Chapter Two

Calholm

Lisbeth Hamilton tried without success to eat her dinner as her sister-in-law, Barbara, and cousin, Hugh, argued about the impending arrival of Calholm’s new heiress. Lisbeth hated discord, having grown up surrounded by it. At the moment, however, she had some appreciation for her dinner companions’ frayed nerves.

The trustee for Calholm, John Alistair, had informed them a month ago that an heir had been located, then sent word last week that the child—and her guardian—should be arriving in Glasgow any day. He had not mentioned an exact date. The news had been met with varying reactions: anger on Hugh’s part, curiosity on Barbara’s—and on her own part, hope.

“Ben Masters,” said Hugh contemptuously. “Sounds like an American ruffian. No doubt he’s latched onto our little cousin for the money.”

Lisbeth privately agreed that was most likely the case. Still, she wondered what the American would think of this household, whether he would find it as unsettling as she did. Through various wills and trusts, both she and Barbara, as widows of successive marquesses, had lifetime rights to live in the house. After her husband Jamie’s death, Hugh had come to live with them as the heir presumptive, taking over some of the sheep-farming aspects of the estate. John Alistair, though, had refused to petition parliament to designate Hugh as heir and had launched a search for Ian, scapegrace though he had been.

No one had expected Ian to be found. But after a year, the search had yielded not Ian himself but his daughter—and heir.

The news had squashed Hugh’s hopes and spurred her own. She and Hugh had long been at odds over the future of Calholm’s breeding of horses. She was as committed to it as the old Marquess. John Hamilton had harbored a lifelong dream to establish a stable second to none in. the British empire. The goal was to produce a champion for the Grand National, the most respected steeplechase in the British Isles.

And they now had a prospect: Shadow, a five-year-old stallion who’d been born the day Lisbeth had come to Calholm as a bride. She had always felt linked to the great gray horse. She had helped train him, had spent hours currying and talking to him; and when Jamie died—two years after his father’s death and one year after his older brother, Hamish—she’d assumed their quest. She would give Calholm its champion.

Lisbeth lived for that goal. But then Hugh had arrived, equally determined to sell the horses and take Calholm in a different direction: sheep farming.

There was also the matter of the twenty tenant families, another bone of contention between herself and Hugh. John Hamilton had been committed to the descendants of the men who had fought with his father, the original marquess, during the Napoleonic wars. The men who had helped the first Marquess distinguish himself, thus winning the King’s favor, a title, and the land. Those families wasted land better used as sheep pasture, Hugh argued. But she wouldn’t allow the tenants to be put off the land, not as long as she still drew breath, not as long as even a sliver of hope remained.

Now, with the discovery of Calholm’s heiress, Hugh appeared to have lost everything. So did Barbara, who’d tied her future to Hugh’s. Their fates, and Lisbeth’s, seemed to be in the hands of the American who held guardianship over Ian’s daughter. And none of them knew what to expect, or even if the claim was valid. Perhaps there was no proof that the girl was, indeed, a Hamilton.

The burning question was: would the American and the little girl bring about Calholm’s salvation or its ruination?

“They have no right,” Hugh said bitterly at the table, stabbing at the meat on his plate. “The letter said the child’s mother was an entertainer. An entertainer, of all things!”

“I thought you liked entertainers—particularly actresses,” Lisbeth said, unable to keep sarcasm from her voice. Hugh was a notorious rake who had accumulated a ton of debts on the expectation that he would inherit Calholm.

He glared at her. He was aware that she had eagerly supported the search for another heir.

“You would rather have an American opportunist claim Calholm?” Hugh inquired, one eyebrow raised.

“At least he may not gamble it away,” Lisbeth said, unable to rein in her impatience with him. “John Hamilton would whirl in his grave if he knew your plans for what he so carefully built.”

“You care about those damn nags more than people,” Hugh shot back. “And you know I’ve stopped gambling.”

“No, I don’t,” Lisbeth said. “Your creditors cut you off when it appeared you might not inherit.”

“Just wait,” he said. “The American will sell those bloody horses of yours. It’s the only thing that makes any sense. And he’ll bloody well kick off those tenants with a hell of a lot less than I would. He’s obviously after money, and he won’t be feeling any need to give it away to a bunch of poor farmers—family loyalty be damned.”

