Chapter Ten
“Are ye certain ye wish to have supper in the dining hall?” Bram asked once Miranda had calmed down enough to hold a conversation with him without bursting into tears.
He was not at all liking Miranda’s decision to confront her foes. Perhaps he had overdone the protective thing, and in doing so had given her false confidence. Did he really need to be grunting and growling, and threatening vengeance on anyone who harmed her?
Well, he was always going to protect Miranda—even with his life, if necessary.
But this was a social battle, not one likely to cause physical injury.
However, the weapons hurled, the cruel japes, the lies, and purposeful degradation could be more hurtful than any physical cut.
A well-aimed barb had the ability to pierce one’s soul quite deeply.
Sometimes those wounds festered so stubbornly under one’s skin, they never healed.
His heart ached to see the effect they were having on Miranda, for she had no protective shields against those horrid ladies. They knew this and enjoyed tossing their taunting remarks, like poison-tipped arrows from a crossbow that struck Miranda with lethal accuracy.
“I thought we had agreed to take our meal in my suite,” he muttered, wanting to swallow her in his arms and just hold her.
“We had,” she admitted, tipping her chin up as though in challenge. “But they will believe I am a coward if I do not show my face tonight. And don’t you dare tell me that I am a coward.” She sighed and glanced down at her toes. “I know I am.”
“Och, lass. What ye’re feeling is no’ cowardice. I dinna know if there is a name for it, but I would call it battle fatigue. It happens even to the best soldiers. The men under my command during the war were no more immune to it than ye are.”
“You fought against Napoleon?”
He nodded. “Of course. I was no’ going to send my Scottish regiments off to fight and remain safely ensconced at Lanark Castle. What sort of leader would that make me? No man dares call himself a leader if he hides behind his men.”
“All the more reason why we must confront them and not dine in. They’ll think I am scared and will take even more delight in tormenting me.
I am not brave, but I know I have to do this.
Besides, I will have you by my side.” She cast him a vulnerable look that had his heart leaping.
“Well, I know it is false bravado on my part. However, I think I must do this or they will circle me like carrion birds, and I’ll never be rid of them. ”
It galled him to think she was right. “As ye wish, Miranda. I’ll do my best to protect ye, but ye must promise me something.”
She nodded. “Whatever you ask.”
He cast her a stern look, for he really did not like that they were going to engage in this social battle that would likely end in more pain for her.
“If ye start this challenge, then ye have to see it through to the end and remain strong no matter what they hurl at ye. No tears. No flinching. No running away. Can ye do this?”
She nodded again. “Yes, if you promise to stay by my side.”
“Aye, lass. I will. Ye know my feelings on the matter.” She was in agony, and he would do all in his power to protect her.
She’d hugged him earlier. He’d felt like a king with her sweet arms around him, squeezing him with all her might and all her heart. Of course, he was a big oaf and she was hardly strong enough to give him much of a squeeze. It was the thought that counted.
He liked that she needed him. But he truly detested these social games played, the malicious poison these so-called ladies delighted in using to destroy reputations and tear others down.
“I’ll reserve a table for us for seven o’clock. Look yer best. No weepy eyes. If I see so much as a drip, I’ll cancel the reservation and we’ll dine in.”
“She’ll look like a duchess,” Gwenys assured them, casting him another of her bright smiles.
He strode down the hall to the dining room, his gaze alert for the Lawsons and their friend, Lady Trowbridge, but they must have gone out or retired to their rooms, because he encountered no one familiar.
After making the reservation, he returned to his suite, and spent the next hour attempting to relax. He settled on his bed and read one of the books on military tactics that he had purchased at the bookshop.
He soon gave up reading because all he could think about was kissing Miranda behind the shop’s bookshelves and how badly he ached to kiss her again.
Since it was approaching suppertime, he rose and began to prepare himself for the impending debacle.
Of course, he would have to look his best. Elegant, powerful. Dressed in ducal splendor.
A complete bother. But he would do this for Miranda.
He tossed off his clothes, then washed and shaved. He had just finished grooming himself when there came a knock at his door.
“Bollocks,” he muttered, wrapping a towel around his waist, since he hadn’t a robe or banyan to cover himself, and marched to the door.
However, he did not open it. What if Miranda or Gwenys were on the other side? He was naked beneath his towel.
“Who is it?”
