Page 15 of To Wed a Wild Scot
They rode for some time in silence, but then a thought occurred to him, and he turned back to her. “Your father, Lord Graystone. Does he know where you are?” Having Lord Graystone appear at the door of Castle Kinross was, above all, the last thing Logan wanted.
“No. My father is in Bath, taking the waters. He believes me to be in Buckinghamshire with friends.”
So, she’d ridden off to the Highlands of Scotland without her father’s permission, or his knowledge. For such a proper lady, Lady Juliana seemed to tell a great many lies.
“Perhaps Fitzwilliam will ride back to Inverness with me tomorrow,” she said hopefully.
Logan gave a slight shake of his head, but he didn’t say anything. Lady Juliana would find out for herself soon enough things weren’t going to turn out as she hoped as far as Fitz was concerned.
Or perhaps they’d turn out just as she wished. Fitz might take one look at her, and do precisely as she asked him to do. Perhaps Logan would be the one who was surprised.
He wouldn’t be the only one.
He cast a quick glance at her, uneasiness tightening his chest. She was beautiful, an English heiress, and one of Fitz’s dearest friends. When he spoke of her—which was often—it was with the tenderest affection. She came from the world Fitz had grown up in, a world he understood, and she and Fitz had been promised to each other for most of their lives.
Logan’s chest drew tighter as they made their way in the dark toward Castle Kinross. This was what came of lies, wasn’t it?
His lies…
If a heart did break tonight, it might not be Lady Juliana’s.
Chapter Four
“You look surprised, Lady Juliana. What did you expect to find in a Scottish castle? Drunken clansman on every sofa, and sheep running around the hallways?”
Logan Blair had been so quiet during their ride to Castle Kinross Juliana had nearly forgotten him until his mocking drawl interrupted her thoughts. She glanced at him, and found him regarding her with a sardonic half-smile on his lips.
Once her gaze alighted on his face, she found it difficult to look away. His eyes were a much more vibrant blue than she’d first thought, and heavily lashed with such a thick, dark fringe it was a wonder he could keep them open at all.
He wasn’t the most handsome man she’d ever seen. His features were too strong, too aggressive to be deemed classically handsome, yet it was his very roughness that held her gaze. Logan Blair was a thief and a scoundrel, but there was no denying his was the sort of face that caught a lady’s attention.
“Scots aren’t quite the savages the English aristocracy thinks we are.” That infuriating grin flirted at the corner of his mouth. “You can rest easy during your stay at Castle Kinross, my lady.”
A sharp retort hovered on Juliana’s tongue, but she held it back. He was a dreadful, teasing thing, and she was determined not to gratify him by falling into a temper. “I’ve never been to a Scottish castle before. I didn’t know what to expect.”
Whatever it was shehadexpected, it wasn’t this.
The road leading up to the castle was dark and isolated. She’d thought the castle would be as gloomy and forbidding as the thick copse of towering elms they’d passed under, but as soon as they were free of the tree line she’d let out a gasp of pleased surprise.
Light poured from a row of windows on the ground floor. Mr. Blair ushered her through the arched doorway, and she found the entryway was no less pleasing. It had a massive wood-timbered ceiling, rich tapestries on the walls, and thick carpets covering a spotlessly clean stone floor.
Castle Kinross didn’t boast a grand, curving drive or elegant stone columns flanking the front entrance, but the place had a friendly, welcoming look about it, in the way only places that had sheltered generationscouldhave. One had only to glance at the staircase to imagine the dozens of feet that had trod up and down it, or curl one’s hand around the doorknob to feel the hundreds of fingers that had grasped the worn iron.
It looked like a home.
Fitzwilliam would like it here.
Juliana knew it instinctively with a sinking sensation in her chest. She stood blinking up at the carved wood staircase, and thought perhaps he never intended to return to England at all.
She had to see him, to talk to him. It was the only way to relieve the unbearable anxiety she’d labored under these past five months. “I’d like to see Fitzwilliam at once, if I may,” she said, turning to Mr. Blair. “I daresay he’ll be shocked to see me, since he didn’t receive my letter.”
She’d intended to give him a set-down, but it seemed Logan Blair was impervious to shame, because he only raised an eyebrow at her waspish tone. “He won’t be the only one who’s shocked.”
He glanced over her shoulder, and Juliana turned to find a butler with a headful of white hair coming toward the entryway.
“There you are, Craig. His Grace has a visitor. Fetch him, please, and bring him to the library.” Mr. Blair paused and glanced at Juliana. “Once you’ve brought him down, Craig, wait in the hallway. His Grace may need you again.”
“Yes, sir. Right away.” The old man assisted Juliana out of her cloak, bowed, and shuffled back in the direction from which he’d come.
