A Scandalous Scot (26 page)

“We were congratulating ourselves on our ruse, of course,” she said. “That no one knew of our great and momentous love. We’re going to escape together and run away to Paris, to live a life of unbridled ecstasy.” She folded her arms. “Of course, any idiot could see Mr. Seath can barely stand. As a lover he, no doubt, would be somewhat lacking.”

Morgan’s cheekbones were a dull bronze color now. Good, let him be as angry as she was.

“I do not take jests about fidelity well, Jean.”

“I doubt you take jests at all, Morgan,” she said. “Life is not all about duty and honor and privilege,” she said. “And wealth,” she added for good measure. “It can also be about fun. About joy. About amusement. About the lighter things of life.”

“I find your lecture odd given you were weeping in his arms.”

Dear Lord, how long had he been standing there?

“Do you find me excessively boring?” he suddenly asked.

She blinked at him. “You?”

He nodded.

“I wouldn’t have used the word boring to describe you, Morgan. Infuriating, perhaps. Annoying, of a certainty. Not boring.”

He folded his arms in front of his chest. “I do not want to have to wonder about my wife’s actions, madam.”

She shook her head. “Well, Morgan, you are going to wonder about me. You are even going to worry about me, I daresay. Because I’m a human being, and can’t be placed in a jar for you to study. I walk. I talk. I think. I speak. None of which is under your control. You will have to trust me.”

“Trust doesn’t come easy to me.”

She marched toward him and punched him in the chest with her finger, before saying between clenched teeth, “I am not Lillian.”

A corner of his lip turned up, as if he mocked her protestation.

“See you don’t behave as she did, then.”

She narrowed her eyes and stared at him. “You can be insufferable,” she said. “Perhaps Lillian had a reason for her infidelity.”

They both stared at each other, Jean horror-struck by what she’d just said. She hadn’t meant it, but she knew from his expression that if she tried to explain, he wouldn’t accept her words. Perhaps it was better for her to simply leave the room before she made a worse mess of things.

She descended the staircase and left the library, intent on her room. Praying, too, that Catriona wasn’t there, her aunt would leave her alone, and no domestic catastrophes required her presence. What she wanted was to simply sit in a corner and pretend she was a ghost of Ballindair.

Better a ghost than a live and troubled human being.

Chapter 24

RULES FOR STAFF:
Any refusal to follow any of these rules shall be grounds for dismissal.

M
organ wasn’t sure what bothered him most—the fact that Jean had been crying and was comforted by his steward, or the fact that she hadn’t told him what they were discussing.

Had she confided in the older man that she was miserable in her marriage? Had she told Mr. Seath she regretted their union? Had she even ventured an opinion that he was a lamentable lover?

She’d called him insufferable.

Lillian had used the word enough times that it pinched now.

He knew well enough his steward was ill. Plus, the man had shown enough loyalty to the MacCraigs over the years that Morgan didn’t suspect him of trying to lure his wife away.

But there were different kinds of adultery.

Why did he mind that she might have confided her thoughts to another man? Because she should have come to him. Why hadn’t she?

I am not Lillian.

The comment whipped at him, as if each word was equipped with a barbed tail.

He’d been nearly insensate in Jean’s arms. He’d been sotted with joy over her response to him. He’d felt mighty, and eager, boyish, and skilled. Right now he felt none of those things. Only foolish, because coupled with that thought was another—he’d brought it on himself by accusing her.

Or by caring too much.

C
atriona stretched, feeling remarkably well, considering she’d been engaged in very strenuous sex for the last hour.

“You’re a remarkable lover,” she said, turning her head and smiling over at Andrew. “But I’d wager every woman you bed tells you that.”

He kept his eyes closed, but his smile had a certain wickedness to it.

She propped herself up on one elbow and trailed a path up his bare chest with two fingers. “Have you had very many lovers? I would say a good hundred or more.”

“I’ve never taken the time to count them,” he said, his smile broadening.

Her fingers trailed along his lips, tracing their contours.

“But I thank you, nonetheless,” he said, “for such praise. Perhaps I should get it in writing and just hand out critiques of my performance.”