“A letter for you, Your Grace,” said a female voice that he assumed was one of the inn’s serving maids.
“Slip it under the door.”
“Oh, it’s too thick to slide under, Your Grace.”
There was something in her tone that he did not like. It sounded mocking to his ears, perhaps even a bit suggestive. Certainly not a tone any servant would ever employ with him.
“Leave it at the door.”
“As you wish,” she said, still sounding as though this errand was a lark for her.
He waited a few moments before opening the door, for something did not sound right about that maid. Perhaps she hoped to make a few bob by offering her services to him. It happened often enough.
He heard nothing more, so he thought she had left the letter and gone away, as he’d instructed.
But when he opened up, he found a lady staring back at him with predatory cat eyes. No tame house cat, either. This woman was a dangerous jungle cat, and he realized this had to be Lady Trowbridge.
“Well, isn’t this convenient? You are even more handsome than Lady Lowery described,” she purred. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
“No’ on yer life.” He held her back when she attempted to march into his suite.
The witch did not waste any time, did she?
Some men might have thought her attractive, for she had golden hair, an ample bosom that was a hairsbreadth from spilling out of her gown, and was batting her eyelashes at him over a pair of deep-blue eyes.
But Bram saw the harsh lines on her face. To him, she looked old, bitter, and used.
“I dinna know who ye are, nor do I wish an introduction. Who put ye up to this?”
He nudged her into the hallway and was about to shut the door in her face when Miranda suddenly opened hers and stepped out looking concerned as she held a note in her hand. “Solway, did you—”
The breath rushed out of her.
Bram groaned. Of course the witch had set this up. No doubt she’d expected Miranda would find them together in his bedchamber.
But even this failed ploy was enough to overset Miranda, because the mere sight of this woman had her recalling those horrible years during her marriage and those awful ones after her husband had died.
Lady Trowbridge ran her hands along Bram’s chest, leaving a light scratch mark as her calling card. “I’ll see you later, Your Grace,” she said in that annoying purr and strutted past Miranda, smug in the knowledge of destroying her composure.
Miranda’s gaze was fixed on her nemesis as Lady Trowbridge flounced out of sight. Only then did she turn back to Bram, staring at him a long moment because she was obviously dumbfounded by what had just occurred.
She held up the scrap of parchment now crumpled in her hand. “I don’t suppose you slipped this note under my door.”
“No.”
She managed a brief smile. “I don’t suppose you meant to greet her while wearing not a stitch of clothing.”
“No. I was washing up for our supper tonight, hoping to look elegant instead of the savage Scot that I am. She caught me as I was about to set out my clothes. She’s a nasty one, isn’t she?”
Miranda nodded. “She meant to seduce you.”
“Och, lass. So what? I’d never succumb to her charms, which are nonexistent anyway. Do ye think I would ever choose her over ye?”
“My husband did,” she said, the pain evident in her voice.
“Because he was an idjit. I am no’ him, Miranda.”
“I know.”
But the look she gave him revealed a wealth of doubt. That boor of a husband had crushed her ability to trust, and Bram knew it would be a difficult hurdle for him to overcome, especially while Lady Trowbridge was doing her best to undermine Miranda’s chance at happiness.
He sighed. “We ought to keep to our original plan and dine in tonight.”
She shook her head fiercely. “No! This is the one thing we cannot do, especially now. Then she will know that she’s won.”
“She canno’ win unless ye give her power over yerself.”
“But that’s the sad part, isn’t it?” She cast him a mirthless smile. “She does have it. Please, we must dine where everyone can see us. Gwenys and I will wear our best silks. What were you planning on wearing?”
He glanced down at himself, his upper torso naked and only a towel wrapped around his hips to hide his lower parts. “What? Am I no’ dressed to yer liking?”
She gave a soft laugh. “I’m sure Lady Trowbridge was pleasantly surprised by your attire.”
“Who cares what she thought? Rest easy, I was going to wear my formal best for ye. I know how important this evening is for ye.”
“Thank you, Bram.”
Och, he liked the sound of his name on her lips.
“Just so there is no confusion, I did no’ open the door to her.
She claimed to be a maid bringing me a letter.
” He nodded toward the one in Miranda’s hand, curious about it.
“I only ventured into the hall once I thought she had walked away. Obviously, she hadn’t. Stupid, childish game she was playing.”