Chapter 9 #3
As much as I abhor the McQuoids, at least they’re not going to marry you off to some old, toothless reprobate.
The stranger curled his right palm about her nape and gently forced her to look at him. Fire flashed in his eyes. “Is he a man who’ll hurt you?”
The sharpness with which he now spoke revealed a lethal side to the man who held her, and she shivered. Despite his playfulness and charm, the fact remained he was still a stranger.
Only his great fury was directed not at her, but to a man whose identity he didn’t even know.
Because of me . . .
“I don’t believe so,” she finally answered. “I’ve never met him.”
“Never,” he repeated flatly.
She shook her head.
“Your family is marrying you off to some chap you’ve never set eyes on?”
Linnie nodded. And given the identity of the suitor picked out by her cousin and brother, and the implications such a union would have on the McQuoids’ already volatile relationship with the Tremaines, she’d not been able to share freely with Jeremy, which was why she found all the words suddenly tumbling forth.
“What I’ve learned is that he is cocksure and arrogant and pompous.”
“Aren’t those the same?” he pointed out.
“At that, he’s charming.”
“Oh, the horror.”
Frowning, she peered into his face for signs he made light of her. She couldn’t make anything out in his carefully crafted features.
“He’s a notorious rogue who will not be faithful to me.”
The stranger she now poured out her problems to frowned at that latest item she’d shared, and at his like disapproval, he grew once more in her estimation.
“I take it you are a woman who will be faithful to the man you marry?” he asked quietly.
Linnie bristled. “Of course! This man, however, has no true interest in me—that is, beyond the connection to be had by joining our families together. He is a traveler.”
“A Rom?”
“No.” She frowned. “A . . . sea captain who is friends with my cousin.”
He went absolutely motionless. “A sea captain who is friends with your cousin, you say?”
Linnie opened her mouth to confirm but immediately stopped herself. Oh, hell. She’d revealed too much. There were, after all, a far smaller number of seafaring gentlemen than noblemen amongst the ton.
Her heart knocked against her chest.
“You wouldn’t know him,” she said quickly. “He’s . . . old.”
“Old.”
Somewhere near thirty, so older than her. That counted.
“Very old,” she added.
“Your cousin or his friend?”
“The . . . friend.”
He gave her a funny look. “To clarify, your cousin, who is not old, happens to know old gentlemen, but you think I cannot know an old chap.”
“Yes.”
“Hmph.” The stranger nodded. “Sound logic.”
Linnie found herself about to enter dangerous territory. She cleared her throat. “Yes, uh . . . so that is my story. Now, if you’ll be so good as to set me down, so I might find my way home.”
The chivalrous gentleman set Linnie on her feet.
The minute she put weight on both feet, she cried out.
Before the whole of her exclamation had fully left her lips, her mystery gentleman swept her right back up into his arms.
The ease with which he did so left her momentarily breathless.
“Allow me to escort you home, miss.”
“Oh, I mustn’t. There’d be a scandal.”
“Yes, you are right.” He appeared to think. “What if you allow me to bring you close enough for you to enter without me being seen?”
Her mind raced. The minute he did, he’d know her identity, and kind and charming as he’d been, the fact remained he was still a stranger. She didn’t know him from Eve. He could be the world’s biggest gossip.
“Miss?” he prodded.
“That won’t be necessary,” she said on a rush.
“Your ankle tells another story, my dear.”
Criminy.
At Linnie’s continued silence, the gentleman slowly nodded. “I see.”
“You do?” she ventured. What, exactly, did he think he saw?
“You’re afraid you’ve revealed enough about your situation and your intended.”
“My would-be intended,” she exclaimed.
“Your would-be intended,” he allowed.
“And now, were I to escort you home, I’d be in possession of not only your identity but also privileged information about your odious potential groom.”
Her shoulders sagged. He did understand.
“You have my assurance, I shan’t breathe a word about the secrets you’ve shared with anyone, miss.”
Her heart trembled. “Truly?” she whispered.
He nodded. “I’m a man of honor. My word is my bond.”
“Thank—”
The rest of her thanks was cut short by a thunderous shout. “Linnie?”
She glanced across the street.
Arran stood on the terraced steps outside Highland Lodge.
Her heart fell. “Oh, hell,” she whispered.
“I take it you’re Linnie,” her savior drawled.
“Yes,” she said weakly.
“And the fellow bearing down on us is the dastardly cousin who’ll sacrifice you on the marriage altar to some faithless, old, lecherous rake?”
She frowned at his presumption—although accurate, but for the errant lies she’d fed him. “I’ll have you know I have three brothers and three cousins.”
It just happened to be he’d guessed right. The gentleman didn’t have to know that, though.
Alas, with every bounding step Arran took to reach them, the gentleman invariably would.
Linnie sighed. “But, yes, that is my cousin.”
“My God, Linnie,” Arran cried. “I looked out the window and—” He made to dash across the street just as a pair of gentlemen, each astride an enormous, fierce-looking mount, bolted out of nowhere. Nearly trampled, Arran lifted a fist and shook it at the now distant riders.
While her cousin, now joined by her brothers, railed over Arran’s near brush with death, Linnie and her stranger continued to speak as casually as they might over tea and biscuits.
“And based on the ages of the assembled lot there, the old gentleman traveler sea captain is not amongst them.”
Linnie shook her head. “No. He is—”
“Culross!”
“Yes,” she said and then frowned. Wait, she’d not given that answer; rather, Arran had shouted the name of—
Arran scooped her out of the arms of her savior. “Culross, you bloody hero, you. Undoubtedly, you’ve helped my cousin out of some spot of trouble this night.”
Culross?
She furrowed her brow.
The attentive gentleman she’d shared too much with inclined his head. “On the contrary, I fear I was the one to cause Miss Smith trouble this night.”
Miss Smith?
She dimly recollected Arran passing her over to one of her other male kin, but beyond that, her mind sought to process, to make sense of . . .
The truth hit her.
Oh, God! No, no, no, no. She cringed all the way to her soul.
“L-Lord C-Culross,” she squawked like the pet chicken Andromena used to keep.
All gazes swung to Linnie, each filled with varying shades of reproval, concern, and confusion.
Except one.
Those bluest eyes she’d never before seen until this night glimmered with amusement.
The gentleman, who was a stranger no more, dropped a bow. “Miss Smith,” he murmured. “It is a pleasure to formally make your acquaintance.”
Oh, hell.