The Scot is Hers by Eliza Knight

6

Alec stared at the sopping wet, mud-covered, bedraggled lass where he’d placed her on the floor against the wall. Her cloak had fallen away from her head, revealing drenched hair, and in the light, he couldn’t decipher the color. Her cheeks were pale, her teeth chattered a little, and he realized the flimsy cloak she wore did little to keep her warm, not when the rest of her was drenched.

He also recalled all too well what the rush of nearly dying did to a body, sending chills to wrack the limbs. If only he had some whisky that he could give her. Alas, he’d not left his castle thinking he’d be on a rescue mission.

Alec removed his jacket and held it out to her. “Take off that wet cloak and put on my jacket.”

“But ye’ll be cold.”

Alec scoffed. He’d been colder before, in battle when temperatures dipped below freezing or sitting for hours exposed to the elements. “No’ as cold as ye, lass.”

She unfastened the hooks near her throat and wriggled free of the cloak, dropping the sodden cloth in a mound beside her. Then, she accepted his jacket with a grateful look and slipped it around her slim shoulders. The woman was tiny; he’d felt it when he held her in his arms. At least a foot shorter than himself, he’d guess.

Alec picked up her drenched cloak and wrung it out as best he could before spreading it out on the ground, well away from the rain, to dry.

“What are ye doing out here?” she asked. “I told ye my reason, but ye never did give me yours. My guess is ye do no’ lie in wait in the abbey ruins for damsels falling off their horses.”

Alec turned around to face her, finding it difficult not to smile at her teasing. She’d tucked her knees up around her chest, and his jacket was wrapped around her legs.

“Ye should elevate your ankle the way I had it,” he said. “It helps alleviate the swelling.”

She didn’t argue but put her foot back on the stone where he’d placed it before, revealing the now-brown stocking of her shapely calf. The lass tried to adjust her skirts to cover what she exposed, but the fabric of her skirt was not cooperating. Finally, she gave up and leaned her head back against the wall, eyes closed as if she were gathering strength. Alec racked his brain for a way to impart comfort, but then her eyes popped open, and she flashed him a saucy smile.

“Any other orders, my lord?” The level of sarcasm in her tone was unnerving.

Alec cleared his throat, deciding to ignore her bait. “Ye mentioned we’d met before. Where?”

The chit bit her lip, nodded and looked away. Definitive signs of withholding information and a reluctance to share. The glee she’d expressed a moment ago evaporated. He was starting to get whiplash from her emotions. Teasing and bold one minute, then closed off and tentative the next. Was it deliberate? He had to guess, given his experience with females, that it was. After all, his mother was classic for changing her moods to fit the environment or get something she wanted—or get rid of something she didn’t want.

Well, Alec wasn’t going to play any more games. He didn’t have the patience for it. He wanted to know exactly who she was and how deep into the rabbit hole he’d be, knowing she’d been engaged to Joshua Keith, that bastard. Was Keith going to storm Slains in the dead of night? Oh, aye, please do...Alec would relish the moment he had good cause to hold his blade to the man’s throat.

“Are ye going to tell me, lass, or am I going to turn to dust waiting?”

She pressed her hands around her ankle. “Since it’s only sprained and no’ broken, as soon as the rain clears, I’ll be on my way. Ye’ll no’ have to deal with me anymore.”

That was a quick and unexpected amendment. Also, she was changing the subject. Alec narrowed his gaze.

“No’ so fast, lass. Tell me who ye are.” Coming within only two feet of her, he crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at her the way he used to stare down at the wayward recruits in his regiment.

“Giselle Hepburn.”

Worked every time. Alec grinned with satisfaction. Guess he hadn’t lost his touch.

He cocked his head to the side, considering her name. Giselle, Giselle...but there was no recognition in the recesses of his mind. The truth was, he wasn’t very good with names, or the list of those within the peerage either. “Does no’ ring a bell, lass.”

She huffed a breath, clearly annoyed with him. “My da is the Earl of Bothwell.”

Well, he knew that name and the man. They weren’t close, but they had come into contact plenty of times in the House of Lords. There was nothing particularly memorable about the man. Good, bad, Alec was indifferent. So how the hell had he come across this chit before that she remembered him? He might have been bad with names, but he thought he’d remember a lass like her. In her company for less than an hour, he’d already picked up on her personality traits.

