Sinful Scottish Laird. Julia London

       Copyright

       CHAPTER ONE

      Scottish Highlands, 1742

      Balhaire

      THE COACH GROANED and shuddered along a nearly impassable road, tossing its inhabitants across the benches and back against the squabs. The young Lord Chatwick’s complexion had turned gray, and he rested listlessly against the wall.

      “My poor darling,” crooned his mother, Daisy, Lady Chatwick, as she stroked his hair.

      “I said from the beginning such aggressive travel would make the child ill. I pray we see a quick recovery from him.”

      This sunny observation was made by Daisy’s cousin Miss Belinda Hainsworth.

      “I’m well when the coach isn’t moving,” moaned Ellis.

      “Dear boy, you think you are,” Belinda said and smiled sadly, as if Ellis had been made feebleminded by the travel and didn’t know his own feelings. She glanced at Daisy. “Is it not too late to turn back and spare us all?”

      Too late? Yes, it was too late! They’d been traveling for an eternity and were only miles from their destination. “Too late,” Daisy said and closed her eyes.

      She would explode, she thought. Shatter into a million bits of furious fatigue. Almost three weeks in transit, from London to Liverpool, then sailing up the coast through rough seas to Scotland, and then the relentless plodding past hovels made of peat and mud, past people in strange dress with small cattle and barking dogs, through miles and miles of empty landscape with a young son made ill by the motion of travel, a gloomy cousin, and no place for them to rest except the occasional mean inn.

      It had been wretched.

      “You look piqued, Daisy.”

      Daisy opened her eyes; Belinda was studying her, her head cocked to one side. “Yes, I am. I am sick to death of riding in this coach,” Daisy fussed. “And I will be much relieved when I can remove these blasted stays.” She pressed a hand against her side with a heavy sigh, feeling the stays of her corset digging into her ribs.

      At that very moment, the coach shuddered violently and sank hard to the right, and the stays dug deeper into Daisy’s side. Her son landed on top of her with an oomph, and Belinda was thrown against the wall of the coach with a cry of alarm.

      “For heaven’s sake,” Daisy said, breathless.

      “Madam!” someone shouted from outside the coach; the door swung open. “Are you unharmed?”

      “We’re fine. Is it a wheel?”

      “It is indeed,” her escort, Sir Nevis, said as he lifted her son out of the coach.

      “What shall we do?” Belinda asked as she carefully backed out of the coach. “We haven’t the proper tools to repair it. We’ll be forced to camp here!”

      “We shall endeavor to repair it,” Sir Nevis said as he extended his hand to help Daisy down.

      She stepped gingerly onto terra firma and adjusted her corset as best she could without removing her gown and clawing the damn thing from her body, then joined Sir Nevis to have a look. A spoke had broken, and the wheel was bowing. The driver and his helper were quickly releasing the horses from their traces.

      “We must elevate the coach to keep the wheel from snapping,” Sir Nevis said. He looked to the three men they’d hired at port to escort them to Auchenard. Gordons, he’d said. A mighty clan, he’d said. Daisy didn’t know how mighty the Gordons were, but she hadn’t liked the look of these three from the start. They were as thin as reeds, their clothing worn and filthy, and they looked at her like little boys staring at sweetmeats in the shop window. They were fond of whisky, and if they spoke English, she couldn’t say—they rarely uttered a word, and when they did, their accents were so heavy that she couldn’t make anything out. Now, they stood aside, eyeing the broken spoke with disinclination.

      “Madam, if you and his lordship would take shelter beneath those trees,” Sir Nevis said, nodding to a stand a few feet from the coach. “This might take some time.”

      Might? Daisy sighed wearily. She was not new to the world of coach travel and rather imagined it would take all day. She looked around them. It was a sun-drenched day, the air uncomfortably warm. Even the plumes atop their coach were wilting. There was no shelter, nothing but miles and miles of empty rolling hills and swarms of midges as far as one could see.

      Ellis had dipped down to examine a rock. At least some pink had returned to his complexion; she was thankful for that. “See, Mamma,” he said, and held up a rock. “It’s pyrite.”

      “Is it?” she asked, leaning over to peer at a rock that was yellowish in color. “So it is,” she agreed, although she had no idea what sort of rock it was. She looked back over her shoulder at her retinue—three servants and a tutor; Sir Nevis and his man, Mr. Bellows, who had accompanied them from London along with the two drivers; a pair of wagons under Mr. Green’s care, loaded with boxes and trunks that carried their things; and a smaller chaise in which Mrs. Green and the housemaid rode.

      It was as if she were leading a band of gypsies across the Highlands.

      A movement at the lake caught her eye, and Daisy noticed the Gordons at the shore. Well, yes, of course, they should swim, the poor things. Perhaps wash a bit of the dirt off them while her men toiled in the hot sun to repair the wheel. How much had they paid for that trio of scoundrels?

      “We can’t possibly be forced to camp here,” Belinda said, fanning herself. “There is no shelter! We leave ourselves open to marauders and thieves.”

      “Belinda, for God’s sake, will you stop,” Daisy said wearily. “I have listened to your complaints until I can bear it no more. There is nothing to be done for our predicament. We are here. We will not die. We will not be harmed. We will not be set upon by thieves!”

      All those years ago when Daisy had been a new bride, with her mother gone and no one to advise her, she’d promised her maternal aunt on her deathbed that she would look after Belinda. Of course she would—Daisy loved her childhood playmate. She’d just never realized how doleful her cousin could be until she was under her roof.

      Belinda said nothing to Daisy’s rebuke. In fact, she seemed to be staring at something behind Daisy. With exasperation, Daisy drawled, “What is it now? Marauders?” She turned around to see what had captured Belinda’s attention, and her heart sank to her toes—five figures in highland dress were galloping down the hill toward them.

      “Not marauders,” Belinda said, her voice trembling. “Smugglers. I’ve heard it said they hide in these hills.”

      And with that remark, the air was snatched cleanly from Daisy’s lungs.

      There was a sudden and collective cry of alarm as the rest of Daisy’s entourage noticed the riders. It was as if someone had fired several rounds into their midst; people ran, grabbed up their things as they raced to hide behind the wagons.

      “Lady Chatwick!” Sir Nevis shouted. “Take shelter in the chaise!”

      He had drawn his sword, and together with Mr. Bellows, stood with his legs braced apart, facing the intruders, prepared for battle. Belinda was already moving, grabbing at Ellis’s arm as he lined up the rocks he’d collected and dragging him toward the chaise.

      But Daisy? She didn’t move. She was too stunned to move. Utterly paralyzed with fear and exhilaration, on the verge of screaming in terror or laughing hysterically at the absurdity of it all—of course they would be set upon by highland thieves! This was precisely the disaster Belinda had predicted all along.

      Something about the notion of disaster made her move; she whirled about to summon the three Gordons, but they were