The Laird's Willful Lass (The Likely Lairds Book 1) Read online

  The man marching beside the cart laughed again, a bass rumble, while his big hairy legs under his kilt ate up the ground beneath him. “Och, aye, ye did. The laird’s inclined to give orders and expect them to be followed. We’re used to his ways.”

  In which case, his retainers should be downtrodden shadows. She saw no sign of that in the impressive crowd of men escorting them back to the castle.

  “You’ll get used to it.” The man went on in the same lilting local accent that lay so attractively on their rescuer’s deep voice. “It helps that he’s always right.”

  Marina bristled under the comment. “I doubt I’ll be here long enough to need to get used to it, Mister…”

  “Och, everyone calls me Jock. Ye can, too.”

  “In that case, I’d like to thank you and your friends for your help, Jock.”

  The man’s smile lacked a couple of front teeth. The Mackinnon—an odd title, she couldn’t help thinking—had excellent teeth. Strong and straight and white. She wondered what he looked like when he smiled. While she had a discomfiting feeling that he found her amusing, he hadn’t smiled properly once.

  Stop it, Marina.

  Jock had called him the laird. She wasn’t familiar with the word, but it must mean something like lord. And he owned a castle.

  Madonna mia, he must be a great power in this wilderness. Perhaps his arrogance wasn’t without basis. No wonder he hadn’t liked her addressing him as an underling when he’d arrived to help them. She supposed she should have been a little more polite. But years of travel had taught her that a commanding attitude was the best way to produce the results she wanted.

  Part of her wasn’t sorry that she’d pricked his self-satisfaction. She had a suspicion the man received far too much wide-eyed admiration and unquestioning obedience.

  “Don’t worry.” She took her father’s gloved hand. The ride was as smooth as human endeavor could make it, but she could tell that even gentle movement pained him. His brief burst of vitality faded fast. “The Mackinnon said it was only a mile. We’ll get you inside soon.”

  She hoped this castle wasn’t a ruin, like so many she’d seen on her way north from the border. She hoped it had a fire and a hot meal and some dry clothes she could change into. All her beautiful dresses had gone into the river—the burn as Mackinnon called it—with the carriage. She was grateful she and her father were alive, and she’d retrieved the one really irreplaceable thing, but that didn’t reconcile her to the loss.

  Blasted fool of a coachman.

  “What I’d give for a plate of ossobuco and a good chianti,” her father said in a dreamy voice.

  She smiled. “More like we’re getting half-raw mutton, and some of that unpronounceable spirit.” The cooking during their week in Scotland had failed to impress her.

  “Right now, even that would be welcome.”

  Inevitably, her eyes once more found the tall man on the gray horse. The Mackinnon. An unusual name for an unusual man. An annoying man. But without doubt, a capable one. And breathtakingly handsome.

  Whatever she thought of his managing ways, no woman in creation would argue with the conclusion that he was very pleasant indeed to look at.

  * * *

  Chapter Three

  * * *

  For what felt like a long time, although Marina knew it couldn’t be, they plodded along in the dark. Papa became quieter with every yard, which was a troubling sign. He was usually the most voluble of men.

  She stared out at the dark hills crowding close around the frail brightness of the lanterns. Then a massive shape took form against the starless sky. Towers and turrets, and a blessed light shining through the gates.

  Dio, a castle indeed.

  The cart rattled across cobblestones and under a raised portcullis. Her father groaned at the sudden bumping, and she tightened her grip on his hand. “Almost there, Papa.”

  As they rolled into a courtyard lit with flaming torches, Marina had the bizarre sensation that she retreated several centuries to an earlier, less civilized time. A time when rough Highlanders seized the women they wanted and bundled them away to a mountain fastness to provide strong sons for the clan.

  Something primitive and powerful stirred inside her. Something that felt almost like excitement. It was clear she’d been reading too much of Sir Walter Scott’s poetry on this journey into the north.

  “I promised ye a castle,” a soft, faintly mocking voice said at her side. The Mackinnon now rode beside the cart. The sight of her home for the night had been so overwhelming, it had diverted her attention from her host.

