Page 108 of To Wed an Heiress
Life might not be easy for them at first, but they’d have each other. Together, with Mercy, he would accomplish anything he attempted.
And he’d be happy while doing it.
Slowly he made his way down the mountain, smiling all the while. He was on a course that was probably foolish, but he didn’t care. People had called him crazy for flying his airship. Let them call him crazy for being in love.
At the base of Ben Uaine, he stopped, surprised. Irene sat on a large rock, her eyes closed, her face turned up to the sun.
A surge of gratitude spread through him. She’d been more than a cook or housekeeper to him and Robert. Not quite a mother, but perhaps an older sister. She was loyal and fiercely protective, and genuinely sweet from time to time, although he suspected she’d be annoyed at that comment.
When he approached, she opened her eyes and looked at him.
“It’s funny how people act the same over and over, isn’t it? First Robert, now you.”
He didn’t say anything, knowing that Irene would explain. She never left him in doubt of what she meant.
“Mary Macrory was a bit more stubborn than your Mercy, I’d say.”
When she didn’t continue, he was forced to ask, “What do you mean?”
Irene smiled, almost as if she were a spider and he the fly and this conversation an intricate web.
She glanced toward Duddingston. “Robert used to climb to the top of the tower. Many a day I’d find him standing there looking toward Macrory House as if the answers to all his prayers were there. ‘Irene,’ he said to me once, ‘pride is a damnable thing. It puts you on an island.’ I didn’t know what to say to him. Mary did, though.”
Irene surprised him because she rarely spoke about Robert. For weeks after his brother’s death he’d find her with red eyes, but she was careful never to cry around him. He suspected that Irene was devoted to maintaining the image of a woman with a crusty exterior.
“She came to Duddingston the day before they eloped and shouted at him, ‘I’ve never known a more stubborn man in my life, Robert Caitheart. You would turn your back on love for the sake of your pride. Well, I hope your pride keeps you warm at night, because it won’t be me from now on.’”
Lennox glanced at her sharply.
“Aye,” she said. “The past is the present once more. They were lovers. It was only Robert’s stubbornness that stopped him from making more of it.”
He frowned at her. “He was in love with Mary.”
Irene nodded. “That he was, but did you forget? She was a wealthy widow. He told himself that he couldn’t offer her anything, not compared to what she already had.”
He had forgotten. Or he’d never thought of it.
“He knew she wasn’t going to change her mind. Either he had his pride or he had Mary. So he took himself off to Macrory House and the two of them decided to elope then and there. It’s a tragedy they died, but I’m glad they were together in the end.”
He’d never realized that his brother had felt the same confusion he had.
“I always thought you were more like your brother than you knew. Now I know I was wrong all along.”
He waited, certain the rest of her comment was coming.
“She’s gone, Your Lordship,” she said, standing. “Mercy has left Duddingston. By morning she’ll be on her way to America. That girl is in love with you. Yer aff yer heid about her and yet you let her go without a word.”
He went to stand in front of Irene. Then, when she was still fussing at him, he grabbed her by the shoulders, pulled her close, and kissed her forehead.
She pulled back and looked at him as if he had lost his mind. He probably had, but he’d never been happier in his insanity.
“Go and change your clothes, Irene. Something fancy, if you please.”
She frowned at him. “And why would that be?”
“Because we’re going to a wedding.”
“Whose wedding?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.
