The Heir’s Chosen Bride Read online

  ‘Yes, I can. I’m only a temp. I came here two years ago on a two-week agency placing, and no one’s given me a contract.’

  ‘But people don’t just leave-’

  ‘Well, why would they when the money’s brilliant?’ Jodie acknowledged. ‘But have you noticed that people do leave this firm? They start taking time off because they can’t cope. They’re constantly tired. They forget things. They stop being efficient and then they’re bumped. So all I’m doing is leaving before I’m bumped. Why do you think Marjorie retired so young? Listening to you and the girlfriend made me think…’

  ‘Me and Marcia?’

  ‘You and Marcia. She’s as pleased as could be about your new title-she can’t wait to get married so she’ll be Lady Marcia Douglas-but as for agreeing you don’t have time to go see a castle…’

  ‘It’s a fake castle,’ he said faintly.

  ‘A castle is a castle and it sounds cool,’ Jodie declared. ‘Just because it’s not six hundred years old doesn’t mean it’s not a real one. And Marcia’s idea of putting it on the market without seeing it is ridiculous. Anyway, I was talking to Nick, and he said-’

  ‘Nick?’

  ‘My partner,’ she said with exaggerated patience. ‘The man I share my life with. He’s a woodworker. He was a social worker with disadvantaged kids, but the work just wore him out. He loved it but it exhausted him. He’s almost as cute as you, and I talk about him all the time. Not that you listen.’

  Hamish blinked. He hesitated and glanced at his watch. Then he carefully laid his papers on the desk in front of him. Jodie was a great, if unconventional, secretary, and it’d be more efficient to spend a few minutes now persuading her to stay rather than training someone new-

  ‘Don’t do this to me,’ Jodie begged. ‘You’re scheduling me into your morning and I don’t intend to be scheduled. I’m working on changing your life here. Not the next half-hour.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘You see nothing but work,’ she told him. ‘The typing-pool gossip is that you’ve been blighted in love. That explains Marcia but it’s none of my business. All I know is that you’re blinkered. You’ve been given the most fantastic opportunity and you’re throwing it away.’

  Hamish sat down. ‘This is-’

  ‘Impertinent,’ she told him, and beamed. ‘I know. But someone needs to tell you. Nick’s been given a contract to rebuild the choir stalls at a gorgeous old church up in New England. We’re both going to move. That’s why I need to quit. So then I thought if I was quitting I should try to save you first. Nick agrees. Spending your whole life making money is awful. Owning a castle and not visiting it before you sell it is madness. So I’ve cancelled every one of your appointments for the next three weeks, starting the minute you’ve finished with the Harrington committee. I haven’t just crossed them out of your diary but I’ve contacted everyone and rescheduled. Job’s done. As of next week I’m out of here, and if you have the brains I credit you with, so will you be.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Yes, you can,’ she told him. ‘Your Lordship.’

  ‘Jodie…’

  ‘Yes?’ She was beaming, as if she’d just played Santa Claus. ‘I’ve booked flights for you. From JFK to Sydney, and there’s a hire car waiting so you can drive straight down to Dolphin Bay. If you want to take Marcia they’re holding two seats, but I told them you’d probably cancel one.’

  ‘Marcia won’t come.’

  ‘No, but you will,’ she told him. ‘You’ve been in this job for nearly ten years, and no one can remember you taking a holiday. Oh, sure, you’ve been away but it’s always been on some financial wheeler dealer arrangement. Dealing with Swiss bankers with a little skiing on the side. A week on a corporate yacht with financiers and oilmen. Not a sniff of time spent lying on the beach doing nothing. Isn’t it about time you had a look at life before you marry Marcia and…?’ She paused and bit back what she’d been about to say. ‘And settle down?’

  ‘I can’t,’ he said again, but suddenly he wasn’t so sure.

  ‘I’ve cleared it with all the partners. Everyone knows you’re going and they know why. You’ve inherited a castle. Everyone’s asking for postcards. So you’re going to look pretty dumb sitting round this office for the next three weeks doing nothing. Or telling everyone that I’ve lied about you needing a holiday and you’re not taking one, yah, boo, sucks.’

