The Tempting of Thomas Carrick (15 page)

Nolan inclined his head and echoed the words.

“Regarding the Bradshaws.” She paused to confirm that she had the pair’s full attention. “If your cousin had not gone to the farmhouse when he did, found Joy Burns dying and immediately fetched me as he did, if we hadn’t discovered that the well was tainted and he hadn’t fetched fresh water, the Bradshaws almost certainly would have died, and anyone who arrived to help them and who drank their water would have fallen severely ill, as well.”

She’d caught and held Nigel’s gaze. She continued to hold it mercilessly. “You were not here to act for your clansmen. Thomas was, and did. As acting-laird, you owe him thanks, although your father has already proffered his.”

Shutting her lips, she waited, letting silence act for her and exact further penance from Nigel and his brother.

The pair had paled, but she doubted it was from shock, not now—more from suppressed anger. She was getting the impression that too few people in their isolated lives spoke to them so directly.

Certainly, she—and her plain speaking—appeared to be something to which neither had any idea how to respond.

“Ah.” If Nigel had been holding a hat he would have been mangling it. “I—ah, take it you’ve been assisting the new healer. On behalf of the clan, you have our thanks.”

Lucilla managed to keep her eyes from narrowing. “I fear your gratitude is premature. I will be overseeing the settling in of Joy Burns’s apprentice into the healer’s role, but that will have to wait until she, the apprentice, arrives.” She arched a brow in haughty question. “I gather she has to travel some distance to reach here.”

While she didn’t know how far away the Wattses’ farm was, she did wonder if Nigel—the acting-laird—had any idea who the clan’s healer’s apprentice was.

“Ah…” Nigel glanced at Nolan but got no help there; Nolan looked equally blank. Looking back at Lucilla, Nigel essayed a smile. “I daresay she’ll be here as quick as she can. But I fear I must leave you to Thomas to entertain.” He waved at the dust coating his top boots. “I should change before dinner.” Nigel glanced at Nolan, then looked back at Lucilla, and smiled again. “If you’ll excuse us.”

She didn’t smile back, but inclined her head. “Of course.”

Nigel’s face hardened as he looked at Thomas. “Cuz—until later.”

The pair moved past Thomas and Lucilla and headed for the stairs.

Thomas didn’t turn to watch them go but, instead, met Lucilla’s eyes as she looked up at him. She’d just defended him—unnecessarily, but still—and he wasn’t sure how to react, or even if he should.

His cousins had paused at the bottom of the stairs. Both he and Lucilla heard a whispered question, the tone too low for them to make out the words.

They turned as Nigel reappeared under the archway. “Ah—we just wondered”—his gaze included them both—“if you were staying for dinner.”

Thomas replied with a bald “Yes.”

Beside him, Lucilla inclined her head regally. “I’ll be staying until I’m satisfied that Alice Watts has settled in as the clan’s new healer. That will likely be several days.”

Nigel’s smile was forced. “In that case,” he said, “we’ll see you later.” With a vague salute, he turned back to the stairs.

Thomas stood beside Lucilla and listened to Nigel’s and Nolan’s boots thud up the stairs, and wondered, yet again, just what was going on.

* * *

Lucilla called blessings down on Marcus’s head. Her twin had sent Fred back with all she’d requested—clothes, shoes, hairbrushes. Her maid, Jenna, had even thought to pack the jewelry Lucilla preferred to wear with each of the three simple country evening gowns she’d requested.

At the sound of the dinner gong, clad in green silk the color of spring leaves, with a necklace of peridots clasped about her throat and the matching bracelet dangling from her wrist, she left the room she’d been given in what was referred to as the visitors’ wing and made her way downstairs. A glance into the drawing room confirmed that the family did not bother with any pre-gathering there; she continued to the dining room. Quick, light footsteps pattered down the corridor behind her. Lucilla paused before the dining room door and smiled as Niniver joined her.

Shyly returning her smile, Niniver murmured, “Good evening. I didn’t know you would be staying.” She waved for Lucilla to precede her.

“I suspect I’ll remain for a few days. I’ve agreed to help Alice Watts take up the reins of clan healer.” Walking into the room, Lucilla saw that Manachan was already there, seated at the head of the table. A tall, thin man with a somber demeanor stood behind his chair—presumably Edgar, Manachan’s manservant.