“He can’t destroy Calholm any faster than you would,” Lisbeth retorted, feeling sick inside. Hugh was right. Her cause was probably hopeless. Still, she had to believe—for Jamie’s sake, for the sake of all the families who depended upon Calholm to survive.

She had sufficient funds to maintain herself in a comfortable if not lavish manner. Jamie had left some money in trust. And her lifelong tenancy in the Calholm home was secured, though she doubted she would want to remain here if Hugh had control of the estate. Remaining would not mean much to her then, not if she couldn’t keep her promises to Jamie and Jamie’s father.

“I wonder what he’s like,” Barbara mused. “I haven’t met any Americans.”

Lisbeth noted Hugh’s swift glance toward Barbara, and she almost felt sorry for him. He thought Barbara was his; indeed, Lisbeth knew the two of them had been carrying on a liaison almost from the moment Hugh had arrived at Calholm. Had they been two other people, Lisbeth might have believed it was a matter of love at first sight. But Hugh had a long and honestly won reputation as a rake, and Barbara an equally well earned image as a flirt. A gleam already sparkled in her eyes at the thought of a new man at Calholm.

And the American would be susceptible. Every man was. Barbara was a great beauty and had the charm to match. If she didn’t use these assets for all the wrong reasons, Lisbeth probably would have liked her. In many ways, Barbara was like a child: pleasant and happy as long as she got what she wanted.

It was early November, but Barbara had already depleted her year’s allowance—more than her year’s allowance. Lisbeth knew she would never again see the money she had lent Barbara, and she’d refused to lend her more, despite Barbara’s continued requests. Everything Lisbeth had was needed for the horses, their training and feed—a fact that Barbara resented.

Hugh glared at Barbara. “He’s probably an old rustic. Not your type at all.” Then he added slyly, “He might prefer Lisbeth.”

Lisbeth didn’t much care for Barbara’s amused smile, even though she knew she wasn’t a beauty. She’d never even tried to be, considering the expenditure of the time it required a waste.

“Or perhaps he has a wife,” Lisbeth countered, although Mr. Alistair hadn’t mentioned one. Or he might be old and rickety, as Hugh suggested. Old and rickety probably wouldn’t stop Barbara, though, not if she could get her hands on Calholm.

Suddenly Lisbeth lost her appetite. Too much depended on Ben Masters—and his integrity. Unfortunately, with the exception of Jamie, most men she’d met lacked that quality. And even Jamie had been unable to deny Barbara anything she really wanted.

“He’ll be short and fat,” Hugh was saying, knowing that Barbara preferred handsome men. And Hugh was handsome.

Barbara gave him an infuriatingly smug look.

“If you—” he started to threaten, and Lisbeth could bear no more.

She rose from the table, and her dog, Henry the Eighth, who had been lying next to her chair, rose with her.

“Do you have to bring that beast into the dining room?” Barbara asked. “I don’t imagine the Yankee will approve.”

Henry the Eighth, a huge, wooly beast, stretched, ignoring Barbara as he always did. He didn’t care for Hugh or Barbara any more than his mistress did.

His tail hit Barbara’s chair with a resounding thump, and she jumped slightly. Henry wagged it again in utter defiance, and Lisbeth had to grin. Henry was a continuing bone of contention in the household, but he went every place she did, and the American would simply have to live with that. She would fight for three things: Calholm’s tenants, her dog, and her horses.

“Mayhap the American will not.” She shrugged. “And mayhap he likes dogs.”

“Not that great ugly dog,” Barbara said and shuddered.

“He’s not ugly,” Lisbeth protested on Henry’s behalf, not that Henry cared. She did, though. He was her best friend. Her only friend. She had always been an onlooker, often an unwilling one. She was that now, in this home. Calholm had never really been hers, not even for the brief time when she was its official mistress.

She soon would no longer have even nominal control. The new heiress—a mere child—would have the estate in entitlement until she gave birth to a son. That, at least, was the most prevalent interpretation of the mishmash of wills and entitlements.

If only Jamie had lived …

“The American might even sell that scruffy animal of yours,” Barbara baited.

“Or make you live on your allowance,” Lisbeth retorted. Angry at herself for rising to the bait, weary of the conflict and speculation, she started for the door. “I’m going to take Shadow out.”

