The Ruthless Laird’s Virgin (The Lost Highland Lairds #1)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

“Callum Fraser is dead!” The messenger’s voice rang out, cutting through the air like a sharp knife. Dropping her quill, Eleanor Whitacker watched as the black ink bled into the margins of the ledger before her. A ledger that her brother had taken great care to compile.

The sound of chairs scraping across the cold stone floor drew her attention up just as her father began coughing, a wet, hacking sound that made her rush to his side.

Her long blond curls bounced as she knelt at his side.

“Father, can ye breathe?” She ran her long fingers over his back, gently soothing him as he fought for breath, her hazel eyes filled with concern.

“What did ye say?” her brother, Andrew, asked, already standing as he stared at the page, standing in the doorway to their study.

The young man heaved for breath, his chest rising and falling in quick succession as he nervously ran his tongue over his lips.

He had been the family’s messenger and assistant for many years, yet he had never before been out of breath.

“There… there was an ambush while the clan was on a hunt. Fraser men were killed, Laird Fraser rode his horse into a ravine, and nay bodies were recovered.” His dark eyes were wild with shock as he relayed the information.

He was young, too young to be delivering such news.

The air around them all stilled as Eleanor looked up and met her brother’s gaze.

His dark green eyes were filled with concern, much like the furious beating of her own heart.

This cannae be…

Her throat suddenly felt too dry to swallow as she raised a hand to her chest.

Running his hand through his thick mop of brown hair, Andrew let out a deep breath. “Are ye certain?”

The boy nodded. “Aye, it has been a week, and the laird is presumed dead. The declaration has been filed. Callum Fraser is presumed dead. Our services will nay longer be needed…” his voice trailed off on a solemn note.

“Presumed?” Andrew asked, waiting for the boy to nod before shifting his gaze back to his sister.

She understood the look in his eyes without him even having to explain it to her. Presumed meant official documents. It meant that someone had waited seven days before deciding his fate and knowing if he was truly dead or alive.

Focusing on her father again, Eleanor met his sad gaze, noting the pain in his brown eyes.

He had been sickly for a while, but the recent years had begun to show in the wrinkles around his eyes and mouth and the thinning of his hair.

He had been too ill to continue the family business, and Andrew and Eleanor had both stepped up as managers and bookkeepers.

“Where was the motion first filed?” Andrew was already crossing the study as he reached for his coat and swung it over his shoulders.

The boy seemed to have caught his breath as his shoulders relaxed. “In Edinburgh, before being sent North. The intermediary was Duncan Fraser.”

Eleanor froze, coming to her feet so quickly that her father had to grip the edge of the table for support as he coughed. “Andrew, do ye ken what it means?” Her eyes searched his worried face that had grown deathly pale.

Duncan Fraser was a name well known to them. Although they had never seen the man in person, his name had appeared on many documents and land transfer deeds in the past.

Taking his time, Andrew slowly swallowed before answering.

“It means that somebody wanted Callum Fraser dead on paper. They wanted a legal and binding document that wiped him off the face of the earth. It means that I must discover who wants his lands before it’s too late.

” His jaw stiffened, making the rest of his body tense along with it.

“I willnae allow the new land agent, this Stewart man, to strip us of everything we have worked so hard to acquire. This family has served the Frasers for many years. I willnae allow it.”

Her heart leaped in her chest, making her pulse race as the study began to spin. Losing their position with the Fraser clan would mean losing most of the money they earned.

This cannae be happenin’.

The thought became more urgent, making her tear up as she looked at her brother. This kind of situation could cause serious trouble for everyone, threatening to break apart the family and alter their lives forever.

“Daenae wait for me, I must go at once.” He turned from her, leaving the study without another word as she shut the door on her and their father.

The echoes of his footsteps continued in her mind long after he had left. It was not until her father began to cough again that she helped him to his feet and called for a maid to take him to bed.

I have to do all that I can.

She waited to be alone in the study again before poring over every document and ledger that contained the name Duncan Fraser.

