The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae (11 page)

Robertson.
The History of Scotland.

He looked at her face, confirmed her concentration, then looked down at his papers. Picked one up and pretended to read it.

Of the hundreds of tomes in the library, she'd chosen the Robertson. Without any fanfare, she'd set out to learn about the world he was taking her into—the world, he suspected, she intended to make hers.

That was one element of her character he shouldn't forget.

The damned woman was intelligent.

Ergo, dangerous, especially to him.

L
ate the next morning, Dominic returned from his shopping expedition with Griswold, a pair of boy's riding boots under one arm. Griswold carried several brown-paper-wrapped parcels. It had taken three hours of tramping London's streets visiting tailors and outfitters catering to the youth of the ton, but they'd managed to acquire every item on Angelica's Youth's Clothes list.

Dominic held the rear garden gate—the only entry they were presently using—for Griswold, who was balancing his burdens, to angle through, then followed Griswold to the back door, opened it, waved Griswold through, and followed his valet into the servants' hall . . .

Halting, he stared. The place had been cleaned—no,
scoured,
to, as the saying went, an inch of its life. The copper pans above the fireplace gleamed. The deal table, scrubbed and polished, glowed, and the dresser, previously devoid of all objects, now displayed neat stacks of clean plates and dishes upon its polished shelves.

Not a single speck of dust, much less any cobweb, remained.

Setting his packages on the scrubbed table, Griswold surveyed the room with patent approval.

Brisk footsteps approached from the kitchens, off one side of the big hall. A vision emerged, dusting her hands.

Angelica saw them and smiled. “Good—you're back. Did you get everything?”

Dominic stared. “Yes. But where did you get those clothes?”

“From Brenda.” She looked down at the full skirt and loose cambric blouse. Both were overlarge, the voluminous wide-necked blouse exposing one delicately rounded shoulder, the skirt rolled over several times at the waist and secured with a length of cord. A striped kerchief tied over her hair completed the outfit. “She had the extra, and these will do for today . . .” Her gaze rose, fastened on the parcels, and her eyes, her face, lit.

Dominic watched her descend on the parcels, undoing string, unfolding paper, and peppering Griswold with eager questions.

She looked like a saucy barmaid from a tavern by the docks—except she was too clean.

Too blindingly beautiful.

He shook his head, hoping to shake his brains into place. It was the contrast, that was all—the disorienting disconnection between the clothes and what was in them. He'd remained where he'd halted, by the end of the table. She was holding up a white shirt, gauging the size, chattering about cravats with Griswold; belatedly remembering the package he carried, he held it out to her. “Your boots. You might have to stuff rags in the toes, but they should at least stay on.”

Face alight, she accepted the package. “Thank you.” Stripping off the paper, she held up one of the boots, considered the size, then balanced on one foot, slipped off one dancing slipper, and compared its sole to that of the boot. “They're almost the right size.”

Sitting on one of the kitchen chairs, she proceeded to try on the boots. Griswold assisted. Dominic forced himself to remain where he was. He didn't need to see her ankles again.

Boots on, she sprang up, strode a few paces back and forth, then, with a delighted smile, she danced a little jig. “They're perfect!” Rounding the table, lifting her skirts halfway up her calves, she halted so Dominic could see.

Then she looked up, into his face, and smiled—a blindingly brilliant smile. “Thank you. You must have had to hunt for them, but rest assured the result was worth it. I'll even be able to run if we need to.”

Silently clearing his throat, he managed an uninflected, unrevealing “Good.”

Sounds outside had him turning to the door. It opened, and Jessup, followed by Thomas, came in. Both nodded to Dominic, looked past him, swallowed their surprise, and, a touch warily, nodded politely to Angelica, too.

Dominic understood their caution. “Did you get the seats?”

“Aye,” Jessup replied. “But only just. Gent behind us was a tad irate about having to change his plans. Offered me a good bit extra for two of our seats. I told him we were sailors and had to be in Edinburgh to catch our ship, so couldn't oblige him.”

