The Whiskey Laird's Bed Read online

  Perhaps that was why she was determined to leave a mark on the world. Without a husband, she certainly wouldn’t have offspring to do it for her.

  Movement caught her attention. Her eyes narrowed as two women took seats at the table behind Faith. One of them was Mrs. Ledbetter, a woman younger than Claire, but her fiercest rival for the Sober Society purse.

  Ever since she’d overheard Lucy Ledbetter laughing and joking about Claire’s spinster status, the other woman had become Claire’s bitter enemy. Even if Lucy traveled in high society, Claire considered her no better than those men calling her crow this morning. Lucy had a whole host of alcoholic relatives that she would trot out at various Sober Society meetings to talk about the woes of drinking. As impressive as that was, Claire hoped her pamphlet distribution in drinking establishments might have an equal impact on the judges. Still, she needed something extra, something to put her over the top in commitment. If she could think of a suitable project—

  A sharp kick to her shin ended her woolgathering. Claire glanced to her side. Sarah’s face tilted toward Miss Townsend.

  “It’s been a pleasure meeting with you, ladies. Especially you, Miss Starke.” She stood, maintaining a tight smile. “I appreciate your fierce warning and pragmatic advice.”

  “You’re welcome,” Claire replied. As soon as Miss Townsend was out of earshot, she turned to Sarah. “Do you think she listened?”

  “I don’t know.” Sarah shrugged. “It’s difficult to ignore the opportunity of improving one’s condition through the procurement of a husband.”

  “The likelihood of finding a husband through a personal ad would be akin to finding a golden crock at the end of a rainbow.” Claire sipped her tea. “She’d be foolish to hang her hopes on this fellow.”

  “I don’t know,” Faith said wistfully, watching the Crescent’s door close behind Miss Townsend. “Edwina followed her rainbow, and look what happened.”

  Though tempted to point out that Edwina had not actually answered the ad that ultimately led to her marriage, Claire held her tongue. A whimsical milieu of hope and romance had surrounded the table, and Claire didn’t wish to dispel it with harsh reality.

  ***

  The following week, Claire returned to the Crescent.

  “They’re gone,” Sarah said, her voice cracking. She sat alone at the table where the three friends were to meet.

  “Who?” Claire asked, suspicions already forming a lump in her throat.

  “Faith and Miss Townsend. They left for Scotland on the nine fifteen.” Sarah gazed up at Claire with worry-filled eyes. “I have a bad feeling about this. I think Faith had a premonition as well. Why else would she send me the address where they were going? She must have wanted someone to know, just in case . . .”

  “And where exactly did they go?” Claire asked, shocked by Faith’s involvement.

  “A place called Ravenswood on Loch Rannoch.”

  “Loch Rannoch?” There were so many lochs and glens in that godforsaken place.

  “It’s in the Highlands. She mentions a place called Beckmore near Pitlochry.” Sarah pulled Faith’s letter from her reticule. “They’re to visit Miss Townsend’s cousin in Edinburgh first, then they’ll go on to Ravenswood.”

  “Let me see.” Claire took the letter from Sarah’s shaking fingers, then examined it for the particulars.

  “It gets worse,” Sarah said. Even through Sarah’s spectacles, Claire saw moisture gathering in the corners of her eyes. “I saw that man again.”

  “What man?” Claire asked absently. She mentally configured the timetable of the two women. Why would Faith go on such a foolish venture, especially to Scotland? Why, the place was rife with drunken sots full of the Devil’s whisky. Hadn’t she listened to Claire’s warning?

  “The one with that awful scar,” Sarah said. “The one who placed the personal ad. I saw him after we met last week. I had planned to tell Faith about it today.”

  “Tell Faith what?” Claire’s patience was truly wearing thin. Action needed to be taken, and yet Sarah was blundering on about men and scars.

  “He was standing outside a brothel. I was thinking about what you said about Stead and his exposé, so when my carriage drove by Flower Street, I peeked through the curtains . . . and there he was, talking to one of those women.” Her tears brimmed over to track down her cheeks. “He’s a white slaver, I know it. We’ll never see Faith again.”

