Rogue with a Brogue (24 page)

“I thought ye were keeping watch,” he said in a low voice, dragging the opposite bench closer and sitting.

“Just warming my innards. Ye've returned early from the dance, aye?”

“Aye.”

Peter glanced up at him. “Should I nae ask ye more aboot that, then?”

“Nae, ye shouldnae.”

Putting it in words could only diminish the evening, anyway. He'd been Mary's first, and he had every intention of being her only. She'd even left her logic aside for a moment, which left him hope that she would be able to choose him over her clan when the time came for it.

Walking out of that room with her sitting naked and disheveled and lovely was likely the most difficult thing he'd ever done. But as long as he was the pursuer, he remained uncertain of her own level of commitment. And with what would certainly lie ahead of them, she needed to decide for herself how far she was willing to go, how much she was willing to do. He knew what
he
was willing to do, but it would take both of them not only to survive this, but to make a future together. For God's sake, he'd intentionally not taken any precautions with her. She could be carrying his child, even now.

The maid brought him a mug and he downed it, blinking a little when the brew turned out to be a bitter beer rather than ale. He could be a father. A year ago with some lass from the Highlands the idea would have dismayed him; he was a MacLawry of the clan MacLawry, and he couldn't afford to be so careless. Tonight, though, he felt … not precisely content, but satisfied. This was the path he was meant to tread, and he was with the woman who would walk it beside him. The only uncertainty was whether she'd yet realized that or not.

“Ye're quiet, Mr. Fox,” Peter commented, working more methodically on his own mug. “I do have Howard up in the stable loft keeping an eye on the road while I'm in here. I'll go oot again in a minute.”

“I doubt anyone has figured out where we are yet, Peter. But I'm still not ready to stop looking over my shoulder.”

“Ye should be looking in front of yerself, as well, ye know. She is a Campbell. Aye, she's pretty, but ye can nae trust a Campbell. She'll smile at ye while she puts a dagger into yer gizzard.”

“My gizzard is safe. Mary wouldnae hurt me.” Not physically, anyway.

“If ye say so. I dunnae trust either of those females.” He sat back again and took another swallow. “So we're to keep strolling aboot this damned soft country and staying at these cozy inns while death comes hunting ye? Because even if they've nae found our trail yet, they will.”

“Death may be hunting me, but I'd wager it's still looking in the wrong place.” That was why they'd decided to avoid the North Road; once the Campbells—and Ranulf—realized what had happened, they would search along the quickest route north. Except that his odd little party was half a hundred miles west of it.

“If ye say so. I know yer brother, though, and he knows ye. How much will ye wager that he'll nae come to the conclusion that ye didnae take the easier road?”

That was a good point, dammit all. “Let's speed our pace a little tomorrow, just to be safe,” he said. “We dunnae want to make it look like we're fleeing, but enough to get us to the Highlands by the end of the week.”

“Aye. That's the best news I've had in a fortnight. Once we get there, though, do ye still mean to marry the Campbell lass?”

“I do, if she'll have me. I suppose it depends on whether she prefers being Alkirk's granddaughter to being my wife.”

“Bah.”

“Bah?”

“Ye've become too civilized, lad. A MacLawry doesnae allow anyone else to decide the course of his life. He sees what he wants and finds a way to claim it. Tooth, claw, sword, rifle, or mind.” He tapped a forefinger against his temple. “Just like yer brother's doing. If ye want her, take her.”

Arran frowned even as a second tankard arrived to replace the first one. Its contents disappeared just as quickly. “Ranulf's turning himself into a Sasannach,” he grumbled. “I want no kinship to that. Because he's nae laying claim to Charlotte; he's twisting himself inside oot to be what she wants.”

“She proposed to him, ye know. He didnae bend a knee nor bow his head, from what I heard.”

“He's bowing now.”

“Why, because he's talking to the Stewarts and those Sasannach lords? How else could he purchase their land in the Highlands? I reckon those prissy lords are the ones bowing to him. And well they should. By the end of the month he'll own more of Scotland than Prince Georgie does. At least that's what Owen says.”