  “And you’re a man of your word,” she said, cursing the betraying rasp in her reply.

  “I’ll show you over the place in the morning, if you like.”

  “Thank you, but as soon as Papa is splinted up and able to travel, we’ll be on our way.”

  He laughed, still with that mocking note. “Will ye indeed?”

  “Although I appreciate you coming to our rescue and offering to put us up.” She paused and frowned. “That is, if you are.”

  “No, lassie, I’ve brought ye here just so you can sit outside on the brae in the rain, shivering and wondering what’s going on inside beside the fire.”

  She studied his face, through long habit breaking it up into patterns of planes and colors. His bone structure was extraordinarily pure. For a dazed interval, she became lost in that perfect symmetry. Then she blinked as what he’d said registered. “I beg your pardon?”

  “If I’m feeling generous, I might send ye out a bowl of cold porridge. Then again, I might not.”

  The remarkable face was expressionless. She blinked again. “You’re joking.”

  His lips twitched. “Aye, I am at that. Let’s get your father inside and onto a bed. He must be ready to rest somewhere comfortable.”

  “Si, si, pronto,” her father said weakly.

  More impressive efficiency and people scurrying in every direction to do the Mackinnon’s bidding. Marina saw her father ensconced in a cozy chamber and watched as an elderly woman with greater skills than hers replaced the makeshift splint with a more substantial support. An ingenious wicker cage raised the blankets over the broken leg and kept the weight off the injured limb.

  “Aye, it’s a bad break, but it could be worse,” the woman said in a singsong voice.” Aye, it could, it could. Rest and quiet will fix this.”

  Papa slumped back against the heaped pillows, and his face had turned a worrying shade of white. Changing the splint had been a painful process.

  “Should we get a doctor?” Marina asked.

  “The nearest doctor is thirty miles away, lassie. Dinna fash yeself. I’ve been caring for Achnasheen’s bumps and scrapes for the last fifty years. Ye’ll no’ do better with the quack at Strathcarron.”

  “I’m sorry if I offended you.”

  The old lady shook her head. “No reason ye should ken our ways. The Mackinnon has entrusted your father to me. I willnae let him—or you—down.”

  More homage to the omnipotent Mackinnon. Santo cielo, no wonder the man was insufferable.

  “Now I’ll show ye to your chamber, and ye can get out of that gown and get ready to have supper with the laird. I dinna want another patient on my hands, and it’s no’ the night to be standing around in wet clothes.”

  Despite the protection of the coachman’s aromatic coat, Marina’s dress was uncomfortably clammy. She’d remained close to the roaring fire to keep from shivering. When they’d reached the castle, the Mackinnon had ordered her to her room so she could change, but she’d insisted that first she’d see her father settled. Her host hadn’t appreciated her defiance, even on such a minor matter.

  “I’ll come back and sit with Papa, once I’ve put on something dry,” Marina said quickly.

  “Och, I’ll see your da eats his dinner, then I’ll give him a wee sleeping draft. There’s nothing for ye to do here, lassie.”

  With reluctance, she complied, not least because the o
ld lady was almost as authoritative as her master. And good manners insisted Marina offer some polite return for the laird’s hospitality and for putting his household out to care for two strangers in trouble.

  It seemed dinner with the Mackinnon was inescapable. If only the laird didn’t send her composure whirling into the wind. She felt much more like her capable, assured self when glittering gray eyes didn’t observe her every move.

  Her room was next door to her father’s and quite as well appointed, with another blazing fire, and a shy young girl of about sixteen who prepared a hot bath for her. When Marina caught the scent of lavender rising from the steaming water, she almost groaned with longing. The long day’s travel, the effects of being flung around the carriage, and a wait in the cold had left her tired and stiff and aching.

  More thoughtfulness from the laird? If he meant to give her a good meal as well, she could almost forgive him for being such an imperious devil.

  By the time she ventured downstairs an hour later, she felt considerably more human. And her native cynicism had set in. The Mackinnon had impressed her, hard as she’d fought against his rugged appeal. But she’d been far from her best after the accident, and frantic about her father, too. Now that she met the laird in more prosaic circumstances—if this gothic setting could be described as prosaic—she was sure he’d shrink to mundane proportions.

