The Devil Wears Tartan Read Online Free Page B

on his arm.
    “Are you often given to such displays?”
    “As often as I am married,” she said.
    How very odd that he felt like smiling.
    She turned her head and regarded him somberly. “Of you, I think,” she said, answering his earlier question. “And marriage. But more you. You’re called Devil, you know. Why?”
    She was brave. No one else had ever come out and asked him that question, even though he was sure they thought it.
    He wanted to reassure her, keep her with him somehow, which meant he wouldn’t give her the whole truth.
    “Why does anyone get a reputation? People are curious, and when they can’t find anything to say, they invent stories.”
    In silence she considered him. He wondered what she thought, and then realized that such speculation was unwise. Did he really want to know what she thought of him?
    Finally she spoke. “No one told me you were so handsome,” she said. “They shouldn’t call you Devil, unless you’re like Lucifer. Are you as evil?”
    Yes. That wasn’t an answer he had any intention of giving her. Instead he only smiled and led her to the altar and to her fate.

Chapter 5
    I n moments, it was done. In moments, she’d gone from being Davina McLaren, slightly older spinster, to Davina McLaren Ross, the Countess of Lorne.
    Shouldn’t such a change have taken longer? Shouldn’t there have been a symphony to accompany such a momentous undertaking—instead of a lone piper whose music accompanied their departure from the chapel and their arrival in this room?
    The magnificent receiving room of Ambrose was reminiscent of a palace. The ceilings were frescoed with dancing nymph-like cupids painted in the Raphael style. Thick blue draperies hung in swags from gold cornice boards. A series of gilt-edged mirrors stretched the length and width of the room. In front of them sat a sideboard of marble and gold, topped with blue frosted glass. The wooden boards of the floor were polished to a high sheen, half covered with a magnificent carpet in shades of blue and green. The receiving chairs were upholstered in blue silk, the mahogany wood of the chair burnished with gold.
    She and Marshall were seated together at the endof the room like royalty, greeting the assembled guests who stretched in a line around the room.
    No one had prepared her for this. But then, no one had told her about her new husband, either. No one had warned her how magnificent he would look attired in a kilt, a garment that left absolutely no doubt as to a man’s masculinity. Or the shape of his legs.
    “You’re the most beautiful bride, my dearest girl,” her aunt said, sweeping Davina up into a hug before she was led away.
    Davina only nodded in response. The moments were going by too swiftly. The ceremony had been too brief, the circumstances too odd.
    One by one people were introduced to her, names she’d never heard before, and faces she wouldn’t remember. She hoped she was gracious and polite. She heard herself saying words, and felt her lips curved into a smile. How very odd to feel that she was here and was not at the same time.
    After another hour she was whisked away to the dining hall, and found herself seated at a long table at the head of the room. Only two places had been set among the profusion of silver candelabra, silver salvers, and charger plates. Three crystal goblets in varying heights sat at the right of both porcelain plates bearing the Ross crest and surrounded by a dizzying array of silverware. Around them sparkled at least four dozen pale yellow beeswax candles, their delicate scent eclipsed beneath the roses and dahlias clustered in small vases all over the table.
    The guests were seated at long tables in front of them, and from her vantage point, Davina could seeher aunt and Marshall’s uncle in pride of place at one of the first tables. Most of the other people were strangers, yet despite her ignorance of their names or why they were attending her wedding, it was all too obvious