“Ah, well, I am acquainted with your father. But I can no’ recall meeting ye.”

“Ye’ve made that clear. Why no’ say it again in case the crows did no’ pick up on it?”

Ooh, so the lass had a little bite in with her wit. Had he been shouting? He didn’t think so. Seemed as if one of those responses meant to deflect attention. Alec grinned all the more. The lass was quite revealing in her moods and thoughts, even if she didn’t mean to be.

She huffed in annoyance—and resignation. “We met a couple of years ago at the ball your mother threw in your honor after your return from the Peninsular War.”

So she was one to the rotten lassies who’d made his night awful, he supposed. Which one had she been? The one who blanched so white she could have disappeared into a cloud if it came to earth? Or maybe she was the lass who’d gagged when he kissed her hand, her revulsion so palpable even he’d shuddered. The reactions from the lassies always surprised him. For certes, his scar was heinous, but it didn’t make him a leper, for bloody’s sake. And he’d done his best to grow a beard that covered nearly half the grotesqueness.

“That explains a lot,” he said, turning away from her. He went to examine the rain, which was not relenting. The sky had turned an ominous dark gray, nearly black in spots. If she’d been one of those lasses, then he didn’t want anything to do with her, no matter how intrigued he was by her now. But being the gentleman he was, Alec couldn’t leave her here and send word back to her father at Keith’s house to come and get her.

“What do ye mean by that?” she asked.

“Nothing.” He certainly didn’t want to get into it with her about how rude the lasses had been since he’d come back to Scotland with the scar, and he didn’t blame them. Alec touched the mark on his cheek, running down the length. Though it wasn’t as bad as they made it out to be, now that he had his beard, he supposed it did make him look a little terrifying. Or more so, it reminded them of the brutality of war. How cushy their own lives were.

Spoiled rotten, the lot of them.

Lady Giselle tried to stand, scooting her spine up the stone wall with her hands planted on the surface, but she winced and sat back down heavily, a sigh of disappointment on her lips. Seemed she was more eager to escape him than he first thought. Didn’t that figure?

“Just rest,” he grumbled. “When the rain stops, I’ll see that ye get back to where ye came from.” He couldn’t even force himself to say the bastard’s name, and he let out a low prayer that the rain ended bloody well soon.

Alec stared out over the landscape through the sheets of rain and darkened sky. It hit him all of the sudden that if his mother had not decided to throw her ridiculous secret party at his castle, that the woman sitting behind him would have fallen over the cliff. In a twisted way, his meddling mother was to thank for the wee nuisance being alive, albeit slightly injured. And how ironic that she was one of the chits to torment him years ago, and here he’d become her rescuer. Well, if that wasn’t Fate kicking him in the ballocks.

“I was at that ball, sir,” Lady Giselle said, cutting into his thoughts, her tone shaper than before. “But we did no’ meet on the dance floor.”

“Ye’re a wallflower?” With that mouth, he wasn’t surprised.

Even covered in mud, he thought she was probably decent-looking enough that she’d not be completely ignored. Hard to tell when she looked as if she’d rolled around with a bunch of pigs. Had to be her attitude that kept her away from the other lads.

She laughed, the sound as bitter as some he’d pushed out in the last couple of years. “Some might say so. However, it’s my own choice. But nay, no’ that night. We met in the garden.”

Alec narrowed his eyes and turned more fully to face her. It couldn’t be...studying the hair matted to the top of her head, the still pale, mud-streaked cheeks, and the earnest eyes that glared up at him with a challenge in their depths, he realized that there was something indeed familiar about her. Alec flashed back to the garden, dawning understanding and recognition hitting him in the gut.

Her words returned to him, how she hadn’t thought of him since that night. How very opposite their reactions had been, for he’d not stopped thinking about her since then. It had been so refreshing to spar with a woman who couldn’t care less about the scar on his face. He’d attempted to find out who she was but never was successful. He’d half convinced himself that she’d not been real.