“You shouldn’t ride by yourself,” Hugh protested with rare concern.

Lisbeth looked at him suspiciously but saw no guile in his eyes.

“Remember what happened to Jamie,” he added.

How could she ever forget? That day would always be clear in her memory: Black Jack, Jamie’s favorite horse, limping home during a hunt; the search for Jamie, and finally the discovery of Jamie’s body; the magistrate’s conclusion that he had fallen. She had never fully accepted it. Jamie had been a superb rider.

“I won’t,” she said bitingly. “I saddle my own horse now.” The implication hung like a sword over them. She’d never directly accused anyone, but she’d expressed doubts about the verdict of accidental death.

God’s toothache, but she needed fresh air. It was still an hour before dark, and Lisbeth hurried upstairs, changed to a pair of boy’s britches and a shirt, and ran down the back stairs to the stable. She didn’t want to encounter Hugh’s and Barbara’s disapproving expressions over her attire, but she’d discovered long ago that these clothes were much more effective while training and jumping horses. But she was careful about when and where she wore them.

Shadow was eager. She quickly cinched the light racing saddle. Callum Trapp, Calholm’s trainer, and the grooms had apparently retired for the day, and she was thankful. She wanted to be alone. She wanted freedom.

She gave the horse his head and allowed him to race down the road as the cold fall wind pummeled her. A familiar exhilaration filled her, the pure joy of the moment. She wouldn’t think about tomorrow or the next day, about the impending arrival of her niece and the American and what it might mean for Calholm, for her own dreams.

She could only hope that the man wasn’t an opportunist who would drain the estate’s assets. She couldn’t quite suffocate that thread of fear, though. Mr. Alistair said the guardian was a solicitor, and her experience with solicitors—with the exception of Mr. Alistair—had proved them to be money suckers and only slightly above criminals.

Lisbeth turned Shadow toward a fence. Elation surged through her as the great stallion lifted and soared over the barrier without shying. On landing, she slowly pulled the gray to a halt, then leaned over his neck, stroking him and murmuring endearments. Shadow arched his neck as if to say he could do it any time he wanted.

“You’re a big fraud,” she muttered.

Henry the Eighth barked from behind the fence. It was a decidedly disgruntled bark, and Lisbeth shook her head. Henry was probably big enough to make the fence himself, but he was disgustingly lazy. He would be as fat as his namesake if he didn’t get more exercise.

Lisbeth turned Shadow back toward the fence. Once more, he took it easily, snorting with well-earned arrogance as they returned to the stable, Henry running happily alongside, his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth. Lisbeth’s elation at Shadow’s jumps faded as she approached the grand stone manor of Calholm. A few more days and the horses might all be gone and the only contentment she’d ever known gone with them.

She was living from day to day. Tomorrow she would take Shadow over the jumps again. If Ben Masters could see him jump, he would understand the potential of Calholm’s stable. She had to believe that.

The rickety coach bumped along the rutted road until Ben thought every bone in his body had been shaken out of place. The jarring movements certainly weren’t doing any good to the livid bruises on the right side of his body. Those and the bump on his head were, fortunately, the only injuries he’d suffered when the crates fell on top of him.

Nagging doubts about this trip deepened. The falling crates could have been a simple accident, most likely it was, but he’d always found coincidences suspicious.

Cameron had seen nothing suspicious, nor had anyone else. Ben had accepted Cameron’s offer to accompany them to the Four Horses, where they all took rooms. Even Cameron decided to stay, saying he too planned to catch the Edinburgh coach the following morning.

That had been two days ago, and he and Sarah Ann were now finally approaching Calholm, having left the main coach at a village and hired this old vehicle for the final leg of the journey. The damned thing groaned as it took a corner, tilting for a moment before settling back on all wheels.

Sarah Ann’s eyes blinked open. She’d slept much of the way. She’d had nightmares the night before and had awakened screaming. The “bears” were back, she’d told him in a tiny, frightened voice. She was alone in a dark room with no doors, and the room kept getting smaller and smaller. She kept crying but no one answered.

And she’d had no Andrew Cameron today, not since Duneagle, to amuse her with stories and magic tricks.

“We’re neara there, sirrah,” the coachman said.

