A Highland Werewolf Wedding - By Terry Spear Page 0,75
treasure?”
She gave a ladylike snort. “Neither of my uncles were the poetic sorts.”
“Okay, then let’s say it is about a treasure. The woman could be dead, for all we know. Even if she wasn’t, do you have any clue as to who she was?”
“Me,” Elaine said quietly, her eyes shimmering with tears. “He told me that right before we disembarked from the ship that day in St. Andrews. It was me.”
Cearnach rose from the chair and helped her to stand, then hugged her tightly. “I love you, Elaine. You are the key to my heart.” He didn’t want her to be sad. She’d had enough of that with losing her close family members, enduring a forced mating with a wolf bastard, and losing other wolf suitors. He meant to make her happy.
She gave him a teary smile. “I can’t express how much being here with you and your family means to me, Cearnach.”
“Aye, you’ve shown me how much it means to you. You are my joy.” He kissed her and gave her one last heartfelt hug as she squeezed him tightly back. “Come on. I’ve got to bathe the dogs, and then we’ll tackle the mystery of the treasure further.”
Before Cearnach could escort Elaine to the kennels, his mother sent word via a lad that she wished to speak with him. She rarely made a summons, and when she did, they always were important.
What was his mother about this time? “Sit in the sunroom for a minute, Elaine, will you? I’ll be but a moment,” Cearnach said, taking her there instead.
Cearnach briskly walked to the library where his mother was sitting at a small writing desk. “Is it done yet?” his mother asked.
This was why he had been summoned? To learn if he’d truly been mated with Elaine? This was too much.
“My lady mother,” Cearnach said, exasperated more than he’d ever been with her meddling ways. “Aren’t you off to London with Aunt Agnes to shop for new dresses or some such thing?”
Her brow wrinkling with annoyance, his mother waved for him to be quiet. “You know how Agnes loves to do research? How she has volumes of history concerning our family’s past and everyone related to us or that we’ve had dealings with?”
Not good news, he suspected. “Aye.” He folded his arms and frowned. “So what has Aunt Agnes dug up?”
“The lass is truly wealthy, Cearnach. Your lass. Which could be trouble. We’re worried about her association with Kilpatrick.”
Feeling the same unsettling concern for the lass, Cearnach nodded.
“She has four estates she manages here in Scotland. Has she told you about them?”
His frown deepened. “Nay. What do you know of them?” He suspected the lass had not known of the estates or she would have mentioned it.
“She owns Senton Castle, two manor houses, and a keep. I’ve told Ian and he’s contacting her solicitor. He wants to ensure that Kilpatrick isn’t trying to steal her properties away from her. Why did Kilpatrick want to meet her at Senton Castle? It’s so isolated that no one in the world would know she was going there, just him. The cliffs below the ramparts are deadly. It would be easy to drag a much slighter woman across the broken wall and toss her to her death.” His mother’s brows rose.
“The properties would still be in Elaine’s name,” Cearnach said, frowning.
“Aye, and he could forge the documents, sign them over to himself, and have someone loyal who worked for him as witnesses to the transfer. But he’d have to get rid of the only one who could prove the documents were forged. The lass herself.”
He’d considered that Elaine might have come to harm in meeting with Kilpatrick at the isolated ruins, especially when Kilpatrick thought to have a chunk of her treasure and wouldn’t want to give up a farthing of it. The properties would add an even greater incentive. “You didn’t know about this before you suggested that I mate the lass, did you?” He had to ask. He had to know the truth.
His mother waved her hand dismissively. “Of course not. What do you take me for? A thief? As for you, you didn’t know either, so she won’t believe you married her for her money. Go,” she said flippantly. “I just wanted to let you know you’re a man of many estates.”
“They will be the clan’s. Ian will control them.” As was usual for a pack that worked together as one big family.