  ‘Pardon?’ he said again, and her grin widened.

  ‘That’s not stockbroker talk,’ she told him. ‘It’s street talk. Real talk. Which I’ve figured you need. If you’re going to go from share-broking to aristocracy maybe you need a small wedge of real life in between.’

  ‘Look, you dumb worm, if you don’t get out of there you’ll be concrete.’

  Susie’s hair was escaping from her elastic band and drifting into her eyes. She flipped it back with the back of her hand, and a trickle of muddy water slid down her face. Excellent.

  This was her very favourite occupation. Digging in mud. Susie was making a path from the kitchen door to the conservatory. The gravel path had sunk and she needed to pour concrete before she laid pavers, but first she had to dig. She’d soaked the soil to make it soft, and it was now oozing satisfactorily between her fingers as she rescued worms. Rose was sleeping soundly just through the window. The sun was shining on her face and she was feeling great.

  She needed to get these worms out of the mud or they’d be cactus.

  ‘I’m just taking you to the compost,’ she told them, in her best worm-reassuring tone. ‘The compost is worm heaven. Ooh, you’re a nice fat one…’

  A hand landed on her shoulder.

  She was wearing headphones and had heard nothing. She yelped, hauled her headphones off, staggered to her feet and backed away. Fast.

  A stranger was watching her with an expression of bemusement.

  He might be bemused but so was she. The stranger looked like he’d just strolled off the deck of a cruising yacht. An expensive yacht. He was elegantly casual, wearing cream chinos and a white polo top with a discreet logo on the breast. He was too far away now to tell what the logo was, but she bet it was some expensive country club. A fawn loafer jacket slung elegantly over one shoulder.

  He was wearing cream suede shoes.

  Cream shoes. Here.

  She looked past the clothes with an effort-and there was surely something to see beside the clothes. The stranger was tall, lean and athletic. Deep black hair. Good skin, good smile…

  Great smile.

  She’d left the outer gate open. There was a small black sedan parked in the forecourt, with a hire-car company insignia on the side. She’d been so intent on her worms that he’d crept up on her unawares.

  He could have been an axe murderer, she thought, a little bit breathless. She should have locked the gate.

  But…maybe she was expecting him? This had to be who she thought he was. The new earl.

  Maybe she should have organised some sort of guard of honour. A twelve-gun salute.

  ‘You’re the gardener?’ he asked, and she tried to wipe mud away with more mud as she smiled back. She was all the welcome committee there was, so she ought to try her best.

  A spade salute?

  ‘I am the gardener,’ she agreed. ‘Plus the rest. General dogsbody and bottle-washer for Loganaich Castle. What can I do for you?’

  But his gaze had been caught. Solidly distracted. He was staring at a huge golden ball to the side of the garden. A vast ball of bright orange, about two yards wide.

  ‘What is that?’ he said faintly.

  She beamed. ‘A pumpkin. Her name’s Priscilla. Isn’t she the best?’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘You’d better. She’s a Dills Atlantic Giant. We decided on replacing Queensland Blues this year-we spent ages on the Internet finding the really huge suckers-and went for Dills instead. Of course, they’re not quite as good to eat. Actually, they’re cattle feed, but who’s worrying?’
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br />   ‘Not me,’ he said faintly.

  ‘The only problem is we need a team of bodybuilders to move her. Our main competitor has moved to Dills as well, but he doesn’t have the expertise. We’ll walk away with the award for Dolphin Bay’s biggest pumpkin this year, no worries.’

  ‘No worries,’ he repeated, dazed.

  ‘That’s Australian for “no problem”,’ she explained kindly. ‘Or you could say, “She’ll be right, mate.”’

  This conversation was going nowhere. He tried to get a grip. ‘Is anyone home? In there?’ He waved vaguely in the direction of the castle.

  ‘I’m home. Me and Rose.’

  ‘Rose?’

  ‘My daughter. Are you-’

  ‘I’m Hamish Douglas. I’m looking for a Susie Douglas.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He really was the new earl.

  There was a moment’s charged silence. She wasn’t what he’d expected, she thought, but, then, he wasn’t what she’d expected either.

