Epilogue

Six months later

Imogen stood at the window overlooking the privy garden at Holyrood Palace and scowled at the dark, flat sheet of rain clouds. They were coming in fast. And the timing could not be worse.

“They say rain on your wedding day is good luck,” Aisla said, joining her at the tall pane of glass, one of several in the luxurious state apartment inside the palace. “It’s a symbol of fertility and cleansing.”

“That’s absurd,” Imogen replied. “Whoever said that was only trying to make a bride feel better about looking like a drowned rat on the most important day of her life.”

Aisla laughed and put her arm around her. “Nonsense. You’ll look radiant no matter the weather. And besides, the rain seems to be holding. Not a drop yet!”

Niall’s wife gave her a reassuring squeeze and hustled away, toward a small pedestal, where Rory was currently being draped in a dress of pale, peach-colored lawn for the occasion.

Imogen’s wedding day.

A weightless sensation lifted her spirits at the thought, and even the slate-colored skies appeared to brighten. Curiously, they were the same color as Ronan’s eyes when he was caught in an impassioned trance, like he had been two evenings before, when she’d straddled him in his bed, riding him to complete euphoria. She shook her head at the wicked and somewhat fanciful thought.

Be rational, Imogen.

The weather was not conspiring against her, nor was it blessing her and Ronan’s nuptials. But Aisla had the right of it: who cared if it spit a little rain today? In a little under one hour, she would be the Duchess of Dunrannoch. More importantly, she’d be Ronan’s wife. And that title was the only one she cared about.

“Ye’re lookin’ all daft again, Lady Im. I can see yer face in the window’s reflection, ye ken.”

Imogen turned to view Rory and, when she saw all the ruffles on the peach dress, shook her head and laughed.

“Oh my, that color does not suit you in the least, does it? Hilda, there must be something else Rory can wear. The yellow gown made for the engagement ball, perhaps.”

A ball that had never come to pass.

After the duel and Silas’s death, the scandal revolving around Imogen and Ronan had whipped into a new frenzy. The man accused of the kidnapping plot had been imprisoned, since he was indeed proven to be working at the behest of one Mr. Silas Calder, and his employer would have been as well, had he not tried to shoot his way out of arrest. The newssheets had also hinted that Silas had been behind the death of the Marquess of Paxton, so the ton had been in a frenzy.

There’d been nothing to do but quit London. But considering she had done so with Ronan, once more as his fiancée, she hadn’t quite cared. The scandal would fizzle eventually, as soon as something else shocking happened to fill the gossip rags.

“Quite right, my lady. Goodness, she looks like a ripe peach!” Hilda agreed, she and Aisla moving toward the many portmanteaus that had been brought to the apartment the previous day.

Holyrood, set at the very end of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, would have normally been off-limits to anyone not associated with its current owner and resident, Charles X, the former king of France. But apparently the Comte d’Artois, who had been living at the palace since being overthrown and exiled the year before, was one of Lord Riverley’s acquaintances.

“There is a black Arabian of mine the Comte has been eyeing for some time,” Julien had explained with a nonchalant shrug when the invitation to hold their wedding at Holyrood’s palace and abbey had arrived at Ronan’s home in Edinburgh. The Frenchman, visiting the city for only a day or two for business, had grinned at the flabbergasted pair of them.

“And ye were willing to part with it if he opened his home to us?” Ronan surmised.

“Quite. And if you had any inclination to name your heir after the hero who secured such a spectacular setting for your nuptials, well, I wouldn’t object.”

“We’ll no’ name our son Julien,” Ronan had scoffed while a fluttering explosion had ignited inside Imogen’s belly. Our son.

Something Imogen had only let herself dream of before. Now, it might become a reality. They were both older, of course, but she didn’t expect their ages to be much of a hindrance. She was only twenty-nine, and Sorcha and Makenna were both older with young children and had proven it could be done. Again and again, in fact.

Now, after spending the evening and night in one of the most beautiful, sumptuously appointed rooms Imogen had ever seen in her life, with her maid, Rory, and her best friend, Emma, she was finally ready to make the short walk to the ruined abbey, adjacent to the palace. Ready to become a wife. And, if God willed it, a mother someday. Though, in truth, she was practically already one to a mischievous imp of a girl, currently dressed as a peach. She and Ronan had discussed making the lass their ward. To her surprise and happiness, he had readily agreed. Rory, it seemed, had captured his heart as well.

“Admit it, ye’re thinking of him right now,” Rory said, tugging off the dress as Hilda returned with the yellow gown.

