The Bride Says Maybe Read Free

I have accepted.”
    “What solution is that, Father?”
    The earl sank onto the chair beside hers. He set his glass on the table. “Perhaps you made a better impression on him than he did on you?” His tone had grown hopeful.
    “I don’t care what he thinks of me. I don’t like him. In fact, I detest him. Yes, that is how I feel. I have no desire to set eyes on him ever again.” It felt good to be her old self.
    The earl lifted his glass to his lips and started to drink before he realized it was empty. He lowered the glass, sighed heavily, and said, “That is unfortunate, my girl. Because the terms of receiving all my paper back is that you marry him.”
    “ Marry him? Me and the Beast of Aberfeldy ? Oh, no, that will not happen—”
    “As a matter of fact it will happen, and it will be done in one hour’s time. I’ve sent for the Reverend Kinnion. Campbell has secured a special license. You’d best go don your prettiest dress, daughter, you are about to become a bride. The groom will be arriving at any moment.”
    Tara sat dumbstruck. Pride now warred with hurt.
    Did her father believe he could dismiss her so easily. That she would willingly allow him to sell her to a Campbell, and the Black one no less?
    That was not going to happen.
    She would show him. She would show all of them, including the duke of Penevey. She would return to London and make her own way. There was more to her than just a pretty face. It had taken intelligence to rule London the way she had, and she could do it again.
    But she kept her thoughts hidden. She smiled at her father, and said, “Then please, excuse me, I need to change.”
    “That’s my girl,” her father said approvingly. “This will be a good marriage. You’ll see. Aye, yes, you will be a Campbell, and it won’t be bad. Well, maybe you won’t be marrying into the ‘respectable’ branch of the clan, but you are a survivor, Tara. You will make them dance to your tune.”
    She smiled her answer, her thoughts filled with the image of picking up the whisky decanter and smashing it over his head.
    Instead, she rushed up to her room. From the back of her wardrobe, she pulled out the boy’s clothing that had enabled her to run away from London.
    Now it would be disguise to return.
    She would not marry a Campbell. Not now, not ever.
    “Let my father marry him,” she muttered to herself as she dressed. She wound her braid around her head and hid her vivid coloring under a wide-brimmed hat.
    With more confidence and spirit than she’d shown for weeks, she opened her bedroom door and stole down the back stairs, heading for the stables and freedom.

Chapter Two
    T hey rode through the mist with a purpose, three grim-faced men set on a mission, their hats pulled low over their brows against the weather.
    In three hours, it would be darkest night.
    In three hours, the tallest of them, Breccan Campbell, laird of the Black Campbells, would have a wife.
    They reached the crossroad that would take them to Annefield, ancestral home of the Davidsons. Breccan started to turn his horse Jupiter up the road, but his uncle Jonas reined short. He was a spry man for his age and half Breccan’s height.
    “There is time to turn back, nephew,” Jonas said.
    “Turn back?” Breccan asked. “And do what?”
    “Have a nice dinner and keg of ale,” Jonas answered stoutly, “in front of a roaring hot fire.” He smacked his lips in appreciation. Ahead of them, Breccan’s other uncle, Lachlan, turned his horse around to join them.
    “And what of my word to the Davidson?” Breccan wondered. The Davidson was known as the earl of Tay. Breccan held to the old ways. Breccan himself would be considered an earl, but he was proud to be laird. Laird Breccan they called him to single him out from the other Campbells. He knew the title was not always a sign of respect. There were those who feared him and his kin, and with good cause.
    “Burn his chits and let him be damned,” Jonas said,