Sarah Ann stirred and moved closer to Ben.

“We’re almost there, Sugarplum,” he said.

She gave him a sleepy smile, then picked up Annabelle’s basket and opened the top. “You see, Annabelle. We did get here.”

Annabelle answered with a plaintive meow, and Sarah Ann plucked her from the basket. In the past weeks, Annabelle had grown substantially. So had her claws. In addition to bruises, he now had several vivid scratches.

But Annabelle seemed happy enough just to be out of the basket, and she plumped herself into Sarah Ann’s lap, accepting Sarah Ann’s crooning noises as her due.

Ben peered out the window. A stately structure loomed in the distance, and his premonitions returned. What business did he have in a place like this, in a country not his own?

At that moment, a horse, with a rider stretched low on its back, appeared out of nowhere in front of them. The coach lurched, the driver reining in the horses to prevent a collision. But the abrupt movement caused the lumbersome vehicle to tilt and in the next instant, it keeled over.

Ben just had time to grab Sarah Ann before the carriage crashed. Annabelle screeched and promptly disappeared out a window. Ben heard curses outside the coach as he tried to straighten, his body complaining bitterly.

“Sarah Ann,” he asked, holding her tight. “Are you all right?”

“Annabelle,” she whispered. “Annabelle’s gone.”

“We’ll find her,” he soothed, wondering what madman had been riding like a fiend down a public road.

The door, now located above them where the roof should be, jerked open, and a voice said, “Anyone hurt in there?”

Despite Sarah Ann’s presence, Ben swore and set her upright. Whoever had opened the door was gone, and he stood, poking his head out of the opening. The coachman was standing in the road, dusting himself off, which brought Ben to the conclusion that the voice he’d just heard had come from the slender, carelessly dressed youth perched on the wheel. He was evidently the same person who had caused the disaster because a riderless gray horse now stamped nervously nearby. The boy was clothed in loose-fitting cotton trousers, a shapeless tweed coat with a cap drawn low over the face.

“Of all the damned carelessness …” Ben began.

“We weren’t expecting anyone,” the youth said, more in accusation than apology. He took off the cap, and as a long auburn braid fell down the slender back, Ben realized the boy was not a boy at all but a woman.

“Shadow could have been hurt,” she added, frowning.

Ben barely suppressed a roar of anger. “Dammit, any fool should know better than to race down a public road.”

“This isn’t a public road. It belongs to Calholm,” the woman started angrily, but then Ben lifted Sarah Ann so that she could be seen, and the woman’s voice trailed off. She moved closer. “She isn’t hurt, is she?”

Obviously his own injuries were irrelevant, but at least she was acknowledging that her actions might have harmed a child.

“No thanks to you,” he said.

She ignored him, her gaze scrutinizing Sarah Ann, who was now sitting on the edge of the door opening. The woman’s eyes suddenly widened with apprehension. “You’re not—”

At that moment, Sarah Ann wailed. “I want Annabelle.”

Ben flinched. Sarah Ann seldom wailed. In fact, he had worried about that. He expected a child to cry more than she did; but except for a very few tears, she’d endured all her upheavals with stoicism.

The woman, still perched on the wheel, spoke softly to Sarah Ann. “Who’s Annabelle?”

Sarah Ann sniffed. “My kitten. I want to get down and find her.”

The woman grinned suddenly. “I think your Annabelle is just fine. She’s busy chasing my dog.”

Humor danced in her eyes, and Ben realized she was prettier than he’d first believed. He also realized he was still standing in the carriage, his head sticking out like the fool he’d called her, and he couldn’t boost himself out with Sarah Ann clinging to the side. “Can you lift her down?” he asked.

“Aye.” She leaned forward and took Sarah Ann with ease. She was stronger than she looked, but then she would have to be strong to control that giant of a stallion she had been riding.

Once Sarah Ann was safely on the ground, Ben lifted himself through the door and slowly, painfully, slid to the ground. His left leg, which always gave him some trouble, was stiffer than usual, and his body was sore all over.

Sarah Ann was looking frantically for Annabelle.

The woman knelt, her expression softening. “I saw your kitten jump out the door and go after Henry the Eighth. He’s a great fraud, he is, and easily involved in games.”

“Henry the Eighth?” Ben asked.

