Free Once Upon a Tartan by Grace Burrowes Page B

did.
    “Fiona is a perfect angel, but the nights grow short, and I’m not quite settled in here yet.”
    A month had gone by since Ian and Augusta had collected her from the train station at Ballater, it being familial consensus that no less person than the earl himself should welcome her back to Aberdeenshire. She’d been pale, brave, and so dauntingly proper in her behavior Ian had wanted to get on the damned train, head to London, and pummel the daylights out of a certain marquess’s youngest son. Matthew and Mary Fran had talked him out of it, lecturing him about sleeping dogs and an earl’s consequence.
    He tucked Hester’s hand onto his arm and led her toward the family parlor. “Will Aunt Ree be joining us, or is she resting?”
    “She rests a great deal, Ian. I try not to disturb her, but she’ll want to see you.”
    “Interrogate me, you mean. Where’s Fiona?”
    Hester untangled her hand from his arm. “I left her in Spathfoy’s care. They were visiting the horses, which seemed like a good way for them to get further acquainted.”
    “Brave man, to take on Fiona in her favorite surrounds. Do you trust him?”
    She took a seat in a rocker by the empty hearth, the same chair Aunt Ree usually favored. “I do not trust him, Ian. Spathfoy came here without any acknowledgement that he’d be welcome or the house even occupied. His family has shown no interest in Fiona since her birth, and yet here he is, when Mary Fran and Matthew are far, far away.”
    Ian took the corner of the sofa. “Augusta has a theory about this, and it makes sense to me.”
    Hester said nothing and didn’t even set the chair to rocking. Last summer, she’d been lively, good humored, and bristling with energy. This summer, she was a different and far sadder creature entirely.
    “Augusta believes old Quinworth is getting on and the young lord is preparing to take over the reins. Showing an interest in Fiona is one way Spathfoy can do that. Then too, by sending his son to look in on the girl, Quinworth isn’t quite admitting he’s neglected his only granddaughter all these years.”
    “Men.” She spat the word. “Titled men in particular.” Ian allowed a diplomatic silence to stretch when what he wanted to do involved travel south, cursing, and fisticuffs. “I don’t mean you, Ian. I mean titled Englishmen.”
    “Has Spathfoy been so insufferable as all that? I can have him over to Balfour, and if that screaming infant doesn’t send him back to London hotfoot, then Augusta’s discussions of nappies and infant digestion will.”
    At long last, humor came into Hester’s blue eyes. “Ian MacGregor, are you complaining?”
    “Bitterly. I finally find a woman I want to keep for my own, a woman courageous enough to marry me, and she’s stolen away by a wee bandit no bigger than this.” He held his hands about a bread-loaf’s distance from each other. “Shall I subject Spathfoy to my son’s hospitality?”
    “I think not.” She answered quickly and with some assurance, which was interesting. “He’s very well mannered, and Aunt Ree enjoys flirting with him.”
    “Ariadne MacGregor has an affliction. She can’t help herself.” Aunt Ree was enough to give a man in contemplation of daughters pause.
    Hester rose from her chair to go to the window. “He flirts back, and he’s very good with Fee—patient, but he doesn’t let her get away with much.”
    Ian moved to stand beside her, marveling anew at how petite she was. “Give it a few days. He’ll be cowering under his bed to hide from his niece, or she’ll be having him up the trees, into the burn, and down the hillside. I have to admit when Fee and Mary Fran left Balfour House, the place felt like a library, so quiet did it become.”
    “It’s not quiet now, is it?”
    When the baby slept it was quiet. “You’re quiet, Hester Daniels. How are you getting on?”
    She crossed her arms and glowered at the roses beyond the window, but did not retreat to her