“No doubt it would shorten the time between meeting a woman and getting her into your bed.”

He opened his eyes, turned his head and smiled at her. “Oh, but those are the most delightful moments. The chase, my dear, is sometimes more fun than catching the quarry.”

She leaned forward and kissed the tip of his nose, answering his smile with one of her own.

“You are a great deal of fun, dear Andrew.”

He turned his head and closed his eyes again as she sat up.

“Are you going to pose for me later?” he asked.

“Is that a euphemism?” She laughed. “If that’s what you wish.”

He slit open one eye. “Because you have nothing better to do with your time?”

“I have no wardrobe for anything else,” she said, shrugging.

It was his turn for laughter. “I do believe I’ve met my match. A thoroughly amoral woman. Have you always been that way?”

“I’m not certain I like the term amoral, Andrew,” she said, frowning. “It doesn’t seem proper, somehow. Is it considered amoral if I simply know what I want and choose to go after it?”

He rolled to his side and studied her. “Even your back is beautiful,” he said as she stood to slip on her shift. “There’s nothing wrong with knowing what you want or in choosing to go after it, my dear. What’s not so proper, perhaps, is the fact that I do not doubt you’d push anyone out of your way to achieve it.”

She turned and knelt on the bed, uncaring the shift was so thin it gave him a perfect view of her. Let him look his fill. She liked when Andrew’s eyes sparkled with lust.

“I’m not quite that vicious,” she said. “I just don’t want anyone standing between me and what I want.”

“What you want, my dear? Dare I hope it’s me?”

She smiled.

“Your watch has been stolen, dear Andrew. It’s loss is a burden to you, since it was the last gift given you by your father.”

He frowned at her, turned, and reached for his watch where it sat on the bedside table. He dangled it by its chain in front of her.

“I haven’t lost it at all, Catriona.”

She palmed the watch, raising her hand to pool the chain in her hand, and gently pulled it from him.

“Oh, but you have,” she said. “And the culprit must be punished.”

He frowned at her, awareness dawning in his eyes. “Is that entirely necessary?”

“Donalda called me names, Andrew. She needs to be taught a lesson.” She stood, looking down at him. “Or perhaps that’s what you think of me. That I am a slut.”

“Why do I think you won’t come back to my bed unless I accuse the girl of theft?”

She smiled, glad he understood.

“What if I think the price is too high?

“Do you?” she asked, slowly removing her shift. She stood in front of him naked, beautiful, and knowing it.

He laughed, reached for his watch, then for her.

N
ight came too quickly for Jean.

With night came the prospect of dinner. With dinner came the idea of sitting at a table with Morgan, Catriona, and Andrew.

She didn’t think she could bear the presence of any of them tonight, most especially Morgan.

She’d been married a week. A week, and she’d managed to offend her husband so much that he hadn’t spoken to her all day. If he’d sought her out, she had no knowledge of it. She hadn’t been hard to find. She’d stayed in her room.

This afternoon she’d gathered up her courage and gone to the library, hoping he’d still be there. She’d planned an apology, reciting the exact words over and over again until they were firmly fixed in her mind.

I’m sorry I was with Mr. Seath, Morgan. Although I consider him a friend, I can see where our being together might be misinterpreted.

Would that be enough of an apology? She wasn’t going to grovel.

The point was moot, because Morgan wasn’t in the library. Nor did she go in further search of him.

She should tell him the truth, let him do the worst. She could, with any luck, obtain a position somewhere. As a maid, true, since it was all she had any experience doing, unless someone had a need for a slightly less than virtuous quasicountess. But there was Aunt Mary to consider, and even though her aunt had advised her to keep silent, Aunt Mary didn’t deserve to be dismissed. Her aunt loved every inch of Ballindair almost as much as Mr. Seath. It was there in her education of the maids, in her lectures as to the art and beautiful objects scattered around the castle.

She needed to consider Catriona, too, on a ruinous path and unstoppable. She hadn’t the slightest idea what to do about it.

Night brought yet another problem. Was Morgan going to come to her room?

Could a wife ever refuse a husband? What woman in her right mind would want to refuse Morgan? A woman who was, perhaps, confused, daunted, and more than a little apprehensive.