Dominic nodded approvingly. “Good story.”

More footsteps approached from the kitchen. Brenda appeared, wiping her hands. Seeing Jessup and Thomas, she smiled. “Perfect timing—lunch is ready.”

Mulley, wearing a long butler's apron over his customary attire and carrying a tray loaded with plates and cutlery, followed Brenda into the hall.

Brenda turned to Angelica. “If you want me to help you change, miss, Mulley'll set up the dining parlor meanwhile.”

Angelica looked at her new youth's clothes, then at Brenda and Mulley. “We've been working hard all morning cleaning down here, and you're right, I'm in no fit state to sit in the dining parlor. But luncheon is just a cold collation—is there any reason we can't all eat here, around this exceptionally clean table? That will be easier for everyone, I should think.”

Mulley exchanged glances with Brenda and Griswold, then looked at Dominic. “That would let us get on more quickly with what we've planned for the afternoon—if you're agreeable, my lord?”

Dominic waved to the table. “By all means.” Mulley was only asking for show, in front of Angelica. Prior to her arrival, Dominic had taken all his meals in the servants' hall, with his people—just as he did at the castle, in the great hall.

He moved to his place at the head of the table. Angelica gathered her new clothes and piled them in one corner of the dresser while Griswold whipped away the discarded wrappings. In the bustle as crockery, cutlery, and mugs were set out, she gravitated toward the foot of the table, but Brenda headed her off, then Mulley intervened and gently conducted her up the table to the place on Dominic's right.

She glanced at him, not quite questioningly, yet he could all but see the wheels in her mind turning as she allowed Mulley to seat her.

Once she was settled, Dominic pulled out his chair and sat.

For masters to eat with their household staff was, he was well aware, unthinkable in tonnish English houses, yet she had suggested it. He wondered if she'd read something in Robertson about how the clans generally shared their meals, laird and people all breaking bread together, or if she was simply feeling her way.

Brenda and Mulley set large platters of cold meats, as well as sauces, fruits, breads, and nuts on the table, then all took their seats, and the meal began.

As they ate, conversation flowed freely. Brenda and Mulley told tales of their discoveries as they'd cleaned the servants' hall, the kitchens, and butler's pantry. Apparently the housekeeper's room, the scullery, and the linen and laundry rooms were next on their list.

When Jessup asked what had prompted the cleaning frenzy, Dominic learned that the suggestion had come from Angelica. When he arched a brow at her, she lightly shrugged.

“We'll be returning later this month, and while the dining parlor and library are habitable, they and the other reception rooms need work, but the rooms most used—and most necessary to a functioning household—are those down here, behind the green baize door, so I thought that, given we've days to wait before we can leave London, we might as well make a start on setting the place to rights for when we return with the goblet.”

She glanced up at him, meeting his eyes as if warning him not to read too much into her actions; she didn't appear to notice the resulting pause as the others around the table took in and digested her words, along with her unstated yet patently obvious confidence that they would, indeed, be back in London at the end of the month, with the goblet in hand.

Thomas, young, eager, and now enthused, turned to Jessup and asked if they shouldn't help with the cleaning.

Dominic left Jessup to decide that while, from beneath his lashes, he watched Angelica. He hadn't yet defined what her underlying purpose was, what her private goals, immediate or otherwise, were.

That she had such goals he did not doubt; she was too definite a personality—she was too much like him. He and she were not the sort of characters who let life toss them where it would; they always knew what they wanted, and as far as possible took the most direct route to that end.

He looked at her and could see neither head nor tail of her direction.

At the end of the meal, she declared her intention of trying on her disguise and conscripted Brenda and Griswold to assist. Leaving Mulley, Thomas, and Jessup to clear the table, Dominic escaped to the library.

A
n hour later, Angelica descended the stairs, one deliberate boot step at a time. She was pleased with the way her legs looked in the corduroy breeches and fitting leather boots. Until she'd pirouetted before the cheval glass in the countess's bedchamber, taking in her appearance in her youth's attire, she'd had no idea her legs, relatively speaking, were so long, or her hips quite so womanly. Luckily, the latter were concealed beneath the skirts of the jacket Griswold had selected.