  The maid had given her directions to the drawing room. Marina had stayed in several large country houses south of the border and was used to having footmen on hand to guide a confused guest, but this house wasn’t so conventionally staffed. From what she’d seen thus far, the Mackinnon had retainers rather than servants.

  She descended the wide stone staircase, decorated with heraldic beasts—the Mackinnon family crest appeared to feature a griffin—and crossed a cavernous hall lit with more burning torches. The walls were decorated with weapons arranged in concentric circles, and ghostly figures loomed out of ancient tapestries hanging from coffered ceiling to flagstoned floor. Marina shivered, not because of the cold this time, but with a return of that sensation that she ventured back into the distant past.

  If a man in surcoat and hose, or even a suit of armor, had greeted her when she stepped into the elegant drawing room, she wouldn’t have been surprised. Instead, the gentleman who turned away from the blazing fire at her arrival wouldn’t be out of place in one of those elegant English mansions she’d visited over recent weeks.

  Marina was almost sorry to find the Mackinnon wearing a beautifully tailored black coat and trousers, snowy neck cloth, and elegant silvery silk waistcoat. That austere face belonged to an earlier age, one of chivalry and faith and danger, not the modern world with all its comforts and compromises.

  He bowed like a civilized man. As he inclined in her direction, firelight sheened across his thick auburn hair. What an intense red it was, like flame. The extraordinary color held her transfixed, and her fingers curled at her side as if she held a paintbrush.

  When she didn’t curtsy straightaway, familiar ironic amusement lit the gray eyes. In a way, they were as remarkable a color as his hair. Oh, dear, any hopes that less dramatic circumstances might banish his larger-than-life air faded fast.

  “Good evening, signorina. You found me withnae difficulty?”

  “I’m sorry.” She performed a wobbly curtsy. “You must think I’m utterly rag-mannered.”

  His lips quirked. “I think ye held your nerve with stalwart courage through some difficult hours, and now you’re tired.”

  All that was true, but she had a horrible suspicion that weariness wasn’t what made her pulses flutter and her breath catch in her chest.

  She couldn’t mistake the admiration in his eyes as he surveyed her. Peggy, her maid upstairs, had made the best of the ill-fitting dress and had done a good job with Marina’s mass of slippery black hair, weaving it into an elegant chignon and decorating it with some pearl pins.

  As Marina rose from her curtsy, the Mackinnon took her hand. Heat rushed up her arm and set her heart skipping and racing like a spring lamb. She might be tired and sore after her ordeal, but right now the world appeared brighter and more vivid than it had this afternoon. Life just seemed more…lively in the Mackinnon’s presence.

  Maledizione, this really wasn’t good.

  At twenty-eight, she was old enough to guess what lay behind this wealth of uncontrollable physical reactions. Her brain might tell her that this man was far too used to getting his own way for her ever to become his friend. While her unruly female body wanted to spread itself before him and invite him to do whatever wicked things he wanted.

  She was used to discouraging predatory men. A woman who dealt with gentlemen through business as often as she did met flirtation, and sometimes propositions that went way beyond flirtation.

  What was exceptional—and worrying—about her encounter with this forthright Scotsman was that her first reaction wasn’t the usual vexation, but anticipation and a slow, swirling heat in the pit of her stomach.

  “I see my sister’s dress fits you, although it’s a trifle short.”

  “I owe your sister a debt.”

  She tried not to notice how his glance flickered down to the ankles on display beneath the pretty yellow gown with its delicate lace trim. His sister also owned the stockings and filmy undergarments. Marina hid a shiver as she imagined this man choosing her intimate clothing, although more likely he’d set a servant to the task.

  There had been a selection of shoes of various sizes waiting in her room, too. “You even found slippers to fit me.”

  “Aye. We raided every wardrobe in the house to find those. They’re my Great-Aunt Frances’s. My sister is small and blonde.”

