Beauty and the Duke Page 17

  Having made that assessment herself, Christine did not argue his point. Or the fact that Erik would risk his own life a thousand times over before he’d ever allow her to risk hers. Even if the cause was for them both. He had brought her to Scotland to help him find Elizabeth.

  She dusted off her hands and began picking her way up the incline. “Yes, it is dangerous. More so if I tripped and actually fell off the cliff.”

  He grabbed her arm as she walked past—not cruelly, but neither was his grip gentle as he turned her to face him. “This entire area is unsafe.” He aimed his fierce scowl over her shoulder at the groomsman standing where he’d tied her horse to the limb of a dead tree. “Or had you forgotten?”

  “Thank you, Hamilton,” she rushed to the groom’s defense. “I have appreciated your expertise in helping me locate everything I needed to see this afternoon. My husband will see that I get home all apiece.”

  The man crushed his hat in his hands. “Yes, mum.” He peered nervously at Erik before slapping his ruined hat back on his head. “Your grace.”

  Watching the poor man mount and then rein his horse around, Christine eased her arm from Erik’s grip. “Hamilton brought me here because I ordered it.”

  “Do you see the old watchtower three meters beyond that ridge?”

  Christine turned her head. “What ridge?”

  “My point exactly. This entire area crumbled into the river last winter.”

  “And do you see the old drover trail behind you? The one that comes up from the valley. I believe you followed it to find me.”

  Erik merely narrowed his eyes. Unabashed, Christine continued. “According to Annie it is still a through trail to the coast. People may not be allowed up here, but that does not mean no one has been here. Including some of those missing.” She swept her arm about her. “This is old volcanic terrain. There are lava chutes running throughout these hills. Such geological formations make for excellent conditions in the creation of caverns. If I were a wagering man, I would bet that is where both of us will find the answers we seek.”

  Looking suitably impressed, he tipped back his hat with his quirt and peered down at her in amusement. “You’ve learned all of that in the ten minutes you were on that ledge?”

  She thumped his chest. “I learned all that the instant I looked over the ledge and saw the hollow below.” She smiled. “Water isn’t overflowing from the river into the hollow. It is flowing out of the hollow into the river. That is why we are seeing a huge torrent of white water below us.”

  His brows rose. “I thought white water was caused by water rushing over protruding rocks.”

  “The protruding rocks are covered in moss. The water is coming from beneath the surface and not over it. And if you look closer, you will see black dirt and rocks on the bank. That, my dearest husband and partner, tells me your river has found a lava tube in which to frolic.”

  Satisfied that she had at last left him suitably astonished, she rocked back on her heels. “When the river shifted its course, it must have found its way into a lava tube and further weakened the walls. The breach could be showing up now because this cliff is unstable or this cliff has become unstable because of the rushing water. The fact that it has collapsed in places demonstrates that much.”

  “I haven’t had my engineer walk these banks recently but—”

  “I am no engineer, but I know dirt,” she said with no amount of humility. “I know the difference between volcanic dirt and plain old river wash. If you want to peer over the edge of the cliff and have a look…?”

  He glanced over his shoulder but did not appear inclined to look further. Smiling to herself, she lifted her skirts and picked her way over the rocks back to her horse. She’d worn stout footwear and pants beneath her woolen skirt, a feminine article of clothing that she intended to remove when the time came for her to climb down this cliff.

  “When the river level has dropped, I intend to go down there for a closer look.” Then, looking up at the gloomy sky, she turned on her heel as another thought struck her, and nearly collided with him. “There are days in a row where the sun does shine?”

  His fingers encircled her wrist like a chain of velvet, and he pulled her against him. She felt the burning touch of his body against hers. “Go back to the part where you said you intend to go down there.”

  She didn’t try to escape him, nor did she wish to. “I need to get closer to the hollow. Maybe there is a way inside from the cliff. Otherwise, we will have to find another way inside. It is too dangerous to try by boat.”

  “Dangerous?” The word was a mockery of her assessment.

  She brought his gloved fingers to her lips. “Don’t be difficult, Erik.”

  His fingers unfurled beneath her chin. Like the legendary black lotus, a fruit touted to induce a dreamy languor and forgetfulness. That was the way he made her feel now as she gazed into his face. Dreamy.

  “When I gave you permission to look for bones, I did not mean for you to be risking your life,” he said.

  “I am not a novice climber.” If truth be told, she was an excellent climber and only her modesty prevented her from bragging. Climbing cliffs was not unheard of and had become something of a sport begun a half century ago by daring-do Englishmen who scaled the Alpines. “Mr. Darlington and I have climbed far worse than this,” she said.

  Erik released her hand but nothing in his stance told her he had relented. In fact, his expression hardened. “Besides,” she added with a hint of nonchalance, deciding it time to clarify certain issues between them, “we signed an agreement stating that in exchange for—”

  “I know what I signed.”

  “I am to have access to your estate.”

  “I know what I signed. It is my contract.”

  “It is your contract, and you clarified the details of this partnership down to each period and colon.” He’d practically done everything but offer to open the door and invite her to leave once she had fulfilled her side of the bargain.

