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“Well, I didn’t,” she maintained and headed to Debranua. “Have a good day, sir.” She curtsied, mounted, and rode away.
Blasted man! Blasted man!
Blasted sodding man! she cursed.
Did he have to tempt her nearly to surrender? How in the whole universe would she forget him when he had travelled all the way south to find her and tear her down with a marriage proposal?
Fortunately, they had met in a place that did not denounce her real status. Or everything would crumble to dust.
She would have to find another place to do her riding until she made sure he left town. If she met him once more, she would not be able to stand her ground. Worse, she would beg him to take her with or without marriage.
He could not very well marry the McTavish chit if he dared ask another.
To be refused. He never thought any lass would ever refuse a McKendrick. Except this one did, certainly because clans and Scotland meant nothing to her. The rejection did not go down smoothly, he must confess. He was still ruminating the bitter mouthful.
That was why he made his way to Mayfair next morning, where he found out his intended lived. At least that was easy to do. He just mentioned that he looked for Angus McTavish’s townhouse to receive its directions.
Going up the front steps, he knocked. The door opened to present a starched butler whose poise made him look like the owner himself. The servant measured Fingal from his ruffled hair, down his white shirt, carefully wrapped tartan, hose, and black shoes. And sniffed.
What the—? The man worked for a Scot, for pity’s sake! That nose in the air number did not recommend him.
“How can I help you, sir?” he asked in a self-important nasal tone.
Fingal thumped his displeasure and answered as if he did this every day. “I’m here to see Miss Anna McTavish.”
“I am sorry to say these are not visiting hours, sir.” The man clasped his hands behind him and lifted his prominent nose even more.
These Sassenach sought to ritualise every single hour of the day. It showed they had nothing better to do but to bore themselves with endless etiquette. “And I am sorry to say I don’t care,” he quipped.
The butler must have sensed the laird’s determination. “I could see if the lady is home. Do you have a card?”
The man was testing his patience. These past days did not go according to plan, and his tolerance hung by a thread. Fingal must have made a fearful scowl, for the servant gave a step back. “You bring the lass right away, or I will go fetch her myself,” he threatened.
With a weary bow, the man widened the entrance and let him into the parlour before leading him to a luxurious drawing room next to it. “If you will wait here, sir. Whom should I announce?”
“Laird Fingal McKendrick,” he answered curtly.
Impatient, he paced the drawing room for what seemed like two days before he heard a noise at the threshold. He swivelled and set eyes on a young woman of twenty-one that was the very furthest from what he had expected.
Wheat-blonde hair artfully pinned, pale blue eyes focused on him, an absolutely impeccable dress of some costly fabric in some costly colour, sapphire earrings dripping from porcelain skin. Petite, no curves to speak of, nor expression on her completely symmetrical, doll-like features.
Naturally, Fingal would not be able to tell what lay beyond her appearance—her personality, wishes, or dreams. But what met the eye was a woman that would not fit in Highland life even if she tried hard. This was a city-bred, city-loving, city-dependant person. If he placed a bet, he would say she was more like a hothouse flower who would not survive in the rugged environment he called home, even though she had been born there and lived in it for the first years of her life.
This was no Highlander’s wife material by any stretch of imagination.
In the same way he measured her, she had been doing the same to him, making it evident that her opinion of him did not differ much from his of her.
“To what do I owe your unexpected visit, my lord?” she asked in a flawless, cultured accent, not leaving any doubt of her opinion about his non-visiting hours.
Fingal looked for something seemingly polite to answer, but before he did, the front door opened and the more-English-than-the-English butler’s voice uttered, “My lady.” Rustling of hats and gloves reached his ears through the room’s entrance, which Anna had not shut.
The hothouse flower’s attention turned to where the sounds came. Boots clicked along the hallway, nearing.
“Catriona!” Anna called in a more enthusiastic tone than the one she had used with him. “Come see! There is,” in her favour, he should say he heard hesitance before she continued, “a barbarian in our drawing room.” He could not even blame her because the perception was perfectly attuned to her perfect London standards.
“A barb—?” That voice!
Then the woman herself came in to blow his world to pieces.