What?
Why hadn't he known that Ranulf was purchasing land? He was generally the one in whom his brother confided. Yes, Ran had asked for support, but Arran had thought the marquis had become set on making friends with the English lords because it pleased Charlotte for him to do so. Just as he'd decided to ally with the Stewarts to gain their trade contacts. He had no idea Ranulf had been purchasing English- and Stewart-owned land.

Peter began to look concerned. “Should I nae have said anything aboot that? I know his lairdship didnae want to argue with ye aboot spreading our cotters thin, but Owen didnae say it was a secret. And we all know we need the land, with us taking in Campbell and Gerdens and Daily cotters. So—”

“It's fine, Peter,” he interrupted. Whatever he'd missed, it was his own fault. Had he been that distracted by London? By Mary? And he'd accused Ranulf of losing his head over Charlotte. Far from it, evidently. His brother had been using his time in London to make more room for their own people, even the newly adopted ones. And now he'd gone and destroyed the truce with the Campbells—at a time that couldn't have been worse for any of this.

“Thank ye fer saying so, Mr. Fox,” Peter drawled, looking relieved.

“Nae. Thank ye, Peter. I may have been a damned fool, and nae even realized it.” And he would more than likely never be forgiven for it. But had it been worth it? He could answer that with every beat of his heart. If she loved him, it was worth it.

“Well, I'd best get back to watching the road,” the footman said, rising a bit unsteadily. “With his one eye, that Howard's only half a lookout, at best.”

Arran forced a grin. “Dunnae fall out of the hayloft. Ye'd send all the Highlands lasses into mourning.”

“Aye. And half them Sasannach ones, too.” Peter buttoned up his coat and pulled a pair of rough gloves from his pocket. “I nearly forgot,” he commented, freeing an envelope from the tangle of gloves. “I saw that female bringing this doon fer tomorrow's mail, and I thought ye might want a look at it.”

“Which female?” Arran asked, taking the letter and flipping it over to see the Mathering House address neatly written across the front.

“The square-jawed one. Crawford. I thought she might be sending word of her whereaboots to Campbell kin or someaught.”

“Aye, it's someaught.” He didn't even hesitate before tearing open the plain wax seal. Whatever it was, Crawford was not going to be sending letters to Mary's parents. Swiftly he unfolded it.

“Dear Lord Fendarrow,” he read, his eyes narrowing and growing anger making his fingers clench into the paper. “On the chance that my previous letter missed you, I again inform you that Lord Arran MacLawry has forcibly taken Lady Mary and myself from the Giant's Pipe Inn. We are presently in the village of Wigmore, and will resume traveling north in the morning. I will once again do my utmost to slow our flight, but our kidnapper is determined to drag us into the Highlands. After that, it will be too late to prevent this catastrophe from being known. It may be too late already. Please come in all haste! Ever your servant, Eunice Crawford.”

“Peter,” he said, keeping his voice low and even, “ye and Howard hitch up a fresh pair of horses. Then come up and help me get the luggage down. We're leaving in twenty minutes.”

“Aye, m'laird. Might I ask—”

“This is a second letter. The Campbells know where we are. Or bloody near enough.”

The footman's ruddy expression paled a little. “I'll see to it.”

As Peter hurried off, Arran strode for the stairs. At Mary's room he shoved at the door, but it was latched. Balling a fist, he pounded. Hard. “Mary! Open the door!”

Inside he heard a smattering of sharp-voiced conversation, and then the door clicked and opened. “What's wrong?” Mary asked, sleepy-eyed in the white night rail he'd purchased for her.

If he'd been less angry, the way she looked would have completely distracted him. As it was, he wordlessly handed her the letter and then moved past her slender form into the room. “You,” he growled, jabbing a finger at the battle-axe in her mobcap and high-necked night rail where she stood on the near side of the bed. “What did the first letter say?”

Her pale features grayed around the edges, but she kept her chin high. “I'm not speaking to you, you rogue.”

“Call me whatever ye like, but ye
will
tell me aboot the other letter.” Arran took a long step forward, using his height to force her to look up even farther, changing her stance from defiant to submissive.

It didn't seem to have any effect. “I am not employed by you,” she declared.

