Hard-Hearted Highlander. Julia London

them. They splashed across a shallow river, then trotted up a glen, through a meadow. At the old Na Cùileagan cairn, they turned west and cantered across the open field where the Killeaven cattle and sheep had once grazed—but they were all gone, seized by the English and sold at market.

      As they trotted into the drive—newly graveled—Rabbie noted the new windows and the repair to two chimneys. The weathered front door of the house swung open. Lord Kent, in the company of Lord Ramsey, strode out to greet them. Both men were dressed for riding. Behind them was Niall MacDonald. Slight and taciturn, he’d proven himself to be a keen observer. He was good at what he did for the Mackenzies—which consisted primarily of keeping his eyes and ears open and reporting back to the laird.

      “There you are, Mackenzie,” Kent said. “I’d expected you well before now.”

      His voice was slightly admonishing, and Rabbie resisted the urge to shrug. Not that Kent would have noticed—his gaze was on Catriona.

      “I beg your pardon, we’ve been detained,” Rabbie lied. He swung off his horse to help down Catriona, but she’d leaped off her mount before he could reach her. “May I introduce my sister, Miss Catriona Mackenzie,” Rabbie said. “She was away when you arrived.”

      “Miss Mackenzie,” Lord Kent said, bowing his head, and then introducing his brother. “Now then, Mackenzie. We would like to be about the business of stocking sheep here. We’ll need a market.”

      “Glasgow,” Rabbie said instantly.

      Kent frowned. “Glasgow is too far, isn’t it? I’d need drovers and such. I had in mind buying from Highlanders, such as yourself.”

      Rabbie’s pulse quickened a beat or two. Kent thought he might help himself to what sheep they’d managed to keep, did he? “Our flocks have been decimated,” he said as evenly as he could. “Sheep and cattle alike.”

      “We will eventually want to add cattle, naturally,” Kent said, as if Rabbie hadn’t spoken. If he understood how the Highland herds had been decimated, he was either unconcerned or obtuse. “But for now, we want to be about the business of sheep.”

      Of course they did. Wool was a lucrative business.

      “You have sheep there at Balhaire, do you not?” he asked, squinting curiously, as if he’d expected Rabbie to offer them up.

      He might have said something foolish, but Catriona slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow and smiled sweetly at him. Her eyes, however, were full of warning. “Aye,” Rabbie said slowly. “But none for sale. They’ll be lambing soon.” That was a lie, but he gambled that Kent didn’t know one end of a sheep from the other.

      “Well. Perhaps we’ll have a word with your father,” he said, exchanging a look with his brother. “We’re on our way to Balhaire now, as it happens.”

      Rabbie could well imagine his father selling off half their flock so as not to “make trouble,” and said quickly, “You ought to call on the Buchanans” as casually as he might as he removed his gloves. “They’ve a flock they might cull.”

      Behind Kent, Rabbie noticed the look of surprise on Niall’s face.

      “The Buchanans,” Lord Kent repeated, sounding uncertain.

      “Aye, the Buchanans. You’ll find them at Marraig, near the sea. Follow the road west. Mr. MacDonald knows where.”

      Lord Kent looked back at his escort, whose expression had fallen back into stoicism, then at Rabbie. “How far?”

      “Seven miles at most.”

      “We’ll be met with hospitality, or a gun?”

      Rabbie smiled. “This is the Highlands, my lord.” He let that statement linger, let Kent imagine what he would for a moment or two, and indeed, he and his brother exchanged another brief, but wary, look. “Aye, you’ll be met with hospitality, you will. But were I you, I’d have a man or two with me.”

      Lord Kent nodded and gestured to his brother. “Assemble some of the men, then.”

      He turned back to Rabbie. “Very well, we will call on the Buchanans. You’ll find your fiancée with the women.” He began striding for the stables, his business with Rabbie done.

      Rabbie watched him go, trailed by his brother. Niall paused briefly before following them.

      “Anything?” Rabbie asked in Gaelic.

      “Only that the food is not to their liking,” Niall responded in kind.

      “They’ll like it well enough, come winter,” Catriona said as she passed both men on her way to the door.

      “The Buchanan sheep suffered the ovine plague,” Niall reminded Rabbie.

      Rabbie gave Niall the closest thing to a smile he’d managed in weeks. “Aye, lad, that I know.”

      “They’ve come round, they have,” Niall said.

      “Who?”

      “The Buchanans. I’ve seen them twice up on the hill behind Killeaven.”

      “Aye, any clans remaining will come to have a look, will they no’?”

      Niall shrugged. “It was odd, it was. They sit there, watching.”

      There was no trust between the Buchanans and the Mackenzies. Rabbie couldn’t guess what they were about, but he’d reckon their interest wasn’t a neighborly one.

      By the time he caught up to Catriona, the butler had already met her. The man wore a freshly powdered wig and his shoes had been polished to a very high sheen. Perhaps he thought the king meant to call today.

      “Welcome,” the butler said, and showed them into the salon just beyond the entry. It smelled rather dank, Rabbie thought, even though the windows were open. Dry rot, he presumed, and supposed that would be his burden once he took the wee bird to wife.

      “Have you a calling card I might present to her ladyship?” the butler asked.

      Rabbie glared at him. A calling card? The lass was fortunate he’d come at all.

      “I beg your pardon, but we donna make use of calling cards here,” Catriona said. “If you would be so kind, then, to tell her that Mr. Rabbie Mackenzie and Miss Catriona Mackenzie have come?”

      “He knows who we are,” Rabbie said gruffly.

      “Yes, of course,” the man said, ignoring Rabbie entirely as he hurried off in little staccato steps.

      “A calling card,” Rabbie muttered.

      “They’re English, then,” Catriona said. “They have their ways, and we have ours, aye? Donna be so sour, Rabbie.”

      He might have argued with her, but they were both startled by a lot of clomping overhead and looked to the ceiling. It sounded as if a herd of cattle had been aroused. One of them—the calf, he presumed—ran from one end of the room to the other, and back again.

      Moments later, they arrived in a threesome—Lady Kent and her lookalike daughter, and the maid, who barely spared him a glance as she entered, but then smiled prettily at Catriona before moving briskly to stand on the other side of the room apart from the rest.

      Rabbie watched her, frowning. What made this woman so arrogant? She should have curtsied to him, as he was her superior in every way. He was so distracted by her conceit that he failed to introduce his sister or greet his fiancée.

      “My brother has forgotten his manners, aye?” Catriona said. “I am his sister, Catriona Mackenzie. I was away when you arrived, tending to our aunt. She’s rather ill.”

      “Oh. I am very sorry to hear it,” Miss Kent said. “Umm...” She glanced across the room at the maid, who gave her a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. “May I introduce my mother, Lady Kent?”

      Lady Kent curtsied and mumbled something