“Ah, aye, I do remember ye.” It was an effort to keep his voice measured. She’d been the one lass who hadn’t been intimidated by him. And she didn’t appear to be now either. Alec’s heartbeat sped up, and a thrumming hummed in his veins. “Ye refused to give me your name then, Lady Giselle. I appreciate ye telling me now.”

A crack of lightning lit up the abbey ruins, and he caught sight of the quirk of her lips, a smile so fleeting it disappeared with the bright light. He thought she was bonnie, mud and all.

“Perhaps I should have kept the mystery going a little longer,” she said. “Though I daresay neither of us wants to meet under such circumstances again. We keep finding each other at our worst. Ye punching garden walls and me falling off of cliffs. A friendship between us seems doomed to fail. Best we keep going our separate ways.”

Friendship. So she didn’t find him worthy of even that. At least she respected him enough—to be honest, that was refreshing. Almost as revitalizing as her not finding him to be utterly hideous.

“If ye help me up,” she wiggled her hand toward him, “I can try to mount my horse and be on my way. Out of your hair, and then ye can return to stalking this pile of rocks to your heart’s content.”

Alec stared at her outstretched hand and considered it. Life would be much less complicated if he sent her on her way. But for the last few years, he’d been exceptionally bored, holed up in his castle. Perhaps what he needed was a bit of a complication.

“Och, nay. I’ll no’ be the one to let ye ride out in this storm. ’Tis too dangerous, and with your ankle like that, ye’ll find it painful to ride. We’ll have to stay here until it settles.” All of that was true. But what he didn’t say was he rather relished the idea of Keith coming to find her and having the chance to punish the man who was the downfall of everything. Sir Joshua Keith was his sworn enemy. Alec was itching for a reason to put their feud to rest. To see that bastard pay the way Alec and so many others had.

Giselle let out a sigh that didn’t sound half as disappointed as he thought she meant it to. “And so I find myself alone with ye once more.”

“Aye, although this time, I hardly think ye need to be worried about anyone stumbling upon us. No’ just yet anyway.”

“Right about now, my mother will discover I’m no’ in my room.” She scrubbed her hands over her face, washing away some of the mud that had started to dry. “She’ll tear through the castle looking for me. Probably scare most of the servants. Father will blame her for my disappearance. Threaten to send her away, most likely.”

Alec chuckled. “Does he threaten that often?”

Giselle shrugged. “They were meant for each other. What of ye? Who will be searching for ye when they discover ye are missing?”

“My mother. But she’ll figure I’m avoiding the disastrous tea she’s got planned with a dozen uninvited ladies. I do no’ think it would cross her mind I’d left the castle because she would no’ leave the castle. ’Tis hard for her to separate her actions and desires from others.”

“Huh. I know what that’s like. I’m also eluding a disastrous tea. And I daresay the single bachelor I’m avoiding marriage with outweighs any of the ninnies awaiting your company. When do ye think our mothers will notice we’ve left the castle grounds?”

The lass had a point. He’d rather deal with the nitwits at Slains than be bound for life to Sir Joshua Keith. “Perhaps another hour or so for ye, after they’ve scoured the castle and outbuildings looking for ye. I think I’ve got a little longer.” His mother would be discreet about it, not wanting her precious guests to catch wind of what she and most of society would deem as inappropriate behavior.

“Will the countess send out a search party?” Lady Giselle asked.

Alec shrugged. “She will try, but my friends will tell her no’ to do so yet.”

“Your friends? Ye’re evading them as well?”

He nodded solemnly, feeling a little bit guilty about that. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see them. Hell, if it had only been them, he would have stayed. But the simpering potential brides his mother had convinced to join them all were not worth the struggle it would take to make an appearance.

“An unfortunate side effect of the situation,” he said. “Now, tell me. Were ye and Sir Joshua intending to join the festivities at Slains?”

“Goodness, I do no’ think so. At least, an invitation was no’ mentioned to me.” She shook her head. “If anything, I feel as though I was about to be locked up and never heard from again.”

“Is that so?” Alec didn’t doubt it.

“Aye.” She ran her hands over her wet hair and started to fiddle with threading a long, messy plait at the back, winding the tendrils with deft fingers, before unwinding it again and running her hands through the locks.

