Laird of the Highlands: International Billionaires IX: The Scots (33 page)

Something he’d said, or the aggression in his voice, appeared to hit her. She sagged in his arms, defeat crossing her face. “It doesn’t matter how you won. Only that you did.”

“But it does.” Loosening his tight grip on her shoulders, he slipped his hands around her waist and laid his head on her dark curls. “Because I don’t understand.”

Her response was a mere sniff into his best silk dress shirt, confusing him even more. He’d dressed up for this most important meeting in his life because he wanted to make sure she understood he came for her with everything he had.

His wealth, his power.

Ceri seemed to like him when he was naked or in jeans, yet he wanted her to understand he had other gifts, too.

He could make sure she never suffered from worry again.

He could offer her and Elis anything they wanted.

He could protect her and her brother.

Maybe she didn’t love him as he loved her. Still, she was a survivor. Using that instinct in his favor, even if it built on the hurt roiling inside him, was something he was willing to do.

“Make me understand, lass.” He ran his hand along her stiff spine. “Let’s start with that.”

“I read your emails,” she stated in a grim voice.

His hand stopped in the middle of her back, his confusion and frustration growing. “Aye?”

Ceri lifted her head to glare at him. “Aye,” she mimicked him in a sarcastic tone.

Racking his brain, he tried to remember his hurried perusal of his emails when he’d arrived back at the cottage. He came up with nothing. “Ye got angry because Elis and I didn’t send ye an email like I promised?”

“Don’t be laughable.” Dropping her head on his chest, hiding herself from his intense focus again, a muffled snort came from her. “And I’m not angry.”

Clearly, she was angry. Obviously so—even for him to detect. The fact was she wasn’t telling him the truth here, when it was so very important. His temper spiked. “If ye aren’t angry,” he growled. “Why did ye run away?”

She tried to move out of his arms, but he clung. If he couldn’t make her understand verbally, he’d do it physically. He had her. He wasn’t letting her go.

“I didn’t run away. I left. There’s a difference.” She sniffed again into his chest.

Was it his imagination or had she snuggled into his arms? Had she moved closer of her own volition? His wretched hope simmered back to life. “Why did ye leave, then?”

She stiffened, making him curse himself. How was he going to understand her, though, if he didn’t ask the hard questions? He pressed on, his breath caught in his throat. “Tell me.”

Tucking her head into his chest like she was trying to escape her words, she blurted, “I saw that report.”

“Report?” He frowned at her curls.

“From your solicitor.”

His brain zeroed in, pushing through the migraine to find the memory. “The report about ye.”

“Correct.”

That was what had angered her? She’d known he’d had her investigated before. Why would one more probe make her furious? So furious she’d left. Left him and left the castle and maybe more important to her than anything, left her dreams behind.

“Ceri.” He tried to nudge her head up, but she determinedly stuck herself into his chest. “Listen to me.”

She humphed.

“I ordered another report when Doc told me about your mum’s death.”

“What?” Her head popped out of her hiding place, her eyes wide. “Why didn’t you merely ask me, you arsehole. I could have told you how she died.”

“Would ye have?” He eyed her speculatively. “Ye aren’t the type to spill all your secrets for my inspection.”

Her face tightened. “You could have asked.”

“I could have,” he confessed. “I’m sorry I didn’t, but time seemed to be slipping by and I wanted to understand your background more thoroughly than just your marriage.”

“What do you mean, time was slipping by?”

“The court case was fast approaching.” Frustration rolled in his words. “I wanted to understand everything about ye.”

“Right. The court case. How could I have forgotten?” A white line of tension appeared around her mouth. “You needed to know about my past so you could use it to win the court case.”

“Use your past?” He stared at her, his head pounding, his hands going slack in surprise.

Using his surprise against him, she pushed on his chest and escaped his clutching hands. “You had them all lined up.”

“Ceri—”

“All of them.” Her hands fisted, her eyes growing hot with anger. “Mr. Sayer. Mrs. Blevin. Mr. Pritchard.”

