.

“What in hell are ye doin’ here?”

“’Tis my home at the moment,” she snapped, and tried to extricate herself from his grasp.

He muttered something ugly and shoved her toward Roddington, who had followed him through the passageway, letting the door shut behind him. The marquess caught her, laughing so incongruously that Brianna wondered if he was in full possession of his wits.

“I could never have imagined the irony, MacGowan. Could you?”

“Shut up, Yer Fancy Lordship,” MacGowan responded venomously. “ ’Tis pure trouble we’ve got here.”

“Release me!” Brianna demanded

“I don’t see why we can’t just have a bit of fun with her and then dispose of her the same way we—”

“Enough!” MacGowan bit out, and Brianna was shocked by the man’s demeanor and speech toward the marquess, a peer with so much power and rank that he could bury MacGowan with but a word. She grasped that the two were functioning as equals here. “Ye and I will do wha’ we mus’ do. Wi’out a lot of bletherin’.”

But Roddington continued to chuckle, and Brianna
took advantage of his inattention to break free of his grasp. She tried to run, shoving a delicate boudoir chair behind her to block them from following her, but MacGowan managed to get around it and grab her before she even reached the bedroom door.

“What do you want?” she demanded.

“ ’Tis no’ a matter of wha’ we want,” said MacGowan.

With an iron grip, he pulled both her hands to her back and ripped a golden bed tassel from its curtain. Wrapping the cord tightly around her wrists, he imprisoned her despite her struggles.

“Be still, damn ye!” He pushed her toward the passageway, and Brianna tried twisting and turning to get out of his grasp, then attempted to fall to the ground. But her antics only made him angry, and he cuffed the side of her head, making her ears ring. And still, he managed to keep her on her feet, moving forward.

“Where are you taking me?” Brianna cried. She feared that if they got her into the old tower, she was doomed.

“Ye’ll see soon enough,” MacGowan growled.

“We’ve more than enough time to enjoy her,” Roddington said, his tone the bleat of a spoiled child. “We saw her husband heading for Stonehaven. Surely you don’t believe he’ll return tonight. And you know as well as I that the servants won’t step foot in the place until the morn.”

“Ye’re a fool, Marquess. She goes now.”

Roddington made a derisive sound of capitulation. “Which way? Up or down?”

“Down this time. He’s already had one wife throw herself from the parapet.”

“No!” Brianna screamed, redoubling her efforts against MacGowan. She lashed out and managed to kick Roddington viciously in the shin. It must have hurt him as much as it hurt her foot, for he yelped and slapped her.

“You bitch! I’ll see that you pay for that!”

“No’ now, Roddington! Close the door to the gallery, then come and snap open the tower door.”

The marquess did as he was told, and MacGowan half dragged, half pushed Brianna into the passage, past a bulky leather satchel that lay the floor. Roddington bent to pick it up, but MacGowan stopped him.

“Leave it! Yer money’ll be safe here until we’re finished.”

They’d left one lamp on the cold, stone floor, and Roddington carried it, lighting the way inadequately from behind.

The stone staircase was wickedly narrow, and curved its way down the walls of the tower. It was bitter cold inside, for the arrow loops she’d seen from the exterior were not covered, allowing the wintry air inside.

Brianna could barely see where she was going, and she feared that MacGowan was going to push her down the steps. Such a fall would likely break her neck, and she would end up lying at the bottom of the stairs, somewhere near the ancient, caved-in pantry. No one would ever know what had happened to her.

Hugh would likely believe she’d left him.

Tears streamed down her face as she walked as care
fully as she could, keeping her body close to the wall, hoping there might be something she could do to save herself once they reached the bottom. If only she could get her hands free, she might be able to find a loose brick or an old wooden beam to use as a weapon.

She did not dare try to free her hands while she walked down the stairs. ’Twas important to pay close attention to each step, for her skirts might trip her at any time. She had to come up with some plan to thwart these villains when they reached the bottom, for neither Hugh nor anyone else would be coming to do it for her.

Hugh walked from the stable to the castle, and let himself in quietly through the scullery door. Closing it behind him, he made barely a sound as he went through the main floor to the staircase. He thought only of taking his wife in his arms and apologizing for being such a lackwit.

And then he would tell her he loved her and wanted her to stay with him. They might well visit Killiedown Manor, but her home was with him. Would always be with him, as his was with her.

He climbed the staircase and headed toward the nursery, where he was sure Brianna would have gone. She favored the snug little room, and he decided she should turn it into her own solar. She should feel free to make any changes she wanted at Glenloch and his other houses, for he intended to make her the true mistress of his estates.

Moving silently in case she was asleep, he lifted the
latch of the door and stepped inside the nursery. ’Twas empty, but it looked as though she’d been there. The fire had burned low, but the blankets on the bed were mussed, and there was a crumpled sheet of vellum on it. He picked it up and recognized the drawing he’d made long ago.

‘Twas clear Brianna had held it as she slept, and Hugh felt she must have known he’d drawn it. It gave him hope that she was not indifferent to him, would not be indifferent to his proposal that she stay with him.

Leaving the nursery, he walked down to his own bedchamber, his hopes rising at the knowledge that there could be only one reason that she awaited him there. She wanted him. He would wake her and ask her to stay with him, then he would draw her into his arms and kiss away all her doubts.

