A Stranger's Promise (Lords of Chance Book 1) Read online

The sudden discovery of his parents’ wedding certificate after so many years smacked of deceit, but no one contested the matter in court. Why should they? They needed Alistair to set the estate to rights if they wanted their yearly sums. Oh, his stepmother had been furious, but her son, Charles, had seemed only relieved. He’d promptly moved to London to carouse and hop from one scandal to another, which meant Alistair himself had to travel down from the north to mop up the mess.

  Lady Prescott rapped her fan on the arm of her chair to capture his attention. He lifted a brow in question.

  “As I was saying, Alistair,” she repeated, her lips puckered in the displeasure of finding herself ignored. “The children could belong to anyone. How can we be certain Charles even fathered the brats?”

  Alistair expelled an exasperated breath. “Take a wee look at their eyes,” he grated. “Even you cannot deny the Cassilis green.” Both children shared the bright, distinct Cassilis green with flecks of blue around the pupils surrounded by a darker rich, deep emerald ring.

  Lady Prescott’s double chin jiggled in distaste. “Well, the woman was a…” She paused to grimace behind her fan.

  “A mere laundress?” Alistair finished for her.

  “Yes, I will say it, Alistair. The woman was a low-born laundress.” The words burst from her mouth as if she could not hold them back. “Let her relations take the mongrel, beggar children in. It’s unfitting we should be involved. Our reputation! Charles is a high-born—”

  “Drunken sot,” Alistair inserted coolly. “A sot refusing to provide for his offspring, and a sot happy to abandon them upon your doorstep so he may carouse on the continent. Good God, woman, can you truly suggest we abandon two wee, motherless children on the streets? Simply because their mother was—heaven forbid—a mere laundress?”

  His aunt bristled like a hedgehog, her lips pressed so tightly together they turned white. “Alistair, your reputation—”

  “Reputation?” he interrupted with a dry chuckle. “I should think my reputation would suffer should I not accept responsibility for the poor, motherless children.” He held his hands up again, cutting her off. “My decision is made. The lad and lassie travel with me to Culzean, and that’s the end of the matter.”

  Lady Prescott fluttered her fan again, affecting an injured air. “Very well, take them, if you insist, but they hardly need a governess. Let them learn a trade. They’re well-born beggars at best and, as such, beneath the notice of polite society.”

  Alistair lifted his brow a contemptuous notch higher, astonished at the woman’s audacity. “I am curious,” he murmured. “Those many years ago, after my mother died and I found myself on my father’s doorstep...whose idea was it then, to send me to the stables?” He’d arrived at his father’s castle, a lad of eight—and had been promptly put to work mucking the stables.

  Lady Prescott gave her fan a vicious snap. “We had to protect your father’s reputation,” she answered through tight lips. “You’ve no cause to be ungrateful. You’re the earl now, aren’t you? And this many years later, I am still providing assistance. I found eight highly respected governesses to care for the two children, Alistair. Eight. Yet, you have refused them all. What am I to do?”

  So, if she hadn’t sent him to the stables, she’d definitely participated in the notion. He shook his head. Just how hard and withered was her old heart?

  “Eight, I repeat.” She fanned her cheeks. “Eight.”

  Alistair folded his arms. Aye, she’d found eight governesses. Eight highly prejudiced old biddies who’d fluttered horrified eyelashes upon discovering they’d be educating two children of dubious parentage in a remote Scottish castle near the sea. He’d suffered enough in his youth with such women. He wasn’t about to inflict the same kind of pain on two motherless bairns.

  A knock on the parlor door prohibited further conversation, and a mob-capped maid entered to whisper hurriedly in his aunt’s ear.

  “Absolutely horrifying,” Lady Prescott tutted behind her ever-present fan. “And she is on my front doorstep? Whatever is the world coming to? Are you certain I know a Major Atchenson? Why would his daughter come here?”

  Alistair tilted his head, curious.

  “Yes, my lady.” The maid bobbed a curtsey. “Major Atchenson saved your son, young master George, in the war.”

  Lady Prescott’s eyes widened. “Heavens! The very same Major Atchenson? How can that be? Such an ignoble end…” Her fan fluttered furiously. “No, no, I cannot…the gossip alone…no, I can’t have her in my household. Show her in, but interrupt me in two minutes, two minutes, mind you. Claim an urgent matter begs my attention and send her away. I’ll make certain she doesn’t return.”