  For a week, he’d been too occupied to visit or inquire as to her welfare. Now he was concerned? “You paid a great deal of money to make this a partnership between us. I am merely reminding you of the rules specific—”

  “I understand that we signed a contract. A contract that, to put it bluntly, we both know would not stand up in a court.”

  “It isn’t the law or the action of a tribunal that matters to me. I know I am your property. Your word binds you,” she said, then on a softer note: “This is my beast we are talking about, Erik.” And Erin’s mother, she started to say, a woman whose fate Erik had charged Christine to discover.

  For a long time, he said nothing, and she started to feel a weight settle in her chest. “Trust my judgment, Erik.”

  His eyes were steady. “I do trust your judgment.”

  Her lips curved up at the corners, a concession to his surrender, the movement of her mouth drawing the full measurement of his sherry eyes. “You are bloody stubborn, Christine.”

  “I prefer to think of myself as independent.”

  “Independence does have its charm,” he said.

  “Truly? You are not just trying to flatter me?”

  “Truly. I cannot take my eyes off you. I am”—he peered down the length of her and lifted her skirts—“in awe of a woman in trousers.”

  “Awed, indeed.” She slapped at his hand. “You are laughing at me.”

  He did laugh then, the rich sound filling her senses with a sort of bleakness. Christine narrowed her eyes, noting that she was too often the source of his endless amusement. “Charming, indeed.”

  She mounted her shaggy nag, the robust mare nothing like the sleek chestnut Erik rode, and suddenly, she felt very much like that mare. Shaggy and hearty. Slightly worn around the corners. Bedraggled and yearning to be more beautiful. An absurd notion, since she considered herself suitable enough.

  Reining Miss Pippen around, she peered down at the horse’s owner from her lofty height and waited f
or him to recover his wits.

  His eyes warmed her. “You must allow that a woman in breeches has its rustic charm.”

  “Most men are only interested in what I have inside these trousers,” she said. “I am glad to see that you are not cut from the same cloth. Considering how close you are standing to the edge of yonder cliff.”

  Having effectively wiped the humor from his face, she decided it was her turn to laugh. “Your grace,” she added as an afterthought.

  “And how many men have been in those trousers?”

  Since she’d stolen these pants from a stable hand years ago, she could not rightly say. But the fact was that no other man but Erik had ever touched her intimately or done the things he had to her. No other man had made her burn with his hands and his mouth and the mere touch of his eyes.

  Or made her as vulnerable to her own feelings as he did now. And while he could claim beautiful women in his life since he had known her, she could not claim other men in her life. Not even a bald, toothless one. The mere thought of such a lopsided existence gnawed at her sense of fairness and dissolved some of the goodwill toward him she’d been inclined to feel the last five minutes since he’d been avoiding her all week. Her hands tightened on the reins.

  Rather than answering with the truth that he had been the only man in her life, she said instead, “I own that at least one man has made it into these trousers. Though it was dark that night in the stable and I could not see his face.”

  “Is that a fact, leannanan?”

  Before she could decide if he was mocking her or himself, she laughed. “Dinnae get yersel’ in a fankle, your grace”—she affected her own Scottish brogue—“ ’Twas long after ye married another.”

  There was heat in his eyes as they held hers. After a moment he said, “I am gratified to know that you are still honest.”

  “You think no man would have me?”

  “You’re a woman. From the moment a lad experiences his first erection, his predominant thought is driven by his want, need, and single desire to fook anything in skirts. I have no doubt half the men in Britain would have you.”

  “Only half, your grace? You do me an injustice.”

  “And you do me one as well.” He lifted her hand, an action that made her wary if only because she detected his intensity beneath the indolence of his touch. “Ye misjudge me if you think I do not know you, Christine.”

  She misjudged herself if she thought she was not in danger of falling in love with him all over again.

  “We’d best return,” he suddenly said, contemplating the churlish graying-green clouds overhead as if they had somehow become an extension of his mood. “You do not want to be caught up here when the rain begins.”

  She watched him swing up on the mount with athletic ease. Sitting astride the sorrel-maned chestnut, he stopped in front of her. The wind caught his hair and cloak and stirred the loose tendrils around her cheek. “You are welcome to ride anywhere you want, but never alone,” he said.

  “Do you have a topographical map of this area?”

  “I have a survey crew working on the road a mile from here. I will see what is available.”

  He reached across her horse and loosened her hands on the reins, and she inhaled his warmth. His shoulder brushed her cheek. “Let Miss Pippen set the pace on the way down,” he said.

  Erik nudged his heels. Then, absently pushing back a rebellious wave of dark hair batting her cheek, she watched his horse move past her and down the treacherous trail.

  While Erik’s time was taken up the next few days with business, Christine had plenty to keep her occupied as she worked to settle into her life at Sedgwick. But by the time she’d pulled up her sleeves and finished digging books out of her trunks, and her gown looked more brown than cheerful yellow any longer, she realized she disliked this dour room Aunt Sophie had aptly called a crypt.

  Erik’s retainers had put her trunks in the guardroom, and, though she didn’t mind being surrounded by medieval weaponry, she wanted some place that was her own. Some place she could turn into her own personal space.

