Page 80 of The Devil Wears Kilts
“So have I,” Jane added. She’d danced the waltz with Arran MacLawry, Charlotte realized belatedly.
“Is something amiss, Glengask?” Lord Hest asked, his expression cautious. From what he’d said about Ranulf, he no doubt expected trouble.
A muscle in Ranulf’s lean jaw clenched. “Nae. Just a feeling.”
“Then you’re free to go, of course. I think we’ll stay.”
For a long moment Ranulf stood silent. “Come along then, Rowena, Arran.”
He reached for his sister’s hand, but she took a step backward. “I’m not going, Ranulf.”
“Then who do ye expect to keep an eye on ye, Rowena?” he returned flatly.
“No one. For heaven’s sake,bràthair,this is a grand ball. Nothing is going to happen to me here. And I’m eighteen. I’m not a little girl with pigtails.”
Ranulf hesitated. It was the first time in their acquaintance that Charlotte had ever seen him indecisive about anything. The effect was oddly heartbreaking. Finally he nodded. “Arran and I will go, then. Unless ye’ve other plans, Arran.”
“Nae. I’ll go with ye,” Arran replied, looking rather stunned to be asked.
“Good.” He sent a glance at his uncle, who nodded, evidently realizing his duty. Then he looked at her, a stiff smile touching his mouth and fleeing again. “I’ll call on ye tomorrow.”
With that he and his brother left the ballroom. Immediately the room seemed smaller, the light dimmer, the music cheap and amateurish. And as much as she tried to deny it, her heart felt dimmer, too.
Of course she was being silly; she’d spent weeks attempting to convince him to see her point of view. Insisting that it was wrong to answer words—especially words that only insulted a man’s or a woman’s pride—with bloodshed. So now that he’d listened, she had no right to feel like a fairy princess whose one true love had just walked away from the battlefield rather than staying to defend her honor.
After all, she knew why he’d left; he’d done it so no one else would have any reason to threaten or insult her or Rowena or Janie. It had been the wise, mature decision. Neither had he been weak in conceding to his sister’s demand to stay. He’d only been attempting to avoid causing a scene, as any proper gentleman would do.
And so she did not, absolutely did not, feel disappointed.
Chapter Fifteen
Ranulf had read somewhere about insects that devoured their victims from the inside, leaving perfect, empty shells in their wake. And he wondered whether fury could do the same thing to a man, eating his heart and organs alive, consuming them with heat and flame, leaving naught but a hollow wretch behind.
Part of him wished that, if emptiness was the end result, his anger would hurry up and get it over with. Because the raw hate he’d been fighting during a night of pacing and drinking and punching half a dozen holes in his bedchamber wall showed no sign of easing.
All he wanted to do was strike out—at Calder and at Gerdens-Dailey and at Berling—and permanently remove the threat those men represented to his loved ones. And that was the one thing he could not do. Not if he wanted to keep Charlotte Hanover in his life.
Arran leaned around the breakfast room door frame. “There ye are,” he said, but didn’t move into the room. Instead his light blue eyes found Owen and one of the new footmen they’d hired. “My brother and I need a moment,” he said.
“Aye, Lord Arran.”
Once Owen had dragged the other servant out of the room, Arran stepped inside and shut the door behind him. Silently he poured himself a cup of tea, chose a hard-boiled egg and some ham slices from the sideboard, and took the seat at the foot of the table opposite Ranulf.
“Ye’ve a note from Myles,” he said, sliding the folded paper down the table.
After he took another drink from the whisky at his elbow and emptied the accompanying bottle of the stuff to refill his glass, Ranulf picked the note up and unfolded it. “I’ll be going to luncheon at White’s,” he said, refolding the note and pocketing it. Evidently Myles had found an Englishman or two for him to befriend. Lovely. Now he would have to find a way to be polite, when all he wanted to do was smash things into wee pieces.
His brother nodded. “I thought I might see if Winnie and the Hanover lasses care to go for a picnic luncheon,” he said, his tone still low and flat and careful.
“Ye do that, then.” Ranulf took another drink.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, before Arran cleared his throat. “I thought ye might’ve still been to bed this morning,” he said, “so I knocked on yer door. I think ye might have some wood beetles in yer walls. Ye’ve a bit of damage.”
If he’d been in a better mood, the care with which Arran was speaking would have been amusing. “I noticed that,” he returned.
“If ye need any assistance getting rid of these insects, I hope ye keep in mind that I’m here, and I’m more than ready to help.”
That couldn’t be allowed. Not only could Arran be hurt—or worse—but any MacLawry doing violence could cost him Charlotte. “Nae. The world’s full of insects, and they’ll eat what they will.”
