She sighed. “I don’t think that would make for a very positive first impression. Christian names are very rarely used among the nobility. Your peers will probably call you Warrick and your inferiors will simply address you as ‘my lord.’”
“And which will you be?” he asked.
“As always, your superior,” she replied without missing a beat.
He snorted. “Then perhaps you can tell me where I’ve been all these years.”
“As I see it,” Pamela said, pushing off from the table to pace behind him, “when the duchess was stricken with the fever and realized she was going to die before she could reach the shelter of her grandfather’s cottage, she had no choice but to place you in a basket and leave you on the doorstep of a kindly old merchant and his barren wife.”
Connor’s voice rippled with mild sarcasm. “And I suppose I’ve been tendin’ the store ever since then.”
Pamela swung around to eye his brawny shoulders. She’d never encountered a man who looked less like a shopkeeper and more like one of the paid brawlers at Gentleman Jackson’s boxing club.
“I think not,” she said, conceding his point. “After the kindly couple died, you struck out on your own, determined to make your fortune in this world. When I found you, you were…” She tapped her pursed lips with one forefinger, searching her mind for a suitable occupation.
“Robbin’ hapless travelers of their underwear?” he offered.
She glared down her nose at him. “Oh yes, why don’t we just come right out and tell the duke you’ve been masquerading as Connor Kincaid—robber prince of the night, terror of the highways and scourge of the Highlands?”
“You left off despoiler of innocent females.”
Pamela might have been able to tell if he was joking had he not chosen that moment to scrape away the whiskers beneath his nose, revealing a delectably kissable cleft.
For a breathless moment, she could only stare.
“If we make them believe I truly am the duke’s heir, you do realize that the same villain who killed your mother may very well try to kill me.”
Pamela clapped her hands together and beamed at him. “Yes, I know! Isn’t it marvelous?”
His reflection cocked one eyebrow at her.
She hastened to explain. “What better way to expose the wretch than to catch him in the act?”
“The act of slippin’ hemlock into my brandy or slittin’ my throat while I’m sleepin’?”
She waved away the heavy note of mockery that laced his tone. “Don’t be ridiculous. If this murderer doesn’t want to get caught, he’ll have to stage a convincing accident. And since we’ll be expecting him to do just that, we’ll have ample time to see that he’s brought to justice. If you see anything suspicious at all, just send word to me and I’ll fetch the authorities.”
“Before he kills me.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” she agreed cheerfully. “After all, he won’t be expecting you to be as dangerous as he is. More dangerous,” she quickly amended as Connor narrowed his eyes at her in the mirror. “And while we’re waiting for him to show his hand, you can learn to pass yourself off as a gentleman in society. The duke will no doubt want to complete your education. Why, just think of it—you can even learn to read!”
Connor gave her another of those enigmatic glances in the glass. “Indeed.”
“He’ll probably hire a fencing instructor and a dancing master.”
Connor shot to his feet. “I don’t mind the swordplay, lass, but you didn’t say anythin’ about prancin’ around a ballroom in ruffles and tights.”
Reaching up to clap her hands on his shoulders, Pamela gently urged him back down in the chair. “Have no fear, sir. Tights went out of fashion several seasons ago.”
Realizing that she had allowed her hands to linger against the muscled breadth of his shoulders, Pamela snatched them back and tucked them behind her. “Even though you’ve been living among the Scots for most of your life, the duke will be just arrogant enough to believe you should still be showing signs of your noble English blood. You should probably go ahead and make an effort to stop dropping your g’s.”
“I don’t know what in the bluidy hell ye’re talkin’ aboot, lass.”
Pamela had already opened her mouth to correct him when another deft stroke of the razor revealed his brazen dimple. Tilting her nose in the air, she said primly, “Regardless of how coarse his tongue might be while in the company of other men, a gentleman would never swear in the presence of a lady.”
“Is that so?” As he captured her gaze and held it, Connor’s voice both softened and deepened, its provocative timbre raising gooseflesh on her arms. “Then I’ll have to trust you to help me mind my tongue.”
