She only shrugged.It wasn’t.
“That’s not much of a point, Richard,” Vin pointed out.
No, it wasn’t.
Richard lifted a brow.“But it is.Oh, she might appeal to gentlemen at first because she’s quite lovely, attractively wealthy, and on any normal day, reasonably good-natured, but she’s bold as brass and not at all shy with her opinions.It’s disconcerting for most eligible gentlemen she’s met and distinctly terrifying for others.”
“Thank you, Richard.I’m feeling ever so good about myself just now.”
“Wait, there’s more,” he warned and continued, “Now, there are two exceptions to this rather regrettable trend.First, there is the rare, yet heretofore, unseen gentleman in possession of comparable intelligence and enough backbone to find such qualities admirable.”
“And second?”
“There is Lord Ramsay.”
Vin threw back his head and laughed at that, somehow comprehending the joke before the punch line was even revealed.“Aye, Ramsay.Too daft to know what he’s getting himself into.”
Fuming silently, Fiona settled a glare of displeasure upon the two men until their laughter faded away.“How terribly amusing you both are.”
“Amusing or no’,” Glenrothes said, following his ball onto the green to line up the long putt he was left with, “there is some truth to what Richard said.You’ve only known Ramsay for two short weeks.Hardly enough time to consider marriage.”
“Not considering,” she corrected.“Lord Ramsay is a fine enough gentleman, heir to an earldom, a fair rider, and an adequate golf player.We share a passion for the sport, and I wish to marry him.”
“A shared interest in a sport is no reason to wed, Blossom,” Richard offered more seriously.
“At times, we must make do with the opportunities we are given,” she said.“What else do you expect me to do, remain single for an indeterminate amount of time?Become a spinster?”
“Wait until you find a man you can love,” her eldest brother said.
“Or at least one we could respect,” Vin added under his breath, but she heard him anyway, and her temper spiked again.
“If I were to wait for that to happen, Vin MacKintosh,” she snapped, “I may very well be past my thirtieth year before I start filling my nursery.”
She winced as Glenrothes and Vin both glowered at her.It was a low, unnecessary blow as both of their wives were just beginning to fill their nurseries at thirty.
Richard punctuated the sudden silence with a low whistle and took an extravagant step back.
“I should like to see ye repeat that sentiment to Eve’s face, as her advanced age hisnae seemed to be such a detriment to her happiness,” Glenrothes said in a soft, deadly burr while Vin only shook his head.
“Och, Francis!Vin!”She began apologising, but her eldest brother held up his hand to halt her rebuttal.
“That is neither here nor there.I ken how ye are when ye get a thought into that head of yers, Blossom.Yer as tenacious as a filly wi’ the bit between her teeth.But, bugger it, I willnae stand to the side and watch ye wed in haste to a man ye met on a golf course, for pity’s sake.”
Bloody hell, but she shouldn’t have picked on Eve, Fiona bemoaned.She loved her sister-in-law dearly and knew quite well that nothing in this world angered Francis more than a slight to his wife.Her insult couldn’t have been more poorly timed since Eve had delivered another daughter for Francis just a month past.
Another baby to remind Fiona how much she was missing in her life.
All the more reason to get on with it.
“You must admit, Blossom, ’tis hardly the proper setting to meet a gentleman,” Vin said quietly.Since he was of a more even keel temperamentally than most of the family, Vin’s anger tended to fade away more quickly.Far more quickly than hers.
“Proper?”Fiona scoffed, twisting the handle of her putter against her palm.“You’re a fine one to talk about anything about propriety, Vin.Besides, it is theRoyalandAncientGolf Club of St.Andrews.”
“What Vin is saying is that young ladies such as yourself are usually introduced to young eligible men in a more suitable setting,” Richard said.
“I’ve been trotted about to high society balls and teas and introduced to eligible men for two years without finding a single gentleman I like better,” she reminded them.“Besides, given my passion for golfing, isn’t it only fitting that I met someone here that suits me?”
“It just seems a bit dodgy that you meet this fellow at the clubhouse, yet he won’t step out with you publicly,” Richard told her.