Thomas was also there, seated on Manachan’s right, two places down the table; he rose as she and Niniver entered.

Manachan glanced up at her from under his shaggy brows. “You’ll excuse me from rising, Lucilla—if I may call you that?”

Smiling, she inclined her head. “You may.”

Manachan waved to the place on his right, and Thomas drew out the chair. Lucilla moved to take it, noting that Niniver—after a brief nod to her father, who seemed to barely see her—moved to take the chair opposite Thomas, but one place further down.

A footman held Niniver’s chair. She sat, then looked up the table. “It’s good to see you here, Papa.”

Manachan glanced at her; his expression suggested he was debating whether to be annoyed she’d mentioned it, or pleased. He settled for a noncommittal humph.

Lucilla kept her brows from rising. Coming from a large family, she was always curious about how other families behaved, especially among themselves.

Norris arrived. He blinked at Manachan, then curtly nodded. “Sir.” Without waiting for any acknowledgment, he strode around the table and claimed the chair on Thomas’s other side.

Then Nigel and Nolan strolled in. They saw Manachan and stopped dead. The looks on both their faces held more shock than surprise. Nigel recovered first. “Papa!” His gaze traveled to Lucilla, then returned to Manachan as Manachan looked at him. “Should you be down?”

Manachan wasn’t pleased. He let silence stretch for several heartbeats before saying, “I’m here, which is all that need concern you.”

Nigel swallowed. “Yes—of course. We’re…delighted you’re able…”

“It was just a shock to see you.” Nolan walked to the place opposite Thomas. He directed a severe look at his cousin. “We hadn’t realized you’d recovered your strength to this extent.”

“Well, I have.” As Nolan sat and Nigel took the seat on Manachan’s left, opposite Lucilla, Manachan waved at Ferguson, standing by the door, to start serving.

Given that beginning, Lucilla wasn’t surprised that the conversation around the dinner table proved somewhat one-sided. Manachan asked about her parents’ travels, and she duly described them. He then asked Thomas about a firm called Carrick Enterprises, of which, she learned, Thomas was part owner. She listened avidly as Thomas spoke of importing tobacco, sugar, and exotic timbers, and exporting fleeces, hides, and whisky. He mentioned several people—Quentin, Humphrey, and Winifred—who, from Manachan’s wish to be remembered to them, she surmised were family of sorts.

The courses came and went, good hearty country fare more suited to masculine tastes, and well suited to this predominantly male family. The staff were silent and unobtrusive. Lucilla took only a small sip of the heavy red wine, and otherwise drank the clear mountain water. She ate, listened, and observed.

Manachan and Thomas spoke about the weather, and about fishing, shooting, and hunting in general, finally touching on county politics. Nigel and Nolan occasionally offered a comment, the tone of which only emphasized the difference between them and Thomas, which in turn underscored Manachan’s attitudes toward the three. The old man treated Thomas like a youthful peer, someone whose opinions he valued and respected, while his sons he still saw as impertinent children, better seen than heard.

Lucilla reflected that, all in all, Manachan was an excellent judge of character.

Beyond Thomas, Norris ate with his eyes on his plate and his attention somewhere far away; Lucilla’s brother Carter, an artist, often wore the same detached expression at meals. Norris barely registered the changing of the courses, much less the conversations, but unlike Carter’s usually unintentional absorption, Lucilla sensed a deliberateness in Norris’s behavior, as if his mental absence was his response to his family—his way of shutting them out.

She felt faintly shocked at that assessment, yet it rang very true.

In contrast, while Niniver also kept her eyes down and contributed nothing to the conversations, from time to time she would glance up, blue eyes locking on whoever was speaking, before looking down again. Niniver might be silent, but she was listening and observing as avidly as Lucilla; far from shutting out her family, she was engaged, watchful—and concerned.

It didn’t take long for Lucilla to be certain of that last emotion.

As the main course was cleared, Manachan turned to Nigel and Nolan. “And what about you two, heh? What have you been up to?”

Lucilla focused her attention on the pair. Thus far she’d found them difficult to read. Cagey. Slippery.

But Nigel seemed to bloom under his father’s gaze; he relaxed and smiled. “We took a quick trip up to Glasgow, but there wasn’t much of interest there.” He tipped his head to Thomas. “Fell in with Thomas for lunch, then we headed back, and the next day we went to Ayr. We spent a few days there, doing the usual.” Nigel shrugged nonchalantly. “The races were on. In between other things, we took a look at a few nags—that sort of thing. Just got back this afternoon.”