Giselle didn’t expound on her words but seemed to drift off into her thoughts as she concentrated on ringing the water from her hair.

The lass was confounding. On the one hand, she had decided to betroth herself to one of the worst people Alec had ever met, and yet on the other, she’d escaped him in a dangerous storm. What was she really about? Other than being silly and apparently reckless.

“Why did ye agree to marry Keith?”

She stopped the movement of her hands and looked at him as if he’d gone mad. “Agree?” That bitter laugh escaped her again. “I think ye misunderstand me. I did no’ agree.”

“Ye were being forced?”

“I said as much before. Do pay attention. Besides, I’m a lady, and we do no’ really have a choice anyway, do we? Our das, older brothers, guardians, whoever it may be, decide our future based on what’s good for them. No’ so much what is good for us.”

Alec frowned. He hadn’t ever thought about it that way. If he had a younger sister, he would be very different, consider her feelings. No one should be made to be miserable for the rest of their days.

Marriage had been one of the last things on his mind until his mother barged into his castle this afternoon. He supposed Lady Giselle’s opinion made sense, given the disgust he’d faced when at the various events his mother had forced on him. The lasses there had not wanted to meet him or subject themselves to him, and yet they had at their parents’ behest.

“I’ll no’ force a woman to marry me,” he vowed with a study nod.

Lady Giselle snorted and resumed plaiting her hair. “How very noble of ye, but I suspect when ye decide ye want something, ye’re no’ afraid to get it.”

Alec grunted. “A lass is no’ a thing, and I’ll no’ take such an undertaking as finding a wife as something so trivial to get.”

Giselle snorted. “Interesting. Ye mean to say ye know something of wooing? That ye’d want your wife actually to like ye, maybe love ye?”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Ye dinna believe me? Of course, I know something of wooing. And obviously, I want her to like me. Love, however, I know is a fleeting emotion.”

“I am no’ in a position to believe ye or no’. After all, I did no’ nickname ye the Beast of Errol for no reason.”

Alec sputtered, “Beast of Errol. Of all the—”

She interrupted him, continuing as if he’d said nothing. “All I can tell ye is my own experience, and it has no’ been positive. I’ve put off marrying as far as my parents seemed willing to let me, and now they’ve foisted Sir Joshua Keith on my head. And he has foisted himself on me, despite my protestations. There is no like, and certainly no love, in our forced connection.”

Alec started from his irritation at being labeled a beast of anything, focusing on the words she’d just articulated. “He forced himself on ye?” He balled his hands into fists. He didn’t know the lass well, but that didn’t matter. He’d be irate on her behalf where Sir Joshua was concerned. That bastard deserved a sound beating. And he wouldn’t put it past him to ill-treat a woman either. How many times when they’d been overseas had he needed to intervene on a camp lightskirt’s behalf where Keith was concerned? The bastard was an arsehole.

She waved her hand in the air as if batting away a fly. “No’ in the way ye’re thinking. But I imagine if I’d no’ made my feelings clear by running away, that was likely to come next.” The way she spoke so matter-of-factly as if this were nothing, an everyday occurrence, made his chest burn with anger.

“Do your parents know he’s such a cad? I’d be happy to tell them for ye.” Oh, do please let me tell them. Better yet, he’d show them by punching Keith square in the jaw.

Lady Giselle glanced over at him sharply. “Ye do no’ like Sir Joshua Keith.” It wasn’t a question but rather an astute acknowledgment of the truth.

“Was I so obvious?” Alec didn’t keep the sarcasm from his voice.

She nodded, and in a flash of lightning, he could see her smile. “I do no’ blame ye. I find him to be quite terrible.”

“Something we have in common.” However, Alec would have used a much harsher word than terrible.

“Then ye’ve changed your mind and promise to keep my secret.”

“Maybe.”

“I’ll take maybe over nay. Your lips are sealed.”

The truth was, right about now, Alec would be fine if they both never returned to their prospective purgatories. The ruined, dreary, soaked abbey felt a whole lot better anyway. He could hunt, provide food—that was until the winter months came and they needed more suitable shelter. But by then, his mother’s guests should have left, and they could take over his castle.

