Page 94 of Wild Wicked Scot
“I amnotdistressed! I’ve been divested of my money by a woman who has come here on disagreeable business! Do you think me ignorant, Lady Mackenzie? I know what you’re about,” he snarled.
Good God, wherewasKnox?
“You want that bloody Scot, do you? That traitor to your queen?”
She resisted the urge to argue with his slander. She had to be calm, quite calm, and slowly began to gather the coins and markers before her. His eyes seemed almost to bulge now as he watched her. “I don’t know what you are implying, my lord. I meant only to enjoy a bit of sport, as I said. My father has freed me from an unbearable marriage and I assure you...” She lifted her gaze, looked him directly in the eye and said gravely, “I don’t want him back.Perhaps a better question is, what doyouwant?”
Putnam slowly licked his bottom lip, as if seeking the last drop of wine.
“I think I know what you want,” she said calmly. “I think you want my money. Quite desperately.”
Putnam’s face mottled, and for a moment, she thought he would explode with anger. He looked as if he might lunge across the table for her throat at any moment, wrap his fingers around her gullet and squeeze. But then, inexplicably, he lowered his head and dissolved into tears. “I’ve lost everything,” he sobbed.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Everything, all of it!” he cried, sweeping his arm across the table and sending markers and cards and his empty glass sailing and breaking on the stone floor. “I’ve nothing! Nothing at all!” He tore the wig from his head and threw it on the ground, then stood and staggered across the room.
“My lord!” Margot exclaimed. She could feel his despair coming off him in great lapping waves. Worse, she understood it. She’d felt that sort of bone-deep despair three times in her life: when she was told she would be married. When she was told she would return to her husband. And in these last two days, when she thought she’d lost him.
Margot stood up and gathered the coins and markers and went to him before he could pour more wine. “Lord Putnam,” she said, catching his arm as he reached for the decanter. He tried to shake her off.“Richard,”she said, her voice quiet and soothing. “Here—this is for you. And...and this,” she said, and reached into the pocket of her gown for Arran’s purse.
He looked down at the bounty she forced into his hands, then up at her again. “No,” he said. “I won’t take charity—”
“It’s not charity,” she said, and folded his hands over the money. “It’s a loan. You’ll repay me when you can.”
“But I can’t—”
“You will,” she said. “Oh, my lord, youwill,” she said earnestly. “I have every faith in you.”
Putnam began to sob, his body racked with them. He clutched the money to his chest as he slipped down and landed on his rump beside the sideboard.
Margot had never seen a man lose his composure so completely, and she was overcome with a strange mix of empathy and revulsion.
“Margot.”
She startled, whipping around to Knox. He, too, was staring at Putnam. “Come away,” he said, taking her by the elbow. “Come now.”
Her brother pulled her from the room, as she was unable to tear her gaze away from the broken man who took in prisoners for money.
Once outside, Knox moved her along much more quickly, and she struggled to keep up with him. He paused at a closed door near the entry and pushed it open. “Your master needs help. He needs to be carried up to his bed,” he said to the startled butler. “Lady Mackenzie and I will take our leave now.” He did not wait for an answer, but he pushed Margot out the door, pausing only long enough to pick up her cloak and gloves.
Outside, the night was so dark that she could scarcely see in front of her.
“Knox, wait,wait,” she said, using both hands to slow his step.
“There is no time, Margot,” he said, and put his arm around her waist as he hurried her down the road.
“But did you—Have you found him?”
Knox grunted and pushed her around the corner.
Her answer was standing there in the shadows. Margot would have known his figure anywhere. She didn’t think; she broke away from Knox and ran, her feet scarcely touching the ground. She vaulted her body at him, flinging her arms around him, desperate to feel him safe in her arms, and just as desperate not to lose him. “Arran, Arran... I thought you were lost to me,” she said. “I thought you werelost.”
“Come now, Margot.” He peeled her arms from him. “Come now, aye? We must make haste. Go and help your brother bring horses,” he said, and set her back, pushing her lightly into a paddock, where their mounts were grazing, still saddled.
Everything happened so quickly—Margot couldn’t say how, exactly, but she was in the saddle, and they were riding. Four horses, riding into the inky black of a moonless night. No one spoke. They just rode as quickly as they could with only the light from an anemic night sky to guide them, the only sound the horses laboring and their staccato cantering.
It seemed like hours to Margot before Knox drew up, bringing the party to a halt. They had come out of the forest and were riding alongside the sea now. The clouds had cleared, and the moon provided enough light to see the road.
