A Highland Summer: The Billionaire's Nanny (A BWWM Billionaire Contemporary Romance)
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Authors: Imani King
A Highland Summer: The Billionaire's Nanny
By
Imani King
© 2015 Imani King
All Rights Reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the expression permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locations is purely coincidental. The characters are all productions of the author's imagination. Please note that this work is intended for adults over the age of 18 and all characters represented as 18 or older.
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Excerpt from:
A Highland Summer: The Billionaire's Nanny
I woke up with no idea what time it was - the sun was still high in the sky so it can't have been too much later - Cameron was still curled against me, breathing slowly and evenly in her sleep. Her father, though, was nowhere in sight. I stayed where I was and watched the little gray pony tearing up clumps of grass and chewing it contentedly until the sound of footsteps made me look up. It was Darach, walking back towards us with something in his hand.
"What are those?" I whispered, not wanting to wake Cameron, as I saw that Darach was carrying a handful of flowers - none of which I recognized.
"Wildflowers," he replied, also whispering and kneeling down beside me as if to show them to me. At the last second, though, just before I expected him to start telling me what they were, I saw something change in his expression. He put the flowers down beside me and looked me right in the eye. That time, I couldn't turn away. There is no turning away from Darach McLanald when he's looking at me the way he did that afternoon beside the Treacle-Eater's Tower. So instead of looking away I met his intent gaze as he bent down over me and opened his lips against mine.
Rationality doesn't come into it when I'm kissed like that. Darach wasn't tentative, but he wasn't pushy either. He kissed me slowly and deeply, so that all it took was a few seconds until the only thing I could feel was the pliancy in my own body and the only thing I could taste was his hunger.
"Oh my God..." I murmured, breathless, as he kissed my chin and then down my neck until my body was on fire with needing his hands on me. He pulled me towards him and I was just reaching up to his shoulders to pull him down on top of me when Cameron stirred. We jumped apart as if we'd both simultaneously realized we'd been touching hot stoves instead of each other.
"Daddy? Miss Robinson?" Cameron's voice was thick with sleep and she was rubbing her eyes - she hadn't even turned towards us yet and I breathed a sigh of relief that she hadn't seen a thing.
"We're here, Cameron, we're right here," I said, brushing her hair - which was full of little bits of heather and grass - off her face.
She looked right at me.
"Miss Robinson are you alright?"
The she looked at her father.
"Daddy? Your faces look funny."
Darach chuckled at his daughter's questions and picked up the flowers as I hid my embarrassed smiles in my hands. "We're fine, wee girl. Look what Daddy found for you. Can you tell me what the names of the flowers are?"
We made our way back to the castle slowly - even Cameron commented on how slowly we were walking. Darach told her it was because the pony Marshmallow was tired but I knew better - Darach and I were both trying to prolong the spell of the afternoon. I felt like Cinderella anticipating the stroke of the clock at midnight. The Laird walked between his daughter and I, and every time he touched me - something he hadn't done before that day - it sent a hot little shiver of lust jolting through my body.
"Are you alright?" He asked me at one point, placing his hand on the small of my back and just allowing his fingertips to graze the bare skin under my shirt.
If Cameron hadn't been there, sitting on her pony and offering up a running commentary on everything she saw, I think we wouldn't have had any choice but to wrap ourselves around each other and make love right there in the heather. But she was there and it was probably a good thing. I wasn't completely inexperienced but Laird McLanald wasn't anything like any of the men - boys, really - I had ever developed feelings for before. Even as his big hands tormented me with their too-short caresses the little voice in the back of my head was warning me to be careful:
You don't know him. You've seen his temper. This is a complicated situation.
When I fell asleep that night it was with the kind of tiredness that comes only from spending hours outdoors. I recognized it vaguely from the summer days of my childhood - the deliciousness of snuggling down into a soft bed with the warmth of the sun still sinking into your skin. Of course there was also the warmth caused not by the sun but by the look on Darach's face when he'd leaned down over me by the Treacle-Eater's Tower - not to mention the hot, needy kiss we'd shared before Cameron woke up. Alone in bed, I blushed a little at the memory of my soaking panties, which I'd only noticed when I took them off for my pre-dinner shower. No man had ever had that effect on me before. It frightened me, but it also just stoked the fire Darach had caused in my belly even higher. He did that with a kiss. A single kiss and a few little touches. What could he do to me if it went farther than that?