  Never see Faith again. Those words carried a physical blow much like those she’d suffered at the hands of her drunken father. Claire gasped at the thought of losing her friend, her closest confidante. The white slavers would delight in capturing such a beauty, and Faith, dear Faith, would have no knowledge of how to extricate herself from their grasp. She hadn’t the experience of dealing with intoxicated fathers or the brutish barkeeps who ruled Oxford Street.

  Claire folded the letter, then tucked the paper in her reticule. She stood to leave.

  “Wait.” Sarah grabbed a fistful of her black skirt. “We have to talk. What are we going to do about this? Where are you going?”

  Claire glanced down, surprised that the answer wasn’t obvious. “To rescue Faith, of course.”

  Chapter 2

  Cameron Macpherson sank his head in his hands. Even the colors from his office’s stained glass windows dancing across the wide ledger pages failed to brighten his distillery’s dismal bank results. Rebuilding Ravenbeck Whisky had taken all of last year’s profits. His extravagant mother’s move back to Scotland threatened to consume all of the current year’s profits. He’d need to talk to her again—not that she’d listened during their previous conversations.

  Peat’s shaggy head lifted signaling imminent interruption. It was just as well. An interruption would be a welcome relief. As expected, a knock sounded.

  Cameron bid them enter while he slipped the foot-long ledger into a desk drawer and locked it with a key. There was no need for anyone else to worry about the sad state of Ravenbeck’s finances. When he glanced up, it was directly into a young laddie’s face. The boy’s stubborn jaw lifted defiantly, while his angry eyes desperately tried to hide his fear—qualities Cameron himself knew well enough. Those eyes were too old for one so young. His gaze drifted higher, to the man with a firm grip on the lad’s shoulder.

  “What’s this about?” Cameron asked quietly.

  His foreman slapped a long copper tube topped with a string and a cork onto the scarred wooden desk. “We’ve a thief in our midst. I caught him sneaking out the gate. A young ’un, to be sure, but a thief no the less.”

  The lad looked no more than twelve. Yet he had a dog, as the device was commonly called, which was used to pilfer small quantities of whisky. At the moment, the lad’s gaze fixed on a different sort of dog. Cameron’s massive deerhound opened his mouth to let his tongue lull.

  Cameron removed the cork and sniffed. Fumes of fresh spirit tinged his lungs. Years in an oak cask would eventually turn this fiery liquid into a mellow whisky, but at this stage, the liquid was barely palatable. Cameron squinted at the lad. “A bit young for a hardened criminal. Do ye have a name?”

  When no immediate answer was forthcoming, Hamish shook the lad and snatched the filthy cap from his head. “Show some respect. That’s the laird who’s asking.”

  Cameron bit the inside of his lip to control the resulting flinch. Even after seven years, the reference to a title that by rights belonged to another still stung.

  “Ian,” the boy mumbled. “Ian Docherty.”

  “Docherty?” Hamish scowled. “Didna a Docherty drown three months ago?”

  The boy’s gaze drifted back toward Peat, but not before Cameron noted his hollowed cheeks and thin arms. The lad hadn’t had a full stomach in some time. “My da.”

  “Should I call the magistrate?” Hamish raised his eyes to Cameron. “A thief is a thief. A stint in reformatory w
ill do the lad some good.”

  Ian’s head jerked up, his eyes widening. “Please, sir. I won’t do it again. I stole it for my ma. With my da gone and the bairns hungry, we needed money.”

  “You won’t be getting money where you’re heading,” Hamish said with a stern shake of the boy’s shoulder. “Thieves go to prison first, and young thieves to reformatory after.”

  Cameron held up a restraining hand to Hamish, but directed his gaze at the boy. “You’d be more help to your ma if you stayed in school and got an education. Then you could get an honest job. Did ye consider that?”