  She’d thought he’d look like Rory.

  He didn’t look like any of the Douglases she’d met, she decided. He was leaner, finer boned, finer…tuned? He was a Porsche compared to Rory’s Land Rover, she decided, limping across to greet him properly. She still had residual stiffness from the accident in which Rory had been killed, and it was worse when she’d been kneeling.

  But the pain was nothing to what it had been, and she smiled as she held out her hand in greeting. Then, as she looked at his face and realised there was a problem, her smile broadened. She wiped her hands on the seat of her overalls and tried again.

  ‘Susie Douglas would be me,’ she told him, gripping his reluctant hand and shaking. ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hi,’ he said, and looked at his hand.

  ‘It’s almost clean,’ she told him, letting a trace of indignation enter her voice as she realised what he was looking at. ‘And it’s good, clean dirt. Only a trace wormy.’

  ‘Wormy?’

  ‘Earthworms,’ she said, exasperated. This wasn’t looking good in terms of long-term relationship. In terms of long-term caring for this garden. ‘Worms that make pumpkins grow as big as Priscilla here. Not the kind that go straight to your liver and grow till they come out your eyeballs.’

  ‘Um…fine.’ He was starting to sound confounded.

  ‘I’m transferring them to the compost,’ she told him, deciding she’d best be patient. ‘I’m laying concrete pavers to the conservatory, and how awful would it be to be an earthworm encased in concrete? Do you want to see the conservatory?’

  ‘Um…sure.’

  ‘I might as well show you while we’re out here,’ she told him. ‘You’ve inherited all this pile, and the conservatory’s brilliant. It was falling into disrepair when I arrived, but I’ve built it up. It’s almost like the old orangeries they have in grand English houses.’

  ‘You’re American,’ he said on a note of discovery. ‘But you’re…’

  ‘I’m the castle relic,’ she told him. ‘Hang on a minute. I need to check something.’

  She limped across to the closest window, hoisted herself up and peered through to where Rose snoozed in her cot.

  ‘Nope. Still fine.’

  ‘What’s fine?’ he asked, more and more bemused.

  ‘Rose. My daughter.’ She gestured to the headphones now lying abandoned in the mud. ‘You thought I was listening to hip-hop while I worked? I was listening to the sounds of my daughter sleeping. Much more reassuring.’ She turning and starting to walk toward the conservatory. ‘Relics are what they used to call us in the old days,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘They’re the women left behind when their lords died.’

  ‘And your lord was…’

  ‘Rory,’ she told him. ‘Your cousin. He was Scottish-Australian but he met me in the States.’

  ‘I don’t know anything about my cousins.’ She was limping toward a glass-panelled building on the north side of the house, moving so fast he had to lengthen his stride to keep up with her.

  ‘You don’t know anything about the family?’

  ‘I didn’t know anyone existed until I got the lawyer’s letter.’

  ‘Saying you were an earl.’ She chuckled. ‘How cool. It’s like Cinderella. You should have been destitute, living in a garret.’ She glanced over her shoulder, eyeing him appraisingly. ‘But they tell me you’re some sort of financier in Manhattan. I guess you weren’t in any garret.’

  ‘It was a pretty upmarket garret,’ he admitted. They reached the conservatory doors, and she swung them wide so he could appreciate the vista. ‘Wow!’

  ‘It is wow,’ she said, approving.

  It certainly was. The conservatory was as big as three or four huge living rooms and it was almost thirty feet high. It looked almost a cathedral, he thought, dazed. The beams were vast and blackened with glass panels set between. Hundreds of glass panels.

  ‘The beams came from St Mary’s Cathedral just south of Sydney,’ Susie told him. ‘St Mary’s burned down just after the war when Angus was building this place. He couldn’t resist. He had all the usable timbers trucked here. For the last few years he didn’t have enough energy to keep it up, but since I’ve been here I’ve been restoring it. I love it.’

  He knew she did. He could hear it in her voice.

  She didn’t look like any relic he’d met before.

  Susie was wearing men’s overalls, liberally dirt-stained. She was shortish, slim, with an open, friendly face. She had clear, brown enquiring eyes, and her auburn curls were caught back in a ponytail that threatened to unravel at any minute. A long white scar ran across her forehead-hardly noticeable except that it accentuated the lines of strain around her eyes. She was still young but her face had seen…life?