Table of Contents
I only picked up the newspaper that would change my life because I was bored. It was sitting on the subway seat next to mine, left there by another commuter. I only read the smudged classified ad on the last page because the word 'Scotland' jumped out at me and made me think of the TV series I'd just finished watching, full as it was of wide, zooming shots of misty, heather-colored mountains and desolate lochs. Not to mention tall, square-jawed Scotsmen who spoke in sexy, barely penetrable accents and treated their women with the kind of tender regard I secretly, under my ambitious-young-student-in-the-big-city surface, longed for.
"Nanny required immediately . 4 year old girl. Scotland, sole carer, live-in. Must have good English. Position to run until September, long-term situation unlikely but possible."
My entire life I've tried to dampen my tendency to fantasizing but honestly, it's never really worked. It didn't work that time, either, especially after I did a Skype interview with a stern, gray-haired Scottish woman who spent a good five minutes trying to figure out how to get the webcam to work. When she told me she thought I might be a good fit for the job and promised to get back to me within a week, I spent every day until that call came with visions of castles and kilts dancing in my head. My friends were baffled.
"Scotland? Why?" - that was my best friend Amy's response when I told her about the possible job I had lined up for the summer before our senior year at college.
When asked, I just shrugged and smiled and said something about being twenty-two and eager for adventure. Of course, that was mostly a lie. The truth was that the last couple of years had been the hardest of my life and I was just barely holding it together. My grandmother, who raised me and was the only consistent presence in my life, had been diagnosed with a terminal illness a couple of years earlier. The following year had been occupied with two things: caring for her and trying desperately to keep up with my classes. Me and my grandmother were the only family each of us had. To this day I take comfort in knowing that I was there for her when she needed me, just as she had been there for me every single day when I was a child, packing lunches and checking homework deep into her seventies - when she should by rights have been relaxing on some tropical beach with a drink in her hand.
I lied to my grandmother about the costs of her care. The truth would have been too cruel. There was no way I was going to let her know that all the pennies she had scrimped and saved up to leave me had been eaten up by hospital bills. When she finally passed a feeling of being profoundly and utterly alone in the world settled over me as I walked, dazed, out of the hospital for the last time. The sense of loneliness hadn't lifted since then and it slowly became my new normal. Friends and professors counseled me to see a doctor or a therapist or to consider anti-depressants but I stubbornly rejected all the advice, telling myself that I only felt alone because I
was
alone and the only thing to do was to face it rather than to try and apply band-aids to open wounds.
So when I got the call from Mrs. Clyde, the steel-haired Scottish woman, telling me I was accepted for the position of nanny, I went straight to the internet and spent the next few hours looking at images of Scotland and listening to the echo of connection between my heart and the empty, open spaces of the Highlands. It was a foolish thing to do, to seek my own salvation in a country I'd never been to and for reasons that were vague even to me but it was the one factor that got me to the airport and onto a plane and, eventually, to a train station in Inverness in the dead of a surprisingly chilly June night.
"Jennifer Robinson?"
I turned towards the voice but it wasn't because I recognized my own name - I didn't. Mrs. Clyde must have seen the look of confusion on my face because she repeated herself, slower this time so I could understand it.
"Mrs. Clyde! Hello!" I tried to sound cheery even though I was falling-down tired after more than thirty-six hours of travel and newly terrified by the undeniable fact that I was in a country where I didn't know a single person - except the matronly Scotswoman standing in front of me with a smile on her face.
"You poor wee thing, you look half-dead you do." Mrs. Clyde's expression dissolved into something like sympathy when she got close enough to get a better look at me and feel the limpness in my handshake. "We'll get you back to the house and you can have a nice sleep - the Laird and the little one won't be back until Sunday night."
My ears perked up at the word 'Laird' - I knew it was the Scottish word for 'Lord' but no one had mentioned anything to me about any lairds or ladies. We drove for over an hour and I spent most of it repeatedly nodding off and jerking awake, embarrassed at my inability to keep my eyes open.
Any assumptions I may have made about working for a normal, middle-class family were wiped out when Mrs. Clyde turned the car onto a graveled driveway and a castle - an actual castle complete with ivy-covered turrets and heavy wooden double doors for a front entrance loomed up in front of me out of the misty night.
"Wow." I breathed, unable to contain myself at the sight of it. "Is this - is this where I'm going to be living?"