Hours passed, and candles were lit as a soft rain began to soak the streets outside.

The ledgers were all the same, deed transfers that did not make sense.

It was always the same name, the same neat writing, and the same seal.

Yet she could not fathom what it all meant.

Her back began to ache, and her eyes felt dry when her brother finally returned, his cloak soaked with rain. The determination in his tired eyes made the pit of her stomach coil with fear.

“Andrew? Did ye find what ye were lookin’ for?” Her voice was thin and hoarse from the hours of working without so much as a drink.

He shook his head before hurrying across the room and retrieving a satchel from beneath the desk.

He began to shove rolls of parchment inside without looking at her.

“I must travel North. I willnae write again, and if I do, it willnae be plainly. If I am wrong, ye willnae need the letters, but if I am right…” His voice trailed off as he paused.

“Well, ye will have to keep yer head on yer shoulders, and nae trust anyone.”

Tears welled in her eyes as she drew her lips into her mouth. Andrew was the only brother she had left, and he meant the world to her. “Ye cannae leave, Andrew, at least let me go with ye.”

Once he had finished gathering the documents, he walked over to her and kissed the top of her head. “Be careful, me hen. Ye always fuss about us. I promise I will come back to ye. Take care of Father for me.” He drew away from her, walking out of the study as silence suddenly set in.

Ride North. Avoid the inns. Daenae trust a soul.

Eleanor repeated her brother’s instructions in her mind with every beat of the horse’s hooves against the dirt.

It had been a week since he had left her.

A week since she had not heard a single word, then suddenly, in the early hours of the morning, a letter had arrived.

Ten simple words that urged her forward.

Ride North. Avoid the inns. Daenae trust a soul.

Soft rain began to soak her cloak as she lifted the hood and covered her hair, setting her eyes on one of the old boundary markers in the distance. She was at least an hour from Fraser lands, and her muscles were beginning to ache from the hours of riding and very little sleep.

Her breath caught in her throat when her horse suddenly stopped rearing on the side of the road just as they reached the edge of a thicket of trees.

“What is it, girl?” Eleanor leaned down and petted the horse’s thick black neck, feeling as if her heart would burst from her chest as it slammed against her ribs.

Slamming her hooves against the sodden ground, the mare flicked her ears, rearing slightly as she snorted and looked toward the trees.

We are too close to the line of trees. Somethin’ isnae right here.

Eleanor stiffened in the saddle, gripping the horse’s reins tighter as the unmistakable scent of sickly-sweet iron filled her nostrils. Blood. Her heart skipped a beat as her pulse began to race, her eyes moving frantically across the line of trees.

There was not a single person in sight, but that did not mean she was alone. The roads between Edinburgh and the Northern territories were well-known for bandits and men who had abandoned their clans for less savory lives.

“Walk on.” Eleanor clicked her tongue, urging the horse forward despite the animal’s hesitation.

Silence filled the air apart from the hesitant clopping of her mare’s hooves. It was quiet, far too quiet for…

Every fiber in her body froze as a blood-covered man stumbled into the road, blocking their path.

The mare reared, kicking her front legs in the air as the man stumbled even closer, and Eleanor had to fight to keep herself seated.

His thick dark hair hung in messy clumps over his shoulders, while the rest of him seemed to have been dragged through the mud. Yet it was his eyes that stood out the most. Blacker than the depths of a coal mine as they locked onto hers.

He glared at her, taking a step forward as he reached a bloody and torn-up hand toward the saddle. He was a big, burly man, well-built and toned.

Is he a warrior or a bandit?

Fear rose in her chest when he grasped for the reins, missing them by an inch.

Acting without thinking, Eleanor reached for her riding crop that had been tucked into her boot and struck him, hoping the blow would buy her some time to escape. “Leave us alone!” she yelled, but the blow did nothing but anger him further.

The man clenched his strong jaw, exposing a vein in his neck as he stumbled forward and caught the reins on his second try. He fell to his knees and met her gaze once again before whispering, “Water…” His eyes suddenly rolled back in his head as he let go of the reins and fell to the side.