“Of course she’s thinking of him,” Emma said from where she sat in a red-striped silk chair, one of many inside the royal chamber. She appeared cool and composed as she threaded a blue silk ribbon around a simple but elegant bouquet of Scottish wildflowers. “The pair of them can hardly keep their eyes off each other whenever they’re in the same room, and now we’ve been out of His Grace’s presence for nearly a full twenty-four hours. She must be desperate for a glimpse of his ducal manliness soon.”

Emma fanned herself while pulling an infatuated face.

Rory made a gagging sound, snorting with laughter, while Imogen shook her head at her friend. “Believe it or not, I missed your sarcasm, Emma. London is dreary. Without you there, it was horrible.”

Emma accepted the compliment with her usual grace. “Whatever will you do at Maclaren without me?” she quipped. It only made Imogen’s mood dip.

“I don’t want to think about that yet.”

She and Ronan could not stay in Edinburgh. He had been away from Maclaren for too long, and it was time to get on with things. Before long, she’d learn what it was to be a duchess and a Highlander laird’s wife.

Though she looked much more forward to learning her way around the marriage bed. Ronan had told her it was larger than the one in his London home and that he planned to chart every square inch of it with their bodies in various positions of lovemaking. She’d giggled at his promise, saying it wasn’t just about the bed but the man inside of it. Exploring his body, discovering the things he liked, and the things she liked as well.

“I will dedicate a good portion of my day to yer education, my lady,” he’d whispered in her ear. “So long as ye teach me as well.”

A blush rose to Imogen’s cheeks at the memory of what Ronan had done to her next.

“Oy, there she goes again,” Rory groaned as Hilda tugged the yellow dress over her head and hushed her while Emma stood and displayed her finished bouquet. It was lovely, the ribbons laced along the stems and dripping with finer strings of lace and even pearls.

“Wherever did you learn to do that?” Imogen asked, accepting the bouquet.

Emma grinned. “Mary taught me.”

Imogen peered at her, dumbfounded. “Mary?” The young maid who’d kept allowing herself to be seduced by her ardent employers?

“It seems she took the last stay at Haven to heart,” Emma replied. “She paid us a visit a few weeks ago. She found work in a hothouse in Leith and says she’s doing well. Mary brought some flowers for the girls and taught them how to bind them prettily, like so.”

The unexpected news lifted Imogen’s spirits. It made her so happy to hear that one of the girls she and Emma had helped, one who she had started to worry would never learn or change her ways, had moved forward with her life. In truth, Mary was one of the lucky ones. She’d not been forced by a relative or an employer or beaten by a husband. She’d simply made bad decisions for herself. But now, it sounded as though Imogen and Emma had finally gotten through to her.

The door opened, and Sorcha swept inside, followed by Lady Kincaid and Ronan’s mother, the duchess. Well…soon to be the Dowager Duchess of Dunrannoch, once the hour was through. The older woman didn’t seem at all unhappy, though. In fact, out of the handful of them in the apartment, it was Lady Dunrannoch who beamed the brightest.

The duchess had had a good old laugh over the rumors of Ronan’s supposed illegitimacy. Apparently, she and Imogen’s mother used to have a game where they sent each other the most outrageous letters, to see who could get the other to visit first. Lady Dunrannoch had won that year, with a panicked Lady Kincaid riding at breakneck speed to Maclaren with a wild-haired, half-asleep, and utterly confused vicar in tow. The two women had collapsed in undignified giggles at the memory.

The current duchess surveyed the group. “Excellent! You’re all ready! The guests have gathered at the abbey, and I don’t see any reason to delay. Oh, this weather!” she exclaimed, looking thoroughly scandalized by the threat of rain. “And on Ronan’s wedding day. Of all my children, he always has to be the most difficult.”

Aisla raised a brow at Imogen, who bit back a grin. “They say rain is good luck,” Imogen put in with a wink toward her future sister-in-law. Another ripple of happiness took her somewhere closer to giddy. Ronan’s family was so large, so vast, and so far they had been welcoming and warm. She couldn’t wait to meet his other siblings, their families and his friends… In truth, going to Maclaren made her shiver with anticipation more than it made her sad.

Haven would not just survive—it would thrive, just as Imogen and Emma had always dreamed. For Imogen, marriage had always spelled disaster for Haven. Her husband would be given her dowry under the law, and her life’s work would eventually fold and shutter. But not this marriage, and Ronan had seen to it. He’d given Imogen the greatest wedding gift imaginable: her dowry to be dispensed as she deemed necessary.

“I dunnae need it, nor do I want it,” he’d told her the week before when working through the solicitor’s papers. “Haven is yer love and passion, and so it’s mine as well. Do what ye planned to before. I’ll no’ stop ye. Ever.”

His promise that Haven would never lack for anything had come on the heels of an unexpected and more-than-generous contribution from none other than Lady Reid. She had surprised Imogen further with an accompanying note, briefly congratulating her on her upcoming wedding and saying that she hoped they could become acquaintances in time. Imogen had responded in kind, impressed by Grace’s goodwill.