How could Lillian have strayed? Was the woman a fool? Or did she want something from Morgan he couldn’t give her? Love, perhaps? Affection? Or an even more basic emotion: respect.

Jean sat in her room staring at the bellpull, summoning up her courage. She stood, walked to where it hung and jerked it once.

When Betty, one of the younger maids, appeared at the door, Jean gave her a note, forced a smile to her face and said, “Would you please convey this to the earl, Betty?”

The girl nodded, without a curtsy or a comment.

Frankly, she didn’t care if anyone ever curtsied to her, and she could dispense with all that Your Ladyship nonsense. It was disconcerting, however, to still be treated as if she were invisible.

Her note had been simple and to the point:
I am not feeling well enough to join you for dinner.
Morgan would simply have to accept her illness. Would it stop him from coming to her room?

She wasn’t going to sit here and wait for him.

He’d done as much as compare her to Lillian, and in such a lordly tone that she knew he’d done it on purpose. He could be the great Earl of Denbleigh with anyone else, but she was no longer a maid.

Wasn’t that what Mr. Seath had wanted her to know? Whatever happened from this point forward would be as a result of her behavior. People were allowed to have memories, yes, but it was her responsibility to supplant better memories on top of the poor ones they might have. Let the maids see her as the Countess of Denbleigh, not as a maid.

At the same time, let Morgan see her as Jean and not Lillian.

No doubt Lillian would’ve gone to him with some cajoling remark, even attempted to seduce the man. Well, she wasn’t going to do that. She didn’t want to have anything to do with Morgan MacCraig right at the moment.

The more she thought about their encounter, the more annoyed she became. The more time that passed, the more determined she was to refuse him admittance into her room and her bed.

Her stomach growled, reminding her that all she’d had to eat today was a scone at breakfast. She wasn’t in the mood for another bout of being treated as if she were invisible by one of the maids, so she ignored her hunger, a habit she’d learned in Inverness.

Instead of readying herself for bed, she tugged on her skirts, worked at the tapes of her hoop until it was free, and let it drop to the floor. Stepping over the collapsed monstrosity, she grabbed the material of her skirt, now too long and dragging on the floor, opened the door of her sitting room and sailed into the corridor.

Another thing—the ghosts of Ballindair owed her an apology, especially the French Nun. If it hadn’t been for her, she wouldn’t have been in this situation to begin with. She wouldn’t have collided with Morgan. She wouldn’t have had to explain her presence in the Laird’s Tower. She would have melted into the sea of other servants and never been noticed.

A thought brought her up short: She would have still gone in search of Catriona.

Very well, perhaps the ghosts didn’t owe her an apology.

Everyone expected her to be so grateful to be a countess, to be the wife of a wealthy man, a titled man, a peer. Why hadn’t anyone said to Morgan: “You’re to be congratulated, sir, on your new wife.” Very well, she wasn’t beautiful, not like Catriona. She was tall and slender with great bulbous breasts. Whenever one of her dresses had to be altered for Catriona, her sister made the remark that she could have folded her arms inside the bodice and still have plenty of room left over.

She asked questions, and wasn’t content to simply allow herself to be taught and told by others. Why had God given her a mind if he hadn’t wanted her to use it?

Perhaps they would say something like: “Congratulations, Your Lordship, on your new wife. She has a sparkling wit, a rapacious mind. What insightful questions she asks! What cogent logic she expresses!”

There, that sounded better, didn’t it?

She was lacking in knowledge of flowers, musicals, or watercolors, and her needlework left a great deal to be desired. Nor did she speak French.

She had, however, been a good maid.

Perhaps someone could congratulate Morgan for that: “Every bit of furniture around her is polished to perfection, Your Lordship!”

Oh bother.

Instead of going to the Long Gallery, she headed for the West Tower, a place she’d never been before in her ghostly excursions. Even though full night had descended on Ballindair, she wasn’t afraid. She’d never been afraid in the castle. Granted, there were probably more reasons to be frightened of corporeal bodies than spiritual ones, but she felt safe at Ballindair, as if the castle had welcomed her from the beginning.