His tone broke her heart, made her ache to jump up, hug him close, and heal all his hurts. “Aye, Ross.” She offered him a smile. “If I didna trust ye, I wouldna have left Scotland with ye.”
He smiled, and the hopefulness in his emerald eyes brightened. “I trust you too, Harmony,” he said ever so quietly.
“Then why do ye never come to my bed?” she whispered.
He stared at her, his gaze piercing, as if searching for any ill will. “You must know some things first.” He looked down at their hands on the table, clearly troubled. “And I had hoped for us to develop a fondness for one another before…”
She kept her hand on his. “If I must know some things—then tell me.” She prayed he didn’t find her boldness off-putting, but she couldn’t bear them to stay their current course of mysterious silence. “What is it I must know, Ross? Does it have something to do with the old woman?”
He narrowed his eyes again, appearing noticeably perturbed as he slid his hand out from under hers. “Miss Nettie appeared to you too?”
“I dinna ken what her name was.” Harmony frowned, trying to remember if the spirit lady had told her. She slowly shook her head. “No, she didna share her name.”
“Whatdidshe share?”
Ross’s tone told Harmony a great deal more than his words. After a long sip of the delectable chocolate, she tried to put him at ease with a smile. “My, that is lovely.”
“I am glad,” he said, but didn’t sound glad at all. “Pray, tell me what Miss Nettie said.”
“That ye are a good and kind man who deserves happiness.” Harmony took another sip of the fine, warm drink. “And she begged me to give ye a chance.”
His dark brows drew closer into a confused frown that made him even more handsome. “Give me a chance?”
“Aye.” Harmony caught her bottom lip between her teeth, stoking her determination to find out if there was any hope of her ever becoming a mother. “Did she mean ye couldnabea husband, and I should try to understand?”
“What?”
She stared down at her lap, wishing she had some water to cool her burning cheeks. “Are ye unable to…” She shrugged and kept her chin tucked. “In the marriage bed…” She squinted her eyes as tightly shut as she could. “Can ye not consummate our union?” she asked as fast as the words could tumble out.
When he remained silent so long that she feared he had left the room, she opened her eyes and lifted her head. He was still there. At the head of the table. One brow hiked higher than the other. Staring at her. His jaw rippled as though he clenched his teeth to keep from roaring.
“I assure you, dear Harmony, that I am quite able to perform my husbandly duties in our marriage bed—once we have an understanding between us.”
An understanding? That sounded ominous. She took another sip of her chocolate, then rose to refill the cup. This conversation warranted the indulgence. While standing beside the lavish buffet, she turned. “Can I bring ye more tea, Ross? Or a scone, perhaps?”
“You are not to serve me, Harmony! We have servants for that. You are my equal! Why can you not remember that?”
The harshness of the reprimand shocked her, and her mouth dropped open before she could stop it. Where was the kind, quiet man of the past few days? Without a word, she poured her chocolate and returned to her seat, clenching her teeth as, once again, he rose and helped her with the chair.
“It will not happen again, Yer Grace,” she said, purposely using his title because she knew it irritated him. “Please do continue in explaining thisunderstandingwe must come to.” If he thought to bully her, he better think again. She had managed six older brothers and a drunken father and was not about to cower before him.
Ross bowed his head, then scrubbed his face with both hands. “I beg your forgiveness, Harmony, for speaking so sharply. My tone was inexcusable, but please understand it is because I fear you will loathe me when I tell you everything I have to say.”
“I shall be the judge of who and what I loathe.” She gave him a regal nod, not quite willing to let him off so easily. “Speak on, husband. Our breakfast grows cold.”
He kept his head bowed, clearly willing to accept her terse judgment. “The Ramthwaite line, the land, this manor house”—he lifted his head, sucked in a deep breath, and fixed a worried scowl upon her—“they are all cursed. Supposedly. And the older I become, the more I believe it is so. According to the stories, my grandfather called the curse down upon the Ramthwaites thenight my father was born, when my grandmother died giving birth to him.”
“A curse upon ye,” Harmony repeated, bracing herself for the rest of his tale. She had never come across a curse firsthand before, but she had heard enough stories to possess a healthy respect for them. Insatiable curiosity spurred her on. “How did he call it down?”
“When my grandmother died, he went mad with rage. Refused to believe it. He charged out into the night, ranting at God, and fell into an old, abandoned well. After the butler and housekeeper saved him, the well caved in, sucking them down into the muddy pit and burying them alive. My grandfather cursed God and ordered the village church demolished before sunrise the next day.”
Harmony pressed a hand to her chest, willing her hot chocolate not to churn back out. “What a horrible way to die,” she whispered, not even attempting to comment on the foolhardiness of cursing the Almighty or destroying one of His churches.
Ross nodded. “The housekeeper, Nettie Bannerly, is the woman who visited you, even though she promised to behave and remain unseen.”
“Sometimes they canna help themselves.”
“Do not make excuses for her,” he said. “In her ghostly form, Miss Nettie startled the horses pulling my mother’s coach. They stampeded into the creek, overturned the carriage, and my mother drowned when I was six years old.”
