Nicola Cornick - The Lady and the Laird

“I am working on a lady’s guide to finding the perfect gentleman,” Lucy said. She spoke with dignity. She knew that Lachlan was laughing at her. He thought her writing was ridiculous, a mystifying hobby. All the Duke of Forres’s daughters wrote; it was an interest they had inherited from their mother, who had been a notable bluestocking. The sons, in contrast, were not bookish. Lucy loved her brothers—well, she loved Lachlan even though he exasperated her, and she tried to love stuffy Angus—but intellectual they were not.

As if to prove it, Lachlan gave a hoot of laughter. “A guide to finding the perfect gentleman? What do you know of the subject?”

“I was betrothed to such a man,” Lucy said sharply. “Of course I know.”

The light died from Lachlan’s eyes. “Duncan MacGillivray was hardly the perfect gentleman,” he said. “Nor was he the perfect match for you. He was too old.”

Lucy experienced a tight, trapped feeling in her chest. “You are so rude,” she said crossly.

“No,” Lachlan said. “I tell the truth. You only agreed to marry him because Papa wanted you to wed and you were still grieving for Alice and you weren’t thinking straight.”

Alice...

Another cold draught slid under the door and tickled its way down Lucy’s spine. She shivered and drew her shawl more closely about her shoulders. Alice had been dead for eight years, but not a day passed when Lucy did not think of her twin. There was a hollow, Alice-shaped space inside her. She wondered if she would always feel like this, so empty, as though a part of her had been cut out, leaving nothing but darkness in its place. Alice’s absence was like a constant ache, a shadow on the heart, and a missed step in the dark. Even after all this time, it hurt so sharply it could sometimes make her catch her breath. Her childhood had ended the day Alice died.

She pushed the thought away, as she always did. She was not going to talk about Alice.

“The point,” she said, “is that I know what constitutes gentlemanly behavior, and more importantly—” she looked down her nose at her brother “—what does not.”

“You know what constitutes French and Italian pornography, as well,” Lachlan said with a grin, “and your erotic writings have been far more successful and profitable than your other writing. I wonder why you do not write more of them.”

Lucy frowned at him fiercely. “You know full well why I do not! We don’t talk about that, Lachlan. Remember? It’s all in the past and no one is to know. Do you want me to be ruined?”

Lachlan scowled back at her, the two of them reduced to their nursery squabbling for a brief moment. “Of course not. And I haven’t told a soul.”

Lucy sighed. She supposed it was unfair to pin all of the blame on her brother when she had been so recklessly stupid and naive, but there was no doubt that he was untrustworthy. A year ago Lachlan had come to her and begged a favor, much as he was doing now. He needed her help with writing a letter, he had said. It had to be extremely romantic, very sensual, and sufficient to seduce the lady of his dreams into his arms.

Lucy had desperately needed to earn some money, and since she was more articulate than her brother, she had agreed. She had culled some lines from Shakespeare for him and added some poetry of her own. Lachlan had laughed and had said he needed something rather more exciting.

It was then that Lucy had remembered the erotic writings in the castle library. The library had always been a treasure trove for her, and she had scoured its shelves from the time she could read, devouring the vast collection that her grandfather had brought back from the Grand Tour. Then one day, among the weighty tomes of political history and the works of the classical scholars, she had found something a great deal more inflammatory than dry politics: several folios of drawings and sketches of men and women in the most extraordinary erotic poses. Some of the sketches had seemed anatomically impossible to Lucy, but it had been both educational and interesting to see them and she had viewed the pictures with intense intellectual curiosity, even turning the books upside down and sideways at various points to check that she had understood the details correctly.

Alongside the drawing had also been writings, vivid and sensual, equally interesting to the curious academic mind. It was these that Lucy remembered when Lachlan asked for something rather more arousing than Shakespeare. She had used the writings as inspiration. Perhaps she had overdone it. She was not sure. But certainly her brother had had no complaints. He had even told his friends and several of them had come forward to ask for similar assistance in their wooing. Lucy had obliged.

Then it had all gone horribly wrong. The first Lucy had heard of the scandal was at a meeting of the Highland Ladies Bluestocking Society. Everyone was talking about a mysterious letter writer who helped the young bucks of Edinburgh seduce the women of their acquaintance. Lachlan was apparently locked in a torrid affair with an opera dancer while his friends were likewise setting the town alight with their licentious behavior. One had impregnated and abandoned an innkeeper’s daughter and another had eloped with the wife of the governor of Edinburgh Castle. In all cases the ladies had been wooed into bed with false promises and erotic prose.

Lucy had felt horribly guilty and dreadfully naive that she had not questioned Lachlan’s motives before she had written the letters, nor had she foreseen what the outcome of them might be. Her need for the money had blinded her and she had thought of nothing but that. She could only hope that no one discovered that she had been the letter writer, because if they did, she would be ruined. She had promised herself that there would be no more provocative poetry. It was not the sort of behavior that a well-bred heiress should indulge in, and in the future she would have to make her money from other sources.

Lachlan was watching her. There was a decidedly calculating expression in his hazel eyes. It made Lucy suspicious.

“Anyway,” Lachlan said, smiling winningly, “let’s forget all about that and talk about me.” He ran a hand through his hair, ruffling it. It made him look charmingly rakish. Lucy thought it a pity that none of her friends were there to be impressed. They all thought Lachlan was delightful, despite the fact that the words selfish and lightweight could have been invented to describe him.

“I’ve fallen in love,” Lachlan said, with the air of someone making a grand announcement.

“Again!” Lucy said. “Who is the fortunate lady this time?”

“It is Dulcibella Brodrie,” Lachlan said. “I love her and she loves me and we want to marry.”

Lucy paused. Miss Dulcibella Brodrie would not have been her first choice as a sister-in-law. Dulcibella was beautiful, but she was also utterly helpless in a completely irritating manner. No doubt that was what had attracted Lachlan to her, but since he was fairly helpless himself, the combination of the two of them would be a recipe for disaster.

“Dulcibella is...very sweet natured,” Lucy said carefully. She prided herself on being polite and she was glad she could find something positive to say. Dulcibella might be a little spoiled and self-centered, and she was drawn to a mirror as a bee was drawn to clover, but she did have her good qualities if one looked hard enough.

Lachlan’s open face suddenly looked as tragic as a rejected spaniel’s. “She’s not free, though,” he said. “She is already contracted to marry Robert Methven. The settlements are all drawn up.”

Robert Methven.

The papers slipped from Lucy’s hand again. She made a grab for them, then straightened up slowly. “Are you sure?” she said. She could feel an unnerving flutter in the pit of her stomach. Her fingers trembled. Her cheeks felt hot. She smoothed the paper automatically.