Mrs. Clyde chuckled and nodded her head.
"Aye, lass, this is Castle McLanald - I don't suppose you see many houses like this in America."
Houses? It wasn't a house. It was definitely a castle. And Mrs. Clyde was only partially right - I didn't see
any
places like it in America. I followed her up a set of wide, shallow stone steps and through the front door, where an older man greeted us with a nod. He turned out to be Mr. Clyde.
"Are you hungry, dear? I can see your tired, perhaps you just want to get into bed?"
She was right. Castle or not, vague worry that I'd managed to travel back in time or not, I was so tired I was starting to slur my words.
"I think I should just, uh, go to bed," I replied, blinking in the dim light.
Mr. Clyde took one of my suitcases in either hand and disappeared through a low, arched doorway - one of many that led out of the foyer - and Mrs. Clyde ushered me after him. I didn't notice my room. As soon as the door was closed behind me I threw back the covers on the bed and managed to mostly undress before climbing in, curling up into the soft mattress and falling asleep.
When I woke up, it was with the feeling you get after a long and much needed rest. All the blurriness of last night's arrival was gone and I felt refreshed and ready to explore what was to be my home and workplace for the next two and a half months. My phone said it was 11 a.m. but that was New York time - it was actually 4 p.m. in Scotland. I cringed a little, hoping Mrs. Clyde would be understanding about just how long I'd been traveling, but then I looked up from my phone and saw my room and forgot all about what time it was.
I'd only ever seen rooms like it in movies - usually movies set in the past. It appeared to be situated in one of the turrets of Castle McLanald, with walls that curved around the sturdy wooden bed and tall, rectangular windows that followed the curve. The view outside the windows was as quaint as the one inside - an open courtyard with a fountain standing in the middle and surrounded on all sides by thick, gray stone walls. I opened one of the windows and took a deep breath of air so fresh it almost smelled sweet. The bright sunshine made me feel momentarily brave. It wasn't even three months here, in a beautiful castle nestled in the Scottish countryside. Even without familiar faces and friends around, surely I could manage?
You might even enjoy yourself.
My suitcases were where Mr. Clyde had left them at the foot of the bed - I spent a few minutes unpacking, taking extra care with the small, framed photo of my grandmother that I placed on one of the windowsills. Looking at her face made me feel hopeful - she always told me to look uncertainty in the eye and face it bravely.
There was an almost comically narrow corridor leading from my room to a large bathroom that looked luxurious but extremely outdated, with fixtures that didn't appear to have been replaced since Victorian times. It took me a good few minutes to get the hang of the dual hot and cold faucets and avoid being alternately scalded and frozen as I washed off all the grime of flying and trains and travel. There was also a very generously sized clawfoot bathtub which promised a good, long soak with a book and a glass of wine when I had the time.
When I felt presentable I ventured down the twisting stone staircase that I'd hardly noticed the night before - it was the kind of architectural feature that makes you think of people in long nightgowns carrying half-melted candles on little trays.
"Ah, Jennifer! We thought we were going to have to come and drag you out of bed ourselves!" It was Mr. Clyde. "Mrs. Clyde will get you some grub if you're hungry - she'll be in the kitchen."
Mr. Clyde pointed me in the direction of the kitchen as it dawned on me that I was, in fact, completely starving, having not had anything to eat since a positively awful lettuce and cheese sandwich at Heathrow airport that had cost me the equivalent of ten dollars.
I sat down at a long table in the cavernous kitchen and watched Mrs. Clyde bustling about as she made me something to eat - I offered to get something for myself but she was insistent that it wasn't my job to be doing any cooking so I was happy to sit and wait as the smell of frying bacon and eggs filled my nostrils and made the rumbling in my belly worse.
"A proper Scottish breakfast," she smiled at me before placing a large plate of food down on the table, "even if it is almost tea time."
I looked down. Some of the things on the plate were familiar. Well, two things. Eggs and sausages. There was something that looked like ham, but when questioned Mrs. Clyde said it was bacon.
When in Rome.
"And this?" I pointed at what looked like a pile of thin, dark biscuits.
"Black pudding."
Black pudding? What was that? It was black, but it didn't look like any pudding I'd ever seen. I made the mistake of asking Mrs. Clyde what it was.
"It's delicious, Jennifer. You must give it a try. It's made of pig's blood."
