Page 2 of The Laird’s Guardian Angel (Highland Lairds #3)

1

Scottish Lowlands

1302

T here was no lonelier place for a lady than living in a castle where she was unwanted, in an unfamiliar land.

Unfortunately for Lady Calliope Ramsey, that had been how she'd felt for most of her life.

She was the eldest daughter of Alaric, Chieftain of the Ramsey clan. Currently, she was seated at the end of the long trestle table, staring into the face of a man she didn't remember but was supposed to be her father. And he was scowling. Scowling as if she'd arrived with eight heads and eels for arms.

Despite the manners that had been drilled into her since she was a young girl, Calliope couldn't help giving him quite a similar look. After all, she had always imagined her father, a war hero, to be strapping, the image of Hercules. The man before her now had a face full of white beard and deep grooves within his cheeks. A paunch to his front, though his arms and legs did appear to be the size of tree trunks. That certainly fit the Herculean fantasy of a father.

Nevertheless, what was he scowling at? She wasn't unpleasant to look at. Calliope wasn't vain, but she had seen herself in the looking glass and determined that someday, someone might find her to be attractive enough to wed.

However, that seemed quite unlikely now. There'd not been a single smile for her since she'd crossed the border and been essentially dropped on her father's doorstep by her stepsire in England. Though now that she thought about it, was he really her stepsire if her sire was still alive?

There'd barely been an hour to mourn her mother before her stepsire had ordered her trunks packed and loaded into a wagon. He'd practically had to throw her over the side of a horse and tie her down to get her to leave. It had only been the threat of wrenching off the precious necklace her mother had gifted her on her twenty-first birthday that kept Calliope in line.

The last gift she'd received. She touched it now, a sapphire rimmed with diamonds that sat perfectly on her throat, the gold chain and clasp delicate enough that it had fallen off a number of times. Sometimes, it simply came loose at just the threat of being wrenched free, as if it had a mind of its own and a desire to escape. Part of the necklace's charm, since she'd felt the same way many times over the years.

"I've no' seen Mary in many years," the old Chief said, his right eye squinting even harder as he gazed at her. "How do I know ye're no' lying?"

"I never lie." Calliope straightened her shoulders. This was true. She never did outright lie. Skirting the truth didn't count.

"How do I know that's no' a lie?"

Calliope grimaced. "You do not. I suppose it is the first thing a liar would say."

"Aye. So ye admit it?" He tapped the table with a balled-up fist. The same move from her stepsire would have left the cups to topple over, but Chief Ramsey's seemed only to punctuate what he was saying rather than to upset the world order.

"Nay, of course not. I tell the truth. My mother said you were my father, which is why my stepsire brought me here."

"Tossed ye here is more like." The Chief grumbled something under his breath that Calliope was desperate to figure out.

Another of her flaws, she loved a good gossip, and even more so a good insult.

Calliope shrugged, playing nonchalant even though she felt like she might burst from her skin at any moment. Too much had happened in too short a time. Her entire life was upended. But, to his credit, her father had a point. They'd no sooner crossed the border than mean old Edgar—her stepsire—had practically tossed her across it with a finger pointing toward the castle.

"The means by which I arrived are irrelevant. The truth of the matter is I am your daughter. And… my mother is dead." With this last word, her voice caught in her throat, and she had to take a moment's pause before she could figure out what she was going to say next. Though she and her mother were often at odds, and Mary Ramsey's demands on her daughter were weighty, she had loved her.

And now she was dead. That was not a sentence she'd ever presumed to have said. Mary had been so full of life one minute and cold in her bed the next. Not even sick. Not old, despite having a daughter who was old enough to wed.

Calliope had suspicions that her stepsire might have had something to do with her mother's death. A woman in the vitality of her life didn't just fall over one day, never to stand up again. But Edgar had vehemently denied her accusations when he'd told her it was time for her to leave.

"What proof have ye?"

"The word of my mother, your wife, is not proof enough?"

The old Chief snorted. "The word of the English is never enough, lass."

"Funny, my mother said the same thing, only about the Scots."

Chief Ramsey growled, his lip curling up in a snarl. Calliope imagined that on the battlefield, a look like that might have been enough to send his enemies running. She, however, wasn't going anywhere. Rather than run, cower, or duck her head, she sat up taller and stared him straight in the eyes.

"Then why have ye come?" he asked.

She swallowed against the rising emotion, against the anger that made her want to stand and stamp her foot and start swiping the remnants of a meal she'd not been offered to partake in from the table. The one and only time she'd done that in England had earned her boxed ears.

"I have no other place to go. My stepsire removed me from his home. You are my father. Why would I not have come here? And as you recall, I was more dropped on your doorstep than approaching like a customary guest."

That subtle fist popping against the wood drew her attention again. For all his bluster, he wasn't as scary as she thought he might be. "He canna be your stepsire."

Calliope cocked her head. Was that… jealousy? "And yet, that is all I've ever known him as."

Chief Ramsey shook his head and gave her a look that might as well have been a shout: You're daft.

Funny, though, she didn't take offense.

"Mary was my wife and last I checked, I still had a pulse, which means she was still my wife until the day she died, and could no' have remarried, could no' have given ye a stepsire."

Calliope nodded slowly, the same idea having come to her just a few moments before. And it made more sense as to why Edgar felt so compelled to be rid of her. He had no claims on her and certainly wouldn't have wanted to provide the dowry to the English noblemen who had started to court a marriage. Poor Bryce. He probably wondered what had become of her. Perhaps Edgar would say she'd died along with her mother.

