Her Highland Boss: The Earl's Convenient Wife / In the Boss's Castle / Her Hot Highland Doc. Marion Lennox

hadn’t noticed smoke from the chimney. Why?

      She’d been too aware of Alasdair, that was why. Of all the stupid...

      ‘How on earth...?’ she managed, staring at the fire in disbelief, and Alasdair looked smug.

      ‘Insurance,’ he told her. ‘There’s never a day on this island when you’re guaranteed of staying dry, and I’m a cautious man. I never take risks without insurance.’ But he was frowning at the rug. ‘I didn’t ask for the rug, though. That’s a bit over the top.’

      ‘You think?’ Her voice was practically a squeak. ‘Who did this? Not you. Surely...’

      ‘You don’t think I could have loped up here before breakfast?’

      ‘No!’ And her tone was so adamant that he grinned.

      ‘That’s not a very complimentary way to talk to your liege lord.’

      She told him where he could put his liege lord and his grin widened. ‘I talked to Mac about getting the fire lit,’ he confessed. ‘Mac can’t walk up here himself any more—I need to do something about gillie succession planning—but he does know a lad, who came up here and lit it for him.’

      ‘A lad?’ Jeanie breathed. And then she closed her eyes. ‘No.’ It was practically a groan. ‘It won’t be one lad. It’ll be two. He’ll have asked Lachlan and Hamish McDonald, two of the biggest wastrels this island’s ever known. They’re twins, they’re forty, their mother still irons their socks and they do odd jobs when they feel like it. And they gossip. Mac’s their uncle. Do you realise what you’ve done? This’ll be all over the island before we get back to the castle that you and I have lain by the fire here and...and...’

      ‘And what, Jeanie?’ His smile was still there but his eyes had become...watchful?

      ‘And nothing,’ she snapped and walked forward and grabbed the backpack from his shoulders and started to unpack. ‘We’ll eat the sandwiches I made and then we’ll go home. And why did you pack wine? If you think I could climb these crags after a drink...’

      ‘I could carry you.’ He sounded almost hopeful.

      ‘You and whose bulldozer? Get real.’ She was totally flustered, trying to haul the lunch box from the backpack, trying not to look at him. She tugged it free with a wrench and shoved it down onto the hearth.

      Alasdair stooped. His hand came over hers before she could rise again and his laughter died.

      ‘I’m not into seduction,’ he told her. His words echoed into the stillness. ‘You’re safe, Jeanie. This fire’s here to keep us warm and dry, nothing more. I won’t touch you.’

      There was a long pause. ‘I never said you’d try,’ she said at last.

      ‘You look like you expect it.’

      She was struggling, trying to get it right, trying to explain this...panic. ‘It’s this ring,’ she said at last. She stared down at the magnificent Duncairn signet and she felt...small. Frightened? At the edge of a precipice?

      But still Alasdair’s hand was over hers, warm, steady, strong. They were crouched before the fire. His face in the firelight was strong and sure.

      ‘The ring is simply a promise,’ he told her. ‘It’s a promise to keep the faith, to keep your faith. You needn’t fear. I’m not into taking women against their will.’

      ‘Not even...’ Her voice was scarcely a whisper. ‘Not even the woman you’ve taken as your wife?’

      ‘You’re not my wife,’ he said, evenly now. ‘We both know that this is a business relationship, despite what Hamish and Lachie may well have told the islanders. So let’s have our sandwiches, and I intend to drink at least one glass of this truly excellent wine—my grandmother kept a superb cellar. You can join me or not, but whatever you do, my Jeanie, know that seduction is off the agenda.’

      * * *

      Which was all very well, she thought crossly as she did what was sensible. She ate her sandwiches and she drank one glass—only one—of wine, and she thought she should have settled, but why did he have to have called her my Jeanie? And Jeanie lass?

      It was merely familiar, she told herself as she cleared their debris into the backpack. Any number of the older folk on the island called her Jeanie lass. Any number of islanders referred to her as our Jeanie.

      But Alasdair McBride was not a member of the island’s older folk. Nor was he really an islander.

      It shouldn’t matter. It didn’t matter.

      It did. It made her feel...

      Scared.

      ‘It does seem a shame to waste the rug. Do you want a nap before we head back?’ Alasdair was watching her—and the low-life was laughing again. But not laughing out loud. It was more a glint behind his eyes, a telltale quiver of the corners of his mouth, the way his eyes met hers...

      Laughter never seemed too far away. What did this man have to laugh about? she demanded of herself. Didn’t he know life was hard?

      But it wasn’t hard for him. This man was the Earl of Duncairn. He could laugh at what he wanted.