were meant for each other. What of ye? Who will be searching for ye when they discover ye are missing?”
“My mother. But she’ll figure I’m avoiding the disastrous tea she’s got planned with a dozen uninvited ladies. I do no’ think it would cross her mind I’d left the castle because she would no’ leave the castle. ’Tis hard for her to separate her actions and desires from others.”
“Huh. I know what that’s like. I’m also eluding a disastrous tea. And I daresay the single bachelor I’m avoiding marriage with outweighs any of the ninnies awaiting your company. When do ye think our mothers will notice we’ve left the castle grounds?”
The lass had a point. He’d rather deal with the nitwits at Slains than be bound for life to Sir Joshua Keith. “Perhaps another hour or so for ye, after they’ve scoured the castle and outbuildings looking for ye. I think I’ve got a little longer.” His mother would be discreet about it, not wanting her precious guests to catch wind of what she and most of society would deem as inappropriate behavior.
“Will the countess send out a search party?” Lady Giselle asked.
Alec shrugged. “She will try, but my friends will tell her no’ to do so yet.”
“Your friends? Ye’re evading them as well?”
He nodded solemnly, feeling a little bit guilty about that. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to see them. Hell, if it had only been them, he would have stayed. But the simpering potential brides his mother had convinced to join them all were not worth the struggle it would take to make an appearance.
“An unfortunate side effect of the situation,” he said. “Now, tell me. Were ye and Sir Joshua intending to join the festivities at Slains?”
“Goodness, I do no’ think so. At least, an invitation was no’ mentioned to me.” She shook her head. “If anything, I feel as though I was about to be locked up and never heard from again.”
“Is that so?” Alec didn’t doubt it.
“Aye.” She ran her hands over her wet hair and started to fiddle with threading a long, messy plait at the back, winding the tendrils with deft fingers, before unwinding it again and running her hands through the locks.
Giselle didn’t expound on her words but seemed to drift off into her thoughts as she concentrated on ringing the water from her hair.
The lass was confounding. On the one hand, she had decided to betroth herself to one of the worst people Alec had ever met, and yet on the other, she’d escaped him in a dangerous storm. What was she really about? Other than being silly and apparently reckless.
“Why did ye agree to marry Keith?”
She stopped the movement of her hands and looked at him as if he’d gone mad. “Agree?” That bitter laugh escaped her again. “I think ye misunderstand me. I did no’ agree.”
“Ye were being forced?”
“I said as much before. Do pay attention. Besides, I’m a lady, and we do no’ really have a choice anyway, do we? Our das, older brothers, guardians, whoever it may be, decide our future based on what’s good for them. No’ so much what is good for us.”
Alec frowned. He hadn’t ever thought about it that way. If he had a younger sister, he would be very different, consider her feelings. No one should be made to be miserable for the rest of their days.
Marriage had been one of the last things on his mind until his mother barged into his castle this afternoon. He supposed Lady Giselle’s opinion made sense, given the disgust he’d faced when at the various events his mother had forced on him. The lasses there had not wanted to meet him or subject themselves to him, and yet they had at their parents’ behest.
“I’ll no’ force a woman to marry me,” he vowed with a study nod.
Lady Giselle snorted and resumed plaiting her hair. “How very noble of ye, but I suspect when ye decide ye want something, ye’re no’ afraid to get it.”
Alec grunted. “A lass is no’ a thing, and I’ll no’ take such an undertaking as finding a wife as something so trivial to get.”
Giselle snorted. “Interesting. Ye mean to say ye know something of wooing? That ye’d want your wife actually to like ye, maybe love ye?”
“What’s that supposed to mean? Ye dinna believe me? Of course, I know something of wooing. And obviously, I want her to like me. Love, however, I know is a fleeting emotion.”
“I am no’