  “Aye,” the lad replied solemnly. “But my ma says I need to earn more than I need to learn.”

  Self-sacrifice for one’s family—another concept with which Cameron was painfully familiar.

  “I don’t abide ignorance in my employees,” he said. “If I hear you’re no trying your best, or if I find you here when you ought to be in school, then Hamish will dismiss you first, and then feed you to my hound.” He nodded toward Peat, who instinctively licked his lips.

  “Dismiss?” Confusion chased the anger from the boy’s face.

  “There’s always more work than men to do it,” Cameron said, though it was questionable whether this lad would qualify as a man. At issue wasn’t so much the quantity of work available but rather the money to pay for it. The dismal state of the financial records bore witness to that. Years of inherited debt, combined with rebuilding the distillery, had taken a toll difficult to repay.

  The boy pushed his shoulders back and stood a little straighter. An honest wage did that for a boy as well as a man. Hamish removed his heavy hand from the boy’s shoulder, but lightly cuffed the lad on the side of his head. “You’ll thank the laird, Ian Docherty, if you know what’s good for you. Not everyone gives a thief a second chance.”

  The boy mumbled his gratitude with a sharp nod of his head.

  “Wait in the hallway while I speak with Mr. Gilchrist. He’ll show you who to report to in the yard and where to collect your wages.” The boy’s eyes widened at the mention of wages, but he turned and left the room as he’d been instructed.

  Cameron tossed some pound notes across the desk. “Feed the lad, Hamish, and see that he gets some food for his family. Hunger causes desperate acts among honest men.”

  Hamish scooped up the notes. “Aye, I will. But don’t be surprised if I bring him back by the scruff of the neck. I think he’s a rebel, that one.”

  A nostalgic smile crept across Cameron’s face, remembering that he’d been called the same once or twice. “We’ll have to see about that.”

  The foreman squinted his way. “You all right? You look like you haven’t slept in a week.”

  Cameron wasn’t aware that his restless nights had left a mark. “Strange dreams. Nothing of concern.”

  The man turned to leave but stopped at the door. “I almost forgot.” He fished a folded blue linen note from his pocket, grinned, then after sniffing the paper, handed it to Cameron. “She’s at it again.”

  The tips of Cameron’s ears heated. All of the men at Ravenbeck knew of his mother’s efforts to find him a wife. She only sent her distinctive notes when she’d lured another desperate, spineless Englishwoman to ride the train to Scotland.

  Hamish left the office, but not before Cameron heard him grumble, “You’d think a Scottish lassie would be good enough.”

  Which was the crux of the problem. While Cameron hadn’t the time to seek out a wife of any particular nationality, his mother continued to lure Englishwomen to Beckmore. The village folk thought she did so at his direction, as if he didn’t value the local lasses, and questioned his loyalties. No matter how many times he mentioned the problem to his mother and requested she leave his marital plans the hell alone, she continued to place those ridiculous ads in a London paper.

  He opened the note, which, as expected, carried a plea for him to return to the house in a timely manner. Two women would be arriving from London to make his acquaintance. Two! Rather than cease this ridiculous pastime, she’d gone and doubled her quota! Cameron crumbled the note in his hand.

  As much as he loved his mother, the time had come for sterner measures to end her interference. Action, as opposed to talk, was warranted. He looked about the office, trying to devise some sort of plan.

  His gaze came to rest on the copper dog, containing potent new spirit and . . . inspiration. A shameless plan began to form, a brazen and rude undertaking that might shock and embarrass his determined mother. But if the scheme worked to end this endless parade of pale but proper pieces of British milquetoast to his front door, then it would be worth it.

  Chapter 3

  “Are you one of the laird’s women?”

  Claire had just fashioned a damp seat amid the tarp-covered supplies on a pony cart when the boy holding the reins posed the question. Cold, wet, and miserable, she thought the boy’s question was the first bright spot in her journey. She must be on the right track.

  “One?” She fastened the buttons higher on her Prince Albert coat to shield against the miserable drizzle that chilled her unprotected cheeks and nose. “Have there been others?”

