Hit Me With Your Best Scot by Suzanne Enoch

Author:Suzanne Enoch
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

* * *

Coll looked over at the wee woman holding his fingers. A stiff breeze would likely send her flying, but her father was a duke’s nephew, and that made her acceptable as a wife to a viscount. They reached the end of the line of dancers and he bowed to her, letting her fingers go as she curtsied. Then, one on either side, they pranced up the double lines of dancers and met again at the far end.

“I’ve heard that every clan has a motto,” she said airily. “What would yours be?”

“Spem Successus Alit. Success nourishes hope.”

“Latin, yes? It’s quite lovely. Clan MacTaggert seems very civilized.”

“There’s nae clan MacTaggert. We’re part of Clan Ross. That’s Ross’s motto.”

“Oh. You don’t have one, then? A motto?”

“We’ve a family crest. A dragon standing atop a lion. And the words ‘Dèan sabaid airson fuireach.’ That’s nae Latin. It’s Scots Gaelic.”

She blinked. “And what does it … mean?” she asked, her voice noticeably subdued.

Grand. He was frightening her. “Fight to Live,” he translated. “Some in the family say it’s more properly ‘Fight to Stay,’ but ye cannae stay if ye arenae alive, so I prefer the first version.”

The lass, Elizabeth Munroe, finished off the fancy set of dance steps alongside him before they began hopping forward again. For Christ’s sake, he hated country dances. They lasted forever and a day, and he wasn’t a man who enjoyed hopping and preening like a rabbit.

As they reached the head of the line again, he stifled a sigh. He’d managed to find a partner for every damned dance tonight, because according to Persephone, that was how a man could judge whether a woman thought him marriageable or not. The present country dance supposedly meant that he wouldn’t ever be walking into a church with Miss Munroe, but Lady Runescroft seemed to adore the things and had far too many of them scheduled for anyone to avoid them all. And at least this lass was talking to him, which was more than he could say of the previous two.

After what felt like an hour, the dance ended. Winded, he escorted Miss Munroe back to her mother, made a bow, and went to find an open window. Most of the side rooms around the ballroom were packed with guests, but he found some open space and an unlatched window in the library, and with a deep breath, Coll leaned both hands on the sill and looked out over the torchlit garden.

Behind him, a young couple seated on a couch murmured quietly to each other, the lady’s maid hovering nearby, but he paid them no further attention than to note their presence. This fete nonsense was the main reason he detested London, he was discovering. Unless a man was a member of the House of Lords—which, as the holder of an honorary title, he was not—days were to be spent in clubs or driving about the parks, hoping to be seen. Evenings were for endless parties or more clubs, and for drinking or gaming or whoring.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.