Scandal's Daughters

Chapter 15

“Michty me!” She blushed to the roots of her hair, a lovely shade of apricot. Like jam. Sweet and tart all at the same time.

Hamish knew he oughtn’t let himself smile, but he was inordinately happy to have so easily found her. Happy to be watching her blush. Happy he had the power to make her blush with his teasing.

“Elspeth? What’s he saying?”

“We’re negotiating the price, mistress.” Hamish raised his voice to carry to the cottage so the ladies didn’t have to cup their hands around their ears. “She’s a hard bargainer, your niece. Powerful hard. She’s making this difficult for me.”

She kept her voice low so the ladies of the house might not hear. “Difficult? Nothing of the kind. You’ve only to take yourself right back to Edinburgh, where you belong. I’ll send—”

He cut off her contingencies. “Oh, I don’t intend to leave. At least not without you.”

She stilled, one hand coming slowly to her throat, as if perhaps something he was saying was finally getting through to her. But then she shook it off. “I’m needed here.”

“You’re needed in Edinburgh, too. Or John Otis is, but since you are, for my purposes, him, it will have to be you.” He cast a glance at the two old crows perched at the wall. “Do they know?”

“About the books? Heaven forbid.”

“If you’re afraid to do it, I don’t mind telling them.”

“Wheesht, Hamish.” She grabbed his arm, as if she might physically stop him. “I’ll never tell.”

“Elspeth? Elspeth, what is he saying?”

She turned to the ladies. “He’s saying he’ll do the thatch for a sovereign and a bowl of soup.”

“Are ye trying to swick me?” He had to laugh at her audacity. “That’s ridiculously low.”

“Of course it is, Hamish. Of course. I’m trying to give you the perfect reason to refuse, since you can’t possibly be anxious to thatch a roof.”

“Actually, I am. Anxious to stay. Anxious to convince you. Anxious to find out all I can about you to use to my advantage.” He was not surprised to find that he would do just about anything to remain near her, even manual labor.

“You’re mad—right off your big numpty head.” She gaped at him. “You’re the son of an earl! You can’t possibly be prepared to climb upon that wretchedly steep roof!”

“Don’t fash yourself on my behalf, lass. I’m not so daft as to promise something I can’t deliver.” He would enlist the outdoor staff from Cathcart Lodge, his father’s hunting box, just up the road, if need be. “I’ll start with that trellis.”

She shook her head, clearly flabbergasted at his ass-like stubbornness, and waved him on to the cottage. “Have it your way. But mind you don’t ruin your coat.”

***

He did not see Elspeth again until evening when she finally reappeared looking harried and worn, as if the carrion crows of the cottage had spent the intervening hours pecking away at her. But she was bearing the promised bowl of steaming soup.

And he was famished. Who knew manual labor could be so invigorating? “Good evening, Miss Otis,” He lifted his battered hat, though his sleeve was caught up in the rosebush’s thorns. “I would offer you my arm, but this rosebush has insisted upon my escort until at least midnight.”

He was rewarded by one of her quiet, small smiles, and he realized that she was tired—she had been working at least as hard as he. And she did it all day, every day, not just as a means to an end. This was her life—one of endless servitude. “Perhaps the rose is an enchanted fairy princess, who clings to keep you till midnight to break the awful spell and set her free.” Her voice sounded wistful.

“And is that how you see yourself, the orphaned fairy princess forced to work for her crust of bread from her cruel aunts, laboring, fetching and carrying all the day through?”

“Goodness, nay.” She shook her head and gave him a guarded smile, dismissing such an unflattering characterization. “Not a’tall. They are not cruel in the least—they are everything kind and forbearing, and have brought me up and given me a home.”

“And you take care of them in return.” He would not argue with her version of events. “But what is to happen to you when they are gone—are you to live here all alone?”

The guarded warmth ebbed from her eyes. “I had not thought on it.”

It was a lie, but not one he would task her with. It was enough at the moment simply to make her think. And perhaps feel. “I feel certain that your aunt, Lady Ivers, would want you to come back to her in Edinburgh. In fact, she charged me with telling you so, should I find you.”

“So you spoke to Lady Ivers, did you?”

“I did,” he confirmed, while he busied himself with the proffered soup. “I called at her house in St. Andrew Square, just as I said I would.” He spooned another helping of soup meat into his mouth. “But you were gone.”

She did not answer his implied question, but asked one of her own. “What is it you really want here, Hamish?”

“You,” he said simply. “For you to come to Edinburgh and write me six more books just as scintillating and romantic—for that is the word we shall use in place of erotic, is it not— enough to pass the censure of the courts as the first.”

More of that lovely apricot flush crept up the side of her cheeks, as if she really were blushing at the word. “Are you trying on purpose to discommode me?”

“I am trying to amuse you,” he said instead, giving her one of his better, most hopeful smiles. “Is it working?”

“Perhaps.” She pursed her lips, then crushed them between her teeth to keep the corners of her shy smile from turning up. “A little, perhaps.”

“Enough to encourage you to do something scandalous? To leave your hidebound, little world?”

She shook her head more emphatically. “My world is neither hidebound nor small, Hamish. It is the same as everyone else’s. Only not as…extensive or exciting.”

“Your world it is not nearly as extensive as it ought to be. It is not even expansive enough for another lesson in kissing. When was the last time you were kissed, Elspeth?”

She sighed. “At exactly fourteen minutes after eleven o’clock on Tuesday evening last.”

His need struck him like a heavy wave—lust rose in him like a spring tide. He battered it back behind a dam of determination and restraint—damn flimsy materials on the best of days, but entirely permeable under the onslaught of this clever, sweet lass who looked like an angel, and left him in a hell of wanting.

The devil was surely laughing now. As was his father.

Ballocks to them both.

He would win her yet.