  And Marina was tall and dark. She blushed—and she never blushed—to realize that her hand remained in his. “Well, they’ve both come to my rescue,” she stammered like some fool of a debutante attending her first assembly.

  “Come and sit beside me and have a glass of wine. Dinner willnae be long.”

  Sitting next to him seemed unwise, but making a fuss would only draw attention to her prickling awareness of his proximity. She drew a shaky breath and decided to pretend that she was used to evenings alone with dashing gentlemen.

  Keeping hold of her hand, the Mackinnon led Marina across to a velvet-covered chaise longue and waited for her to sit before he took his place beside her. More fluttery feelings in her stomach, and she hardly noticed her aches and pains anymore.

  Perhaps, she thought without much conviction, she was just hungry. It was a long time since she’d eaten. She tried to muster a bit of backbone by telling herself he was pushing her around again. But after the day she’d had, it was marvelously soothing to accept his care and admiration, even if it came with a side dish of command.

  Marina cast around for some subject to distract him from watching her with such unabashed masculine interest. “No dogs?”

  His gaze didn’t waver. “They’re down in the kitchen, hoping for scraps.”

  She pretended interest in a gloomy landscape across the room, although if anyone had asked her, she couldn’t have named a single object in the painting. She had a sinking feeling that if she met the Mackinnon’s eyes, he’d guess her unwilling fascination with him. She developed an inkling that this was a man who understood a woman’s weaknesses—and how to take advantage of them. “What are their names?”

  “Macushla and Brecon. They’re brother and sister. Their father Bailey was the best dog in Scotland. He died of old age last year.”

  The sadness in his voice made her stop avoiding his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “Aye, so am I. He was the companion of my youth. I still feel like his ghost is running at Banshee’s heels when we’re galloping over the hills.”

  “Perhaps it is,” she said softly. She fought a crazy urge to take the elegant hand that rested on his thigh and offer comfort. They were chance-met strangers. There was no reason for her heart to melt at the love in his voice when he
spoke of his old dog. “I like dogs.”

  “Do you have one?”

  “No, I’m away from home too often to have a pet.”

  “And am I permitted to ken the name of the bonny lassie who likes dogs and who owes such a debt of gratitude to my sister Clarissa?”

  Shocked, she straightened. She struggled to ignore that sneaky “bonny” in his question. “Cielo, we never did introduce ourselves, did we?”

  His long, expressive mouth twisted with the mocking humor she now knew was characteristic. “For most of our acquaintance, we had other things on our minds. I’m Fergus Mackinnon.”

  “The Mackinnon.”

  “Aye. I’m the chief of the clan, and Laird of Achnasheen.”

  That smooth baritone turned the three syllables of the place name into music. “What a lovely name for an estate.”

  “It means ‘field of rain.’ Which as you’ve discovered today is regrettably accurate.”

  “At least it stopped after a little while.”

  “Still, you didn’t get the best introduction to my home, Signorina…?”

  “My name is Marina Lucchetti.”

  “And you’re Italian?”

  “Half. Mamma was a wellborn English lady. She met Papa in Florence when she was eighteen and eloped with him.”

  “So that explains why ye speak like a Sassenach.”

  “Sassenach?”

  “Aye, the English.”

  Her mother had tutored her in British history. She could well imagine her accent wasn’t a welcome sound in this corner of the world.

  “I hope you’ll overlook my unfortunate antecedents,” she said with a smile that came far too easily. “Perhaps it will help if I tell you Mamma’s family disowned her after her marriage, and I’ve never met them.”

  “In the circumstances, I’ll forgive the connection, then.”

  She gave a gurgle of laughter and didn’t miss the interest brightening his eyes. “Grazie.”

  He rose and crossed to lift a decanter from the sideboard. “I hope you don’t mind dining with me. I realize it’s not strictly proper for us to be alone, but we’re not so finicky about the rules of society here in the Highlands as they are down in London. If you’d rather, I can have a tray sent to your room. Or I could ask one of the maids to sit with us if you’d like a chaperone. But it’s a pity to waste the chance for some interesting conversation, when I get so few visitors at Achnasheen.”