Page 50 of The Laird’s Dangerous Prize (The Highland Sisters’ Secret Desires #1)
CHAPTER ONE
Keppoch Castle, Lochaber, the Scottish Highlands
“Saoirse, ye’re hurtin’ me. ’Tis way too tight.” Lady Agnes MacDonald exclaimed as she braced herself with her arms against the bedpost while her maid laced her into her corset.
“Yer maither says I must tie it at tight as possible and snatch yer stomach,” Saoirse replied, but in her usual kindly fashion, she relented enough to loosen the lacing so her mistress could breathe more easily and stopped feeling pain in her belly.
For the moment, at least. “Here, put this on,” she added, fetching a voluminous travel cloak from the bed and draping it around Agnes’s shoulders.
It enveloped her small frame from head to toe.
“It’ll hide a multitude of sins,” Saoirse told her with a wink.
“Thank ye, Saoirse,” Agnes told her with gratitude.
“Now, have we packed everythin’ I’ll need?
” She glanced around the room to see if they had forgotten anything.
The chamber she had occupied for the whole of her twenty years seemed stripped to the bone, all the little personal items she had gathered over the years gone, packed and loaded onto a separate carriage that would follow them the next day.
All that was left was the furniture, a few ornaments, some unwanted items of clothing, and a rumpled coverlet on the four-poster bed where she had spent many idle, happy hours daydreaming, reading, and sleeping.
“Nay, I’ve checked and checked twice already,” Saoirse replied, picking up a large tapestry bag that was almost bursting and going to open the chamber door. “We’re ready tae go.”
Agnes collected her reticule from the vanity and followed the maid out into the hallway with a heavy heart.
“I wonder how long it’ll be before I come back here again tae me old chambers.
Maybe I’ll nae come back at all,” she said sadly.
The thought of leaving the only home she had ever known was both daunting and heartbreaking.
“Now, none of that sort of talk,” Saoirse chided gently as they made their way along the hallway in the direction of the staircase.
“Of course, ye’ll be back. Folks go away from their homes all the time.
Look at me, for instance. And they live tae tell the tale, and so will ye, me lady.
So stop yer mitherin’ and cheer up. ’Tis nae the end of the world.
But we’d best keep an eye out when we get downstairs.
We dinnae wantae bump intae yer faither on the way, eh? ”
That had Agnes quickening her steps as they started down the stairs. She had weathered too many black looks of angry disapproval from her father in the last day or so to last her a lifetime. He must be avoided if at all possible, and she had no expectation he would come and wave her off.
“Besides, ’tis nae as though we’re goin’ tae the moon.
’Tis only France, and that’s just across the water.
People go there all the time. I’ll be with ye, and ye’re goin’ tae stay with yer own family as well.
Really, me lady, in the circumstances, there’s little tae complain of,” the ever-practical Saoirse said on the way down.
They reached the bottom of the stairs, their booted footsteps noiseless on the thick rugs as they made their way down the broad, lamplit corridor leading to the castle’s main hallway.
“Aye, I ken ye’re right, Saoirse, but I cannae help feelin’ sad and a bit nervous. I’ve never been tae France afore, and me Aunt Morag and her family are practically strangers,” Agnes confessed to her trusted confidante.
“Aye, and I’ve never been tae France afore either.
At least ye can speak French! I cannae, so I truly will be among strangers.
But I’ve heard the French gentlemen are very handsome and charmin’ though, so it cannae be all bad.
Maybe I’ll come back with a nice French husband, eh?
That would be a turn up for the books, would it nae?
Think of what me ma would say tae that. She’d have a fit! ”
Agnes managed a weak smile at that scenario, being well acquainted with Saoirse’s eccentric mother. She was truly grateful for her maid’s ceaseless attempts to keep her spirits up, even if they were not entirely successful in easing the general sense of unease that held her in its grasp.
“I must go ahead of ye, me lady, tae make sure the hand luggage has been put in the right carriage,” Saoirse muttered, hurrying ahead of Agnes along the corridor, clutching the bulging tapestry bag in her arms as if it were a fat child.
“Aye, all right,” Agnes said, pleased to have an excuse to dawdle a little and take a last look at the familiar surroundings, knowing she would not see them again for some time.
Years probably. Things had happened so fast since the day before, her head was still spinning, and she had not had time to say goodbye properly to anything or anyone she valued, or so she felt.