Alec steadied his gaze on Lady Giselle. She grinned at him, a teasing glint in the set of her mouth and the twinkle in her eyes. It was the first real smile he’d seen from her since yanking her from certain death, and the very sight of it took his breath away, mud-splattered and all.

Alec was amazed. The lass wasn’t shying away from him. She wasn’t cowering in shock. Or begging him to return her from where she’d run. It felt so odd to be treated like a man and not some mindless barbarian. Like a partner almost, in a crime they’d both fashioned.

Alec had a sudden recollection of the first time they’d met in the garden in Edinburgh. She’d not cowered when she looked at him then either. If he remembered correctly, she was a feisty woman who’d given him a dressing down. Teased him then as she did now. The banter between the two of them then was as easy as it was now.

“Ye did no’ say what your parents think of Keith. Have ye told them what he did?”

Lady Giselle’s smile faltered, and he watched her fidget with the ends of her hair where she’d tied a ribbon that had come loose from her hair. She frowned off into the distance.

“I’ve tried to tell them, but they will no’ listen,” she mused, then flicked her gaze toward his. There seemed something else on the tip of her tongue, but she didn’t continue, leaving him to try and guess what it was she’d been about to divulge.

“Seems your parents are as stubborn as my mother, for I’ve tried to parley to her on numerous occasions that I wish for her to stop throwing me parties that I do no’ want to attend.” Alec kept to himself exactly the type of parties his mother threw, for it was an embarrassment to admit that on some level, his mother felt he needed her to find him a wife because he wasn’t capable of doing so himself. “Until today, she’d listened, and I’d been excused from the torment for the last few years.”

“’Twould be an interesting fate if they were locked in a room to contend with one another.”

“Och, but I’d no’ set Keith on my mother,” he said.

“Fair enough, but I meant our mothers, wee beastie. But, saints, Sir Joshua Keith is a bastard.” Her hands came to her mouth after that. “Oh my, I’m so sorry. My mother might have me hanged for such vulgar language in front of a gentleman.”

“Ye do no’ need to apologize to me, lass. Most would say I’m no gentleman. I’ve no’ got a care in the world if ye wish to use vulgar language.” He chuckled. “Hell, I’ll call him a bastard right along with ye. But honestly, wee beastie?”

Giselle chuckled. “I could no’ help it. Ye’re anything but wee, and well, beastie fits just as humorously.”

Alec groaned. “What shall I call ye?”

“Lady Giselle, of course. Could ye no’ tell? I am so verra ladylike.”

Now he laughed, and she let out a mock huff.

“Will ye tell me why ye hate Sir Joshua so much?” She eyed him curiously.

“’Tis a long story.”

Giselle turned, craning her neck as she peered out into the storm-filled skies, then lobbed a challenging squint back at him. “I think we’ve got time, would ye no’ say?”

Alec chuckled. “We do.”

“I’m all ears.” The lass settled back against the wall, her arms around her one tucked-up knee, and she stared at him with interest. “Do please go on.”

Again, Alec found himself almost speechless at her regard. There was not even a minuscule hint of wariness or scrutiny. Only curiosity. Being stared at by a woman without judgment was a rarity. Well, except for Lorne’s wife, Jaime, but they were friends and that didn’t count.

He couldn’t help but wonder if perhaps Lady Giselle was addled or missing a few brain cells. Whatever the case may be, she continued to surprise him.

Alec perched on a stone not too far from her, picked up a smaller bit of rubble and rolled it around his hands. “I’m no’ sure where to begin, but I suppose I can start with how we met. ’Twas here, in fact, as lads. With our castles no’ too far apart, we’d often meet up on the road, or our two families would get together for celebrations both formal and casual. So it happens I’ve known the man most of my life. And I’ve disliked him as long.”

Lady Giselle nodded. “So ye’re most definitely a good judge of his character.”

“Aye.” He knew Sir Joshua Keith as well as he knew himself.

“I’m relieved to hear it since I was starting to doubt my intuition.”

“Never doubt it, lass.” Alec tossed the rock toward the back of the abbey, where it cracked against a far wall. “When your gut gives ye the measure of someone, there is some truth to it. Especially when it tells ye to run.”