Warmth purled low in her belly as she remembered how that tongue had traced the yielding softness of her lips before sliding between them to have its way with her. She tore her gaze away from his before she could blurt out something incredibly foolish like, “It would be my pleasure.”
She injected a deliberate note of briskness into her voice. “I suppose I should warn you that you’ll still be a wanted man in London. It won’t be the hangman you’ll have to beware but a horde of ambitious young women eager to become your duchess. I’m sure their attentions will become even more relentless when they discover that you’re young, virile and”—she shrugged as if his blatant physical charms were of absolutely no interest to her—“passably good-looking.”
“How kind of you to notice,” he said dryly. “So are these the willin’—I mean the willing women you promised me?” he asked, correcting himself before she could.
“I’m afraid not.” Pamela shook her head sadly. “If you find yourself in a compromising position with an unmarried young lady, you may end up being forced to wed her against your will.”
“So I’m only allowed to find myself in compromising positions with married young ladies?”
“Oh, no!” she exclaimed. “That won’t do at all. A jealous husband might challenge you to a duel. You could cause a terrible scandal that could expose us both.”
He sighed heavily. “So despite your promises I should resign myself to a life of celibacy more suited to a monk than a duke.”
“Oh, there are always women of questionable moral character who will welcome a gentleman’s attentions—lusty widows, courtesans”—she sniffed as if the smell of some overbearing perfume lingered in the air—“Frenchwomen.”
“Ah yes, Frenchwomen.” A nostalgic smile curved Connor’s lips. “I robbed a coach once with a buxom young French maidservant on board. When I demanded her mistress’s jewels, she threw herself in front of my pistol and begged me to take her instead.” His smile deepened a devilish degree. “Begged quite insistently as I recall.”
Pamela’s own lips felt oddly stiff, as if they belonged to someone else. “I’m sure you were only too happy to accommodate her.”
“I’m afraid I had to disappoint the lass.” His smile vanished as the blade glided over his jaw, revealing its hard, unyielding planes. “Pleasure is fleeting. Gold is the only thing that lasts forever.”
“What about love?” she asked softly, regretting the sentimental words the instant they passed their lips. “Isn’t it supposed to be eternal?”
“Love’s a luxury reserved for fools, poets and the rich. A poor man would rather have a bowl of warm stew in his belly and a pair of new soles for his boots.”
“What of your parents? Did they not love each other?”
Steel flashed in the gaze he gave her, reminding her how it had felt to face down this man over the barrel of a gun. “They did. But it wasn’t eternal. It only lasted until the redcoats murdered them.”
Pamela was almost relieved when she heard the cheerful patter of her sister’s boots on the stairs. “I’ve found the costume, Pamela!” Sophie sang out, her buttery curls bouncing as she came waltzing into the chamber. “I couldn’t find the garters for the stockings so I’m loaning him a pair of mine.”
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It appeared that Brodie had already fallen beneath her sister’s spell. The burly smuggler was trotting at Sophie’s heels like a well-trained lapdog, his arms piled high with garments.
“Costume?” Connor repeated ominously, rising and turning to toss the razor and the cup on the table.
Nodding toward his all-black ensemble, Pamela said, “I had Sophie fetch you some more appropriate traveling garments from my trunk. And not a moment too soon, it appears,” she added as he used the tail of his shirt to wipe the remainder of the shaving soap from his cheeks and chin. His unruly hair came tumbling around his face before she could gauge the full effect of his shave. “We had no idea what sort of financial straits we might find the duke’s heir in, so I took the liberty of borrowing this costume from the theater where Sophie gave her last performance.” Her very last performance, Pamela thought grimly.
Sophie whisked a shirt from the top of the pile of garments in Brodie’s arms and held it up in front of her. “Petruchio wore this one in The Taming of the Shrew. Isn’t it dashing?”
Eyeing the elaborate fall of lace-trimmed ruffles adorning the collar and cuffs, Brodie snickered. “Aye, lass. Our Connor’ll be so comely in that, even I won’t be able to resist the lad’s charms.”
“I’d suggest you try,” Connor growled with a marked absence of any charm.
Hoping to avert disaster, Pamela bustled forward to relieve Brodie of the next garment on the pile. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a waistcoat fashioned from bright lavender silk.
“You needn’t look so dismayed,” she told Connor, struggling to hide her own consternation. “All the most fashionable gentlemen are wearing them.”
Connor scowled at the meadow of yellow flowers dotting the shiny fabric. “The gentlemen or the ladies?”
Brodie choked back a guffaw.
“Perhaps you’d prefer to wear your mask,” Pamela said stiffly. “And in place of an elegant walking stick, you could carry your pistol so you could shoot anyone who dares to offend your stubborn pride. In lieu of a nicely tied cravat, we could simply drape a noose around your thick neck.”
Muttering something mercifully unintelligible beneath his breath, Connor strode forward. Sophie skittered backward, clearly aware that he could snap her in two just as easily as he had her parasol.
But he simply snatched the shirt from her hands, the waistcoat from Pamela’s and the rest of the garments from Brodie’s arms before storming from the chamber.
When Connor reappeared in the doorway, Pamela didn’t know whether to clap a hand over her mouth or her eyes.
The actor who had originally worn the costume was obviously a much smaller man than Connor. Much smaller. In every way. The lavender waistcoat gaped open over Connor’s broad chest with no hope of button and hole ever meeting. His well-muscled shoulders had already split the delicate stitching of the shirt. As they watched, the seams of the buff breeches clinging to his powerfully built calves and thighs like a second skin threatened to give way as well.
“Cover your eyes, Sophie,” Pamela ordered.
Her sister quickly obeyed but Pamela glanced over to catch her peeping through her fingers. Pamela wasn’t sure she could blame her. Nor could she deny her own fascination with the battle being waged between the fragile fabric and the magnificent masculine specimen that was Connor Kincaid.
Another man might have looked ridiculous standing there in clothes tailored for a man half his size. Connor simply looked dangerous. Although it was Brodie who finally burst into hearty hoots of laughter, it was Pamela who bore the brunt of Connor’s accusing gaze.
“I have a much better idea,” he bit off, turning on his heel and marching back down the stairs.
Connor was gone even longer this time. So long that Pamela feared he had reconsidered their unholy little alliance and was even now racing away from the castle on his stallion, abandoning her and Sophie to the dubious mercies of Brodie and his companions.
While Sophie taught Brodie the words to a bawdy ditty she had learned while in the chorus of Winifred Wooster, Fishwife of Ulster, Pamela waited in front of the ugly gash that had once been a window. Last night she would have sworn the sea surrounding the castle was as dark and unfathomable as India ink. But the sunbeams slanting through the clouds revealed a shimmering swath of blue-green water that made her think of white sandy beaches and swaying palm trees she would never see. If not for the frigid snap of the wind against her cheeks, she would have sworn she was in Barbados, not Scotland.
A rainbow melted out of the misty horizon right before her eyes. Despite the sun streaming through the window, it was still raining somewhere beyond that magical arch of color. The bruised tint of the distant sky made the rainbow’s ethereal hues appear even more vivid. As she watched, a second rainbow—just as impossible and equally glorious—appeared just to the left of the first.
For the first time she wondered if a man who had awakened to the breathtaking beauty of the Scottish landscape every morning of his life could ever be truly happy beneath the gray soot-laden clouds of the London sky.
When she heard a footfall at the top of the stairs, she turned, prepared to tell Connor that it had all been a terrible mistake. That she and Sophie would return to London to fight their own battles without his help.
She heard a gasp. If not for the bedazzled expression on Sophie’s face, she would have sworn it was her own.