He was an absolute skitterbrain for thinking marriage to Brianna would be anything but perfect. Brilliant and exhilarating. She was an exceptional woman who would not allow a lack of children to destroy—

Hugh stopped midway to his chamber at a sudden realization. Amelia’s sorrow was due to her marriage to him instead of to Simon Parker. His understanding of Amelia’s unhappiness was based on a false assumption. She hadn’t cared about motherhood at all. Everything he’d believed about her was a mistake.

He continued to his room and opened the door quietly, but found it empty. And no fire had burned there recently.

A sudden thickness obstructed his throat as he pe
rused the room. If Brianna was not there, and nowhere else in the castle…

Good Christ, could she have left him? Had his temper and his abandonment driven her away? ’Twas nothing less than he deserved.

The mare he’d bought in Stonehaven was still in the stable, so she hadn’t gone on horseback. And he’d seen no tracks when he’d come in. Unless she’d gone before the snow had started again, she’d have left tracks.

In any event, she couldn’t have gone far. Intending to go after her, he went out the door and came up short at the sight of a filmy light outside Amelia’s bedchamber. It looked nothing like lamplight as it shimmered erratically, nor did it emanate from inside the room to shine under the door. Hugh frowned at the idea that he might actually be looking at the ghost Brianna had insisted she’d seen.

A cold sweat broke out on his forehead as the thing took on the shape of a woman and beckoned to him.
It could not be real,
not when tales of the Glenloch Ghost had merely been invented to keep curious customs agents and other intruders away from the castle.

Yet it was hovering in plain sight at Amelia’s door until it had his full attention, then slipped through the wood and disappeared. Hugh shook his head to clear it and started back toward the staircase. There was no time to investigate the ghost now. He had to catch up with Brianna before she froze—

Unless the ghost knew where Brianna was. He could not believe he was actually entertaining the possibility that the Glenloch Ghost was real…But
something
had
caused that light to appear, and it didn’t seem to have been from any natural cause. It had actually taken the form of…

He muttered a low sound of self-derision and returned to Amelia’s door. Hesitating for a moment, he braced himself and opened the door.

It was dark inside, and no fire burned in the fireplace.

And yet the hazy specter hovered there, as though trying to tell him something. Swallowing his trepidation, he approached the strange thing. Brianna said she’d never felt threatened by it, but it might have been trying to gain her trust. If the servants were right, and it was a fearful thing, it might have caused her some harm. And—beef-brain that he was—he’d left her in the castle, to face it alone!

Anguish flowed through him at the thought that the phantom might have lured her somewhere and caused her harm. “Where is she?” he demanded, as he nearly tripped over something on the floor. He bent down and discovered the plaid blanket he and Brianna had shared in the kelper’s cottage. He picked it up and thrust it toward the ghostly apparition, and repeated his question.

Slowly, the ghostly form slipped through the wall beside the bed, and Hugh felt a moment of despair. He could not follow the damned thing, and he had the distinct feeling that it knew where to find Brianna. “You showed me the blanket,” he said, his voice a quiet rasp of hopelessness. “Now show me where you’ve gone!”

He lit a lamp and looked around, but there was no
other clue. Only an open drawer with several small, absorbent sponges in it. Frowning, he lifted one of them, and then noticed the open jar of vinegar beside it.

A strange sound in the room caused him to set it aside. He followed the sound, and went toward the bed, where he’d last seen the ghost. The sound came again, almost like the flapping of a blanket in the wind.

And yet it had come from the other side of the wall.

He placed both hands against it and tried to understand what was happening. If the ghost was behind the wall, then it was hovering in the empty shell of the north tower, which had been securely locked after Amelia’s death. So he could not imagine how Brianna could have gone inside. Besides, she would have no reason to go into those ruins.

He swore under his breath as the flapping sound returned, even more insistent this time, and he knew he would have to get inside the tower. There was probably a key to those doors somewhere, but ’twould be much faster just to break them down. He started to move, but caught sight of a piece of white fur.

‘Twas exactly like the fur that had trimmed Brianna’s wedding dress.

‘Twas caught somehow, and when Hugh reached down to pick it up, he realized it was wedged
under
the wall. He suddenly knew that this had to be an arrangement like the secret door in the drawing room.

He ran his hands down the edges of the wall and finally found the latch, hidden just behind the head of Amelia’s bed, and obscured by her bed curtains. He tripped the bolt and pushed the wall forward, then
picked up his lamp and stepped into the locked portion of the tower, where the old stone staircase hugged the wall. All was quiet, and when he looked up, he saw the shadowy steps Amelia must have climbed as she prepared to jump.

The shimmering light of the ghost appeared on his right, distracting Hugh from his morbid thoughts. He realized it meant for him to follow it.

Complying with the phantom’s wishes, he started down the treacherous stairs, but stopped when he came across a large leather pouch that was filled with coins and paper currency. He tossed it aside and went to the stairs, descending as quietly as possible. When he’d made it down a full flight, he heard voices. MacGowan’s, if he was not mistaken.

And Brianna’s!

He took a quick look to memorize the steps he needed to descend to reach her, then extinguished his lamp. Standing still in the darkness, he heard a crack, and then a whimper.

All thoughts of caution fled.