The dinner bell interrupted them not long after, and Mena decided she and the sweet valet had made sufficient progress.
“Miss Mena,” Jani exclaimed upon opening the door.
She looked up from her dressing table, where she hastened to tidy her coiffure.
“This was left in the hallway outside your room.”
What lay in his hands instantly softened the sharp edges of her heavy thoughts, and brought back the memory of her encounter with the marquess.
And the heat.
Standing, Mena reached for the tidy, if indelicately arranged, bouquet of the very same flowers she’d abandoned that afternoon. There was no note, no card, and nothing but a small knot made from the Mackenzie plaid to hold them together.
But there was no question as to just who had left them at her door. And as she wrapped careful fingers around the fat stems of the few roses, Mena noticed something that melted the very cockles of her careful heart.
Ravencroft had stripped them of every thorn.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Liam ran his hands through the soft green of the fresh peat moss and tried not to compare it to the vibrant shade of Miss Lockhart’s eyes. Was this the newest torment to his endless search for peace? Was there no escaping the lass? He couldn’t even examine something as innocuous as fucking moss without conjuring some part of her to his mind. She’d been at Ravencroft two weeks, and he could barely get through dinner every night without hiding arousal beneath the table.
Crushing the soft little buds in his hand, he growled at Russell. “Just how many barrels of peat did Grindall order?”
“Enough to roast the entire harvest,” his steward said carefully. “He said he discussed it with ye.”
“I’ve no memory of that.”
Russell swiped his hat off, revealing tufts of wild orange hair, and scratched his scalp nervously. “Well, if ye doona mind me saying so, my laird, ye’ve been a bit … distracted lately.”
Distracted by a ripe mouth and a round arse.
“I do mind ye saying so.” Because it was true. He’d always been a focused, driven, and determined man, and no tempting wee English lass was going to change that.
The Ravencroft distillery had almost collapsed under the drunken tyranny of his father, and Liam would be goddamned if he added the failure of the livelihood of so many to his already tainted legacy.
Employing a breathing technique he’d learned from an Indian guru, he took a breath in through his nose, and counted slowly as he controlled the exhale with his throat.
Russell likewise employed another tactic. “This shipment was expensive, and we could barely afford it due to the new copper mash tuns for the barley we acquired last year without dipping into the tenant rents. Grindall said that the peat would hasten the kiln fire of the barley and add smoke to the taste. So many of the Highland distilleries are implementing the practice.”
Goddammit. He’d wanted the distillery to be self-sustaining. He’d do anything to avoid dipping into his other sources of income.
Liam looked to his right, counting a few bricks of the warehouse which held rows upon rows of aging Scotch in their blond oak casks, then back to the kiln fires over which he was aiding Thomas Campbell, the cooper, in assembling and charring the insides of the imported casks for this year’s offering of spirits. The work was backbreaking for most men, but Liam found that he appreciated the mental monotony of it. Once Andrew fit the wet slats of oak into the bottom ring, he passed them to Thomas Campbell to char the inside over the flame.
Liam would then take one of the already charred barrels and bend the slats of wood to fit into the iron rings, and employ the blacksmith’s hammer to pound them into place. He enjoyed the need to sweat and strain, found a sort of physical release in the force it required of him.
A physical release that he was sorely in need of.
This peat business was an unwelcome interruption.
Taking another breath, he tossed the peat back into the crate. “There are three—and no more than three—ingredients in Ravencroft Single Malt Scotch. What are they, Andrew?”
He turned to his son, who stood behind him. The boy’s mood was as black as the soot smudged across his fine shirt and stubborn, miserable features. He’d brought Andrew down to experience the jolly frenzy of work that came after the barley harvest. The milling and mashing of the barley into grist, the import and assembly of the casks, the careful fermentation in the mash tuns, the distillation processes, and finally the stacking of the finished barrels where they would sit for no less than three years and one day, and sometimes more than two decades.
“I doona ken what they are,” Andrew mumbled.
“Aye, ye do, lad. They’ve been the same for centuries.” Liam tried to keep his rising temper from his voice.
Glowering at the crates of moss, his son lifted a shoulder. “I canna remember.”