  Alistair stared, speechless. Had the woman no shame?

  The maid left, then returned with a young woman dressed in a modest, brown, quilted Spencer jacket over a simple high-waist, blue gown, and a straw bonnet in hand.

  Alistair’s breath caught. She stood just inside the door, a perfect example of feminine beauty, a delicate and pale tragic angel. Her dark-lashed hazel eyes held deep-seated pain and her full downturned lips, betrayed a healthy sense of unease. She’d twisted her gold-tinted, brown locks into a simple bun, but several rebellious strands had escaped and curled around her neck. He dropped his gaze over the soft curve of her jaw.

  “Miss Atchenson,” his aunt raised her voice in greeting. “Allow me to offer you my sympathies, child. Such a shock, such a shock.” She smiled, a most disingenuous smile.

  Miss Atchenson dipped into a respectful curtsey to his aunt, then darted an uncertain glance at him. Alistair nodded a polite reply.

  Lady Prescott tilted her head his way. “My nephew, Lord Alistair James, Baron Aisla and 11th Earl of Cassilis.”

  Alistair leveled Lady Cassilis a thin-lipped look. Could her boastful tone possibly be in poorer taste?

  “I am told you’re seeking employment, Miss Atchenson,” his aunt addressed the young woman again. The lass brightened and opened her mouth to respond, but the old woman barreled on, “Considering your unfortunate circumstances, I would think it wise for you to look in the country. Perhaps Ireland?”

  Miss Atchenson caught her breath. “I…see, my lady.”

  The maid rushed into the room. “Lady Prescott, a most urgent matter requires your immediate attention.”

  Alistair folded his arms across his chest. “One urgent matter,” he said with a sardonic twist of his lips. “As ordered.”

  The women in the room froze.

  He stepped forward and bowed. “Miss Atchenson, allow me to assist you whilst my dearest aunt of aunts deals with her urgent matter. Our family stands indebted to yours. Without your father’s courageous action, my cousin George would no longer grace his mother’s dinner table. Is that not true, Lady Prescott?”

  His aunt recovered first. With an angry snap of her fan, she scowled at the maid. “The matter will have to wait. I must handle Miss Atchenson’s predicament first.” She turned to Alistair and added, “My dear boy, pray do not involve yourself. These things are far beneath your attention.”

  From the expression on her face, it was clear she thought him anything but ‘dear.’ He smiled, a cool, warning smile, and faced the young woman. Miss Atchenson regarded him uneasily. Another victim of the ton, to be sure. Well, now that he held a position of some authority, he knew by far the easiest way to provide true assistance to the lass was to face the gossip and rumors head-on.

  “Forgive my frankness, Miss Atchenson,” he addressed her as kindly as he could, “but might I inquire as to the nature of these ‘unfortunate circumstances’ my aunt has mentioned?”

  Her eyes widened in surprise.

  Lady Prescott gasped, horrified. “Heavens, Alistair, how unseemly.”

  “I mean no disrespect.” He summoned a smile. “How can I help otherwise, pray tell?”

  Miss Atchenson bravely smiled back. “My father recently met an unexpected and disgraceful end, my lord.” Her voice, strong and low, hel
d a musical quality.

  For all of her talk of his approach being unseemly, his aunt had no problems jumping in. “Quite shocking.” Her eyes lit with the thrill of gossip. “It was in every paper, Alistair, the week before you arrived. Every paper. Gambling debts and mismanagement of funds. Thousands of pounds. A decorated major! Such a disgrace. And now? The drinking. There’s even talk of frequent visits to houses of ill repute. Why, Lady Witherby says his death was rather too convenient to be an accident and that he, well, you know…” She let her voice trail suggestively away.

  Miss Atchenson’s eyes flashed, but her lips remained firmly sealed. Aye, the lass obviously wished to defend her father. He found her response and restraint admirable.

  Alistair lifted a brow at his aunt’s haughty conceit, and couldn’t resist saying, “What was that, Lady Prescott? Mismanagement of funds, you say? Rather reminds one of Castle Culzean’s former laird, does it not?”