“My dog.” Then at Sarah Ann’s stricken face, she added, “Henry wouldn’t hurt a mouse. That’s why I have him. He absolutely refused to have anything to do with chasing foxes or pointing quail, and my neighbor was going to put him down. He thought Henry was cowardly. I think he’s tenderhearted. But I’ll send some people out looking for your Annabelle.”

Sarah Ann was not pacified. Her face slowly began to crumple.

“I think we’d better look now,” Ben said, more curtly than he intended. He was tired of accidents, pure or manufactured, and he was sore and frustrated. He’d never had much patience with irresponsibility, and he had none at all if it affected Sarah Ann.

He wasn’t sure who the woman was. Maybe a servant stealing a ride on one of the estate horses. She surely didn’t belong to the Hamilton family. He’d heard about the proper English gentry and had assumed the Scots would be similar.

Whoever she was, she looked taken aback by his tone, but she merely nodded. Just then, a great barking erupted from a distant copse of trees on the other side of the stone wall to the right of the road.

“Henry!” the woman exclaimed, and without another word, she easily mounted the large horse, backed him a number of yards down the road and flew over the Avail as if it were two feet high instead of five.

Ben wanted to go after her. Dammit all, it had been years since he’d had to stand back and allow someone else to do his hunting, much less this slight figure of a woman with no more sense than a goose.

He made sure the coach driver was all right, along with the horses, which were still in their traces. Then he went over to Sarah Ann and checked her again for injuries. She’d sustained a few bruises—nothing of note. She stood there looking hopefully toward the wall.

Feeling helpless, Ben lifted her, then walked over and set her atop the wall. He vaulted up next to her.

“Who is she?” Sarah Ann asked. He could only shrug.

“Why is she wearing pants?”

That was a harder question to answer. He’d known only one woman who’d worn pants, and she had been an outlaw’s daughter in the Indian Territory. Such behavior was daring even in the freedom-loving American west. God knows what it was considered here.

He tried to see through the copse of trees but couldn’t. He heard barking, a screeching meow, and then a howl. Suddenly, what looked like a small pony came galloping out of the woods rushing straight for them. It veered, disappearing through an invisible opening in the wall, reappearing on the other side only to collapse several feet away from them. Putting a great, hairy head on his paws, tongue lolling thirstily from one side of his mouth, he eyed Ben and Sarah Ann cautiously. Minutes later, the woman appeared from the woods; she was carrying something gingerly in her arms.

“She has Annabelle!” Sarah Ann said.

“It appears so.” Ben wondered what the kitten had done to the cowed dog—and the woman, who was eyeing Annabelle so warily.

Her careful approach gave Ben several moments to study her. She was not, by any stretch of the imagination, beautiful. Her features were ordinary and her face unfashionably freckled, something she’d made no effort to hide with powders. Her eyes, though, were quite remarkable. They were hazel, a mixture of amber gold, soft greens, and gray. They should, he thought, appear serene. They didn’t. He saw cautiousness and suspicion in them instead—and hot, quick anger had ignited them when he’d accused her of recklessness. They were eyes that had learned to protect, to conceal, and in Ben’s experience that was unusual in a woman.

Who in the hell was she?

She finally arrived beside their perch on the stone wall, and she gingerly handed the kitten to Sarah Ann, who instantly clutched the animal tightly to her chest.

“Thank you,” Sarah Ann said politely, and Ben knew if she’d been on her feet she would have managed a perfect curtsy.

“You’re welcome,” the woman replied. The horse pranced beneath her, and Ben noted the blood dripping from a scratch on her hand. Her gaze turned to him, and he saw the silent appraisal in those wide eyes. “You must be the solicitor from America.” Her voice was husky, low, but there was no mistaking its femininity—nor the Scottish burr. “And,” she added, moving her gaze back to Sarah Ann and allowing a hint of amusement to creep into her tone, “you must be the newest Lady of Calholm.”

Sarah Ann looked puzzled and turned her face to Ben in question. “Papa told me all about that,” she said, “but I still think I’m just a girl.”

“Aye, that, too, and a bonny one as well,” the woman said, and Sarah Ann beamed with pleasure.

Ben decided it was time to learn who the stranger was. “And whom do we have … the, uh, honor of addressing?”

