An ugliness he intended to deal with.
He recognized the Gothard brothers from the descriptions his villagers had given him: Geoffrey, tall and slender with an elegant sneer; Walter, shorter and bony.
Jason’s footsteps echoed as he strode through the open arches, his own brother following behind. Scattered businessmen, exchanging mail and news in the shade beneath the dome, paused to glance their way. People seemed to stream from all four corners of town, rushing to catch the show.
Walter Gothard scurried back like a frightened rabbit, but his brother merely stared.
With a click of his spurred heels, Jason came to a halt and drew an uneven breath. He pinned Geoffrey Gothard with a furious gaze. “You’ll come with me to the magistrate,” he snapped out, surprising even himself at the commanding tone of his voice.
For a moment Ford seemed dumbfounded, then he stepped away and motioned back the crowd.
Gothard continued to stare.
Jason’s hand went to the hilt of his sword. “Now, Gothard.”
His stare held hard and unwavering. Finally his thin-lipped mouth curved in a smile. “My nearest and dearest enemy,” Gothard drawled.
A line Jason recognized from Shakespeare. The man wasn’t uneducated, then—indeed, his bearing was aristocratic, and his clothes, though rumpled from days of wear, were of good quality and cut. He looked to have but a handful of years on Jason’s twenty-three.
Confusion churned with the anger in Jason’s stomach. “Why should you call me your enemy?”
Gothard’s gaze roamed Jason from head to toe. “The Marquess of Cainewood, are you not?”
“I am,” Jason said through gritted teeth. He wanted nothing more than to go home to Cainewood, back to his calm routine, his life. But he could think only of little golden-haired Mary following him around the village, begging for a sweetmeat, her blue eyes dancing with mischief and radiating trust.
Blue eyes that might never open again.
And there stood the beast who had hurt her. Smiling at him from the shadows.
“I’ve done nothing to draw your malice—we’ve never even met.” Jason peered at the shaded figure. Gothard and his brother were pale, with the type of skin that burned and peeled in the sun—and it looked as though they’d been much in the sun of late. “Stand down and consign yourself to my arrest.”
Gothard’s blue eyes went flat with resentment. Jason blinked. He seemed to know those eyes.
Maybe they had crossed paths.
“A pox on you, Cainewood.”
Jason squared his shoulders, reminding himself why he was here. For justice. For Mary and Clarice. The questions could wait—for now.
Responsibility weighing heavily on his mind, his focus shifted to the fat needle of a spire that topped the old Norman cathedral across the green. He tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword.
Father would have expected this of him. To defend his people, stand up for what was right—no matter the cost.
Deliberately he slid the rapier from its scabbard.
Gothard drew his own sword with a quick screak that snapped the expectant silence. “We’ll settle this here and now.”
Jason advanced a step closer, slowly circled the tip of his rapier, then sliced it hissing through the air in a swift move that brought a collective gasp from the crowd. The blade’s thin shadow flickered across the paving stones.
His free hand trembled at his side.
With a roar, Gothard lunged, and the first clash of steel on steel rang through the still summer air.
Vibrations shimmied up Jason’s arm. Muscles tense, he twisted and parried, danced in to attack, then out of harm’s way. His heart pounded; blood pumped furiously through his veins.
Like most young men of his class, he’d been trained and spent countless hours in swordplay—but this was no game. And his opponent was skillful as well.
Two blades clanked with deadly intent in the shadow of the Market Cross.
Leslie, Scotland
“MARRIED? I’m not getting married!”
The last strains of the funeral bagpipes were still echoing in Caithren Leslie’s ears when she found herself facing the family lawyer across her father’s desk.
As though it weren’t enough she had to bury Da today, now this. She rubbed her eyes, still itchy from this morning’s tears. “Have I misheard you?”
Lachlan MacLeod sighed and ran a hand through his grizzled hair. “There’s nothing wrong with your hearing, Miss Leslie. All of Leslie is Adam’s…that is, unless you see fit to wed within the year. Then the larger portion that came through your mother will revert to you and your husband. In which case you’ll provide for your brother, of course. The minor lands entailed with the baronetcy aren’t sufficient to support a man.”
“At least not in the style to which Adam is accustomed,” Cait’s cousin Cameron put in dryly.
“Heaven forbid my brother should put Leslie before pursuing his own pleasure,” Cait said, pensively twirling one of her dark-blond plaits. “It’s been five years since he’s been home for more than a visit.” She closed her eyes momentarily. “Crivvens, this cannot be.”
“It can be, Miss Leslie, I assure you.” MacLeod’s arthritic hands stacked the papers on the desk. “While it’s rare for a daughter to hold title, it isn’t unprecedented. Your father’s wishes will stand against a challenge.”
“Nay, that wasn’t what I meant.” Caithren stared at her father’s desktop. It had always been littered with papers, reflecting the goings-ons at busy Leslie. Now it was neat. Too neat. Her heart ached at the sight. “Da told me that if Adam didn’t mend his ways, one day Leslie would be mine. That part isn’t surprising.” She looked toward Cameron for strength, feeling a bit better when their hazel eyes met. He’d always been there to lean on. “It’s the marriage requirement that makes no sense.”
Cam perched his tall form on the arm of her chair, slipping his own arm around her shoulders. He looked toward the lawyer. “Might you read that wee portion of the will again? I don’t think Cait
