One Night with the Laird. Nicola Cornick

you are indisposed?” Frazer spoke delicately, hovering by the terrace door.

      “No.” Mairi cleared her throat. “No, thank you. If I am to leave for Methven tomorrow, there will be no time to speak to him. But, Frazer—” She raised her chin. “Pray give me a moment.”

      The steward nodded.

      As soon as he had disappeared, Mairi made a beeline for the pier glass that hung to the left of the fireplace and checked her reflection. It was not as bad as she had thought, though her eyes looked strained and bright and there were lines at the corners she could have sworn were new. With a sigh she tucked a stray curl back beneath her bandeau and turned to face the door.

      When Jeremy Cambridge was announced she was standing behind her desk. She found she needed the physical barrier. Not that she needed protection against Jeremy. There was nothing remotely threatening about him. Jeremy’s father had been estate manager to Lord MacLeod, but he had had ambitions for his children to rise in society. He had sent Jeremy to university and his sister Eleanor to finishing school. Jeremy was now a respected banker in the city of Edinburgh and was among other things the MacLeod family’s man of business. He was large, solid and reliable. Steady. Safe. Mairi found herself thinking that he was the opposite of Jack Rutherford in every respect. He had nothing of Jack’s restless spirit or air of danger.

      “Lady Mairi.” They had known each other for a number of years, but Jeremy was never less than respectful. He held out a hand to shake hers. “I was passing by and called on the off chance that you might be at home. I hope I find you well.”

      “I am in very good health,” Mairi said. “No need for formality, Jeremy. Would you care for a cup of tea?”

      She saw him relax. His gray eyes warmed. “Of course, if you have the time to spare. Frazer tells me you leave for Methven tomorrow. Will you call on Lord and Lady MacLeod on your journey?”

      Mairi nodded. “I intend to. I hope Lady MacLeod will be well enough to see me.” Lord MacLeod would have received her letter by then. She paused, toying with the idea of confiding in Jeremy about the latest threat from Michael Innes, then decided against it. She needed to speak to the laird first. Jeremy did not know anything of Archie’s secrets, and it would be better if it remained that way. Besides, she had her vanity, and while she knew Jeremy well, she would not relish discussing with him what Innes referred to as her moral turpitude.

      She waited while Frazer, who had evidently anticipated her order, maneuvered the tea tray into the room and placed it at her elbow on the table beside the gold-striped sofa. Mairi sat. Jeremy, who had been waiting for her to be seated first as a gentleman would, sat down opposite, his body angled toward her most attentively. Mairi’s lips twitched. Jeremy was so devoted. She had never been quite sure, though, whether he admired her or her fortune. Another face rose in her mind, strong, dark, not remotely a gentleman. She could feel the clasp of Jack’s fingers about her wrist, hear the low timbre of his voice and feel the touch of his lips. Her fingers shook. The teaspoon rattled against the side of the pot as she stirred.

      “Is all well?” Jeremy asked.

      “Of course.” Mairi could feel her face heating. She kept her gaze averted from him, making a little performance of pouring the tea, adding milk and passing it to him. “Is there any news of interest?” she asked. “I have been at Ardglen so long I have heard none of the latest gossip from the outside world.”

      Jeremy’s face fell as though she had asked the one question he had been hoping to avoid.

      “There isn’t a great deal of news,” he said evasively.

      “Nothing from Edinburgh?” Mairi said.

      Something moved and shifted in Jeremy’s eyes again. His gaze slid away from hers. “There’s nothing much to tell,” he muttered.

      Well, that was odd. There was always news from Edinburgh, even in the summer when society was quiet and many people were at their country estates. Mairi waited, but Jeremy said nothing else, merely draining his cup in one gulp. He had ignored the cook’s homemade Abernethy biscuits, and now he looked as though he could not wait to leave.

      It was the mention of gossip from Edinburgh that had wrought the change in him. Mairi felt a vague flicker of alarm. She wondered if the talk had been about her. Normally she was not so vain as to assume that everyone was talking about her, but taken together with Michael Innes’s threatening letter, it left her with a bitter taste of fear in her mouth.

      Had Innes learned somehow of her night with Jack? Did everyone know?

      She added more honey to her tea and drank it down, trying to calm the flutter of panic. The MacLeod heir had made such wild threats before. There was no reason to suppose that he had any more evidence now than he had had in the past.

      She looked at Jeremy. He was staring evasively at the pattern on the Turkey carpet. The tips of his ears were bright pink and he looked as though he were sitting on pins.

      He knew. Mairi was sure of it. And if Jeremy had heard the gossip, so must everyone else. Her heart did a little sickening skip. She would apologize to no one for the night that she had spent with Jack Rutherford, but she did not want it to be the talk of Edinburgh. That would be beyond embarrassing. As a widow she was allowed a certain latitude in her behavior, but it was demeaning to feel that her reputation was besmirched and that everyone was dissecting her behavior. It had never happened to her before.

      But perhaps she should have thought of that before she had thrown caution to the winds and enjoyed a night of wild passion with Jack.

      “More tea, Jeremy?” she asked, reaching for the pot. She could only hope that the gossip would die down while she was out of the city. Her absence would surely starve it of fuel. Or so she hoped.

      “No, thank you.” Jeremy leaped to his feet. She had been right; he was suddenly desperate to leave. She put out a hand, caught his and held it tightly. He was too much of a gentleman to wrench it from her grip, so he stood there like an abashed schoolboy in the headmaster’s study.

      “Jeremy,” Mairi said. “You would tell me if there was something I should know?”

      He looked shifty. There was no other word for it. The expression sat uncomfortably on such a fair, open face.

      “Are people talking about me?” Mairi asked.

      Jeremy did not answer directly. “It’s nothing,” he said. His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “I can see...” He cast a look at her, quick and furtive. “I can see that it’s nonsense.”

      “What is?” Mairi said, mystified.

      This time Jeremy eased a finger around his collar. “It’s nothing,” he repeated. “All nonsense.”

      Most unsatisfactory, but short of torturing the news out of him, Mairi knew she could not make him talk. She sighed. “Then I wish you a safe journey home, Jeremy, and I shall hope to see you soon.”

      Jeremy looked relieved. His gaze softened as it rested on her. He took her hand again. “And I hope you have a good trip to Methven.” He hesitated. “Once the christening is past, though, I think that perhaps you should return to Edinburgh.”

      Mairi raised her eyebrows. “Do you? I had thought to go to Noltland first.”

      Jeremy’s jaw set stubbornly. “Edinburgh would be better. You need to be seen in society rather than appear to be hiding out in the country.”

      He kissed her hand this time with rather more fervor than she was expecting. “Lady Mairi—” he said. There was a great deal of repressed emotion in his voice.

      “Jeremy?” She hoped to goodness he was not going to make her a declaration. She did not wish to hurt his feelings, but she could never look on him as anything other than a friend. Guilt gripped her; she had leaned heavily on Jeremy after losing Archie. She hoped he had not interpreted her friendship as something stronger.

      “Goodbye, dear Jeremy,” she said, and stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “You