Her father had told her expressly that he would speak to the Duke, but she felt that she had to speak to him. She felt that she owed him some sort of explanation. It occurred to her as she approached the house that the Duke might not care at all for her explanation. But something had driven her here, far too late in the day and without a chaperon, which she knew would have been a death knell to her reputation were it not already to be killed at the hands of a Highlander.
She ached.
She felt as if she were dying. She had planned a life here. Over the past space of time the Duke had been courting her she had easily slipped into imagining what it would be like to call this place home.
It was the grandest residence she’d ever beheld. Nestled into rolling green hills, surrounded by lakes which provided fresh fish and backed by a forest filled with stags and boars, ensconced by great gardens that provided fresh herbs and vegetables, as well as cheerful English blooms, and orchards filled with apples, the estate was well able to sustain not only itself, but nearly all of the homes in the vicinity.
The limestone façade was stately without being imposing, the great white pillars that flanked the doors giving it the gravity of a Grecian temple. And indeed, the man the residence contained had the quality of a god.
It was warm inside, always. So much more comfortable than the manor house in Avondale could ever be. Adjacent to the great hall was a great, sweeping staircase with frescos of heavenly bodies painted along the walls and looming overhead. She’d always found it to be slightly intimidating. As if the man were really a god and was thus surrounded by angels.
There were many parties given at Bybee House, though she’d always had the sense the Duke was not the driving force behind them. Or rather, his desire for parties was not. They were something he did, rather, to please his family and to continue maintaining appearances fitting for a man of his status.
The Duke’s father was long dead. Hugh Ashforth had assumed the title at twenty and had set about restoring the dignity to his family name that his father had destroyed with a life of debauchery, or so Penny had heard the servants whisper. The Duke’s mother remained in residence, along with his much younger sister and his ward.
Penny had grown close to them all. She had never been surrounded by women in such a way. And it was that which had given her such a strong sense of home. Of family.
For the first time in her life she had felt as though she would be part of one in a true sense. But not now.
She shrugged off the brief fear that she might cause a scandal by turning up alone after dark. What did it matter? She was hurtling headlong into a scandal and there was no stopping it.
Lachlan was right.
That she would abandon the engagement of marrying the Duke to marry a soldier—a Scottish soldier—was going to create waves that would roll throughout all of London, if not all of England.
None of it would have mattered had it only been her. But she was betrothed to the Duke of Kendal. That would ensure that the scandal was far-reaching. She was sorry that it would touch him. It would. There was no avoiding it.
And she could not offer a full explanation, not without dragging unsavoury aspects of her father’s character into the foreground, and a good portion of the reason she was marrying Lachlan in the first place was to avoid such a thing.
But she wanted to say goodbye. To this man who had never as much as touched her ungloved hand. This man who had made her feel as though she might, on some small level, matter even a little bit.
A man who had given her hope for a future that was softer, more civilised, and warmer than any reality she had yet inhabited.
She blinked back tears. Her throat had felt raw the entire day, as though she was coming down with an illness, though she suspected it was simply despair.
After she knocked on the door, she was ushered inside immediately, her arrival announced promptly.
The Duke was in residence, which was a blessing, she supposed. He could have easily been in London, seeing to business.
She had to wonder if part of her hoped that he might’ve been, if what she truly wanted was a chance to say goodbye to her friends, his sister and his ward.
Her heart thudded a dull rhythm, echoing in her ears, as she stood in the entry of the home that would have been hers. She gazed at her surroundings with longing.
The lovely marble floors, the walls the colour of a robin’s egg. It was beautiful. Though she ignored those frescoes, because she felt now as if the angels judged her.
But it didn’t matter now. It wouldn’t be hers. And neither would he.
It wasn’t long before the Duke appeared in the entry. He was a tall man, his fine clothing perfectly tailored to suit his athletic figure. A navy coat over a white shirt, buckskin breeches and the finest boots she had ever seen. He was impeccable, even at home.
Though, she supposed she should expect nothing less of him. He was ever mindful of his image. A man in his position never did know when company might arrive.
There was a hardness to his handsome face though, a severity and sternness in his eyes she had never had directed at her before.
She understood at once.
Her father had been here already.
‘I needed to speak to you...’
‘Without a chaperon?’ The note of judgment in his voice was unmistakable.
With the angels looming overhead, he made a thunderous picture. He was the sort of man she’d found it difficult to look at when she’d been on good terms with him. Now, having earned his displeasure, it was nearly impossible.
She took a breath and pushed her fear down deep. Locked it away. ‘I didn’t want to rouse Mrs. McCready from her bed, so, no. I felt this was important and it could not wait.’
‘And I find propriety to be important. As ever. Regardless of the situation we find ourselves in.’ He turned his head slightly. ‘Beatrice, perhaps you would like to formally bear witness to this interaction, as a female relative who is lurking in the shadows to eavesdrop on the conversation anyway.’
She heard timid footsteps, and then Lady Beatrice Ashforth appeared from an alcove, her hands clasped in front of her, her expression sheepish. Knowing Beatrice as she did, Penny didn’t believe her friend was sheepish at all.
She had first met Beatrice covered in mud and distraught in a field, out exploring without her brother’s permission. The Duke of Kendal disliked it when anything moved without his say so.
A sickly child, Beatrice had spent her life being cosseted and overly protected. Prodded by doctors and barred from playing outdoors, exerting herself or upsetting herself. Beatrice did not like to do as she was told.
Beatrice was also loyal to her brother with all that she was.
‘I have spoken with the Earl.’ His tone was dark and forbidding and she would have never ascribed those words to him before. He had always been polite. Solicitous.
A man who had never taken a liberty beyond taking her gloved hand in his to help her down from a carriage.
Now, she did not know where that man had gone.
‘I assume he explained—’
‘About your affair with a Scottish soldier?’ The words were clipped, short and shocking. ‘Yes.’
‘My...what?’
He had done it. Her father had taken a burning arrow and fired it directly into the fortress of her reputation, not caring at all that it would reduce her to ash. Destroying his reputation would have taken hers along with it, but it was only her... Yes, he was keeping his own hands clean by making it her sin.
She had never thought him cruel, but this was cruel. Or the act of a truly desperate man. But she had never thought he would sacrifice her like this.
She had always felt as though he’d protected her at least.
But it was only ever physically.
He had locked her in that room with her grief when her mother had died, willing to let her sob until she was ill, alone.
This was much the same.
‘Do not worry,’ he said. ‘I have no desire to see your reputation in tatters. Your upcoming marriage will do that for me.’
And he would not have to sully himself with base gossip. He didn’t say it, but it hung there in the air. All of the men involved would manage to stay above it.
The closest he’d come to debasing himself was saying the word affair at all. A word that touched on dark, illicit acts that Penny couldn’t even form imagery for in her mind.
And he believed she had done it.
That’s what happens when you’re a chess piece...
‘I bid you goodnight,’ he said, turning and leaving her.
She could only stare after him, the sound of his footfalls on the marble floor, along with the air of disdain lingering behind long after he was gone.
A piece of her heart withered as he left.
Hope. Extinguished.
The life she’d dreamed of vanishing around her.
If the very walls of the manor dissolved she would not have been surprised in the least.
But they remained. And worse still, so did her friend.
Her friend, who she knew would be...perhaps not her friend now.
Penny turned to Beatrice, who was still standing there, looking pale, large eyed and filled with confusion, hurt. Anger. Beatrice had been her friend these past months, but any kinship they might have shared was gone now. Stolen by Penny’s father’s lies. And she would have to be content to let the Duke believe them, as contradicting them might cost her father his very life.
Surely Beatrice should know the truth. Beatrice, who had scarcely ever had a Season due to the overprotective nature of her mother and older brother. A childhood spent in ill health had caused all of them to treat her as a rare and fragile flower. Penny knew that Beatrice resented it and yearned for a more normal existence, hence her wanderings in the forest. Penny understood that. The wildness that was deep inside her.
She had thought they recognised it in each other, though they had not brought themselves to speak of it. Penny had been afraid to. If she gave away too much of what she was before her marriage to the Duke...well, she’d been sure he’d find her lacking.
It didn’t matter now.
And what she needed in the moment was not the Duke of Kendal. She needed Beatrice’s friendship. For she found as she stood there, the thing she grieved the most was the loss of her friend. Beatrice was the first woman she’d ever befriended. She’d been so lonely and having someone else her age to speak to had only ever been a dream until they’d met.
‘I had to speak to him,’ Penny said softly.
‘You don’t deserve to speak with him,’ Beatrice said, her voice like ice. ‘Not ever again. I will never forgive the blow you have dealt my brother’s pride.’
‘It’s not as it seems,’ Penny said. ‘My father has put me in an impossible position.’
‘And I’m certain that your affair with a Scotsman has nothing to do with the impossible position you’re in.’ She had never known her friend to speak with such acidity.
‘Affair?’ The truth didn’t offer up less humiliation, for her father had left her exposed. Even if she absolved herself of immorality, her friend would know how callous her father had been in this. But she could not let her believe she would have betrayed the Duke. ‘Never. I was sold. To pay my father’s debt. But my father clearly wishes to put my own reputation on the altar and not his own.’
There was a pause. Beatrice looked at her sceptically. ‘Is that the truth, Penelope?’
‘I have no reason to lie. The end result is the same either way. And I could not tell your brother. Lachlan Bain...the secrets he knows about my father, the debts my father carries, they could cost him his life. At the very least his home, every last vestige of respectability. And my reputation would go down with it as well.’ She felt as if she were on the edge of a void. ‘There you have it. I doubt your brother could have truly married me after all. Pieces of the truth would have come forward no matter what. If not from Lachlan, than from somewhere else. Your brother would never marry a woman connected to scandal. There was never any protecting me, I suppose.’
‘Isn’t it a father’s job to protect his children?’ Beatrice whispered.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Neither would I. But Hugh has certainly always protected us.’
She nodded, her throat tightening. She wondered when the Duke would have given her permission to call him by his Christian name.
She wouldn’t know now. She would never say it.
Hugh.
His name burned bright inside her and it hurt.
‘No one has ever protected me,’ Penny said.
Not even the Duke, because he had to protect his family, his reputation. But she had loved him and he had not defended her. He had believed the lie because it was easy.
She’d been so certain this was love. But how could it be when it had been bound up in the way she’d felt safe and protected by him? By the way he’d brought her into his family? Now he had removed his protection. All of it.
Every man around her cared for his own ends and never hers.
‘Will he hurt you?’ Beatrice asked. ‘Because if so then your father’s reputation can go to the devil. He won’t allow it.’ She meant her brother and Penny thought it lovely Beatrice believed that. But after seeing the coldness in his eyes... Penny did not. ‘He will not allow you to be carried off by a barbarian.’
‘I... He’s not a stranger to me. As a boy he worked on my father’s estate. He’s as a stranger now, but I don’t believe he would harm me.’
She didn’t know. Not for certain.
She thought of the way he had filled the entry hall, all broadness and power, with a sword strapped to his hip and his tartan proclaiming that he was a foreigner in this land. Foreign to her in every way.
She could not say for certain if that man might harm her.
But the boy who had helped her with the bird... He would not have harmed her. And perhaps, even if it were buried deep inside him, that boy still existed. She could only pray it was so.
‘Please tell Eleanor goodbye. And...explain to her? I couldn’t bear the thought of either of you hating me. And that’s why I needed you to know. I have never had friends. The two of you have been the dearest to me. And of all the things that I mourn because of the dissolution of this engagement, that friendship was of the highest value.’
She found herself being pulled into Beatrice’s embrace. ‘I wish there was something I could do. I could always appeal to Briggs.’
The Duke of Brigham, Hugh’s friend, who Penny understood was like a brother to him. He was a notorious rake and every time Penny had been in his company he’d made her smile. But these men...they were second only to the Prince Regent.
They could not understand what it meant to be in her position. Even her father’s. They would be shielded by rank. As evidenced by the Duke of Brigham’s reputation. That it was spoken of with laughter, not with cruel disdain.
‘There’s nothing left for me,’ she said, feeling pressure gathering behind her eyes. ‘My reputation is destroyed. Where would I go?’
Emotion was a knot in her chest and she would not let it unravel. She would not let herself sink into melancholy.
‘We could find something...’
She let out a hard breath, though it did nothing to loosen that pressure in her chest. ‘At the cost of your reputation, perhaps Eleanor’s. I won’t allow you to take such a risk.’
She wished she could ask it. But she could not. Not in any good conscience. Finding that centre, that bit of purpose.
‘It is enough,’ Penny said, ‘to know that you would. To know that I had such a friend.’
‘Write to me,’ Beatrice said. ‘Promise.’
‘Assuming that a letter can be sent from where I’m going.’
Her friend squeezed her hand and Penny tried not to think about the fact that she knew nothing of where she was headed. If she would just descend back into loneliness the way she had before. She’d had so much hope bound up in her marriage to the Duke. In joining his household and being part of something.
Now her entire future rested in the hands of a man who might as well be a stranger.
A man who was either intent on harming her or bedding her.
And, truth be told, she could not decide which prospect frightened her most.
Obtaining a special licence had been easy enough. Money, that was all it took.
As a boy he’d had wealth. He hadn’t realised it was being stolen from the clan. But it hadn’t taken the same shape in the Highlands as it did here in England. Or perhaps that was simply a boy’s perspective. He’d wanted for nothing. If his stomach growled, food appeared. If he needed clothes, he had them. Warmth, shelter, all of it was there.
It was only as he got older and his father was in the castle less and less, spending money away from their homeland and on drinks and whores in Edinburgh, that he began to realise.
But that didn’t matter now. Now, he had the money he needed and in this instance it made the process much shorter and simpler. The reading of the banns could be avoided completely. Which suited Lachlan’s purposes. He wanted to publicly humiliate the Earl of Avondale, but he also felt the urge to get back home.
Home.
He had sailed the world over these past years. Had fought on foreign battlefields. His fortune had been earned both in valour there, and in trade on the seas, but he had not gone back to the Highlands.
After the death of his mother there had seemed little point.
He knew that his father would continue on his path. Destroying the once-proud name of their clan, a name that had belonged to Lachlan’s mother and was badly used by his father, who had come by his position as chief through marriage. He had squandered any of the wealth the clan had ever possessed, that which was not taken from them already in the uprising.
The rent he had charged the farmers, who were responsible for feeding their people, had been nothing short of criminal. And all so that he could rub elbows with English aristocracy. Lachlan was well aware there were those within his clan who would consider him no less of a traitor, not simply for bearing his father’s blood, but because he had fought with England against Napoleon. Because he had worn the uniform of a British soldier.
The uprising had been before Lachlan’s time, but there were those who remembered and remembered it well. Lachlan’s father was clearly not one of them, as he had taken to the excess of the English peerage with much enthusiasm.
Lachlan’s aim was to restore that which had been damaged. He did not know if it were possible.
But when he returned, it would be with money and it would be with a bride.
Not for the first time he wondered if an English bride would cause difficulty, but he had to lay some hope in the idea his clan might see merit in him bringing a Sassenach back to a Scottish castle to live their way. For wasn’t an English wife evidence that he might just as easily have stayed in England? Particularly one of aristocratic blood.
But she was his trophy. He saw it clearly. He would make his people see it, too.
And he had no intention of carrying on a bloodline. Not with her. Not with anyone.
There would be no bairns.
He would fix that which had been damaged. And he would return leadership of the clan to his mother’s family when he went to the dirt. His cousin, Callum, had kept the clan going in his absence, even before his father’s death. Callum, his children and their descendants, they could rule.
The problem now was resources, so depleted had they become.
He had learned all that he needed about managing industry as he had built his merchant fleet and he had capital enough to invest in his homeland. And his people.
But after that...
It was best if the name Bain died with him.
He was the only surviving child of his parents’ union.
That in and of itself seemed a sign.
All of his brothers, dead at infancy, both before and after him. But he had survived.
He had survived childhood and he had survived war, he assumed for this purpose.
So, he would see it done.
It gave him deep satisfaction to go into this English church wearing his tartan. It was true that sentiments had changed regarding Scottish dress and custom, but he still bore the scars of a time when it had not been so readily accepted. His land bore the scars of war he had not seen with his eyes, but had lived through the consequences of all his life.
His loyalty could never entirely be to England. His blood flowed from the Highlands.
He ascended the stairs of the church and pushed the doors to the sanctuary open.
The priest was already in residence.
‘And where is the bride?’ Lachlan asked.
‘She has yet to arrive,’ the priest said. ‘And when she does, I will want to be sure she is entering into the marriage of her own accord.’
‘What a complicated concept,’ Lachlan said. ‘Do we do anything of our own accord, Father, or is it all some higher power?’
Lachlan himself knew what the highest power was. Money. Greed. In his case perhaps his motivations were honourable, but he did not think it was because he was a superior manner of man to his father.
Rather, just an angry one.
Angry that his mother had been so disgraced she had taken her own life. Angry that the Earl of Avondale had failed to give to him the compensation that was promised and therefore had prevented Lachlan from returning home in time to keep that tragedy from happening.
It was anger that drove him. And a strong sense of how powerful, wealthy men destroyed the lives of those around them on a whim.
No, Lachlan was not a better man. He was just angry at men like his father. And that did colour his actions.
It was then the doors to the church did open again and his bride appeared. She wore a gown in blue silk, the colour like china making his little bride seem yet more fragile than she had when last he’d seen her. Her hair was tied back simply, something about the style drawing his eye to the elegant line of her neck. To the curves lower still.
It took him a moment to remember the Earl was even there. He was next to her, the distance between the two of them palpable.
‘So, you’ve come,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You made it quite clear that there was no other choice.’
The priest began to speak, as if to object. ‘You consent to the marriage now, don’t you, lass?’
‘I am here. I didn’t come to attend a service.’ He did not know why he was pleased that her sharpness remained.
‘There you have it,’ Lachlan said to the priest. ‘From her own mouth.’
Her father said nothing. Lachlan had thought he couldn’t despise the man more, but in that he was proven wrong. The only opposition the Earl had voiced to Lachlan marrying his daughter related to the loss of the connection with the Duke of Kendal. It had nothing to do with Penelope. Her happiness. Her safety.
His own father had not cared a wit for his own either, but Lachlan was a son. He had been born to be hard, born to be a warrior.
A man should offer more protection for his daughter.
He deserved to wonder about her well-being. If he ever would.
He deserved to fear for her.
There were no words of reservation from the Earl. And the priest seemed placated as well, beginning the wedding invocation at once.
Lachlan had attended weddings in the Highlands, as a boy, but he’d never been to one in England. As with all things, he’d made a study of it. Often he found the expectation was that he would be an uneducated brute. He took great pride in proving to Englishmen that he was, in fact, an educated brute.
Lady Penelope spoke her vows with a clear voice that verged on defiant. As if she refused to show any sort of weakness. He had to respect her for that.
He had purchased a simple ring. When the time came, he slid it on to her finger. He was surprised by how very soft her hands were. By how fragile she felt.
Such a strong little thing, she was. And yet...
So easily breakable.
‘With this ring I thee wed, with my body I thee worship and with all my worldly goods I thee endow.’
There was something in her eyes when he said that. A fleeting shock followed by something akin to fear. Perhaps it was the moment settling over her. The realisation that it was done. For all her bravery could not withstand this moment.
He should not be looking at her face. He should be looking at the Earl. For it was not his bride’s fear and loathing that he craved. No. It was her father’s. But he found he could not look away from her, from the very real consequence of his revenge.
But he would treat her well and he knew that. He’d given her no indication that he might, but he would.
He was not an abuser of women. No matter how deep his anger, that was something that would not change. And perhaps life in a castle in the Highlands was not the same as life for a duchess in London might be, but she would want for nothing.
Except bairns.
But her hand was still resting in his and her skin was soft, and he had not anticipated being affected by such.
He was a man. He had physical needs and he dealt with those the way he dealt with all things. As a transaction. Money changed hands and pleasure was shared by both. But he was not looking for softness when he bedded a prostitute. He was looking for the basest, lowest form of release and he found it.
It had nothing to do with soft, delicate hands.
And certainly nothing to do with large eyes that seemed to offer a window to his past life.
The marriage bed was about duty and he would see the marriage consummated as it must be. But a young virgin would have no knowledge of how to please a man. However pretty she might be, she’d hold no candle to the trained whores he was accustomed to.
He had no doubt he would have to seek his pleasure outside of the union. But it was nothing to him. Vows easily spoken that didn’t reach his heart.
As he thought of the hollowness of those vows, the marriage was done. Legal before God and, more importantly, recognised by the church.
Which meant it would have to be recognised by all of England.
Avondale’s daughter officially belonged to him.
He looked at the man, his face drawn with sorrow and defeat, and a surge of triumph rocked through his chest. She was his.
No longer a pawn to be used by the Earl, Lady Penelope Hastings belonged to Clan MacKenzie now. Whatever the people thought of his Sassenach bride was no concern of his. He would command their acceptance. For she was his, owed to him by a man and a country that had tried to strip him of his pride. Of all that he was.
She was his token.
His token of fifteen years spent in exile while he earned his way back to his home.
She was his payment.
He could think of nothing more upsetting for the Earl, a man who prized his lineage, a man who had secured such a boon of a marriage, a near miracle really considering his financial status.
And Lachlan had stolen it from him.
And now, he would steal the man’s daughter physically as well.
‘It is a long journey to the Highlands,’ he said.
‘What about my...my things, my...?’
‘I’ve had new things purchased for you. Anything you will need is already in the carriage.’ Because he would damn well see her taken off from the church in a near-parade that would rival anything the Duke could have provided for her.
He was not a boy any more. Avondale didn’t own him. England didn’t own him.
His bride didn’t move. It was as if she were rooted to the spot. She didn’t cling to her father. Her father would have offered her no comfort and he knew she wasn’t fool enough to think he might.
‘Your carriage waits, Wife,’ he said.
Still she did not move.
‘Your carriage might wait, but I will not.’ He picked her up then, her weight insubstantial. And still he could not quite get over the softness.
She made a noise halfway between a squeak and growl, clinging for a moment to his shirt before releasing her hold on him and going limp, her hands dangling at her sides, her expression one of fury. ‘I can walk,’ she said, as he began to stride towards the church doors.
‘But you weren’t.’
‘I would have!’
‘I was tired of waiting,’ he growled, pushing the doors open, early morning sunlight washing over them both.
The carriage was just outside, two shiny black horses, a driver and footman. When he saw Lachlan approaching, the footman scrambled down the side of the carriage and held the door for them. Lachlan deposited Penelope inside and she moved to the far corner, putting as much space between the two of them as possible. ‘You were waiting for all of ten seconds,’ she said.
‘No,’ he said, his voice like a stranger’s. ‘I’ve been waiting for fifteen years. I will wait no longer.’