Once Upon a Highland Autumn (8 page)

He leaned forward to hear more, but there was a commotion in the hall, the unmistakable whisper of silk gowns, the soft rush of satin evening slippers on stone as they hurried toward him. Kit rose to his feet, steeled himself for the onslaught of simpering smiles, batted lashes, and breathless and boring conversation, designed to draw him closer—and close the snare. He took a step back as a young woman was shoved into the room.

She wasn’t smiling—she was scowling mutinously—and Kit met a pair of fierce dark eyes before a whispered word from her mother—and a sharp pinch judging by the way she leaped forward—brought her eyelashes down.

She didn’t simper. Her curtsy was brief, sharp, and resentful.

She did not gush when she was introduced as Lady Margaret McNabb. She said nothing at all. Her gaze moved over him once, then flicked away, and Kit had the feeling he’d been found wanting and dismissed. She kept her eyes firmly fixed in the center of his cravat.

She did not rush to him, and hold out a trembling hand for his kiss, or raise adoring eyes to his. The countess was grinning with hopeful delight, rattling off a list of her daughter’s accomplishments. He watched as Lady Margaret’s cheeks pinkened, then turned a deep shade of rose, then scarlet.

Lady Devorguilla should be proud indeed, he decided. She had created the perfect debutante from the top of Margaret’s elegant and rather alarming coiffure, to the demure pearls at her throat and the expensive cut of her fashionable gown. The gown was a ruffled abomination, vivid pink with lavender flounces at the hem and shoulders. Her complexion was now nearly the same color as the dress—the lavender part—and her jaw was tight with irritation. Her dark hair was perched on the top of her head, rigidly held there by an army of pins. It was bedecked with a riotous array of roses, ribbons and jeweled clips. It didn’t suit her.

“Good evening, Lady Margaret,” he said, and she raised her eyes to his. He read a warning there, as clear as the one given by Dundrummie’s formidable front door. It took him aback a moment. She tossed her chin, and looked him straight in the eye. There was nary a single bat of her long, thick lashes.

“I’m Lady
Megan
. Margaret is a kind of pet name my mother has for me. And you are Lord Rossington, from England. May I ask why—how—you came to be here in Scotland?” She made no attempt to hide her Scottish burr. It was like being rubbed with silk. Her eyes, too, were remarkable—a cauldron of color, gold and russet and green, like the Scottish hills.

Beautiful, he thought, and checked himself at once, and clasped his hands behind his back.

“A holiday,” he said vaguely. She attempted to nod, and remembered her coiffure and raised a steadying hand to it. Rose petals scattered at her feet.

“He’s here to visit Glen Dorian Castle,” Eleanor said, and Kit watched Margaret’s—Megan’s—eyes widen at that, and saw her cheeks flush a much more becoming shade of pink. Then she picked up her skirt, manhandling the train, and crossed the room away from him.

Were she in London, he thought, Lady Margaret/Megan would fit in perfectly—until she spoke, or moved. Her bearing was proud, coltish, athletic, even, as if she was more used to running than walking. She went to the fireplace and stood beside it, and studied him from the shadows.

“Allow me to introduce my younger daughter,” Devorguilla warbled, and he turned to look at the second girl. “This is Alice,” she said, and the girl blushed as she curtsied. She, too, was fashionably dressed, but in green. She was demure and shy, her eyes downcast. Not his type at all, Kit decided—even if he
had
a type he preferred.

“Or Alanna, if you wish,” Eleanor said.

“How did you come to hear of Glen Dorian, my lord?” Lady Margaret/Megan asked.

He met her eyes from across the room, felt her gaze like a touch. “My great-uncle wrote of it. His journal was recently found at a house I am renovating.” He didn’t mention Mairi’s letter, but the slight narrowing of her eyes suggested she suspected there was more.

“Happy memories, then,” she said acidly, and he sent her a sharp look, which she returned, steel clashing on steel.

“You found this journal in Derbyshire?” the countess asked.

“In Northumbria, my lady.”

“You have two estates?” she warbled with delight.

Kit smiled blandly but did not elaborate. Still, he knew the added value of a second home must be ringing like a cash box in the countess’s mind. He cast a sideways look at Lady Margaret/Megan, felt her eyes hard and bright upon him. She did not look away when he met her gaze. “I understand you are here on holiday as well, my lady,” he said.