  He nodded.

  Over an hour ago, the train had deposited Claire and her carpetbag on an empty platform in the middle of a gray fog before it continued to Inverness. She’d learned during the Edinburgh stop that a modern hotel had been erected near Pitlochry to take advantage of the scenic views and cold waters of River Tay. Scenic views. She’d almost laughed. Scotland was a poor country indeed if gray fog was considered scenic. While she’d hoped others would exit the train with her, she’d been the only passenger deposited in the cold drizzle on the empty platform. She shouldn’t have been surprised. It was hardly suitable weather for a river swim.

  While she might have attempted to walk to Ravenswood, she’d had no idea of direction or distance. After an hour’s contemplation of her dilemma, she’d waved to the first conveyance she saw traveling the road, a pony cart filled with lumpy sacks, and inquired about a ride. Which brought her to this point, trying to wrangle information from a boy who was too young to recognize the sort of debaucheries that occurred right here in his community.

  “Did two others arrive recently?” she asked the boy, hoping for confirmation that she was following on the trail of Faith and her friend.

  The boy shrugged. “My ma says that the laird’s ghillie picks them up at the train stop, then bundles them off to Ravenswood.” He tilted his head toward Claire. “Why didna he come for you on a dreich day?”

  “Dreich?”

  He held his hand out to the drizzly rain. “This. It’s a dreich day.”

  Huddling deep in her father’s old coat, Claire supposed the word suited the wretched weather perfectly. In fact, it summed up her entire opinion of Scotland. It was a word she’d remember.

  “I’m unexpected,” she answered truthfully. “What’s a ghillie?”

  The boy looked at her as if she were daft. “One who knows all about hunting and fishing. They’re deerstalkers, and care for the land.” He thumbed proudly at his chest. “I’m going to be a ghillie when I’m older.”

  “You like to hunt and fish?”

  The boy nodded. “Do you?”

  Claire considered a moment, her hands gripping the sides of the cart as they turned another tight curve. “I don’t really know . . . I’ve never tried either.” She could make out green pastures in the mist, and every now and then, fat white sheep with black faces. A darker form of gray, which she assumed must be mountains, loomed in the distance. Even in the cold mist, it was peaceful. Open. And not a building to be seen. The surrounding countryside was so unlike her familiar London that she was suddenly filled with uncertainty. Even if she managed to rescue Faith and Miss Townsend, would they be able to find their way back to the train stop?

  “Why did you come here?” the boy
asked with a sideways glance. “For the laird, I mean. My ma says he already has people to cook and clean.” A sheepish look crossed his face. “What do you do over there?”

  “Perhaps you should ask your mother.” They were about to cross a pretty stone bridge over a swiftly flowing stream. Claire used the span of straight road to rub her hands and blow her heated breath on them.

  “I did.” The boy grimaced. “She boxed my ears and said my arse was next if I asked again.”

  Claire set her back teeth. That confirmed her suspicions, at least. A mother wouldn’t have responded that way unless the answer involved intimacy. She gripped the side of the wagon in frustration. Still, her unexpected arrival might work to her benefit. The element of surprise would help her rescue Faith and Miss Townsend from the man determined to do them hard. She would whisk them off to safety. Assuming, of course, that it wasn’t already too late . . .

  “How do you know the way to Ravenswood?” she asked, suddenly concerned she might be heading in the wrong direction.

  The boy laughed. “Everyone knows Ravenswood. The draff from their distillery feeds our cattle.”

  “Distillery?” She shouldn’t be surprised that demon alcohol was behind the evil scheme to lure women to their ruin. “They make gin this far north?”

  The boy laughed. “You are daft! It’s the single malt. The whisky.”

  “You feed your cows whisky?” She was totally confused. Granted, she had lived in London all her life, but surely that couldn’t be right. Still, she thought about the English cows she had seen through the windows of the train, peaceably kneeling in bright green fields. Were they so unlike the men slumped in taverns?