Who? “Who are these people?”

His blank stare seemed to catch her attention because her eyes narrowed. “The Brekelly villagers your weasel recruited to testify in court against me.”

“What? What weasel?” Horror froze the blood in his veins. “What are ye talking about?”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t read the report your solicitor sent you.”

“I didn’t.” She must mean Reid was the weasel. He couldn’t make much sense out of anything else.

She waved his claim away. “Don’t tell me you didn’t order your weasel and your security to go to my hometown and dig up dirt.”

“The first time, yes.” Truth was the only thing he could offer her right now. “But not the second report. That wasn’t ordered to dig up dirt on ye.”

A snort was all he got for that.

“Listen to me.” Fisting his own hands so he wouldn’t grab her, he took a step back for extra insurance. Instinct told him only words would soothe. “When I first came to Castle Ross, the only thing I wanted to do was drive ye away. I admit that.”

Her arms came around her and her mouth drooped, making his heart hurt. Still, he needed to tell the truth. Even things that damaged his cause.

“But then, lass, I started to know ye.” He kept his gaze level on hers.

“You started to have sex with me.” The words punched out of her, an ugly accusation.

“Naw,” he rebutted. “I got to know ye, quite a bit about ye, before we ever went to bed. And not from the first report, either.”

“What? What could you possibly know about me?”

“Things like ye enjoy singing.” He took a chance and stepped closer.

She threw him a glare and stepped back, almost hitting the wall behind her.

If he’d let his lust and fear rule him, he would have pushed her onto the flat surface, pinning her down. However, his migraine hadn’t completely wiped out the rest of his working brain.

He stilled.

“Ye are good at singing, ye know,” he offered.

“Am I.”

“Aye.” Struggling to remember all the things he’d taken in about her, he reached for another. “Also your eyes. I got to know your eyes.”

A sniff was her only response.

“Your laughs.” Frustration pulsed through him, but he forced his voice to be cool and composed. “Remember how I told ye about your different laughs.”

“None of that means you know me.” It was a stout, solid rejection.

His heart shuddered. Lorne Ross never quit, though. Not until he was sure he was defeated. And something about the way she stood—her body shifting sideways from him, as if ready to bolt and yet her head tilting toward him as if ready to listen some more—gave his hope a lift.

“I also know about your plans, eh?” he said. “Your plans for your lotions and the shop.”

“That’s never going to happen now.”

The pain in her voice pushed him past his caution. He took two steps in and wrapped both arms around her. She stood in his embrace, a cold, stiff shadow of the warm, willing woman he’d become used to.

“Listen to me,” he whispered in her ear.

“What?”

He’d thought to keep this offer in hiding until the end. He’d thought perhaps he’d give it to her along with the ring that lay like a rock inside his suit pocket. But the pain in her voice and defeat in her expression made his pompous plans to bestow this prize on his lady a blindingly stupid idea.

So he gave to her.

Gave her a way to leave him for good, leave him behind.

“Ceri.” He pressed his lips on her dark curls and took her in. The heather smell of her scent. The softness of her hair. The way she fit into his arms. He took her all in, maybe for the last time. “The castle is yours. I deeded it back to ye this morning.”

L
orne’s words
echoed in her mind like an old tale told to her when she still believed in happily ever after. In princesses, and promises, and in people who loved her and wished her well.

Ceri went taut in his arms.

Because wonderful things like this didn’t happen to her. Not in Brekelly. Not in Pictloch. Not in Edinburgh, and certainly not in London. He did this to her over and over. Made her dream. Made her wish. Drew her into a fantasy where he was everything she wanted.

“Stop it.” Yanking out of his embrace, she headed for the door. “Just stop talking.”

“I’m telling ye the truth.”

He sounded bewildered and she bet if she turned to stare at him, he’d have that boyish look of puzzlement on his face. The look that always made her want to wrap him in her arms and brush his fiery hair off his forehead. “Open this door now.”