She was getting on well with Dominic's valet. At first he'd been cool, distinctly reserved, but he was coming around to seeing her as an ally, at least where his master's interests were concerned. Brenda had more rapidly come to the same conclusion and was now a ready source of information on Dominic, the castle, and the clan, all matters on which Angelica needed to cram.

Knowledge was the key to managing anything; she needed to learn much more about Dominic.

Including those insights only she could glean.

Reaching the front hall, she stepped onto the tiles and turned down the corridor to the library. Dominic had bought her the disguise—it was only fair she show him the result.

And learn what he thought of it.

Opening the library door, she walked in.

Dominic looked up—and had to battle to keep his jaw from dropping.

Battle to keep from scowling, from reacting at all as she—the minx—swanned in. Swinging around, she shut the door, causing the skirts of her jacket to fan out, giving him a glimpse of her derriere neatly outlined in brown corduroy.

His mouth dried. He was conscious of stilling—of his hunter's instincts taking hold and locking his muscles in that preternatural stillness all predators assumed when stalking prey . . . he told himself that she wasn't prey, but to that more instinctive side of him she most definitely was.

She walked to stand before the desk, the shift of her hips distractingly evident. Gracefully spreading her arms, she posed and waited while he raised his gaze—slowly—up the slender length of her, past her ruthlessly restrained breasts concealed behind a linen shirt, the wide lapels of her brown jacket, and the ends of the colorful red-striped neckerchief artlessly wound about her throat, to her face, to her eyes. She captured his gaze and, lips curving, asked, “Well? Do I pass muster?”

As what? An angel from one of his more salacious dreams?

When she arched a brow, the curve of her lips deepening, he gave up on impassivity and frowned. “You need to learn to walk like a man—a male.” Not even a drunken sailor would have missed the elementally feminine sway of her hips. “And . . .” He felt his frown darken. “What have you done with your hair?”

For one horrible, gut-churning instant, he thought she'd cut it off.

“Oh, it's all up here.” Angelica tapped the crown of the wide-brimmed black hat Griswold had insisted would shade her face sufficiently for her to pass as a youth—if she kept her head down. “Griswold had the clever notion of using a net to keep the strands in place, and we've pinned the hat to the net so it won't blow off or shift.”

She kept her eyes on Dominic's. She'd come there intending to flirt with him, to confirm for herself that she could, that him being her hero did indeed mean that he was susceptible to her in that way. But the way he was looking at her . . . suggested that further flirting would be akin to dancing between a dragon's teeth.

Some gentlemen would have reacted by undressing her with their eyes. He hadn't. His slow perusal had felt like an inventory taking—the way a sheik might assess a new slave—and from the moment his eyes had locked on hers, what she'd sensed called to mind a large, wild carnivore, presently reined and content to watch, but who might, at her next tempting move, pounce as fast as lightning, catch her in an unbreakable grip, and devour her.

She'd never thought herself fanciful, but staring into those mesmerizing eyes . . . the question of whether he had an animal on his crest—and if so, what—flashed through her mind.

Gazing into the turbulent greeny-gray, she drew a shallow breath, one further constricted by the band binding her breasts, and decided that, for today, she'd learned enough. Headstrong and willful she might be, but she rarely precipitated situations she might not be able to control.

She smiled with no teasing in the gesture. “So my striding needs work?” She glanced down at her boots. “The freedom of no skirts does take getting used to.”

“You might try observing Thomas—try copying him.”

Dominic got the words out, heard the crispness of his diction, the deeper tone . . . if she didn't get out of the library soon, he would very likely do something they both might later regret.

Her expression brightened. “An excellent idea.”

Her gaze returned to him, to his eyes . . . he wondered if she had any inkling how close she stood to . . .

Cutting off the thought, he nodded curtly. “I believe he and Jessup are helping the others.”