Page 2 of To Defy a Highland Duke

Hours of trundling along in this inhospitable weather had chilled Marjorie to the marrow. A glance out the coach’s window revealed a cranky, charcoal-gray sky. She pulled her mouth downward and leaned forward a couple of inches, then clamped her teeth together in another bid to tamp down the wave of frustration billowing upward from her chest.

Perfectly wonderful.

If she weren’t mistaken, and she’d lived in the Highlands long enough to know she wasn’t, those pregnant clouds portended snow.

Had Berget noticed too?

Mayhap that accounted for the single crease between her russet brows, the only indication she was less than satisfied. Berget hadn’t uttered a word of protest during the lengthy journey, and she’d been traveling longer than Marjorie. Her sister-in-law was a saint and had become a good friend in recent months.

She and Graeme had returned from Liam and Emeline MacKay’s Yuletide house party to collect Marjorie and her daughters for the trip to Trentwick Castle.

Marjorie sincerely believed she would’ve been half-mad by now had she been required to jostle about in a conveyance as much as Berget had the past few months.

And yet her sister-in-law remained as cheerful and patient as ever. Marjorie couldn’t help but admire her daughters’ former governess’s stamina and good nature. It was no wonder Graeme had fallen in love with Berget.

Fending off the beginning of a headache, Marjorie pressed two fingers to the bridge of her nose and wondered for the umpteenth time why she’d agreed to spend Hogmanay at Trentwick Castle.

Not just Hogmanay, but a full week of festivities, God help her. A week amongst strangers. More on point, in the home of the Duke of Roxdale.

Loneliness and boredom, that’s why.

Pshaw. She silently but emphatically disregarded the impudent thought. Utter twaddle.

She was the mother of two adorable, vivacious daughters, and she lived with her charming brothers-in-law, Graeme and Camden Kennedy, kind-hearted Berget, and a good-sized, devoted staff.

She most assuredly was neither lonely nor bored.

The pair of red-haired minxes currently—blessedly—sleeping soundly made certain of the latter. As for the former? Well, Marjorie refused to contemplate it. Widows with high-spirited daughters had other things to occupy their time and thoughts.

Neither, however, was she contented.

Eyeing the pewter, slightly pink-tinged sky, she schooled the frown once more trying to pull her mouth downward at the corners. Most definitely snow. Marjorie almost rolled her eyes heavenward in silent rebellion.

Had that devil, the Duke of Roxdale, summoned the foul weather? Nae. Devils preferred roaring fire, not snow.

Despite her determination otherwise, a sigh filtered past her lips.

All they needed was to be snowed in with the austere, ill-disposed Keane Buchannan, Duke of Roxdale.

To think, last summer—for all of five foolish minutes—she’d believed him disarming and interesting. Before his true colors had emerged. Rather, his true personality. Surly. Dour. Judgmental. His midnight severe brows pulled together and thunderous censure heavy in his arrestingly beautiful hazel eyes.

The devil cannot have beautiful eyes, she argued to herself.

No? Well, that one does.

Probably to enchant his victims into sinning like the sly serpent in the Garden of Eden.

With deliberate intent, and perhaps the merest thrust of what she considered a too-square chin, Marjorie pointed her thoughts in another direction and stared out the grimy window.

In the freezing mist, she could make out the outline of Graeme’s huge horse plodding along to the right of the team.

Always mist and fog and rain and gray. Yet, she’d grown to love the Highlands.

Her brothers-in-law preferred to ride, rather than stuff their large frames into a cramped coach. Not that she blamed them. Towering well over six feet and boasting legs and arms to rival small trees, each was as out of place in a conveyance’s small confines as an elephant in a canary cage. But surely, they must be half-frozen themselves, even if they were Scots and accustomed to the cold clime.

A particularly powerful shiver scuttled up Marjorie’s spine, spreading across her shoulders and raising the flesh. Shuddering, she silently cursed the weather, her sense of duty, and, most of all, the domineering man she’d encounter all too soon.

Come now, she chided herself, are you going to allow the likes of that bounder to keep you in a temper?