Connor stood in the doorway. The ill-fitting breeches had been replaced with the soft woolen folds of a green and black kilt. His knees were bare but tartan stockings hugged his muscular calves, disappearing into a pair of polished black shoes crowned with silver buckles. A ruffled jabot flowed down the front of his ivory shirt, accentuating the rugged masculinity of his jawline. A plaid that matched his kilt in both pattern and fabric was draped over one broad shoulder and secured with a copper brooch.
He’d smoothed his hair away from his face, securing it at the nape with a black velvet queue. The sunlight streaming into the chamber burnished the streaks of honey in the rich maple of his hair to pure gold. Without the whiskers to mask it, the sun-kissed planes of his face were even more striking. He had only his stubborn scowl and slightly crooked nose to rescue him from being too pretty.
He did not look like a duke. He looked like a prince.
When in the company of Sophie and their mother, Pamela had often felt like a dowdy wren next to a pair of preening peacocks. Now she felt more like a humble dormouse in danger of being snatched up by the talons of a magnificent hawk and gobbled down in a single bite.
Brodie let out a low whistle. “For a second there I thought it was the ghost o’ Bonnie Prince Charlie hisself!”
“Have you ever thought about treading the boards, sir?” Sophie asked Connor, unable to resist giving her silky eyelashes a fresh flutter. “Why, you’d make a marvelous MacBeth!”
They both fell back a step as Pamela glided toward Connor. When she reached his side, she took up a corner of the plaid, unable to resist touching him—even if it was only to finger a fold of the rich wool. “Where did you find such garments?”
“On the back of a haughty Englishman who liked to play at being a Scottish lord. He kicked all the Scot tenant farmers off his lands and replaced them with sheep.” Connor’s devilish dimple reappeared. “One afternoon when he went strolling through the heather in his kilt and plaid to admire his fine flocks, he found me waiting for him instead.”
Pamela felt her heart plummet toward her boots. “So you killed him,” she said flatly, letting the corner of the plaid fall from her fingers as if it was still stained with his victim’s blood.
“He was unarmed, so I demanded his purse and ordered him to strip. The last I saw of him, he was rolling down a hill as naked as on the day he was born, cursing me, the Scottish curs who had spawned me and my future offspring.” Connor chuckled. “It probably took days for his valet to pluck all the thistles from his—”
Pamela cleared her throat, shooting a warning glanc
e at her wide-eyed sister.
“—toes,” Connor finished with deliberate care as Brodie rolled his eyes and Pamela nodded in approval.
The sunlight winked off of something shiny nestled in the folds of Connor’s jabot. Intrigued, Pamela reached into the ruffles and drew forth a gold locket suspended on a delicate length of chain.
She held the lovely trinket up to the light. “Did this belong to your haughty Englishman as well?”
Connor removed the locket from her hand, his touch gentle but intractable. “No.”
That one softly spoken word felt almost like a rebuke. He dropped the locket inside his shirt where it would be safe from prying eyes, including hers.
Pamela lowered her lashes, feeling unaccountably embarrassed. The locket must not be ill-gotten gain but some sentimental keepsake from a woman he had once loved and perhaps still did. Why else would he wear it next to his heart?
“So when do we leave for London?” Brodie asked.
“We?” Connor, Pamela and Sophie all said in unison.
“Aye,” Brodie replied, blinking innocently at them. “Ye can’t expect a fine gentleman like our Connor here to travel without his devoted valet, can ye?”
Pamela opened her mouth to protest, but Connor caught her by the arm and tugged her onto the landing, where they could converse in private.
“It wouldn’t hurt for me to have an ally in the house,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Someone I could trust.”
“So why take him?” Pamela whispered between clenched teeth.
“Brodie has a good heart.” Connor frowned at his friend, who was at that very moment showing Sophie how he could make his serpent tattoo dance by flexing his upper arm. “A wee brain, but a very good heart. I can trust him to have my back in a fight.”
Eyeing Brodie’s barrel chest and massive forearms, Pamela sighed. “If you insist, we can bring him along. But he’ll never fit into the lavender waistcoat and I have no intention of letting him marry my sister.”