Chapter 2
Captain Arran McQuoid would hand it to the McQuoid and Smith clans—they could smile through even the most shite of times. Or attempt to, anyway.
At present, Arran’s family did so in the White Parlor of McQuoid Manor. Look at them. Hanging ornaments. Tying ribbons upon the freshly cut Scots pine. All of it in keeping with their annual Yuletide tradition.
Rubbing the back of his neck muscles, tense from hours of sitting in the carved, giltwood armchair, Arran hung on the fringe of it all.
They let their masks slip every now and then: his mother, the Countess of Abington, his happily-married sisters, Lady Helia and Lady Myrtle, their husbands, his cousin, Brone Smith and his wife, Lady Cora.
The younger members of their clans—Arran’s siblings, twins, Fleur and Quillon, and cousinly twins, Andromena and Oleander, were either lads at university or ladies about to have their first Season. They remained filled by the usual holiday spirit and untouched by the hovering darkness.
Arran uncorked his flask and took a healthy swig of whiskey.
Such was youth.
Adjacent to him came a noisy crinkling that drew his attention to where his sire, the Earl of Abington, sat buried in his newspaper.
Correction.
Such was youth and old age.
Lucky bastards…
Arran took another drink.
Andromena’s happy squeal filled the parlor. “Oh, we must sing!”
“Must we?” Arran muttered to himself.
Oblivious as the rest of the room to his presence, his youngest cousin, Andromena, jumped up and down on slippered feet. “Has anyone heard a word I’m saying?”
“How could we not?” Dallin, Viscount Crichton, Arran’s brother and the future earl, gave Andromena’s plait a gentle tug.
Swatting at his hand, Andromena pulled a face. “You mustn’t go about pulling my hair.” She tossed her head. “I’m a grown woman now, you know.”
A contrite Dallin touched a hand to his chest. “My apologies.” His show of proper solemnity, he ruined by giving another one of Andromena’s curls a tug. “I did not know you were all grown up.”
Andromena stuck her tongue out. “Yes, well, we can’t all be old as Father Time like you, Dallin.”
Fleur leant her voice in support of their cousin and in rebuke of their brother. “That ridiculous beard you’re sporting is not helping you, Dallin.”
“Hey now.” The affronted viscount rubbed a hand over his neatly groomed beard.
At Dallin’s side sat his devoted wife, former Diamond and still as radiant Lady Alexandra. She swept in to her husband’s rescue. “You are perfection, dear husband.”
Husband and wife leaned close and shared a kiss.
Whatever snide comment Fleur made to Andromena brought them both to laughing.
The countess properly anticipated a rebuttal from her eldest son. Without looking back from the current bow she tied to a branch, she stopped him in his tracks. “Dallin, do not give your sister and cousin a difficult time.”
“Of course, Mother,” he demurred.
Dallin waited so long as it took for their mother to look away before snatching Andromena’s plait for another yank.
“Andromena is correct!” Cousin Fleur might be Andromena’s twin for the enthusiasm and support she threw the other girl’s way. “The decorating of the tree is simply not complete unless we do!”
Both girls with their unaffected grins and ebullient laughter personified ignorance.
Or innocence.
Either way, both were one and the same—at least in the matter of maturity and the young ladies.
Determined to rouse the room, Andromena and Fleur burst out in song.
Arran took it in. All of it. As he did, he felt like a voyeur staring through a frosted pane of a faintly familiar scene.
“…Sit ye merry Gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay…”
The agreeable McQuoid-Smith lot instantly fell into line.
Because I was once part of this…the ribbing. The laughter. All of it.
Those days were long over. Arran’s jaw worked. A man couldn’t break the family and then slip right back into the fold like nothing happened.
He took another deep swallow.
“…for Jesus Christ is born to save or’ souls …”
Everyone did their best to keep up a facade of “customary McQuoid Christmastide festive spirits.”
“…from Satan’s power…”
All with the exception of he, the Honorable Captain Arran McQuoid.
“…Whenas we runne astray…”
Andromena and Fleur looped their arms through the countess’s.
“O tidings of comfort & joy…”
The girls brought the family matriarch to join in their lively chorus.
Normally, Aunt Leslie and Cousin Linnie would be right alongside the loudest revelers. This year, Aunt Leslie and Linnie stayed in London. They said it was to spare Linnie the strain of travel so soon after delivering her twin babes.
Arran stared into the haggard face reflected in his flask.
This time, when he raised the carafe, a gift given to him by his cousin, Campbell, Arran nearly downed the whole bloody contents.
“…From God that is our Father
The blessed angels came…”
To her audience’s delight, Fleur jumped onto the chaise.
Even as the countess remembered herself and the rules of decorum she’d hoped—and failed—to instill in her wayward children, Arran stared sightlessly at the engraved carafe.
A memory surfaced of the family’s last happy Christmas, where he’d attempted to arrange a marriage between Linnie and one of his closest friends, fellow shipping magnate and privateer, the Earl of Culross.
“…And it is tidings of comfort and joy…”
Arran pressed his thumb against the thistle rendered in metal.
What’d begun as a promising future alliance resulted in a hellish nightmare that’d nearly seen Linnie killed and left her with mental scars perhaps worse than any physical ones a person could suffer.
“…The blessed Virgin kneeling down
Unto the Lord did pray…”
He bore his finger into the Scottish symbol of strength and national pride.
“…With sudden joy and gladness—”
His mouth twisted in a harsh grimace.
My, what a splendid job they all did pretending all was right in the McQuoid-Smith family…
“…The shepherds were beguil’d…”
As if Arran weren’t responsible for the war brewing between his eminent shipping family and Culross. Though, in fairness, that was surely the lesser of his sins, considering he’d nearly gotten his cousin Linnie killed at sea and left her with a lifetime’s worth of horrors—
“…Before his mother mild…”
He raised his unstoppered flask to his lips and took a swig.