“Ceri.”

The lights flashed on, flooding the room with harsh light. It startled her enough she whipped around to confront him.

Lorne Ross stood behind his desk. The marble inlay gave the wide surface the appearance of a white lake filled with lacy strands of seaweed. He had his London finery on. Red power tie. Sleek blue suit. Blazing-white shirt.

Both things—the desk and his dress—reminded her he was her enemy. A billionaire intent on having his way. A stranger. Not the man who’d held her through the night and not the man who gave her his boyish grins.

“I want to leave.”

“Not before we end this once and for all.” He said the words in a clipped, hard tone. The one she’d heard when she first met him, but never since.

The thought made her want to weep and she’d wept enough about this man. “It’s already done. You won.”

“Did ye not hear me?” He glared at her before reaching for a large tan envelope lying on the desk and thrusting it her way. “Here.”

Wrapping her arms around her, she thrust her fists into the safety of her armpits. Because she’d reached out before. Reached out with her belief in the goodness of people. Reached out with her hopes of a better life. Reached out again and again only to watch her dreams shatter in front of her. “I want to leave.”

“This is the deed to Castle Ross and the estate. Everything my da left ye, back in your control.”

Ceri’s nails dug into the skin of her palms.

“Don’t ye understand?” Frustration crossed his face, making his red-gold brows furrow. “It’s yours.”

“Why?” She didn’t understand. Couldn’t. Why would he give up everything he’d come at her for? His heritage. His home.

His brows rose out of the frown into a confused arch. “I thought it would be clear.”

“Clear?” She scowled at him. “Clear as mud.”

A short burst of laughter came from him before he brushed his rawboned hand across his forehead. For the first time, she noticed the tight lines around his eyes.

He had one of his migraines. That’s why he’d turned off the lights.

A reluctant compassion filled her. “Lorne.”

He lifted his head, his gaze latching onto hers.

“It’s your castle. It’s your heritage. It’s really yours and always has been.” She gave him the truth she’d known inside her. The truth she’d shied away from as she’d fallen in love. Or at least, fallen in love with the man she’d had in the cottage in Scotland. Because she couldn’t deal with this London billionaire part of him. The part that wanted to dress her up like a doll and parade her around as a talisman. She’d done that once and she’d never do it again.

Not even to achieve her dreams.

Not even to have her lover.

His frown returned. “I’m giving ye—”

“No. I don’t want it.” And she didn’t. She honestly didn’t. It wasn’t worth the sacrifice.

She knew, watching him, knowing him—he thought if he got her to take the castle, she’d also take him. If he convinced her to take the castle, there were still the estate taxes to contend with, the mortgage. He had his billions and his allure, and he’d try and keep her by his side using those weapons. Ultimately, she’d have to deal with him and his demands for the kind of lady who should be with a rich man.

She couldn’t do that. Wouldn’t.

Wiping his fingers across his face once more, he closed his eyes. “I’m confused.”

“It doesn’t matter.” She tugged on the door handle one more time and sighed when it didn’t give. “Can you unlock this now?”

“I need to understand.” A pugnacious tone edged his voice.

“You aren’t going to let me out until you do, right?”

“Exactly.” His eyes were still closed. “I’m going to go through this last month step by step.”

“Oh, God.” Although her anger didn’t recede, reluctant amusement bubbled underneath. “Seriously?”

Her logical lover.

No
, her pride reminded her.
Not your lover anymore
.

“Seriously.” He lifted one long finger. “I come back to London to find my da has left my castle to a woman. A stranger.”

“It is your castle, Lorne. I’ve told you that. Can’t you just let this be?”

He ignored her as he had so many other times before. But now she realized, after living with him, it was a coping skill. Unlike other people, he needed to focus his intense brain on one thing at a time. Her unwanted love for him and her unwilling affection towards him kept her tongue quiet.