A pause ensued while the dessert was served—Chantilly cream and a heavy charlotte.

After everyone had started eating and the footmen had departed, Manachan directed a lancet-sharp look at his heir. “I take it you’ve heard by now that the Bradshaws were taken ill, and that Joy Burns died while she was there helping them. As you weren’t here to deal with the situation, I went out to the Bradshaws to see what could be done.”

Nigel’s and Nolan’s hands slowed. Their heads remained down, their gazes on their plates. Neither had known their father had left the house; Thomas hadn’t mentioned that, and clearly, no one else had, either.

His deep voice giving no hint of his emotions, Manachan continued, “Quite aside from the Bradshaws’ illness, I learned that no seed has yet been supplied to our farmers, those who grow our crops. Not to any of them. Yet unless matters have changed mightily, they’re already late to be getting the first crop into the ground.”

Nolan shifted slightly; Lucilla would have sworn he’d kicked Nigel beneath the table.

A second passed, then Nigel raised his head; his pale skin was flushed, although whether from embarrassment, frustration, or anger, Lucilla couldn’t guess. “I’ve instituted a new system which, overall, will save the clan money. Funds it doesn’t otherwise have. As I’ve been happy to explain to anyone who’s asked, the new system works on a slightly different timetable. The seed is still coming and will be here when it needs to be, which is to say any day now. There’s no need for the farmers to have it in their hands earlier—that was an inbuilt inefficiency of the old system.”

Nigel had delivered his explanation with increasingly arrogant certainty.

Manachan frowned. After a moment, he asked, “So there isn’t actually any problem with the seed supply?”

“No!” Nigel raised his hands in the air, and this time his frustration was transparently clear. “I have no idea why anyone would think there was—well, other than that they refuse to listen to a word I say.”

Manachan stared down the table for a moment, then his gaze switched to Thomas.

Nigel’s gaze followed his father’s; his brown eyes grew agate hard. “And I cannot conceive,” Nigel said, his voice low, dripping with rancor, “why anyone would think Thomas, who doesn’t live here and hasn’t been here for the past two years, would know more about how to run the estate than I do.”

Thomas read the antagonism, the barely reined challenge, in Nigel’s gaze, and tipped his head. “I, too, have to wonder why, given I’m no longer frequently here and you are acting-laird, anyone on the estate would appeal to me about such matters.”

He wasn’t entirely surprised when, after a moment of replaying his words, Nigel inclined his head and lowered his gaze, obviously mollified. Nigel had taken his comment as supporting Nigel’s own position; he hadn’t registered the critical question Thomas’s comment had underscored. Why
had
two senior clansmen gone to the trouble of contacting Thomas and asking for his aid?

A glance at Manachan showed his uncle frowning. Unlike Nigel, Manachan had caught the implication.

Thomas looked at Lucilla. Her green gaze was fixed on Nigel. Her expression was neutral, but Thomas suspected that she, too, had heard the true question, the one that yet remained to be answered.

In the circumstances, with Manachan, a well-beloved father figure to the entire clan, having effectively handed the lairdship to Nigel, the question of confidence in Nigel’s leadership was a sensitive one—for Nigel, for Manachan, and even for Nolan, Niniver, and Norris. And Thomas, too. While most often the title of laird was passed from father to son—or, indeed, to daughter—the family that held the lairdship was elected by the clan. A laird who failed to hold the confidence of the clan could be replaced by clan election, either with another of his own family, or with someone of another clan family.

Thomas had assumed that, regardless of the reins of the estate being passed into Nigel’s hands, that Manachan—being Manachan, the benign tyrant he’d known all his life—would still have influenced decisions. Would still have been there, directing matters from the wings.

Instead, Manachan had been laid too low to function in any overseeing capacity.

Nigel had been running the estate entirely on his own.

Thomas gave his attention to his serving of charlotte. The promise he’d made to Manachan, to stay until they’d learned what was going on, resonated in his brain. Quite how he, most likely without Manachan’s direct help, was going to learn what they needed to know, he wasn’t yet sure, but he now accepted that they did, indeed, need to get to the bottom of it. Thomas knew where his loyalties lay. With Manachan, yes, but as a Carrick, as his father’s son, the clan, its people, were his ultimate concern.