Beatrice paused before answering.
How bad is me father’s reputation? Does she ken how much he has cost us?
“Whitmore,” she replied, after a beat. “Me father’s Patrick Whitmore.”
Violet’s smile did not waver.
Beatrice was waiting for an interrogation to start, a million questions about what Violet might see as an odd and sudden arrangement, but there was very little said about the betrothal.
It’s like she just wants to get to ken me. Who I am and where I’ve come from.
“Well, if ye ask me,” Violet said lightly, “ye are much too bonnie and sweet for the likes of me brother. But nobody ever asks me.”
Beatrice let out a laugh and then sighed. “Yer brother has… his own charm.” That made Violet laugh. “But Effie’s just adorable.”
“Aye, she is.” Violet rose from her seat, still smiling beatifically. “Glad I sought ye out, Bea. I’m happy to see ye betrothed to me brother. Even if ye’re lovely and he’s a bit of a bampot.”
She left Beatrice alone in the misted light of the library.
Beatrice did her best to return to her reading, but now her mind was a jumble of images and phrases too distracting to parse through to do anything else.
She closed the book, brought her knees to her chest, and let her mind wander.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“How long do ye expect the patrol to take?” Tyler asked. He was holding all the weapons Leo planned on taking with him and looked comically overloaded. “In case Miss Beatrice enquires about yer absence.”
“And why would she do that?” asked Leo.
Tyler raised his eyebrows but said nothing.
Violet laughed from across the chamber, where she poured herself a whisky. “Aye, Brother. Ye understand so little about women.”
“I understand what I need to,” Leo protested, but felt himself outnumbered. “Tell the lass I’ll be gone for a day if she asks ye, Tyler, though I cannae think why she would.”
Tyler nodded. “Of course, me Laird.”
Leo felt that his head was too full of Beatrice right now. Long auburn hair and a green dress, swishing into the Great Hall, the warmth of her body against his through a thin nightdress and dressing gown, fiery hazel eyes catching the candlelight in the castle corridors or watching him exercise with his men in the courtyard…
Patrolling was an easy excuse to leave the whole mess behind for a day and clear his head. Leo loved riding through the outlands, alone with his thoughts and left to his own devices.
Nay lasses around to muck it up.
Oftentimes, he went with only a skeleton crew of men, the ones who knew how to take care of themselves, so he didn’t have to keep a close eye on them. He could gallop off into the green wilds and breathe in the cold, foggy air that kept all of Scotland shrouded in its embrace.
“I’ve met Beatrice, by the way,” Violet revealed as Leo finished gathering his accoutrements.
He stiffened. “Aye, and what of it?”
“She’s a wonderful lass. I think she’s too good for ye, actually.”
“Ye spoke to her?”
Violet scoffed, staring him down as if he were being a petulant child. “Of course. Ye didnae just expect me to lurk around and watch her from a distance.”
“I daenae want the two of ye chattering like the old witches in the kitchen.”
“She’s rather beautiful.” Violet tilted her head to the side, studying his face the way she used to when they were children and he was trying to hide something from her. “Do ye nae think so?”
