“What?” he interrupted.
A smile flickered across her face. “He told me so, himself.”
“Now I wish I’d punched him when I had the chance.”
“How did you end up with his coach, anyway?”
“My brothers and I dragged him out of it, stripped his driver, and they’re … seeing to him while we leave London.”
“‘Seeing to him’? What does that mean, Niall? You haven’t hurt him, have you? They’ll arrest you, even in Scotland.”
“Nae. His sense of self-importance may be damaged, and he whimpered a bit, but we didnae damage him. They’ll let him loose at half two, and hopefully he’ll go home and sulk and do a bit of thinking before he tells yer parents what’s happened.”
He felt a shiver run through her. “What if they come after us?”
“They may,” he returned, with less concern than he actually felt. “That’ll take some time, since I doubt they’ll go off on a long trip without preparing first.”
“How long?”
“Four days at the most. A little under that if we can hire someone to relieve Gavin and let him snore in here with us. Or he and I can trade off driving.” He took her hand again. “My lass, I have ye now, and they’ll nae take ye from me. I’ll nae allow it.”
She nodded, her expression easing. “I won’t allow it, either.”
Twenty minutes later they turned up a quiet road just south of Hampstead Heath. Beneath a copse of trees the large Oswell-MacTaggert coach stood, four bay horses hitched to it and stomping restlessly while one of the Oswell House grooms watered them. Niall had put the clothes and incidentals he’d selected into a single trunk; the last thing he wanted was for everyone who saw the coach to realize it was set for a lengthy journey.
“Ye ken what ye’re to do, aye?” Gavin asked the groom as he hopped down from the Hurst coach. “Take it somewhere in Knightsbridge and leave it on the street. Dunnae put it anywhere too obvious, but ye need to make certain it gets noticed.”
The lad nodded. “Master Niall explained it to me.”
“Off with ye, then,” Niall took up. “If ye get stopped, dunnae lie. This isnae yer responsibility.”
The Hurst coach rolled back out to the road and disappeared behind the bend. One step finished. Two, actually, since Amelia-Rose still stood beside him. Would always stand beside him.
As that thought struck him, though, it also occurred to him that he’d neglected something. But that he couldn’t do it while he wore these tight dandy’s clothes. Going to the trunk, he unlatched it and forced it open, stripping off the jacket and waistcoat and tossing them inside, followed by the hat and his trousers.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Amelia-Rose watching him, and he concentrated on thoughts of Old Sean and his mad cats. They would have time to become reacquainted later, but not in Hampstead Heath, and not with Gavin already making grumbling noises about how far they needed to get before nightfall.
Once he had on his kilt and a simple blue coat and waistcoat that actually allowed him to flex his arms, he faced her. Now he was himself again. His heart lurching, he walked up and took both her hands in his. “I need to ask ye someaught,” he said, hearing the catch in his voice, and knowing she’d noticed it, as well.
Her eyes widened a little, but she only nodded.
Niall sank down on one knee. “I’ve stolen ye away with the idea of marrying ye, but I’ve nae asked ye formally if ye’ll have me. I promised ye summers in London, and I promised ye a life ye’ll both enjoy and find fulfilling in the Highlands. Ye’ll have the second one. I dunnae ken what will happen to yer time in London, but if ye want to come, no matter who looks at us sideways, I’ll stand beside ye. I’ll stand in front of ye, so I can set every man who looks like he has someaught to say on his arse.”
“Niall,” she said quietly, teary-eyed and smiling.
“Nae. I’m serious.” He took a breath. Rambling was easier, but they were pressed for time. “I love ye, Amelia-Rose. Ye stand on yer own two feet, even with yer own parents set on knocking ye down. Ye’ve stayed kind, and ye’ve a wicked humor, and ye’ve stayed true to yerself. I didnae expect to find ye. I didnae think to look for anyone like ye. But I saw ye, and I was lost. Will ye marry me, adae? My leannan?”
She sent Gavin, rapt on the driver’s seat of the coach, a swift glance. “Leannan, Gavin?”
“Och. Lover. Sweetheart.” the driver replied, flushing.
Returning her gaze to Niall, she sank down on her knees in front of him. “You are a good man, Niall MacTaggert. Without even being aware of it, you look after everyone around you. You’ve bent over backward to try and give me what I said I wanted. I love … I love that it bothers you that I may not see London again. And that you look baffled now, as if you couldn’t conceive of why you should think anything different.”
She cleared her throat. “I love you, Niall. I tried not to, until I realized that it wasn’t you who was wrong for me. It was the things I thought I had in place to make me happy that were wrong. Going to a ball made me forget for an evening how miserable I’ve been. But that’s not happiness. That’s just pretending, closing my eyes to the truth. You make me happy. And my eyes are open. Yes, I will marry you. Happily. Very happily.”
Niall pulled her into his arms and captured her mouth with his own. A fortnight. He’d known her for less than a fortnight, and now he couldn’t imagine a life without her. Her practicality, her compassion—she matched him well. And the Highlands wouldn’t collapse if they held a dance or two at Aldriss Park, for Saint Andrew’s sake. Clan Ross might be better off if a few of its chieftains knew the waltz.
All of that, though, paled compared with the fact that she trusted him, that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Standing, he took her hand and helped her to her feet, then swung her into the air and kissed her again.
With a yelp she chuckled, folding into his arms. “Don’t drop me. We still don’t know if your sister’s clothes will fit me.”
“I’ll nae drop ye.”
Gavin cleared his throat. “Begging yer pardon, but we’ve a few miles to go before we sleep. If we sleep.”
“Aye.” Lowering her to the ground again, he took her hand and helped her into the coach. “Let’s get to Scotland, shall we?”
One hand on her chin and the other on her hip, Francesca Oswell-MacTaggert stood on the landing of Oswell House’s grand staircase and eyed the best-dressed red deer in the kingdom. Her sons had meant Rory the stag as an insult, as a touch of their rough Highlands lives brought into her sophisticated London life. Yet now Rory boasted a beaver hat over one antler, a green bonnet over the other, a single earbob, a wilted, badly knotted cravat around his regal neck, and a lady’s skirt around his rump.
She quite adored him, actually, though she would never say so. Whatever he’d been meant to represent, Rory brought … fun to the household. A sense of devil-may-care that she’d known in the Highlands, but had since all but forgotten.
How odd, that when she’d lived in Scotland she’d noticed only the loneliness and isolation, the lack of polish and sophisticated entertainments to which she’d been bred. Once she left, she’d done her best to put all but the thought of her boys out of her mind. Now that they were here, she remembered the laughter, the stubborn, proud sense of freedom every Highlander seemed to possess as a birthright. She remembered warm, passionate nights in a chilly room, and the bagpipes that had played to announce the birth of each of her children.
“Do you know if Sally was able to get Hannah to help her sew the hem of my green silk gown?” Eloise asked from the top of the stairs above her.
“Dear?”
“Oh, don’t touch the deer. I quite like Rory.”
Francesca forced a smile. “Not that deer. You, dear.”
Her daughter descended to the landing. “Oh. I was going to wear the green silk tonight, but I can’t find it anywhere.”