“Rory? Are you ready?” she asked once Hilda had pinned a last dark curl away from her narrow face.

“Aye. I mean, yes, Lady Im. And you look like a right rum-mort, too.”

“Rum-mort?”

Rory grinned. “A queen.”

Imogen’s gown had been completed just days before, and she had fallen in love with it immediately. It was simple, yet elegant, cut of creamy satin and a lighter white lace overlay. Unlike some of her previous fashion choices that ran the gamut from frivolous to practically nonexistent, this dress embodied who she was…at least who she wanted to be. It sported small capped sleeves and a modest bodice strewn with seed pearls that tapered to a V at her waist before falling in graceful, voluminous folds to the floor. A lace train with delicate embroidery hung from her coiffure all the way to the hem of the gown. White elbow-length gloves with pearl buttons and silver slippers completed the ensemble.

“I don’t think anyone has ever paid me a finer compliment,” she replied, holding out her hand. Rory took it, and they left the apartment, leading the other ladies through the grand corridors toward the front of the palace. The Comte had made himself scarce after an initial greeting, and now it almost felt as if the whole of the palace was theirs and theirs alone.

Outside, the early September air was humid and dense, and there was barely a breeze at all as she and Rory and the other women met with a handful of very handsome gentleman. And one gaming hell owner.

“Mr. McClintock, it’s good to see you,” Imogen said as Hilda ran one last hand over her skirts and nodded her approval. She then joined McClintock at his side.

“Lady Imogen, it’s a fine day, is it not?”

She peered at the sky dubiously.

But McClintock waved his hand. “Ye’ve dealt with worse stuff than this. Good on ye, lass. My felicitations.”

The man made a bow and led Hilda toward the ruins. He was absolutely correct: she had dealt with worse stuff than rain and had turned out just fine. She smiled at McClintock’s straightforward words and turned to meet her future brother-in-law.

“Ye look lovely, my lady,” Niall said as he reached for Aisla’s arm. He and Brandt Montgomery, who claimed Sorcha’s hand and reverently kissed the ridge of her knuckles, wore full dress kilts in their clan colors. The other men gathered to receive the ladies and lead them to the abbey wore formal breeches and swallowtail coats.

“Tarbendale has the right of it, Lady Imogen,” Lord Bradburne said as he offered his arm to Lady Dunrannoch. “You are truly stunning.”

“Thank you, Your Grace. I’m so pleased you and Brynn made the journey north for our wedding.”

“She would not have missed this for the world, and she’s been longing for a reason to return to Scotland,” he said with a wink before leading Ronan’s mother toward the abbey. Imogen could already hear the string music playing inside. The ruined abbey with its roofless nave allowed the musicians’ notes to carry.

A rumble of distant thunder joined in and drew a curse to Rory’s young lips.

“Sorry, Lady Im,” she quickly said.

“I can’t argue your point,” Imogen replied as Lord Northridge stepped forward and extended his arm to both Rory and Lady Kincaid.

“Best hurry,” North said before eyeing Rory skeptically. “Though, young lady, I’m not convinced your legs can keep stride with mine.”

Imogen saw the teasing challenge in the earl’s eyes, as well as Rory falling for it. “Horse shite, I could beat ye any day of the week!” North burst into raucous laughter while Lady Kincaid gasped. Rory bit her lip, though she did not look repentant in the least.

Imogen smiled at her, her heart full. “Just try not to curse in the abbey, all right? We don’t need any more questionable signs.”

The girl grinned and took one of North’s elbows while Imogen’s mother accepted the other.

Lord Langlevit came forward next. “If you don’t mind, my lady, I’ll see you in,” he said, his tone serious and deep as he addressed Emma.

“I don’t mind at all,” she replied, then, with a happy, teary-eyed glance toward Imogen, moved away with the decorated war hero.

“That leaves me, I suppose.” Lord Kincaid approached his daughter, looking as distinguished as he ever had. But there was a note in his tone, one that she had heard for many weeks now. Ever since she’d finally told her parents the truth about Silas. It wasn’t anything to do with her, Imogen knew, but with him. She took her father’s arm and hugged it as they moved toward the beautiful ruins of the abbey.

“The very best of them all,” she said. He exhaled a doubt-filled huff, that ever-present regret in his eyes.

“I don’t think that is the case, my dear.”

He was disappointed in himself and felt responsible for trusting the man who’d harmed his young daughter, bringing him closer to Imogen all the while.

“I really do have to insist, Papa, that you bring yourself up from this,” she said gently. “He manipulated all of us. I know that. I don’t blame you, and it hurts me that you blame yourself. I blamed myself, too, for the longest while. It was Ronan who made me see who the real villain was. They were his actions, not ours.”