“I dunnae—”

Mary pushed past him. “What did you do, Crawford?” she demanded, snapping the missive against her palm. “When did you send the first letter, and what did you say?”

The maid didn't alter her expression. “I am in the employ of the Marquis of Fendarrow. In his absence, I will do whatever is necessary to protect his reputation and that of his fam—”

“Arran, do you have two pounds?” Mary interrupted, turning her back on Crawford to hold a hand out to him.

Wordlessly he pulled two coins from his pocket and placed them into her palm. If she meant them to be set over the dead maid's eyes he would have preferred that she use shillings, but he couldn't disapprove the gesture.

Rather than throwing the blunt at Crawford, though, Mary turned and left the room. Immediately the maid started forward, but Arran took a step sideways to block her exit. “Ye're nae going anywhere.”

“I will scream,” she retorted.

“Scream till crows fall from the sky, ye witch. Ye'll still nae leave this room until we decide what to do with ye. And I favor putting ye in a hole in the ground and shoveling dirt over ye.”

“I am only doing my duty. How dare you!”

“Yer duty. Bah. Ye've set an angry group of men after us. What, ye think they'll nae consider that Mary is ruined? Ye think she'll return to London and everything will be as it was?”

“I think this entire venture is all your idea, and your fault.”

“Mayhap that's so, but she's in it now. And she's here because she didnae want the life her father decided for her.”

“That is not her decision.”

Mary topped the stairs again, her expression even grimmer than before. “I think ye have the wrong of that, Crawford,” he returned, and faced his lass. “Is everything well, Mary?”

“Yes. Help me gather my things, will you, Arran?”

“Aye. We need to be oot of here before we're caught.”

While Crawford, arms folded, continued glaring at them from one corner, they tossed Mary's new clothes and toilette items into the small trunk he'd purchased for her. She held back one plain green muslin, and crossed into his room to shed her night rail and pull it on. However much he would have liked to follow her to watch, he wasn't inclined to leave the maid unsupervised. Now was not the time for her to attempt again to convince Mary to return to London or to wait there at the inn for her father's arrival.

Peter trotted up the stairs, and Arran set him to watch Crawford while he hastily packed his own trunk. He carried it into the hallway and set it down. “There ye go, Peter. Get them loaded as quick as ye can.”

“Aye, m'laird.”

Mary approached again, and he moved behind her to close the trio of buttons running up her back. “Do ye have a preference over what we do aboot the battle-axe?” he asked, sending Crawford another glare. If Mary still wanted the maid with them he would agree to it, but only if she traveled bound and gagged and tied to her bedpost each night. And
that
he wouldn't compromise about.

“I've seen to it,” she said, a grim iron to her tone that he'd never heard before.

“If you continue on with him, my lady, you'll be ruined beyond anyone's ability to salvage. He's not only an enemy of your family, but he's a
Highlander,
for heaven's sake. A barbarian. It is my duty to guard you and your rep—”

“Not any longer, Crawford. Consider your employment terminated.” She took a breath. “And you likely should have considered that I'm a Highlander as well, before you went about insulting all of us.”

The maid's mouth opened and closed again, like a dying fish on a riverbank. “Your father hired me,” she finally gulped out. “You cannot hand me my papers.”

“I just did.” Mary turned as the blacksmith with whom she'd danced earlier came upstairs, a hammer and lumber in his hands. “If you please, Thomas.”

Crawford drew her hands up to her chest, an oddly girlish gesture for someone as severe as she was. Clearly she was mortified about being seen in her night rail by a stranger—though she hadn't so much as flinched when Arran barged into the room. “This—what do you think you're doing?”

“Making certain you cannot cause any more trouble.” The tavern maid appeared next, a tray holding a loaf of bread, a pitcher of water, and a glass in her hands. Mary took it with a nod and set it inside the doorway. “Goodbye, Mother Graves.”

The blacksmith started to close the door, but Arran stopped him with one hand. He wasn't surprised that his logical lass had figured out a way to dispose of the woman, but he
was
impressed. “One moment,” he said, not bothering to disguise his brogue any longer. Fendarrow knew where they were.