She had stopped to take a final look at her favourite painting, when a hand clamped around her arm, and she found herself being pulled backwards.
“What-what—!” she gasped, bewildered when she was dragged bodily into the cupboard on the opposite side of the wall, into stuffy darkness, to be crushed against a large, warm body.
“Haud yer wheesht, sister,” came a familiar voice next to her ear, low and conspiratorial.
Relief flooded through her. “Duncan! What d’ye think ye’re daein’?” she cried, before he clamped a hand over her mouth. “Wheesht, I told ye. D’ye want Faither tae hear us?” he hissed at her. “Listen, here he comes,” he added in a whisper.
Frozen, Agnes listened. Heavy footsteps were coming along the corridor, unmistakably their father’s.
She and Duncan held their breath, and Agnes wondered why he seemed as concerned as she was that they should not be discovered by him.
Duncan was the son and heir, literally the blue-eyed boy in Laird MacDonald’s view.
The steps passed in front of the cupboard door, and she heard her father’s voice.
“Apparently, he’s on his way here now,” he was saying, sounding none too pleased. “He could arrive at any moment. Dinnae keep him waitin’. As soon as he gets here, show him straight tae me study.”
“Aye, me laird.” Agnes recognized the voice of Willy Grey, her father’s steward, answering him.
Thankfully, the pair continued on past the cupboard and into the depths of the castle.
The siblings both breathed out. After a few moments of intense listening to make sure the danger had passed, Duncan opened the door a crack and peeked out.
“The coast is clear,” he said stepping in to the corridor and giving Agnes his hand to help her out too.
“Duncan, why did ye have tae drag me intae that cupboard?” she quizzed him in irritation as she brushed dust from her cloak.
“Ye must hurry, Agnes,” he told her, his voice low but filled with urgency. She grew more irritated when he took hold of her arm again and began pulling her along the corridor, forcing her to trot to keep up with his long strides.
“Whatever fer? There’s nay rush,” she replied, wondering what the emergency was.
“Aye, there is. I’m nae jokin’. Ye really must hurry. Maither’s already in the carriage in the courtyard waitin’ fer ye.”
“What? Why?” Agnes asked, puzzled as they rushed along.
“Because Faither had a message just half an hour ago tae say that Laird Tavish MacDonnell of Glengarry is on his way here, and he’s due tae arrive any minute. He cannae see ye, and ye must be gone before he gets here.”
The news was indeed alarming. Realizing that Duncan was right, she had to be away from the castle before Laird MacDonnell arrived—to avoid embarrassing her parents—she stepped up her pace to keep level with Duncan, hurrying alongside him down the corridor, heading for towards the castle’s main exit.
“What’s he comin’ here fer anyway?” he asked.
“He wants yer hand in marriage, Agnes.”
“He what?!” She suddenly stopped dead, shaking off his grip as shock and disbelief ran through her. She had no idea MacDonnell even knew of her existence. “He wants tae wed me?”
Duncan grabbed her arm again and resumed his rapid pace. “Aye. He wrote tae Faither sayin’ he wants tae marry ye, and Faither was keen tae accept the offer.”
Agnes bristled with fury. “He was gonnae accept it? Well, what a nerve! He wanted tae wed me tae that man, and he never even consulted me on the matter.”
“Dinnae be a child, sister,” Duncan said matter-of-factly as they sped along.
“Ye’re the daughter of a laird. It was tae have been a strategic marriage, a union of alliance between the two clans.
Yer opinion would have been neither here nor there.
‘Tis nae required that ye should like yer husband in such marriages.”
“But he couldnae have seriously expected me tae wed a monster like MacDonnell?” she said, her anger at her father flaring as the full implications of what Duncan was telling her sank in.
It occurred to her that, while the situation she found herself was far from ideal, she had in fact had a lucky escape from what would undoubtedly have been a life of misery.
MacDonnell was a famously brutal man, warlike and violent.
“Well, ‘tis out of the question now. In the circumstances, Faither had nae choice but tae write back tae MacDonnell refusin’ his offer fer yer hand,” her brother explained, picking up their already rapid pace.
“So, why’s he comin’ here then?” Agnes asked, puffing along next to him.
“I’ve nae idea. Maybe because he hasnae seen Faither’s letter yet or maybe because he has and he’s furious about bein’ turned down. It daesnae matter now. Faither has nae choice but meet him face tae face and reject his offer in person.”