“I was angry.” His eyes flashed open and he winced at the light. “I was also hurt.”

Her heart tilted toward him against her strong will. “I’m sorry.”

“Why should ye be sorry?” His looked at her, his gaze confused. “It was my da who hurt me.”

“Your father didn’t mean—”

“I was determined to get it back.” He brushed right by her, his concentration once again focused. A second and third finger went up. “I was determined to make ye pay.”

And he had. Probably not in the way he’d envisioned, yet she’d paid an awful price for Lorne Ross. Losing her dreams of belonging to Castle Ross. Losing her dreams of making her lotions with Ross heather and roses. Losing her heart because he’d wheedled it from behind her armor before she realized the danger he was to her. The only thing he’d left her was her pride. The pride that demanded she not buckle in front of him and beg him to take her the way she was.

A T-shirt-and-jeans-type woman.

A female who would never allow herself to be dressed up in a role.

A girl who’d lost her hope and was too frightened to ever want it back.

“So that’s why I ordered the first security report.” He cut into her thoughts with his dogged recitation of facts. “To find out your agenda. To find out your weaknesses.”

Ceri pressed herself along the door, trying to stop herself from following him down the memory lane he was intent on traversing.

“I came to Castle Ross to drive ye away and to claim what was mine.”

“It is yours. I’ve said that.”

He ignored her once more, his gaze growing distant, his hands dropping to his desk, fingers loose and lax. “But then I found ye.”

Found her in a way no person on earth had. The inner, secret heart of her. And he damaged her, too. She understood he hadn’t meant to, but getting so far in, he’d trampled on the last piece of her she’d held safe.

The realization shook her pride.

Shook her soul.

His glance came her way. “Ye weren’t anything like I expected.”

Fury flared. “I wasn’t all dressed up with my make-up on.”

“Naw.” He frowned, confusion filling his expression as well as his eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Really?” She pulled out her weapons. Weapons she’d laid down weeks ago when this man came for her and took her. Angling her hips into a flare, she thrust her chest up. “I don’t believe you.”

He eyed her presentation. “Ye know, I can be a wee bit slow on the uptake, but I’m beginning to get an inkling of what happened in Edinburgh.”

“Are you?” She plastered on her best fake smile, hoping he was wrong.

“Aye.” He closed his eyes again, his hand lifting to massage brow. “Still, we’ll get there soon enough.”

“No, we won’t.” Since he wasn’t looking anymore, she dropped her weapons and sagged on the door instead. She was tired. Defeated. “Just let it go.”

“I don’t let anything go until I’ve figured it out.” His hand fell to the desk and one finger started to tap on the marble. “Where was I?”

“
Cnych
.”

His eyes flashed open at her swearword. “What does that mean? Something in Welsh?”

“I’ll tell you when you tell me what
a ghràidh
means.”

A winsome, almost bittersweet smile crossed his face. “I promise ye, I’ll tell ye at the end of this conversation. Even if it’s not something ye want to hear.”

“Then get on with it.” She didn’t allow her heart to melt this time at his expression. “I want to see my brother.”

He straightened, as if girding himself for something horrible. “I met ye. I watched ye. I studied ye.”

Hurt bloomed inside. “Oh, great. Like a specimen.”

“I suppose ye could say that. At first.” Another flash of his eyes came her way. “It’s how I usually deal with people.”

She knew that, understood that. She’d also come to appreciate it, too. It would be grossly unfair to throw him at himself. He was who he was, and so was she. The difference was she accepted him. But he wanted to change her. That’s why this whole thing wasn’t going to work. “Go on,” she barked. “I don’t have all day.”

He winced, his face filling with hurt. A hurt that tore at her staunch stance not to fold in front of him and become what he wanted.

“Ceri,” he said, his gentle voice wafting across the room. “Have a bit of patience with me.”

“I’ve had plenty of patience.” Suddenly realizing she had some control, she yanked her mobile from her back pocket. “I could have called the police and told them I was being held against my will.”

