Taking another sip of the wine, she regarded the marquess over the glass as he discussed the suspicious fire in the barley fields with Russell Mackenzie.
He hadn’t so much as acknowledged her presence since the soup course.
Mena still couldn’t believe it. The savage Highlander from the road had transformed into a militant marquess. He’d been telling her the truth, after all. Though he’d donned his white-tie finery, bathed, shaved, and slicked his hair back into a neat queue, Mena still expected the barbarian to somehow rip free of the refined nobleman any moment and threaten to hack her to pieces with a claymore.
Troubled, she set down her wine. Lord, he must think her a fool for how she’d acted this afternoon. But he hadn’t mentioned it, and she hoped he wouldn’t. Or maybe she needed him to say something, to allow her to explain, to perhaps absolve her, somehow.
Mena watched the muscles of his jaw work ponderously on a bite as he listened to his steward’s reports intently. Only a fool would expect absolution from such a man. He was the sort that granted favor sparingly and forgiveness never.
She’d do well to remember that.
He was the Demon Highlander, elder brother to the Blackheart of Ben More. These monikers, they were not granted by the happenstance of birth or marriage, like marquess or earl, they were earned by means of ruthless violence and bloodshed. It was easy to forget that fact beneath the grand chandelier of this lofty keep. That was, until the fire in the hearth ignited the amber in his eyes, lending him a ferocity that even his expensive attire couldn’t tame.
Suddenly feeling as though she’d taken refuge in a sleeping bear’s den, Mena drained the last of her wine much faster than was strictly proper.
When dinner adjourned, she bade the children a fond good night and curtsied to Russell and the marquess.
Rhianna attempted a curtsy, as well, and Mena put that on the list of things to practice with the girl. Andrew merely nodded at her and mumbled an excuse before hurrying away, not once lifting his eyes from the carpet. He was on the tall side of thirteen, and very slim, but his hands and feet were large and ungainly on his frame, hinting that he had the propensity for his father’s build.
His aloofness distressed her, and Mena decided, as she made to slip away, that she’d use the next few restless hours in her bed thinking of ways to ingratiate herself to the boy.
“Remain a moment, Miss Lockhart, I would have words with ye.”
The vise winched around her lungs once again at Ravencroft’s command, squeezing them until her limbs weakened for want of breath. Turning toward him, Mena kept the length of the grand table between them. “Yes, my lord?” she answered, as she watched Russell Mackenzie’s retreating back until it disappeared around the entry, abandoning her to the terrifying presence of the so-called Demon Highlander.
“Forgive me, as I’m not the expert, but is it considered good manners to call a conversation across a room?” His expression revealed nothing. Not an eyebrow lift, a half-smile, or even a scowl. Just an unsettling stoic watchfulness that set every hair of her body on its end with absolute awareness.
He’d not-so-subtly requested for her to approach him, but it sounded like a dare.
Like a temptation.
“No, my lord, it is not.” Remembering Millie LeCour’s advice, Mena lifted her chin and forced her eyes to remain on his, summoning every iota of British superiority that had been beaten into her since she’d come to London as the Viscountess Benchley.
The flames that reflected in his unblinking eyes licked his gaze with heat and, for a moment, Mena could truly believe that a demon stared out at her from those abysmal depths. He regarded her approach with the same sulfurous glare she imagined the devil used to survey his unholy realm.
To compensate for her apprehension, Mena rolled her shoulders back, as though stowing angel wings, and traversed the length of the table with the deportment of a benevolent royal. Though she kept the corner of the table and one of the high-backed chairs in between them.
She was being brave, not idiotic.
Mena regretted eating quite so much at dinner, as the meal now rolled and tossed inside her stomach, and threatened acid that she had to desperately swallow. Despite that, she didn’t allow her gaze to waver, though it cost her more strength than she’d ever credited herself with.
His eyes touched her everywhere, and Mena had to fight the impulse to cover herself, lest he know how exposed she felt in his presence.
“We’ve not had the opportunity to formally meet,” the marquess remarked. “I must say, Miss Lockhart, ye’re not what I expected.”
Mena attempted a polite smile and fished in her blank mind for something witty and charming to say. “It seems, my lord, that the circumstance is mutual.” Indeed, she hadn’t expected him to be so young. So devastatingly virile. So wickedly dark and—dare she think it?—attractive.
She’d meant to be witty, to diffuse some of the intensity between them, but she could tell that her answer hadn’t pleased him.
“Aye.” He didn’t return her smile, and Mena fought the urge to fidget like a child set in the corner.
She’d met precious few people in her lifetime who’d made her feel small. She looked most men straight in the eye, if she didn’t tower over them. But Ravencroft dwarfed her so entirely, she had to tilt her head back to meet his stern regard. He stood before her every inch the regimented soldier, posture erect and unyielding with his arms clasped behind him, neither a hair nor stitch out of place. At this close vantage, Mena could identify the familial resemblance between Liam Mackenzie and Dorian Blackwell. The same thick ebony hair, similar dark, haunted eyes, and a raw, almost barbaric bone structure. All hard angles and broad planes and no quarter given to weakness. But where a cruel, sardonic twist adorned Blackwell’s lips, Ravencroft’s were instead drawn into a perpetual hard line. Unreadable and forbidding. Dorian had the look of a prowling lone beast, hungry and predatory. Ravencroft, however, had never seen a cage that would dare hold him. Nations fell before him. Kings had bowed and tyrants had groveled at his feet.