Payton eyed her suspiciously. “What of yours is in London?” he asked. “A pirate’s treasure?”
Grif and Liam exchanged a look, but Mared’s smile brightened. “In a manner of speaking, aye, ye might say so,” she agreed. “But we canna say more than that.”
So they had latched onto a scheme of some sort— just like the Lockharts, barmy lot that they were. “And what has this to do with me?” he asked, his gaze sliding to the décolletage of her gown.
“Our Grif must go to London, then. He’d be gone now, he would, except that…” Mared paused. “Except that we are a wee bit short on funds,” she said, holding her thumb and forefinger a hairbreadth apart to show just how wee short. “A-And, we’d no’ ask, indeed we wouldna, but this is right important. Our only hope is, ah, that… that… yewillhelpus.”
“I beg yer pardon?” Payton asked, not hearing her.
“Diah!” she suddenly exclaimed, exasperated that she had to repeat it. “I said, our only hope is that ye will help us, Douglas!”
“Help ye what?” he asked, and smiled as a fire lit in her eyes.
“What she is trying to say,” Grif said, quickly stepping up, “is that we’ve no funds of our own, and we’ve come to ask if ye might see yer way to lending us a wee bit of yers.”
Money? They wanted his money? The proud, stubborn, we’ll-all-go-down-together Lockharts, who’d not take the shirt off Payton’s back if they were naked and freezing in the dead of winter, wanted to borrow his money?
Judging by the way Grif began to prattle, they obviously mistook his silence for denial instead of the shock that it was. “We need enough to go to London and fetch our… belonging, but when I return, we shall have enough to repay the loan,” he said quickly. “With interest, of course.”
“Soldier’s honor,” Liam chimed in. “Ye have me word it will be returned to ye, every last pence.”
“We’d no’ ask if it wasna so important,” Mared pleaded. “Please, Payton.”
Please, Payton… He could count on one hand the times he had heard Mared use his Christian name, and looked at the three of them standing there—especially Mared, who’d once said she’d not want a prayer from him even on her deathbed. Her cheeks were flushed a dark red—she was remarkably shamed by this request and Payton had never seen Mared shamed, not once in the many years he had known her. Oh no—this woman had the grit of the gods.
“How much would ye look to borrow?”
“Three thousand pounds,” Grif said quickly.
“Three thousand pounds?” Payton half spoke, half choked. “Have ye lost yer bloody minds?”
Mared’s face was flaming. And as much as he would have liked to enjoy her discomfort, for some reason Payton saw this outrageous request as his one viable chance to integrate the Lockhart and Douglas lands and make them the premier Highlands sheep producer. He’d no longer have to worry about encroaching on their lands or their bloody cattle encroaching on his. They’d all prosper.
He strolled to the sideboard that held several crystal decanters filled with Scots whiskey and French wines, his mind rattling through all the possibilities as he helped himself to a tot of whiskey and tossed it down his throat.
“And if ye are no’ successful fetching this… thing?” he asked casually, pouring whiskeys for Liam and Grif. “How will ye repay the money?”
Grif smoothed the sleeve of his coat. “We’d repay ye with a piece of our land.”
Payton almost choked, but managed to keep his expression stoic as he handed a whiskey to Liam. He handed the other to Grif and looked at Mared. “How it must pain ye to come here and ask this,” he said.
Mared rolled her eyes and looked away. She was the most exasperating of all the Lockharts by a furlong or more, the one who made his blood boil every time she opened her accursed mouth. Aye, but since she was a wee lass, she could light a raging fire in the pit of him, one that never ceased to glow when she was nearby.
“I’ll agree to lend ye the money if ye can manage to repay me in twelve months’ time.”
“Done,” Liam said.
“And I’ll ask six percent for me trouble.”
Grif and Liam glanced at one another. “Fair enough,” Grif said.
“And if ye canna repay me?”
Grif was already nodding. “We’ll give ye a portion of the Lockhart lands equal in worth to the original loan, and the six percent—”
“No,” Payton said, shaking his head amicably. “If ye canna repay me…ye’ll give me Mared.”
For a moment, no one spoke a word, and the silence, Payton was pleased to note, was deafening. But then Mared gasped her outrage. “Why, ye bloody—”
Grif instantly and desperately jumped behind her, clapped a hand over her mouth as he yanked her into him, and held her captive while he exchanged a worried look with Liam over her head.
“Ah… Douglas, are ye certain ye know what ye ask?” Liam asked.