Giselle followed the path of the tossed stone. “Wise advice. I will endeavor to remember that. Do continue, please.”

“Keith was always competitive, even as a lad. We often found ourselves in rows, whether in or out of doors, and so I grew to hate him with a passion from early on. He’d often start a fight, and when we were caught, he always blamed me. My father’s belt got worn over the years that man was in my life.” Alec’s mount took that moment to nuzzle his shoulder, in search of a prize for waiting so long in the storm. He stood, reaching into a saddlebag and passing his horse and hers both pieces of a carrot.

“I’m guessing this rivalry continued into adulthood?”

“Aye. Only it got worse. When our regiments were assigned for the Peninsular War, he was placed under my command. But the bastard kept undermining all of my orders.”

“How?”

“Either downright disregarding them, or by telling the men below him to do the opposite, saying that it was me who’d changed tactic. It caused a lot of chaos. And worse—

it cost men their lives.”

“As if war isn’t hard enough, to have to deal with a soldier who wants to create more turmoil.”

“Exactly. I should have had him flogged, locked up, or sent back home, but I decided to give him one more chance. And I’ll never forgive myself for that.” Alec swiped a hand over his face, not certain he could go into more of what had happened between himself and Sir Joshua Keith. Besides those in the War Department and his commanding officer, Alec had never told another soul. Not even Lorne when he’d asked.

Giselle seemed content to sit and wait until he was ready. She picked at the rubble beside her, making a neat and tiny stack of stones in a row.

“He went against my orders when the French attacked us. As a result, we lost a good man to God, and another was abducted. And this…” He touched the scar on his face. “This was at his hand. But he’ll deny the truth, clutching it against his cold heart even to his grave.”

Giselle’s gaze whipped up to his. “Dear God, nay.”

“Aye. And to this day, he’s yet to apologize or take any responsibility. After I recovered, when the War Office questioned us on what happened that day, he blamed me.” Alec bristled at the memory. “Typical of the whoreson. Pardon my language.”

“Did they believe him?”

Alec shook his head. Thank God. “I set them straight on what had happened, and as there’d been many documented disputes with witnesses over the years, they believed me. Keith was levied a heavy fine for his insubordination, however.”

Giselle frowned. “That does no’ seem a fitting punishment for his crimes. He is wealthy enough to afford it. How is that a penalty?”

“He was wealthy. No’ so anymore.” Alec suspected that Keith had a gambling problem. There’d been several times he’d had to pull him out of gambling hells while they were overseas.

“What do ye mean?”

“He’s a lot of properties, but the Keith coffers have run dry. Likely why he’s so eager for ye to be his wife.”

Giselle was quiet for a few moments. “What would ye know of my family’s wealth?”

Alec grinned. “I make it my business to know the wealth of everyone.”

Giselle shook her head, a slight smile lifting the corner of her mouth. “’Tis a shame that ye had to contend with Keith and that he was the cause of ye losing your men.” She bit her lip and looked poised to say something but held her tongue.

“What is it?”

“Was the man who was abducted the Duke of Sutherland, perchance?”

Alec’s eyes widened. “Aye. And the one killed was Douglas. How did ye know about the duke?”

Her grin broadened, and she leaned forward, eager to share. “I am quite good friends with his wife.”

“Jaime?”

“Aye. Since we were wee lasses.”

That was a coincidence that was too good not to latch onto. “Well, isn’t that splendid. They are at my house as we speak.”

“Are they, truly?” Lady Giselle was nearly squealing at that bit of news. “In that case, our meeting was Fate. Ye must take me to your castle.”

It did indeed seem as if Fate had intervened in more ways than one. “Aye. It would no’ do for ye to ride back to Boddam alone or with me. There is only one choice. When the weather clears, I’d be happy to take ye to Slains to convalesce. Ye’ll no’ be able to go anywhere any time soon with that ankle.”

Giselle’s excitement faded. “I wish to never return to Boddam Castle.”

“I can understand that.” He only wanted to go there so he could wring Keith’s neck. So he supposed it was a good idea if he never did as well. Purgatory with his mother’s meddling seemed far better than the newly minted Calton Jail in Edinburgh.