THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

his bride—-a Highlander with a keen appreciation for the absurd—about his day. To her credit, she did manage an “Oh my, ye poor lamb” and a few commiserating “clucks” between muffled giggles. Imagining her, plump and rosy-cheeked, sitting in her favorite parlor chair with a hand on her belly and tears of mirth rolling down her face, he smiled.
    She asked, “Will Miss Pudding come, then?”
    “Aye, but we’ll not be home for another week.”
    Margaret sighed. “‘Tis just as well. Gives me time to tidy the place up a bit.”
    An ache suddenly materialized between his eyes. “What has his lordship done now?”
    “As soon as you left, he tossed everything the old man owned— from toppers to shoes—into the bailey. Even smashed the telly to smithereens. A shame, that.”
    Tom hadn’t liked the previous heir in the least himself, but to smash the telly...
    He squeezed the bridge of his nose in an effort to ease the pain. “It could have been worse.”
    “Aye, according to your Da, it has been.”
    “Love, I dinna want you goin’ over there.”
    “Dinna worry, Tom. I’m far too pregnant to tolerate another trip to the castle in that wee boat of yours. I’ll send a couple of lads over to snow up the place. But tell me, what does Miss Pudding look like? Will his lordship find her fair? Is she bonnie?”
    “Who can tell under all the paint American women wear.”
    “Tom, I’m no’ in a mood—”
    “She’s attractive, but I suspect she’s really quite plain under all the gloss and feathers.”
    “Oh, dear.” After a pause Margaret asked, “Does she at least have red hair? He has a recorded weakness for titians.”
    “I’m afraid it’s kirk-mouse brown, love.”
    “Augh! I was so hoping for our son’s sake...”
    “Aye, I know.” Since 1408, a Silverstein son had been chosen and educated in law and finance—-despite what aspirations he might hold—-to serve as executor to the Laird of Castle Blackstone. And so it would be for their soon-to-be-born son, unless...
    “If it’s any consolation,” Tom said, “Miss Pudding’s no fool. She asked if Blackstone was haunted.”
    “What did you say, Tom?”
    “I told her I’d never seen a ghost.”
    “Tom! ‘Tis written, as executor, you can’t lie to the heir. A ‘alf truth—by omission or otherwise—is still a lie.”
    “‘Tis no lie to say I’ve never seen him. Heard him, aye. Tolerated his insufferable arrogance and temper, aye. But never once has he deemed me worthy of his august presence, so I didna lie.”
    After a sigh and a long pause, she murmured, “Could Miss Pudding be the one ?”
    Margaret’s reference to the Gael curse levied on their laird just as he died made the words swim before Tom eyes.
     
         Curse ye MacDougall by my will,
         forever lost in nether world
         to pine for all ye lost most dear
         Only by ain token thrice blessed
         ‘tis the way to dreams and rest
         will one come to change thy fate.
     
    “Love, we’ll not know the answer to that question,” murmured Tom, the twenty-third of his line to serve Duncan Angus MacDougall, “unless he takes her.”
     
     
     
    Chapter 1
     
    Drasmoor, Scotland
     
    Yawning, Duncan MacDougall, the laird of Castle Blackstone, stretched in his enormous bed then cursed as the residual stench from Robert Sheffield’s cigars filled his nose. Eight weeks had passed since the old man’s death and still the noxious odor hung about the castle like a shroud.
    Who would come now?
    He prayed it wouldn’t be another cigar smoking fop, but better that than no heir. He feared for his home—where he’d been trapped between life and death for so many lifetimes.
    Victoria Regina had just died the last time a young family had claimed Blackstone. He smiled thinking of John and his lovely wife, Mary. He missed their children. Aye, it had been too long since he’d heard a lass giggle or watched a lad play with the lead soldiers now hidden away in the east wing. 
    But what if Silverstein couldna find a rightful heir? Or worse, what if he had, and the new occupant wanted to convert Blackstone into a bloody tourist attraction?
    Duncan shuddered, picturing thousands of stippled and pierced youths with their pot-bellied parents stomping up his stairs and running their sticky hands over what had taken him a lifetime—at the cost of his soul—to acquire. He’d sooner abandon his long held hope for redemption, to suffer the