  Lady Prescott’s jaw dropped open. “Your father had nothing in common with—”

  “He spent thousands of pounds he did not have,” he cut her short. As she sucked in a shocked breath and furiously fanned her reddened cheeks, he eyed the young woman once again. “And what position…” he began, then, a sudden idea crossed his mind. “I assume you read and write, Miss Atchenson?”

  His aunt’s fan abruptly stilled.

  Miss Atchenson’s gaze darted quickly between them. “Yes, my lord.”

  “You hold some basic knowledge of deportment and polite society? A smattering of French? Can you play at least one song on the pianoforte?”

  She hesitated, then nodded.

  “Absolutely not, Alistair.” Lady Prescott pushed to her feet. “You preside over an ancient and noble Scottish house. Think of your reputation, young sir.”

  Reputation. She couldn’t have picked a better word to egg him on. “I need a governess to oversee two wee children at Castle Culzean, clan Cassilis’s ancestral home on the Ayrshire coast,” he continued smoothly. “A lad and a lassie, raised in London by their mother, a recently deceased laundress and, until now, without proper knowledge of their father’s station in life. Were you to secure this position, you would teach them their letters and the ways of polite Society.” At this point, the other governesses had flinched. He paused and studied the young woman’s reaction.

  Miss Atchenson hesitated, then dropped another nervous curtsey. “I am most honored for your consideration, my lord, but I am more suited to the scullery.”

  Scullery? The word tugged at his heart, reminding him of his mother. “Why not a governess?” he pressed.

  She took a deep breath and answered with candor, “I know nothing of raising genteel children, my lord.”

  Genteel children. His lip curled in a smile. “Aye, you will do quite nicely, Miss Atchenson. The position is yours. I grow weary of London. We leave for Castle Culzean at once. I will send a man with you to gather your things.”

  Miss Atchenson’s eyes widened.

  “Have you gone mad?” Lady Prescott struggled to catch her breath.

  He eyed the young woman before him. Had he? He didn’t really know, but for some odd reason, he didn’t truly care.

  Chapter Three

  “What the devil?” Charlotte gave her worn canvas bag another hard yank to dislodge it from the black iron railing that lined the front steps of her old home. The bag came free all at once. She stumbled backward and nearly slid down the icy steps.

  “Allow me, Miss Atchenson.”

  She glanced over her shoulder to see Lord Cassilis’s mutton-chop whiskered footman stepping out of the hackney coach he’d hired. The man had been waiting patiently. Not that she’d been long. She had only a worn peach-colored day dress, a thin nightgown, and a hairbrush to pack.

  “Thank you, but I am fine,” she replied, embarrassed to relinquish a nearly empty bag.

  The man nodded and leaned against the coach to wait. Charlotte pulled on her nearly threadbare winter gloves, then turned to inspect the small townhouse for the last time. For the past six years, it had been home—well, where she’d lived, anyway. She’d never felt comfortable in the place. Home, to her, would always be the country cottage of her childhood. She cocked a wry brow at the townhouse, eager to leave it, London, and her problems behind. She’d already exchanged farewells with the butcher’s wife. As for the rest of her acquaintances and relatives? They didn’t care where she ended up so long as it wasn’t on their doorstep. Why tell them anything?

  As for Captain Edwards…

  She tossed her head and snorted. Let him wonder where she’d vanished off to—not that he would. Nae, she wouldn’t think of him again. Why should she? She was free. Free, at last. A thread of excitement wound its way through her at the thought and she smiled for the first time in weeks.

  She spun on her heel and headed for the hackney coach with her bag clutched tightly under her arm. She’d no sooner sat down on the scuffed leather carriage seat then the coachman whistled and they were off.

  With a deep breath to steady herself, Charlotte leaned her head against the grimy coach window and let London pass unseeing before her eyes. She turned her thoughts to the challenge ahead. Again and again, she heard Lord Cassilis’s deep baritone play in her mind. You will do quite nicely, Miss Atchenson. The position is yours.