A deep swig.
The brandy seared a fiery path down his throat, one he welcomed.
Not that the French spirits left any lingering warmth. He’d long given up hope of fine liquor—or even cheap stock—blunting that battle at sea.
“…O then with joy and cheerfulness…”
There was none for blackguards such as he. Nor should there be.
He took another deep swallow.
“…Rejoice each mother’s child.
And it is tidings of comfort and joy…”
Bloody hell. He shouldn’t have come.
His nape pricked.
“…Now to the Lord sing praises”
With all the McQuoid-Smiths now joined in the show of happily celebrating kin, he looked for the one paying him notice.
“All you within this place”
Seated at the adjacent corner of the Axminster carpet, near one of the four thistle medallions woven to match the gilded one at the center, his cousin Meghan watched him.
“…Like we true loving brethren,
Each other to embrace…”
Eye contact proved folly. Meghan took that connection for an invitation to quit her seat and head for his.
Bloody hell.
He’d managed to avoid direct conversation with the whole of the McQuoid-Smith clan. With their big brood, it was all too easy to distract and slip off. Divert. Avoid.
They’d avoided him.
In actuality, for as much as they’d avoided him, he’d avoided them just as much.
Of all the confrontations, one with Meghan Smith, Linnie’s devoted sister, was not the one he’d been eager to have.
All hope she’d take a turn for the games and carols at play died a swift death.
Meghan dropped into the seat beside him. “Hullo, cousin,” she greeted with a confounding amount of normality.
“Cousin,” he returned.
Meghan settled beside him. Kicking her legs out like the hoyden she’d always been, Meghan crossed her feet at her ankles. She folded her arms at her chest.
The collective singing voices came to a rousing conclusion. Barely a breath later, a new carol rang out. This time, Dallin’s wife, Lady Alexandra, and her sister, Lady Cora, broke into song.
“…My true love sent to me…”
Cassia lent her voice the loudest. “…A Partridge in a pear-tree…”
Ah, the charade continues.
Together, he and a silent Meghan stared out at the festive tableau.
All right then. It was clear Meghan wouldn’t be leaving any time soon. And it was all Arran could do to keep from dragging his hands over his face.
He’d be forced into small talk.
“Shouldn’t you be up there singing in joy, Meg?
” Arran gently nudged Meghan’s arm with an elbow.
“We are soon for London and your grand winter wedding to Hartwell.” Hartwell, the best friend of Arran’s former best friend, Captain Culross.
“That day you’ve been waiting for since you were but five.
” He’d long teased her over that pronouncement she’d made as a young girl.
“As such, I’d expect you’d be over there with Hartwell.
” Instead of me. He rubbed the top of Meghan’s auburn head and stopped.
Of note, Meghan neither responded with an answering laugh, an affirmative glow, or beamed the way a soon-to-be bride ought.
So little Meg wasn’t the eager bride the other McQuoid-Smith girls had been.
Arran wouldn’t set his foot a second time in his female kin’s betrothals, marriages, relationships, families, or any other decision they’d make.
He slid a glance in the duke’s general direction. “Hartwell appears eager to join in the festivities.”
Meghan looked at her intended—and then only briefly.
She snorted. “His Grace appears more eager to clap his hands over his ears.”
She too had noticed her betrothed’s lukewarm enthusiasm for the wintertime fun.
She also very clearly wanted to discuss her impending marriage in a few days’ time with Arran.
Because of that, he wanted her gone more than ever.
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” he cajoled. “He’s unable to take his gaze from you.”
Obviously knowing to look in her betrothed’s direction meant she’d be required to join him, Meghan didn’t even take a sideways glance. “Trying to be rid of me, are you, Arran?”
He scoffed. “Hardly.”
The heavily freckled miss let out another snort.
Nor did she budge from the sofa.
They did however settle into a far more comfortable quiet. Arran could almost imagine no great tragedy brought about by his doing had befallen them.
“…My true love sent to me: four colly birds, three French hens, two turtle doves…”
Meghan’s next words shattered his all-too brief illusion. “They’re doing a convincing job of acting as if it is a normal holiday.”
This felt far more comfortable—forthrightness. “At least they seem to think so,” he murmured.
That was the only invitation his unusually somber cousin needed. “Linnie and Jeremy’s not being here has nothing to do with you, Arran. Given her condition, it was determined it best she remain in London for the…for…”
“Your wedding?” he supplied.
“Linnie is a grown woman, Arran. She made the—”
Oh, no. This he’d neither anticipated, nor deserved.
The Lord appeared to agree.
A commotion sounded in the hall, the flurry of footfalls and cries and shouts. That was all it took to break the festive spirit and restore the equilibrium to the problems brewing.
His nerves fully heightened, Arran, along with Dallin, the Marquess of Winfield, the Duke of Aragon, and cousin Meghan’s betrothed, the Duke of Hartwell, were on their feet before the door exploded open, braced for the revenge they’d been anticipating.
The family butler, Cornell, stumbled in. The tall, spindly servant’s face was a color to match his shock of white hair. “N-Not Culross,” he rasped, by way of announcement. All the staff, servants, and family had been fully informed about the feud. “Mr. Campbell has arrived.”
“At bloody last,” Quillon shouted in annoyance. “Took him long enough.”
“Yes, but I should—” The poor butler didn’t stand a chance of completing his sentence. He’d already been overtaken by the family rushing past him to greet the returning cousin.
Meghan lingered a moment, looking like she wished to remain behind, the same as Arran, but then she shuffled off.
Arran waited and then reluctantly set out to join the joyous reunion.