Seduced by a Rogue Read Free

dark-haired men with well-formed features. The one in the lead was narrow
     through hips and waist, had powerful looking thighs and shoulders, and stood inches taller than his companion.
    He also looked five or six years older and displayed a demeanor that suggested he was accustomed to command, and to doing
     as he pleased. He had worn his leather breeks and boots often enough that they molded themselves snugly to his form. The shirt
     showing beneath his dark green jack was snowy white.
    As they drew nearer, she saw that his boots were of expensive tanned leather, not rawhide. He also wore a fan brooch of three
     short reddish-brown feathers pinned with a small but brightly sparkling emerald in the soft folds of his hat. Sunbeams painted
     similar reddish highlights in his dark brown hair.
    The younger man had black hair, a lankier body, and looked nearer her own age. He was eyeing Fiona in a way that made Mairi
     think of a hawk eyeing a tasty-looking rabbit.
    Clearly oblivious to the predatory look, Fiona smiled flirtatiously enough to make her sister yearn to scold her. But Mairi
     held her tongue and shifted her gaze back to the two visitors.
    “Well met, my ladies,” the younger one said as the women drew rein. “What are two such bonnie lasses doing, riding amongst
     these rough field men?”
    Stiffening, Mairi put up a hand to silence Fiona just as the older man clamped a hand to the brash one’s shoulder. Her own
     gesture failed of its aim, for Fiona said pertly and with an arch look at the younger one, “But who are
you
, sir, to address us so rudely? And
what
are you doing in our barley field?”
    “Pray, forgive us, my lady,” the larger man said, looking at Mairi with long-lashed eyes of such a clear ice-blue that she
     could almost see her reflection in them. His voice was deep and of a nature to send strange sensations through her, as if
     its gentle vibrations touched every nerve in her body.
    Still looking right at her, he said, “I am Robert Maxwell of Trailinghail. This unmannerly chuff with me is William Jardine
     of Applegarth. I expect you must be Dunwythie’s daughters, are you not?”
    Mairi nodded, touching Fiona’s arm as she did in a hope that the gesture would silence her, at least briefly. Then she said,
     “You must know that you are on my father’s land, sir. Have you reason to be?”
    “Good reason, my lady,” he replied. “I am Sheriff Alexander Maxwell’s brother, here today as his sheriff-substitute.”
    For a wonder, Fiona kept silent, perhaps as captivated by the man’s low, purring voice as Mairi was.
    “But why do you come here?” Mairi asked, although she could guess. Her father had spoken often of the sheriff.
    “Why, to determine the exact amount your lord father will owe the Crown in taxes this year,” he said. “Sithee, one determines
     the figure by counting everyone on the estate, measuring its size, and estimating its likely crop yield.”
    Mairi knew that. Her father had recently been teaching both of his daughters about running his estates, as protection against
     the possibility that his lady wife might fail to give him a son to inherit them. Phaeline had been pregnant many times during
     their sixteen-year marriage, but so far, she had produced only Fiona.
    Dunwythie had long agreed with his lady that, in due time, God would grant them a son. But, at last, urged by Phaeline’s elder
     brother, he had decided to teach his daughters what each would need to know if she should inherit his estates.
    The estates’ crops being a primary source of his lordship’s wealth in a region where few men had any, he had brought Mairi
     and Fiona to Dunwythie Mains to observe the progress of the early plantings there.
    Despite her recently acquired knowledge, Mairi was reluctant to cross words with the sheriff’s brother. Just meeting his gaze
     made her feel dangerously vulnerable, as if without effort he had melted her defenses and would as easily demolish any