CHAPTER ONE
SMOOTHING HER LONG, dark blond hair away from her face, Nia Elgin took a deep breath and followed Stephen, the butler, through the wood-panelled hallway of her family home, Lamington Hall.
Except the beautiful Georgian manor house wasn’t her home right now.
For the next year at least, she would be living in the gardener’s cottage along the drive.
And Lamington was being rented out to Tom and Diane Drummond, an American couple who were taking a sabbatical in Scotland to research Tom’s ancestral roots.
This evening was her first visit to the house since the Drummonds had moved in a week ago, and it felt strange walking past the family portraits and suits of armour as a visitor.
But that wasn’t the reason her heart was in her mouth.
As Stephen’s fingers rested on the door handle, she took another breath, forcing herself to stay calm, trying to prepare for what lay on the other side of the door.
Not what, but who.
Her heart lurched.
Farlan Wilder.
Even now, she could still picture the first time they’d met.
He had been twenty-two, three years older than her, with eyes the exact same green as summer bracken and a smile that had made Morse code messages of excitement beat through her body.
It had been love at first sight, at first touch, at first everything—swift and as certain as a swallow returning home from its wintering grounds in spring.
And he had loved her right back, just like the heroes in her favourite books.
That year, the summer of their love, time had slowed, days had lengthened and the warm, lazy heat had spilled through September, nudging into the first few days of October.
Six months and two days after they’d met Farlan had proposed. She’d accepted, but they’d decided to go travelling first.
Her breath burned her chest.
And then, just as swiftly, it had been over.
Ended by her.
And, just like the swallows, he had upped and left the cool, inhospitable shores of Scotland for a new life in another country.
She shivered.
The fact that he was back in Scotland at all made her want to reach past Stephen and clutch the door handle for balance.
But the fact that he was here, at Lamington, was the cruellest cut of all.
Her stomach dipped with a desperate, panicky plunge, just as it had been doing ever since Tom and Diane had invited her to join them for Burns Night supper and she had stupidly agreed to join them.
Would she mind awfully if there was one extra for dinner? Tom had asked, and of course she had said no without thinking.
‘It’s a big deal for us, him coming. He wasn’t even supposed to be getting here until next week,’ Tom said slowly. ‘You see, he hates Burns Night.’
She hadn’t known who ‘he’ was then, and—incredibly—she hadn’t cared.
Tom had shaken his head, as though not able to believe what he was saying. ‘Something to do with a woman, I think. But I told him, you can’t hate Burns Night, my boy, not if you’re a Scotsman.’
The look of outrage on his face had made her burst out laughing. ‘So why did he change his mind?’ she’d asked.
He’d grinned. ‘I played my trump card.’
‘And what was that?’
‘You.’ Tom had grinned again. ‘Changed his mind real quick when I told him Lady Antonia Elgin was going to be here. Apparently, you and he crossed paths once a few years ago. Must have made quite an impression on him.’ He’d winked. ‘I’ve gotta say I was surprised. I’ve never known anything or anyone change Farlan’s mind before, and that’s
a fact.’
He had carried on talking, but she hadn’t been able to hear what he was saying. Her heartbeat had swallowed up his words.
Inside her head, her thoughts had started to unravel.