She leaned closer to him as more thunder rolled above, closer this time.

“That doesn’t mean I don’t wish my eyes had been open sooner. I’d rather die than see you hurt,” he said, and with a pat to her hand, added, “I’m in awe of you, and I only want to make you as proud of me as I am of you.”

“You’ve already accomplished that,” she said, kissing his cheek as they came upon the entrance wall of the ruins. It was tall and imposing, the great arched window frame absent of any glass but just as stunning anyhow.

Holyrood Abbey had a desolate kind of beauty and grace, and while Aisla and Lady Dunrannoch and the very sensible Emma had balked at having the ceremony outdoors in a ruin, suggesting instead one of the grander rooms inside the palace itself, Imogen and Ronan had agreed on the abbey. The roofless nave, arched aisle vaults, and empty window casements gave it an intractable quality—it had not given up over the many centuries it had stood. Perhaps Imogen and Ronan would have a little something in common with it.

The musicians had set their chairs under the front wall’s massive window, and other seats had been set up off to the side of a pair of ruined columns, farther inside, the placement forming an aisle straight ahead. Rory and Imogen’s mother were just taking their seats, everyone else turning to see the bride enter.

Her heart sputtered even as it seemed to inflate to a size too large to contain in her chest. As she and her father stepped forward past the first crumbled column, she saw Ronan’s head of dark hair, the loose curls brushed back from his forehead. He stood tall and stoic in front of their gathered guests, and Imogen couldn’t beat back the smile that spread across her lips. He was dressed like Niall and Brandt in full dress kilt, a blue Maclaren sash crosswise over his broad chest.

He looked so handsome, and when he broke into a wide grin as she came toward him along the makeshift aisle, Imogen wanted to toss her bouquet to the side, hitch up her skirt, and run to him. She wanted his arms around her, and she nearly stopped breathing when she realized that after today, and every day for the rest of their lives, that was exactly where she would be. Right in his arms.

She’d nearly made it halfway down the aisle when a loud crack of thunder shook the sky above them, the reverberations bouncing off the old stonework inside the abbey. On her next step, Imogen felt the first drop of rain on the bridge of her nose. She looked up—and it was as if a stretched-thin seam in the clouds above split apart.

Rain pattered down on the flagstones and gravel inside the abbey at first, but it quickly turned into a deluge.

“Ballocks!” she shouted as another rumble of thunder, thankfully, ate up the word. Though Rory’s sharp ears had caught it.

“No swearing in church, Lady Im!” the girl shouted as she jumped up and joined the other guests, all hurrying from their seats and scattering for shelter into the arched vaults along the left side of the abbey.

Imogen slapped her bouquet against her leg with the sudden urge to cry.

But instead, a hysterical giggle came forth.

“Can you believe this?” she shouted as Ronan walked toward her, his smile still affixed, those reticent dimples of his on full display. His hair was soaked, the shoulders of his dress coat and sash darkening with the rain.

He spread out his arms and threw back his head, opening his mouth to the pouring rain. Love and lust spiraled through her at the sight of him, so boyish and happy. She reached for his hand and tried to pull him toward the vaults. “Hurry, we’re getting drenched!”

But he dug in his heels. “Nae, stay with me, mo gràidh. Right here, under the sky.”

“What? Under the sky—are you mad?” she laughed, her dress now getting ridiculously wet. It would be ruined, most likely.

“Aye, maybe I am. Mad in love. With ye.” He held her hand firmly in his. “I want to marry ye, Imogen. I dunnae care if it’s in the middle of a Scottish squall. I dunnae care if we’re drenched to the bloody bone. In fact, I think it’s better this way.”

She shook her head, still smiling for some inexplicable reason. “Why on earth would you think that?”

“Because this is life; we dunnae run from it, we face it.” He kissed the back of her hand, his lips warm and firm, his blue eyes never leaving hers. “And we’ll come out the other side of it together. I’m yers, and ye’re mine, in bad times and in good, Imogen. So stand here with me and take me as yer husband before we both catch our bloody death of cold.” His hungry gaze panned down her drenched and near-transparent gown. “And also because I’m desperate to peel that dress off ye.”

Her face was wet now, and not just from the rain. Hot tears spilled down her cheeks even as she laughed. Imogen did as she’d longed to earlier and threw her arms around him, kissing him hard on the lips.

“Call the vicar over,” she said, “so I can do that again. As your wife next time. Let’s get married, Your Grace.”

And they did. Surrounded by their loved ones and all the rainy luck imaginable, they shouted their vows to the sky in the middle of a Scottish tempest, and it was perfect. Imogen would not have wanted it any other way.

She and her Highlander duke could weather any storm together.

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