“Ye didn’t, though, and I appreciate that.” He paced around his desk in that gangly, yet elegant, way of his.

She braced for his nearness, but he settled himself on the marble edge, his long legs spread before him. Sighing with relief, she eyed him. “Finish your long, boring story.”

A soft chuckle rumbled from his throat. “I’m not going to win ye over with my tale, eh?”

“Like I said, you’ve already won everything, so I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He shook his head in rejection, and a stray curl of fire slipped out of the bun, sliding onto his cheek. It struck her—she’d never touch his hair again or smell his skin or have him inside her, strong and sure. The realization made sudden tears well in her eyes. She willed them back, catching them before they fell on her cheeks.

Yet he caught them, too, before she could hide her gaze. “Ceri. Lass.”

“Finish this,” she choked.

He sighed. Grabbing the tan packet, he ambled over to where she stood. Not touching, but too close. “I realized,” he murmured. “Realized ye loved the castle and the land far more than I ever had.”

“That’s not true. You love the place.”

“Now I do, that’s true. And I have ye to thank for it.”

Closing her eyes to his powerful draw, she held herself stiff. “I don’t want your thanks.”

“I know, deep down, ye want the castle.” He grabbed her hand and stuffed the packet into her limp grasp. “I know what it means to ye so I’m giving ye everything free and clear.”

Her eyes opened to a narrowed gaze as she tried to shake his grip and the packet away. “What do you mean by that?”

“Exactly what I said.” His frown turned to a scowl. “No ties. No demands. The castle is yours, with no mortgage, and no estate taxes due anymore.”

His claim slammed through her like a Highland windstorm. It couldn’t possibly be true. Even if Lorne Ross had told her truth after truth, she couldn’t comprehend this one. “You’re lying.”

He immediately snarled at her, his white teeth gleaming in the harsh light. “I don’t lie.”

That was true. He didn’t lie.

“I don’t understand.”

Looming over her, his expression still fierce, he stated, “It’s pretty simple. Most things are when ye get to the heart of them.”

Her heart wasn’t simple. It hadn’t been for a very long time. Her heart was twisted and broken and hard. She couldn’t give him that. And she couldn’t give him a pretty version of herself either. “I can’t be—”

“Don’t say a thing.” His rawboned hands landed on the door, pinning her in. “Until I’ve had my say.”

A shiver of pain swept down her spine. She knew, in her gut, she did not want to hear what he had to say.

“Here’s my simple truth, Ceri,” he whispered near her ear, not meeting her stony gaze. “I met ye. I studied and watched—”

“Don’t—”

“And I fell in love.”

The words laced around her like a silky, slick rope. Something that would tie her into a knot and never let her go. “No.”

“Aye.” Pulling his head back, he kept coming at her, his expression filled with determination. “What do ye think
a ghràidh
means, lass? It means my love.”

She believed his claim. She also believed he loved a woman she couldn’t become. “I can’t,” she whispered to him. “I just can’t.”

He stilled, his chest punching out as he sucked in a breath. Then, it whooshed from him in a near gasp. “Right. Got it.”

Easing away, he gave her a weary smile.

That smile made her bleed inside. “I’m sorry—”

“There’s no need to be sorry.” His smile held. “I understand. I’m not normal.”

He said the words with such surety, the bleeding inside her gushed into a torrent. Even though she couldn’t be what he wanted her to be, this didn’t mean she was willing to leave him with this wretched conclusion. “That is not true at all. You’re perfectly normal.”

“No. I’m not.” Wrenching around in a jerky movement, he headed back to his desk. For the first time, she noticed the line of computers behind it, ready for duty. With a flick of his finger, the three screens filled with white-on-black code. “I’ll email Doc and let him know he can come and unlock the door. Your brother will be wanting to see ye, I’m sure.”

“No. Wait.” With a lurch, she tore across the room and past the desk. She grabbed his arm before he could punch any keys. “Wait just a moment.”