Grant wanted to shake his head. The terms were agreed upon. The lass couldn’t already be changing her mind.
“That’s only if Julia asks me to plan a Christmas party for her.”
Guthrie didn’t look happy about that. Would he tell Julia that? Encourage her to have a party when it went against every financial bone in his body?
Grant wondered which way it would go.
Calla changed the subject abruptly and said to Grant, “Since Archibald Borthwick was here tonight, it made me think about him and Colleen, and I thought you should know this. He wasn’t at my wedding as friend of the groom but only because he was trying to learn when Colleen Playfair was coming to Scotland and forgot the time. I didn’t think anything of it because I didn’t know his connection to Colleen. I thought he was an old friend of the family.”
“Hardly,” Grant said, although Archibald might claim to have been a friend of Theodore Playfair.
“Baird had said, by rights, the castle should have been Archibald’s.”
So Archibald had told Baird this tale, too. “How did he figure that?” Grant asked as he opened the gate to the garden path that led to the garden room. They could hear the ladies all laughing and having a good time of it. He wanted to know what they were talking about that was so funny.
“You know how men are. They were drinking, boasting, and making wild claims. I had no idea what they meant by it. I didn’t even know if they were talking about Farraige Castle. I thought that Archibald was friends with Colleen, though. She said she’d never met the man before she came here. So that had me wondering what was going on.”
“Aye. He’s like a leech, looking for a free meal ticket. So did you gather anything from what Baird and Archibald said that might give you a reason why he thought he should own the castle?”
Calla sighed deeply. “His grandfather Uilleam Borthwick had been the manager—and that was one of the reasons. The other was that Uilleam had shown interest in Colleen’s grandmother when her grandfather died. He had every intention of mating her.”
“What?”
Neda had never once mentioned, nor had his own father, that Uilleam had not only managed the estate but intended to mate Neda. Grant didn’t believe it.
“According to Archibald, his grandfather had been the manager. He said that Uilleam was successfully courting Neda Playfair at the time. And that it was only a matter of time before she would agree to a mating. But he said that John MacQuarrie, their scribe, lied to her, saying Uilleam was crooked. Uilleam was fired. Worse, your grandfather took over and managed the estates. Until Uilleam murdered him.”
Grant couldn’t believe it. Yet, if it was true, it made some sense. All these years he’d thought his family had managed the keep since it was built. Now he was learning that Archibald’s grandfather had been taking care of the property from the beginning. But still, Archibald could be lying, trying to say that Grant’s family had been the cause of all the trouble in the beginning.
“So if Uilleam had mated with her, he wouldn’t have had to worry about cheating on the accounts because he would have controlled them,” Grant said, “if this isn’t one big lie.”
“Aye. Agreed. If it’s true, though… What if he did love Neda Playfair? Maybe it wasn’t all about the money and properties. But once she turned on him, he was bitter and took his revenge out on your grandfather for telling on him and then getting his position.”
Grant could see that. Not that he thought Uilleam loved Neda, but that he was so close to having everything—not just as the property manager, but as the owner while Neda was his mate.
“My grandfather must have had enough proof to sway her, or she wouldn’t have believed Uilleam was cheating her.”
“She might have also suspected something wasn’t right. Women’s instincts,” Calla said.
And that was probably the reason why Archibald’s father had tried so hard to get back all that the Borthwick line had lost because of the mistake his father had made.
***
The fire was still going in the garden room, making the room cozy, and the women’s sweet scents wafted in the air. It was in the wee hours of the morning that all the ladies had finally stopped talking. Colleen stared up at the roof made of skylights that showed off a gray, cloudy night, no sign of stars or the moon. The garden room had cool stone towers that mimicked the castle’s at the four corners of the curtain wall. She was considering making such a place at Farraige Castle for her people to enjoy. She smiled at the notion that the pack was indeed hers, and that they were not just living on her property.
She heard a pebble hit one of the floor-to-ceiling glass windows and turned her head. Julia and Heather had shut the soft green shades over the windows to make the room more private earlier that day. So they couldn’t see who was bothering them now.
Julia groaned. “They should know better than to disturb us,” she grumbled under her breath.
Colleen smiled. Julia needed her nine hours of sleep to be able to deal with life the next day. Colleen watched as Julia opened the garden room door just a crack. “Grant,” she said, feigning annoyance. “I should have known. This is an all-girls’ slumber party, you know.”
“Can I speak with Colleen for just a minute?” Grant asked, sounding as if he was attempting to appease her, but Colleen heard the hint of aggressiveness in his voice that said if Julia wasn’t agreeable, he’d barge right in and have his way anyway.
Colleen loved him for it.
“To give her a good-night’s kiss and that’s it, right?” Julia asked, as if she was responsible for every member of her pirate crew, and she wanted to ensure the terms were agreeable.
“Aye,” he said with a smile in his voice.
Colleen draped her blanket around her like a shawl and got off the couch to get her kiss. She wondered how many of the ladies were awake and ready to watch the show.
But when she passed Julia, who was already returning to her made-up bed, Colleen didn’t expect Grant’s quick action. Still only wearing his kilt, he grabbed her up. She squealed, and he hurried back to the castle with her.
The door to the garden room shut, and she heard no one coming after her to rescue her. So much for her pirate comrades-in-arms.
“A kiss, you said,” Colleen told Grant, wrapping her arms around his neck as he smiled down at her.