  Her husband had been murdered, he remembered. That’s what the lawyers had told him. Back in New York it had seemed a fantastic tale but suddenly it was real. Bleakly real.

  ‘Do you know about the family?’ she asked, as if she’d guessed his thoughts and knew he needed an explanation.

  ‘Very little,’ he told her. ‘I’d like to hear more. Angus was the last earl. He died childless. Your husband, Rory, was his eldest nephew, and he and the second nephew, Kenneth, are both dead. I’m the youngest nephew. I never knew Angus, I certainly didn’t know about the title, and I’m still trying to figure things out. Am I right so far?’

  ‘Pretty much.’

  ‘Angus and my father and another brother-Rory and Kenneth’s father-left Scotland just after the war?’

  ‘Apparently the family castle was a dark and gloomy pile on the west coast of Scotland,’ she told him. ‘The castle was hit by an incendiary bomb during the war and it burned to the ground. As far as I can gather, no one grieved very much. The boys had been brought up in an atmosphere that was almost poisonous. Angus inherited everything, the others nothing, and the estate was entailed in such a way that he couldn’t do anything about it. After the fire they decided to leave. Angus said your father was the first to go. He boarded a boat to America and Angus never heard from him again.’

  ‘And Angus and…what was the other brother called-David?’

  ‘Angus was in the air force and he was injured toward the end of the war. While he was recuperating he met Deirdre. She was a nurse and her family had been killed in the London Blitz, so when he was discharged they decided to make their home in Australia. David followed.’ She hesitated. ‘The relationship was hard, and the resentment followed through to the sons.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘A situation where the eldest son gets everything and others get nothing is asking for trouble.’ She walked forward and lifted a ripening cumquat into her hands. She touched it gently and then let it go again, releasing it so it swung on its branch like a beautiful mobile. There were hundreds of cumquats, Hamish thought, still dazzled by the beauty of the place.

  Did one eat cumquats? He’d only ever seen them as decorator items in the foyers of five-star hotels.

/>   ‘Angus rebuilt his castle here,’ she said. ‘It was a mad thing to do, but it gave the men of this town a job when things were desperate. Maybe it wasn’t as crazy as it sounds. He and Deirdre didn’t have children but David had two. Rory and Kenneth. I married Rory.’

  ‘They told me that Kenneth murdered Rory,’ he said flatly. It had to be talked about, he decided, so why not now?

  She pushed her cumquat so it swung again and something in her face tightened, but she didn’t falter from answering. ‘There was such hate,’ she said softly. ‘Angus said his brothers hated him from the start, and Kenneth obviously felt the same about Rory. Rory travelled to the States to get away from it. He met me and he didn’t even tell me about the family fortune. But, of course, it was still entailed. Rory was still going to inherit and Kenneth wanted it. Enough…enough to kill. Then, when he was…found out…he killed himself.’

  ‘Which is where I come in,’ he said softly, trying to deflect the anguish she couldn’t disguise.

  She took a deep breath. ‘Which is where you come in,’ she said and turned to face him. ‘Welcome to Loganaich Castle, my lord,’ she said simply. ‘I hope you’ll deal with your inheritance with Angus’s dignity. And I hope the hate stops now.’

  ‘I hope you’ll help me.’

  ‘I’m going home,’ she told him. ‘I’ve had enough of…of whatever is here. It’s your inheritance. Rory and Angus have left me enough money to keep me more than comfortable. I’m leaving you to it.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  THIS was where he took over, Hamish thought. This was where he said, Thank you very much, can I have the keys?

  The whole thing was preposterous. He should never have let Jodie insinuate her crazy ideas into his mind.

  The thought of being left alone with his very own castle was almost scary.

  ‘Let’s not do anything hasty,’ he told Susie. ‘I’ll get a bed for the night in town, and we’ll sit down and work things out in the morning.’

  ‘You’re not staying here?’ she asked, startled.

  ‘This has been your home,’ he said. ‘I’m not kicking you out.’