"Did you know you had a daughter?" she asked, challenging him to deny her.

"Aye." His fist uncurled, the flat of his palm pressed to the table.

That admission stung. "And you did not see fit to fetch me? Or even visit me?"

"Dinna be offended, lass. I'd no' have crossed the border to lay eyes on ye, and I ordered your mother to send ye north, but she ignored me. The same reason why she left."

"Which was?"

Calliope had a very good idea why, but she still wanted his side of the story. Her mother had made it very clear that Chief Ramsey was cruel and that living on the border holding had been awful and undignified. What lady would want to live in such conditions? Apparently, no amount of complaining made her husband change, and finally, she'd annoyed him so much that he'd tossed her back to England the same way he tossed cabers at festivals.

Ironically, it was the same way Edgar had just tossed Calliope back into Scotland.

To think that throwing trees was deemed a suitable pastime seemed utterly ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as tossing women.

"The trouble between a man and a wife is no one's business but his own." There was a resigned sound to his voice, as though he were very tired, and this an argument he'd had so many times that the very concept of it had been what turned his beard from black to white.

"Well, my mother is gone."

"I am still here."

She drew in a long, weary breath. The man was not going to share what had transpired. Fine. She'd give him the time he needed to adjust to learning his wife was dead, and his daughter was alive. Then she'd figure out a way to get him to tell her. Calliope had learned long ago that an agitated dog wasn't always so willing to approach for a treat, and sometimes you had to toss the meat first.

"I am your daughter, whether you care to admit it or not. If you wish for me to leave, I shall." Calliope pushed away from the unwelcoming table, her feet unsteady, her legs weary from the overlong journey.

"Where will ye go?" The question might have shocked her if he hadn't looked so stricken.

The words themselves appeared callous and uncaring as if he might just pack her bags himself. But the way his brows drew in, his eyes widened, and the ever-so-slightest quiver to his lip belied his indifference.

"I do not know, not that it's any of your concern."

Chief Ramsey stood and walked around the table to where she braced herself on the edge, afraid she'd collapse. She'd be lying to herself if she didn't admit to being slightly terrified by his size.

Ramsey leaned forward, his bushy white brows squeezing together as he squinted at her, studying her. His gaze fell to the sapphire at her throat, and when he reached out to touch it, though she flinched, she didn't back away.

"Where did ye get that?" His voice had softened even further.

"My mother."

"Did she tell ye where it was from?"

"Aye. My mother said it was a family heirloom."

"She's right. My family."

"Then my family, too." Calliope wanted desperately to ask him who the gem had belonged to, but she needed him to acknowledge that she was indeed his daughter and be done with these silly games. She was exhausted. After a lifetime of trying to conform to her mother's rules, she'd have to figure out her father's terms and then a husband's. Why could she not just be herself and everyone else accept it? Perhaps it wouldn't be so hard if she wasn't so stubborn, so unwieldy.

"'Twas my mother's. I gave it to Mary the day she realized she was with child."

"Pregnant with me," she prodded.

"Nay. A little lad. He died just after he was born. She threw the necklace out the window after that. But, when she grew with child again, I returned it to her. That time was with … ye."

At last, he'd admitted it. Calliope was his daughter. But even that admission was bittersweet, knowing that she might have had an older brother. Poor sweet baby.

"Did you love her?" Calliope asked.

Ramsey snorted. "'Twas the only reason I was willing to marry an Englishwoman. For love. All the reward it got me. She was a pain in the arse and hated me every day she was here."

Calliope couldn't help but frown. The man did not appear to be lying. But according to her mother, he'd been a monster, so maybe he was just really good at misleading and manipulation. Except, that didn't match with the man standing before her. Calliope had always had a keen knack for reading people.

"Ye'll stay here." He turned to a woman hovering in the shadows. "Bessie, have a room made up for my daughter."

There were so many questions she wanted to ask, so many she needed clarification on. But exhaustion, both physically and emotionally, was getting the better of her. A week ago, she was the happiest she ever thought she could be. She and her mother had attended court, and there'd been many suitors interested in her hand. It had felt at that moment that she was going to be a happy bride soon, and her mother had promised new fabrics for a trousseau.

Now, she was in Scotland, her mother was dead, and the man she didn't remember as her father was offering her shelter. She stared at him hard, trying to pull from memory some little bit of him, but all she remembered of Scotland was the festival, the groom who'd taught her archery, and the many trees she'd climbed.

How cruel life could be. To present its gifts and hopes and then just as quickly snatch them back.

She pressed her hand to the sapphire again, wondering if it was cursed. A gift given to her mother for the life of a son she'd lost, only to be given to the daughter she'd had and stolen away with.

Aye, indeed, life could be so cruel.

"Go on then. Get some rest. We'll discuss your future more in the morning." Her father patted her arm awkwardly, and Calliope yearned to pull him in for a hug. When was the last time she'd had a hug? Her mother wasn't one for affection, and she'd grown up pretending hugs weren't something she desired.

But now, at this moment, she wanted one very badly.

On feet that felt too weary, Calliope managed to force herself to follow the waiting servant up a winding stone staircase. But instead of being relieved that she'd been accepted into the Ramsey fortress, she felt a little like she was climbing to an uncertain future. But she pushed away the sense of doom that loomed, chalking it up to her overactive imagination.