She raised her chin, a captivating, swanlike gesture. “My brother is newly married. My sisters and I came away to visit our mother and allow Alec and Caroline to spend their honeymoon alone,” she replied.

“And are you enjoying your stay at Dundrummie Castle?”

“Of course,” she said, but he read the opposite in her eyes—wariness and something akin to fear, perhaps. What color were her eyes exactly? She arched one shapely eyebrow disdainfully, and he realized he was staring. He looked at Lady Alice instead. She sat silently beside her mother, her expression curious, but reserved. He knew that look—he was not for her, but intended for her sister. He smiled at her and she blushed like a rose. The Dowager Countess of Glenlorne had graceful daughters. They would have no trouble at all in finding willing husbands—but not him.

“Dinner is late,” Eleanor said peevishly.

“I asked Graves to delay the meal a little while,” Devorguilla said. “I thought it might serve as a celebration of sorts after—” She sent Kit a glorious smile and rose to her feet and held out her hand to her eldest daughter.

Kit felt his chest tighten with sheer dread.

“I would like to propose—”

“Oh please do say a toast to his lordship’s health, Devorguilla!” Eleanor interrupted. “You’ve only just met the man.”

“Marriage,” Devorguilla said, firmly, ignoring her sister-in-law. “Between Lord Rossington and Margaret.” Kit felt the whisky roll in his belly like lava under a mountain. He stumbled to his feet and stared at the countess. She beamed anew, began to come toward him, since Megan had ignored her mother’s outstretched hand and stayed where she was by the fireplace. He could not look at the girl. “The details will have to be finalized with Glenlorne, of course, but tonight—” the countess went on, but Kit wasn’t listening.

“No!” His cry of horror came out at the same moment as Megan McNabb’s own refusal.

The countess turned toward her daughter. “Don’t be silly, Margaret. It takes only a single glance to see that you and his lordship are well suited. There is no reason why Alec should object, and a fall wedding would be lovely. If you are willing and his lordship is willing then why should there be an impediment to the match taking place at this very moment?”

This very moment? Kit heard warning bells, not wedding bells.

“I am most unwilling,” he said. “I would never marry
her
!”

Megan’s gaze turned from her mother and onto him. Her jaw dropped, and her complexion turned from pink to ashen white. He realized he could have said it more gently, but it was done now.

Margaret/Megan McNabb folded her arms over her chest and squinted at him. “And I would never marry
him
.”

Oddly, it felt like the unkindest insult he’d ever received. “You would never—?” he spluttered. “I expected this to be a quiet supper, not an ambush.”

“Then go,” she said. “We shall not detain you a moment longer.” She reached up and began to pluck the pins out of her hair, dislodging the roses too, and the thick dark waves tumbled over her shoulders.

For an instant, Kit was speechless. He watched as she transformed from a passable debutant to a rare beauty. Her mother gasped. “What are you doing?” she asked. “Margaret, please—” But the pins scattered. Her color was high, her face radiant, her hair a glorious tangle. She looked like a woman who had just been bedded, or should be.

“Megan, Mother. My name is Megan.” She said something more in Gaelic, something that made her mother and sister blush, and her aunt giggle. Kit had the feeling that he had just been insulted yet again. He felt his skin heat. He bowed stiffly.

“I shall bid you goodnight,” he said. “It was a—” He paused. He could hardly say it had been a pleasure. “Thank you for inviting me, Lady Eleanor.”

“Have you recalled a prior engagement, my lord?” Megan demanded tartly. “I wish her luck, poor lass.”

He colored. “And here’s to your future husband, my lady,” he said, and drained his whisky in a single gulp. “I have no doubt he will need all the luck—and all the whisky—in the world.”

He watched her jaw drop at the insult, wondered what had gotten into him. He had been brought up to be polite, solicitous, and chivalrous to women. An apology hovered on his lips, but the look of glittering fury on her face changed his mind. Lady Megan’s pretty eyes were dark now, almost black. “Go,” she said, and he read the word on her lips, even if he could not hear her over the countess’s desperate protestations.

