Free One Night With the Laird by Nicola Cornick

his money.
    One of the inn servants passed her with a murmured word of apology; the taproom door creaked a little on its hinges and Jack looked up from his game. For a moment their eyes met; then a spark of mockery came into his and he raised his glass to her in mocking toast. Mairi shot away up the stairs, furious with herself for being caught staring.
    She saw no more of Jack that night and fell asleep quickly, lulled by the quiet lap of the waves on the shore of the loch. By the time she arose for breakfast, Jack had already set out on his journey to Methven. Mr. Rutherford was riding, the serving girl said, with his luggage following on behind. It meant that he would be a great deal quicker than Mairi was on the road and she could only be grateful to be spared an endless procession of nights staying in the same inns as Jack was.
    When Frazer came out to the carriage, he had a face as long and dark as a wet day in Edinburgh.
    “What on earth is the matter?” Mairi asked, as the steward stowed his purse in the strongbox beneath her seat.
    Frazer’s mouth turned down even farther. “The landlord would take no money for our stay,” he said. “The entire bill had already been settled.”
    He handed her a note.
    Mairi had never seen Jack Rutherford’s writing, but she had no difficulty now in identifying the careless black scrawl as his.
    “A gentleman always pays,” the note ran.
    Mairi dropped the letter on the seat beside her. She remembered taunting Jack the previous night when he had appropriated her parlor. She remembered she had said he wanted the comforts that only money could buy. She also remembered that he was one of the richest men in Scotland and had no need to beg those comforts from her.
    “Everyone thinks you are his fancy piece now,” Frazer said sourly. “And that I am some sort of pander who delivers Mr. Rutherford’s women for him as and when he wishes. The landlord congratulated me on such a profitable job. He promised his discretion.”
    “Oh dear,” Mairi said. She knew she should feel exasperated, but she could not help her lips twitching. It was so obvious that Frazer was more annoyed to have been mistaken for a procurer than he was for the damage to her reputation. As the carriage rolled out onto the road to Achallader, Mairi reflected wryly that Jack’s had been a clever revenge. She had turned him down, but despite that he had given everyone the impression she was his mistress.
    * * *
    J ACK REINED IN his horse when he reached the summit of the track above Bridge of Orchy. The view was spectacular: the great sweep of the mountains painted in green and gold, the glint of sunlight on the water below. There was an ache in his chest, a knot of nostalgia. He had not traveled this way in years. He was not really sure why he had ridden up here today when the road to Methven should have taken him along the wide glen below.
    Nothing he had seen in Canada or beyond could surpass the peerless beauty of this land. He had turned his back on Scotland over ten years before, but eventually it had called him back. When Robert had returned to take up his title and estates, Jack had thought of staying on. Unlike his cousin he had no particular reason to return to his ancestral land, but in the end he had sold his business at vast profit and taken ship for home.
    Below him on the road to Achallader he could see something that resembled a royal progress, a line of four traveling carriages rumbling along in convoy. Lady Mairi MacLeod was on the move. His mouth twitched into a smile. She was making such a grand statement of wealth and status with the carriages and the servants, the endless baggage train. He wondered how she had felt when she had discovered that he had paid her shot at the inn. Damned annoyed, he would imagine. She did not appear to have much of a sense of humor, and for that reason alone it had felt irresistible to provoke her.
    He wondered suddenly if Mairi ever rode out as he was doing