  Working her hair back into a chignon, she’d set out to find the housekeeper, when a glance out the window stopped her. Her gaze landed on the old tower keep. Standing five stories in height, the keep belonged to the oldest part of the castle. Four turrets crowned the battlements. Windows overlooked the countryside in all directions. Her hands gripped the windowsill. With her heart racing like a child having just discovered her first cave drawing, she knew exactly where she would settle.

  “His grace is the only one with a key to get inside,” Mrs. Brown said an hour later as they stood in a small enclosed courtyard outside, staring up at the beautiful ivy-covered keep.

  “But surely he will not mind if I go inside to look around.”

  “You will have to speak to the master, mum.”

  The place was certainly ancient. “Is it dangerous?” Her heart raced in anticipation and impatience as she stood back and let her eyes travel upward. “Someone must go up there.”

  Scotland’s flag, along with that of Great Britain and Sedgwick’s standard, flew atop the highest point of the battlements.

  “You will have to speak to the master, mum. I only know that his grace does not want anyone in this courtyard either.”

  Christine looked around. Little light penetrated the ivy-enclosed courtyard. But hidden in the shadows in what appeared to be abandoned enclaves gone to weed, the gardens looked as if loving hands had once tended them. “Why ever not? This spot is charming. If it were cleaned up a bit.”

  Or perhaps a lot. If someone had a large scythe to hack away at the thorny vines that had come close to blocking the door.

  Why should such a place be forgotten and neglected?

  Christine shaded her eyes as she continued to look around her. A warm breeze tugged at her hair and skirts. The housekeeper cleared her throat, snapping Christine’s attention back to the woman.

  “I will need the key back, mum.”

  Christine frowned. She had practically forced Mrs. Brown, the termagant housekeeper, to give her the key just to unlock the gate so she could get into the tower courtyard. She and Mrs. Brown were definitely not going to get along.

  “How long have you been with Lord Sedgwick, Mrs. Brown?”

  “My family has served the dukes of Sedgwick Castle for the last hundred years,” she said as if she were the guardian of the eternal flame. “We have been here since the old Sedgwick laird stole Angus Maxwell’s bride from the altar and ravished her, then got hisself and all his seed cursed for the trouble.”

  “I see.” Moved by Mrs. Brown’s passion, Christine found she wanted to know more. “Tell me about the curse, Mrs. Brown. Is it truly as awful as everyone seems to believe?”

  “Aye, mum. A hundred years ago, the old Sedgwick laird and Angus Maxwell were cousins, but they both fell in love with the same woman. Angus Maxwell was so bitter that on his deathbed he cursed the man what had once been his best friend and who betrayed him. No Sedgwick duke would ever know love again. Those what carried the mark all died before the age of four and thirty.”

  “But this is the nineteenth century. Surely no one believes such rubbish—”

  “Rubbish?” Mrs. Brown’s chin jutted outward. “The master be the last descendant what sprung from the youngest of the old laird’s three sons. The Sedgwick line will end with him. And when the last Sedgwick duke passes without an heir, a Maxwell will inherit the duchy, just as old Angus predicted. The master’s thirty-fourth birthday comes the end of summer.”

  Christine opened her mouth to reply, but whether from shock, disbelief, or the niggling realization that Mrs. Brown believed everything she had said to be true, she didn’t know. What had Reverend Simms said about the power of superstition?

  “The master would never have forgiven himself if something happened to you, mum.”

  “I appreciate your honesty, Mrs. Brown.”

  After a moment Christine withdrew the
key from her pocket and handed it over to the housekeeper. She took two steps, stopped and returned her attention to the courtyard. “This place is too beautiful not to use. How difficult would it be to get someone in here and begin cleaning?”

  “His grace—”

  “I will talk to his grace.”

  Christine found Erik in the library. But he was not alone. “I hope I am not interrupting, but I would have a word with you.”

  “As I would with you.” Motioning for her to precede him, he invited her forward to meet his visitors. Her husband introduced her to Hodges and a man named Bailey, who was the engineer Erik had hired to work on the various road construction projects around the estate.

  “They are at your disposal for questions and anything else you might need,” Erik said.

  After Christine greeted them, Erik turned to the desk. She saw the rolled-up parchment next to a stack of books. It took only a moment after he handed her the parchment to discover that it was a topographical map. Or, as she realized as she met his gaze, something even better. Erik was essentially giving her the keys to his estate.

  “My side of our bargain, madam.”

  “Oh, Erik!” She held the map to her chest as if it were gold. “Thank you.”

  “You do not have to thank me, Christine.”

  The men remained standing. Conscious of their presence, she wished now she had dressed in a prettier gown and taken care with her hair before she ventured to talk to Erik. They still stood within sight of the others, but not so near that her conversation could be overheard.

  “I would like to open the keep,” she said, jumping right into the kettle. Better to boil all at once than simmer slowly, as Aunt Sophie would say. “Your housekeeper seems to believe I am some invading army, and has refused to allow me any farther than the courtyard.” Imagine that, she almost said, sensing the sudden change inside him. “Mrs. Brown was concerned you would be angry.”

  “Yet she let you inside anyway.” His voice was quiet, subdued.