The Virgin of Clan Sinclair Read Online Free PDF Page A

her lip hard, tasting blood, and felt the carriage turn again.
    The road to Edinburgh didn’t wind around like this.
    Abruptly, they stopped, the rocking of the carriage a sign the driver had dismounted.
    To her horror, she heard Brianag’s voice, the words echoing.
    “When you’ve settled your horses, ask one of the lads to bring you to the kitchen. We’ve a fish stew and bread baked this morning.”
    They weren’t going to Edinburgh. Instead, all she’d done was hide in the carriage while the driver took it around to the stables.
    She couldn’t leave the carriage for fear one of the lads would see her. Worse, they’d report her behavior to Macrath, who would feel duty bound to talk to her mother. That conversation would doom her to weeks of lectures, and might well escalate her mother’s plans.
    In an attempt to gain her freedom, she’d only made matters much, much worse.

Chapter 3
    T he library door opened to admit Drumvagen’s housekeeper. Ross had the thought that regardless of how many times he met her, he would probably always be startled by her appearance.
    Tall, with broad shoulders, she appeared almost like an Amazon. Her square face was matched with square lips and a jaw that jut pugnaciously out at the world. Her graying hair indicated that she was an older woman but her face was curiously unlined, making him wonder at her age.
    Attired in a red and black tartan skirt and white blouse, she had a feathered brooch pinned at the base of her throat and a glare in her eyes.
    She nodded just once in his direction, then evidently dismissed him.
    “The Earl of Gadsden has agreed to be our guest, Brianag,” Sinclair told her. “Would you please show him to the guest chamber?”
    By the time they made it up the stairs, the rain was pelting the windows like pebbles. He was even more appreciative of Sinclair’s hospitality; he wasn’t a fool to travel in weather like this.
    Even in the midst of an increasingly fierce storm, Drumvagen was an oasis of safety, an example of man’s thumbing his nose at nature. When the lightning flashed from cloud to cloud, followed by deafening peals of thunder, the house stood impervious. None of the walls vibrated. The floors didn’t shake. The structure was as solid as a mountain and as defiant.
    The housekeeper led him to a broad oak door with a brass handle and stepped aside.
    “You’ll be settling in, then,” she said, nodding at him again. “The boiler works, but I imagine you’ll discover that on your own. I’ll send a maid to take you to the dining room promptly at six. In the meantime I’ll see that your coachman is settled.”
    When he thanked her, she didn’t respond, merely left him standing in the hall, staring after her.
    He entered the room, unsurprised to find that the comforts of Drumvagen extended to its guest chambers as well. He’d been given a bedroom with an adjoining bathing chamber, one that opened into a second bedroom.
    Deep blue curtains were open, revealing a view of a turbulent sea, lightning flashes illuminating boiling clouds for just a second before plunging the world in darkness again.
    He doubted his mother would miss him at home, not as long as there was a new arrival of purchases. Nor was there anyone else who would miss him at Huntly. Strange, that the realization should pinch now when it never had.
    Perhaps it was the noise of Sinclair’s household. He could hear children laughing and someone singing not far away.
    How long had it been since Huntly was filled with the sounds of children? Or had it ever been? Or was the house too large to be tamed in such a way?
    He pushed the thought aside, along with the strange discomfort of the comparison.
    Drumvagen wasn’t the first disappointment he’d ever experienced at his father’s hands, but it was a first lesson learned. Thomas was easily bored and not equipped to handle any problems. Over the years, he’d begun to understand that his father’s way of handling any crisis was to