Kit turned on his heel and strode out. What right had she to be insulted? He was an earl, wealthy, handsome, and quite charming—usually. He waited for the sound of tears, or screams, but aside from the countess’s strident lecture, Megan McNabb said nothing more, as if he’d been dismissed and forgotten. As he waited for the butler to bring his hat, she came out of the drawing room, sent him a single scathing glance and proceeded up the stairs, her chin high, her movements elegant, as if he didn’t matter in the least. He watched the graceful sway of her hips until she disappeared, and winced as a distant door slammed.

He turned to see Lady Eleanor watching her niece as well. “Pity you couldn’t stay for dinner, but understandable. I doubt I’ll get any dinner myself. I daresay there’ll be ruffled feathers to be soothed. I have qualms about breakfast, too.”

“My apologies, Lady Fraser. I wasn’t expecting—”

“Och, never mind. Hunting season is about to begin here in the Highlands. I have no doubt Devorguilla will find more biddable quarry to suit her purposes. Ah—here’s Graves at last. Well, it’s a small village, my lord. I daresay if you’re still planning to stay we’ll see you again before long,” Eleanor said.

Graves’s expression remained bland as he opened the door, as if dinner guests left before the meal all the time—but if this is the way every gentleman was received, Kit was hardly surprised. Outside, his coach had been brought round, and he climbed in, pounded on the roof, and set off at a fast trot.

He leaned back into the plush squabs as the castle disappeared from sight and the village lights twinkled in the distance. Once again, he had successfully avoided entanglement with a hopeful debutante and her scheming mama. Once again, he’d kept his freedom.

He looked out into the darkness and saw a pair of flashing eyes, the dark silken fall of her hair against flushed cheeks, and felt the thinnest wedge of regret.

M
egan stared at the empty doorway for a long moment after he strode through it, unable to speak—they all did, for different reasons. He was the handsomest man she’d ever seen, Megan thought, and shook the idea right out of her mind. He was also the rudest.

Alanna stared at her with pity in her green eyes. It had been insulting, humiliating, and horrible. Megan put a hand against her tight belly, felt her knees shaking. How dare he? It wasn’t as if she were a strumpet in the street—though her mother had acted as if she was, throwing her at him that way. Her mother had been certain the earl had come to the Highlands to find a wife. Was she so disagreeable? How mortifying. No doubt she could expect the same reaction from other gentlemen in London. Her chest tensed with dread.

Devorguilla stared at the doorway in disbelief, as if she expected him to come back. Slowly, as the seconds passed, her skin flushed an angry scarlet, and her mouth worked as she tried to find the words to express her disappointment, or perhaps it was outrage. Megan hoped it was outrage, but it wasn’t directed at Lord Rossington’s humiliating rejection of her. It was directed at her. “Go after him!” she hissed, but Megan stood her ground.

“I will not. How could you do such a thing, Mother?”

“Indeed. Most indelicate,” Eleanor said calmly. “Someone ring the kitchen and see if dinner is ready. I wonder why he’s really come to Glen Dorian.”

“Not to find a wife, obviously,” Devorguilla sniffed.

Alanna blinked, her eyes swinging from Megan, to her mother, then back to Megan, wondering where to offer comfort first, and just how to do that best. “But not Megan,” she ventured, and Megan glared at her. Alanna shrank back.

Megan’s cheeks burned. She had never been so humiliated in her entire life. He’d looked as if he’d been asked to kiss a toad. He could not have been more horrified. He might have laughed it off, made a joke of it, continued with the evening, but he had fled as if the devil—her—was chasing him. Was it the gown? The seamstress had assured her it fit to perfection, was cut in the latest style. She couldn’t wait to take it off and burn it.

She headed for the door.

He was still standing in the hallway, but she did not stop. She kept on going, climbing the stairs, feeling his gaze on her backside—and that was also mortifying. She reached her bedroom, slammed her door, and leaned on it. She almost leaped out of her skin when someone knocked on the other side. She opened it just wide enough to peer through the crack with one eye. It was Eleanor.

“No need to be so upset, dear girl,” Eleanor said. “Take a drop of whisky and calm yourself. Hunting season starts in just a few weeks.” Devorguilla pushed in behind her sister-in-law, her handkerchief pressed to her eyes.

“Hunting season? What’s that got to do with anything?” Megan demanded. “Do you suggest I go out and shoot him, bring him to ground that way?”

Devorguilla stopped crying and looked hopeful, and Megan rolled her eyes. “Really, Mother, I wouldn’t marry him now if he fell on his knees and begged.”