Now is me chance.

Uncertainty entered her heart as she gripped the reins and held them tight.

It would not be right to leave the man injured and alone if he were a warrior, but if he were a bandit…

Her heart suddenly jolted at the thought, causing her to act without thinking as she dug her heels into the horse’s flanks and urged the mare on.

The mare began to gallop, leaving the man lying still beside the road as they sped away.

Be kind, nay matter the cost.

Her father and Andrew’s words echoed in her mind as she drew further and further away.

“Damn!” she swore and slowed, looking back over her shoulder.

The man lay deathly still, too still for someone who could rise again and walk away.

Heaving a sigh, she turned the horse around and slowly began to make her way back toward the stranger. He did not so much as stir as she drew closer and dismounted, keeping a safe distance at first.

His chest rose and fell in steady, uneven rhythms as the rain grew thicker and blanketed them both.

She took a few steps toward him, nudging him gently at first before kneeling at his side when he did not stir.

I shouldnae get any closer. Her heart raced with fear, yet she could not help but notice the subtle scars on his arms and his strong build. He looked far fiercer, like a warrior rather than a bandit.

Her breath caught in her throat again as the rain washed away patches of dirt from his skin. He was tanned, almost olive-colored in the patches that were now beginning to reveal themselves.

“Water…” He finally stirred, almost making her jump from her skin.

“I can give ye water,” she whispered before pushing herself up and hurrying back to her horse, where she retrieved a hide flask and hurried back. “Here.” She placed one hand under his head and lifted, guiding the flask to his lips.

The man drank in large gulps, unashamedly quenching his thirst like an animal in the desert. The flask was almost empty by the time he breathed a sigh of relief and fell back down, his heavy head lolling onto her lap.

“I cannae just leave ye here.” She released a heavy breath and lifted her head to look around.

She was still an hour from her destination, and the road was not safe.

She thought of lifting him onto her horse, but there was no possible way that someone with her lithe figure would be able to manage his bulk.

The horse neighed when lightning lit up the sky in the distance.

She had no choice but to drag him off the road and into a shelter.

“But where?” She looked around, hoping against hope that a miracle would present itself. It was then that her eyes fell on something in the distance. A faint pillar of smoke was barely visible above the line of trees.

A pillar of smoke like that could mean only one thing: a fire.

And where there was a fire, there were people who could help them.

It suddenly dawned on her that she recognized exactly where she was.

She and her brother had spent many hours playing in the forest during trips up North.

The smoke was more than likely coming from the healer’s hut, Fiona MacRae, an old woman despised by most of the highlands, but useful when it came to healing.

“Fiona is the only person who can help us.” She stood and spoke out loud with another heavy sigh before fetching her horse and looping the reins around her arm.

The stranger still lay deathly still, and had it not been for the uneven rise and fall of his chest, she would have thought him dead.

“I guess we have nae choice.” She gritted her teeth as she leaned down and placed each hand under his arms, lifting him slightly off the ground as she began to drag him backward.

“Good Lord, ye must have weighed more than a few sacks of grain as a bairn. Yer poor mother.” She gritted her teeth and headed toward the line of trees.

It took her what seemed like more than an hour to drag him all the way to the hut, taking frequent breaks as the underbrush caught his hair and cloak. She was soaked through to the bone and almost completely out of breath by the time she lowered him to the ground and knocked on the door.

A loud wooden creak sliced through the air as the door opened at once.

“Aye?” An old woman who appeared to be in her seventies, with pure white hair and ice-blue eyes, looked at them both.

She was tall and thin with bony hands and features, yet her face bore the evidence of someone who had once been quite pretty.

Her eyes dropped back down to the man on the floor as she stepped aside. “Ye had better bring him in.”

Taking a deep breath, Eleanor composed herself again before lifting his shoulders and dragging the man inside the hut.

What have I gotten meself into?

The door shut behind her just as a loud crack split the sky outside.