  Quite nicely? She bit her lip. She hadn’t the slightest notion how to begin. And a smattering of French? Did swearing count? She winced. Why had she nodded? Because she’d been too petrified and desperate to do anything else. At least she could play a few songs on the pianoforte—Irish drinking songs. She prayed he wouldn’t ask for a concert. She’d only wanted a position as the lowest of scullery maids. She’d never dreamt of becoming a governess to the children of an ancient and noble Scottish house. But given the beggar’s power of choice, what could she do?

  As for the man himself, he clearly knew no fear. He’d taken on Lady Prescott without a moment’s hesitation, a woman none in London dared cross. She shifted uneasily in her seat, unable to shake his image from her mind as he’d stood before the fire, a powerful Scottish lord over six feet tall with thick dark hair and deep green eyes.

  “What have you landed yourself in, Charlotte?” she whispered, and blew her truant curls away from her eyes.

  She grimaced. She’d have to make do.

  All too soon, the hackney rolled to a stop near Lady Prescott’s Mayfair address and Charlotte stepped down, her canvas bag close to her side. An impressive barouche waited at the townhouse door, a remarkable conveyance painted an elegant black and emblazoned with the Cassilis coat of arms. Four splendid bays stamped in their gleaming harnesses as several footmen strapped large, iron-banded trunks to the vehicle’s rear.

  “His lordship awaits inside, Miss Atchenson,” the mutton-chop whiskered footman informed her kindly. As she started toward the front door, he caught her arm and quickly added, “The servants’ entrance is ‘round the back, Miss.”

  Charlotte checked her step. Ah, yes. As a governess, she followed a different set of rules now. She nodded thanks, then altered course and headed to the proscribed door. A dour-faced maid answered on the second knock and promptly escorted her up the back stairs to a small dormer makeshift nursery with yellow-painted walls, a mattress on the floor, and little else.

  Two children stood by the single window overlooking the street below, a young dark-haired boy of approximately nine years of age and a little red-haired, freckle-faced girl of perhaps three. Both shared Lord Cassilis’s unusual green eyes and both wore stiff new clothes they obviously found uncomfortable.

  Under their watchful gazes, Charlotte took a deep breath and nervously cleared her throat. “Good afternoon, children, I am Miss Charlotte Atchenson, your new governess.” She forced her lips into a smile. “And your names are?” She waited.

  The children simply stared.

  Adding a bit more warmth to her smile, she tried again. “What is your name, young master?”

  The boy’s dark
lashes lowered and his mouth clamped shut—a challenge if ever she’d seen one.

  Somewhat startled, Charlotte addressed his sister, “Your name, young mistress?”

  The child’s big eyes widened even more as she darted behind her brother and grabbed fistfuls of his new wool coat in her tiny hands. The boy stiffened and he held out a protective arm as if to block Charlotte from coming any closer.

  “Well, this won’t do,” Charlotte breathed. They clearly didn’t trust her. She’d obviously have to make friends with them first.

  At a movement near the door, she glanced over to see Lord Cassilis duck under the lintel to enter the room, the heels of his fine, well-polished black riding-boots a loud click on the attic floor. Rising to his full height, he stood tall in a dark blue waistcoat topped off with a gray silk neck cloth tied with an elegantly careless twist. The folds of his white sleeves and cut of his waistcoat emphasized the breadth of his shoulders. Charlotte realized she was staring and dropped her gaze, only to find her attention diverted to the tight fit of his tailored trousers, where they stretched over his long, lean thighs. Heavens, but she didn’t recall him being quite so handsome.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Atchenson.” His deep, Scottish-accented baritone cut into her thoughts.

  She snapped her head up. Heat rushed to her cheeks. Had he noticed her gawking? The humor in the dark-lash rimmed, green eyes answered a resounding ‘yes’. The chiseled lips crooked into a sensual curl above the dimpled chin.

  Horrified, she fumbled a belated curtsey. “Good afternoon, my lord.”

  “I see you have met your charges.” He strode forward to join her.

  “Yes, my lord,” she croaked.

  Charlotte turned to the children, instead, and noted their solemn, shuttered expressions. The little girl still huddled behind her brother’s protective arm. Ah, yes. Their names.

  She nodded at Lord Cassilis, her focus on his chest, and asked, “Might I know their names, my lord?”

  Silence met her request.

  When it became apparent he wouldn’t answer, she dared a glance at his face, only to see him surveying the children with a mystified expression.