“Or the misfortune?” she retorted quickly, a smile on her lips. Ben found himself liking her spirit.

“You redeemed yourself by finding Annabelle,” he said.

“And how does Annabelle redeem herself?”

“She doesn’t feel the need,” he said.

“I see,” the woman said, the smile widening. “I’m Lisbeth Hamilton, another … lady of sorts.” Humor sparkled in her eyes, making her rather plain face appealing. “There are three of us in the household now. My sister-in-law, Barbara, is also the Dowager Marchioness—though I wouldn’t call her that unless you want a glass thrown at you.”

Ben was surprised. She looked more like a stable lad than a member of the peerage. “You’re Lisbeth Hamilton?”

“The fool,” she said, reminding him of his first utterance. “I really am sorry about the accident, but usually there’s no traffic on this road, and I’ve been jumping Shadow—”

“That’s your horse?” Sarah Ann asked eagerly.

“Yes,” she said. “I’m training him.”

“Can I ride him?”

“He’s a little big for you.”

“Papa promised me a pony,” Sarah Ann confided.

“Did he now?” she said, then looked at Ben. “You’re planning to stay, then?”

“Did you think not?”

“We know very little,” she said. “Mayhap I can help you with that pony.”

Though the offer was gracious, there was a sudden wariness in her that kept him at a distance. The smile had disappeared.

“Mayhap,” Ben mocked slightly. “But now we would like to get to Calholm. We were beginning to think it didn’t exist.”

“It exists,” she assured him. “Just over yon.”

Ben slid from the wall, helped Sarah Ann down, then limped to the coach.

“You were hurt?” Lisbeth Hamilton said. Ben saw concern replace the reserve in her face, a reserve that raised his curiosity. He wouldn’t have expected it of a woman who wore men’s clothes and faced like the devil.

“An old injury,” he said curtly. And a new one in Glasgow, he added silently.

“I’ll ride back to Calholm and have our carriage brought for you and some men to right the coach,” she told him. “I hope the rest of your trip was less … eventful.”

He didn’t reply, but he couldn’t help but ponder the immediate question that popped into his mind: had she anything to do with the accident in Glasgow? Would she benefit if the new heiress disappeared—or died?

Lisbeth pondered the meeting with the heiress and her guardian as she rode back to Calholm. No doubt about it, Sarah Ann was a delight. A beautiful child and well mannered, even under the worst of circumstances.

The American was another story—he was far more complex.

Ben Masters was reticent, which Lisbeth expected of a solicitor. But he certainly wasn’t rickety or old or fat, as Hugh had hoped. She pictured him in her mind again, wearing that unfashionable sheepskin jacket. It made his shoulders look enormous. His feet had been encased in the strangest pair of boots she’d ever seen: brown leather tooled with a simple design. They had a slightly elevated heel that made him look taller than he already was, which was very tall, indeed. He was almost startling in his great size.

She was certain that Barbara would be on him like a leech. Would Barbara find him as easy to manipulate as others?

Lisbeth doubted it. Indeed, recalling the alert, cautious look in his eyes and his distinct lack of response to her attempts at humor, she knew he was not a man to be easily influenced.

What he was was interesting-looking. Not handsome—his face was too rough-hewn for that, with intriguing lines that inched out from his eyes and carved trails across his cheeks. She didn’t think they had been made by laughter. His skin was bronze, as if it had been permanently colored from long hours in the sun, which was more than a little unusual for a solicitor. His light brown hair was colored with gold, and his eyes—a startling light blue—were suspicious and watchful.

He hadn’t smiled, but then why should he, given the circumstances of their meeting. She had not made a good first impression, which didn’t bode well for her winning him to her side. A reckless fool. That’s what he’d called her, and her capture of the cat—even she couldn’t call it a rescue—didn’t seem to have helped.

He certainly didn’t look like an opportunist. But then, how did one look? And what did he want from Calholm? Money was the logical answer.

But perhaps she was misjudging him. Perhaps he would turn out to be the answer to her prayers, rather than her worst nightmare. Much to her distress, she didn’t have a clue as to which it would be.

With a heavy sigh, Lisbeth spurred Shadow to a faster pace. Ben Masters was waiting and she had to tell her sister-in-law and cousin that the newest Hamilton had arrived at Calholm.