Unlaced By The Highland Duke. Lara Temple

and wealthy and would depend upon no one but herself.

      Strangely, her usual daydream felt rather grey and she trudged up the stone steps and through the Sea Gate and into the tunnel leading to the great stairs. It took her a while to realise she was lost. She finally stopped walking and raised her eyes from the flagstones. There was just enough light coming in from the narrow open slits on either end of the corridor, and she could hear the surf outside, so she did not feel particularly alarmed, just hungry and weary. Had she turned left or right at the Sea Gate? She retraced her steps, but the silence only deepened and so did the gloom.

      She could not have come this way because at the end of the ill-lit tunnel with its vaulted ceiling there was nothing but a spiralling staircase heading downwards, which made little sense to her unless she had reached an entrance to the cellars? The Duke’s words came back to her—the cellars were closed off so surely there was no point in going down. Unless by coming in from the side door on the cliff side they had entered higher than the main entrance and by going down she would find herself some place familiar?