I was in the middle of trying to figure out how to politely refuse the Scottish delicacy when a deep, amused male voice called out from behind me:
"Go on, then! I can't have my daughter looked after by someone who doesn't like blood pudding."
I turned around to get a look at who was speaking and noticed Mrs. Clyde looking flustered as well.
"Laird! We weren't expecting you until Sunday! There's not been any trouble in London has there? Where is the little one?"
"Calm down Mrs. Clyde, everything is fine. A little trouble with Diane in London so I'm back a day early, Cameron will be up tomorrow."
I didn't pay much attention to the conversation between the Laird and Mrs. Clyde, due mostly to being helplessly dazzled by the Laird himself - but if I had I would have caught the ominous undertones in both of their voices.
The Laird, though. The Laird. He was one of those men that made it very difficult not to stare. The sun was shining through the high windows of the kitchen, catching his thick blonde hair and giving it a coppery tinge. He had high, wide-set cheekbones and a straight Roman nose. I could see about a day's worth of beard growth scattered across a jawline that matched the rest of his face in its general, broad masculinity. The most striking thing of all about the Laird, though, was his eyes. Deep-set under a prominent brow and arrestingly blue, I actually felt my heart skip a beat when he turned them towards me, smiling so they crinkled slightly at the corners.
"You must be Miss Robinson. Welcome to Scotland - I trust the Clydes have helped you settle in?"
I got to my feet feeling slightly awkward at the juxtaposition of the domestic surroundings of the kitchen and the fact that the Laird was my employer. He shook my hand and then looked down at the plate sitting in front of me.
"Go on, have a wee bite. The name is much more gruesome than the taste."
And damn if I didn't sit right back down and do exactly what the Laird was asking me to. Even then in the first few moments with him some part of me seemed compelled to do what he wanted. He watched me lift the fork to my lips and then laughed as I chewed slowly for a few moments. It didn't taste like blood at all - in fact it didn't even taste like meat, it was surprisingly mild - almost bland.
"Well?"
The Laird kept his eyes on me, as did Mrs. Clyde, waiting for my pronouncement. When I looked up at them and said: "It tastes...like oatmeal," they both smiled approvingly.
"Yes, it has oatmeal in it, too," Mrs. Clyde said, setting down a mug of hot tea beside my plate.
She and the Laird fell into a conversation I pretended not to listen to as I sat back down to finish my breakfast. There were a lot of references to a Diane and to Cameron, the Laird's four year old daughter and my soon to be charge. Without noticing what I was doing I just went back to looking at the Laird. He was a very big man - noticeably big, tall enough to take note of even if I'd only seen him on the street. Six foot four? Six foot five? Something like that. He was wearing a pair of dress pants and a button down shirt, both of which managed to do an almost painfully good job of revealing the fit, well-muscled build of the man beneath them. When he turned to the counter to take one of the oatcakes Mrs. Clyde was offering I shamefully couldn't stop myself from checking out the rear view: shoulders so wide all I could do was imagine what running my hands over them would feel like and a round, firm ass that looked perfect in the dark dress pants. When he turned back around I quickly looked back to my food, terrified he'd seen me looking.
He didn't show any hint of having noticed my ridiculous behavior, though.
"I'll see you again tomorrow, Miss Robinson, when Cameron returns from London."
"Yes. It was nice to meet you..." I paused, realizing I had no idea how to address him.
"Darach," he said, "I know you Americans aren't ones for formalities and to be truthful neither am I. Darach will do."
Then he was gone and I had to do my best to keep any hint of disappointment out of my expression so Mrs. Clyde wouldn't notice it.
"Aye, he's a handsome one isn't he, Jenny? You'd best not pay any heed to how fair he is lassie, because he's in no position to be looking for a wife - he's already got one down in London and she's a handful."
Ugh. Of course. That must be who Diane was. I did my best to eat the rest of my breakfast but it was too much. Mrs. Clyde seemed pleased anyway, smiling at me as she cleared away my plate:
"Well done. That'll help you get over the jet-lag. I've got a few more things to do for dinner tonight but when I'm done I'll show you a little of the house if you like."
I smiled at her repeated insistence on calling Castle McLanald a 'house' and accepted her offer of a tour. She told me that in the meantime I could go for a walk in the grounds and I decided to do just that - the sunlight was too warm and inviting and I was eager to get a feel for the place that would be my home until September.
