The Devil Wears Kilts by Suzanne Enoch Page B

had curled into a fist, and slowly he straightened out his fingers. Not here. Not now . “I ken why ye’re here, Myles, but I dunnae think it requires us t’have a conversation.”
    From the way Lady Charlotte’s shoulders stiffened, she didn’t approve of his brusque retort. What she didn’t realize was that she should be grateful for it, and that the only reason no one’s nose had been immediately bloodied was because he was apparently being judged along with Rowena.
    The line of debutantes moved forward slowly, until Lady Hest stood with Jane to her left, and Rowena to her right. The two lasses looked nothing alike; one was tall and yellow haired, the other petite with hair black as pitch. Even more tellingly, one was English aristocrat through and through, and the other a well-born lass fresh from the Highlands. Could they approve one and deny the other? Would they dare?
    “It’s going well,” Lady Charlotte murmured below the sound of her mother reciting the two young ladies’ pedigrees as if they were horses at auction.
    “How can ye tell?”
    “They’re looking at our girls rather than whispering to each other.”
    “Does having two debutantes there diminish the odds of both being accepted, or increase them?”
    She glanced sideways at him. “They won’t care that Winnie is Scottish. It’s all about her bearing and her breeding.”
    Was he that transparent? After fifteen years as the Marquis of Glengask he was well aware how most English lairds regarded one of their fellows who chose to remain in the Highlands. He knew how the Sasannach in general viewed Scotsmen—scrappers and drunks and ultimately the losers, with hundreds of years of war and disputes finally settled in favor of the English. They weren’t finished yet with asserting their authority, either. “ I care that Rowena is Scottish,” he said under his breath.
    Whether by accident or not, her fingers brushed his. It made his gut tingle as if lightning had struck nearby. By the time he’d sorted out that it must have been the luncheon he’d forgotten to eat making him light-headed, one of the patronesses stood and nodded. “Welcome to Almack’s, ladies. And to London, Lady Rowena.”
    Beside Ranulf, and despite her statement that everything was going well, Charlotte looked relieved. Perhaps it was a good thing that he remained ignorant of the minute machinations involved, or he might have been tempted to intercede, after all. When Rowena came bouncing up to him, he smiled. “Now ye can have yer waltzes, my heart.”
    “Aye. So dance the first one w—” Her eyes widened as she looked beyond his shoulder. “Uncle Myles!”
    She released her brother to give their uncle a sound hug. Unsurprising, as she was a warm, kindly, naïve lass—which was, he was beginning to realize, to a great degree his fault. He felt a much cooler wind blowing where their mother’s brother was concerned, but tonight was for his sister. And so he clenched his jaw and kept silent.
    “You’ve grown up in three years,” Myles Wilkie, Viscount Swansley, said, taking her hands in his. “You look so much like Eleanor it almost brings me to tears.”
    “Do I look like Mother?” she asked, swishing her skirt almost shyly. “My brothers have never said so.”
    Because it wasn’t allowed . Myles had the good grace to clear his throat. “You do look very like her, Winnie. Will you dance your first waltz with an old man who adores you?”
    Now that was interfering where he wasn’t wanted. Ranulf took a step forward—and felt slender fingers wrap around his arm, slight and gentle and burning through the heavy cloth of his sleeve like a brand.
    “That certainly saves your brother from a dilemma,” Lady Charlotte said with her sunlight smile. “I don’t think he realized there would be no dancing until after the presentations, because he asked me to dance the first waltz with him.”
    “Oh, splendid!” Rowena towed her chuckling uncle toward the dance