CHAPTER ONE

      LAYLA CAMPBELL WAS placing dust sheets on the furniture in the now deserted northern wing of Bellbrae Castle when she heard the sound of a firm footfall on the stairs. Goosebumps peppered her skin like Braille and a cold draught of air circled her ankles like the ghost of a long-dead cat.

      No such things as ghosts. No such things as ghosts.

      Her old childhood chant wasn’t working any better than when she had first come to live in the Scottish Highlands castle as a frightened and lonely twelve-year-old orphan. Taken in by her great-aunt, who had worked as housekeeper for the super-wealthy aristocratic McLaughlin family, Layla had been raised in the kitchen and corridors of the castle. In the early days, downstairs had been her only domain, upstairs out of bounds. And not just because of her limp. Upstairs had been another world—a world in which she did not and could not ever belong.

      ‘Is anyone th-there?’ Her voice echoed in the silence, her heart thumping so loudly she could hear it booming in her ears. Who would be coming up to the north tower at this time of day? Logan, the new heir to the estate, was working abroad in Italy, and last time Layla had heard, Logan’s younger brother Robbie was doing a casino crawl in the US. Fear crept up her spine with ice-cube-clad feet, her breathing coming to a halt when a tall figure materialised out of the shadows.

      ‘Layla?’ Logan McLaughlin said, with a heavy frown. ‘What are you doing up here?’

      Layla clasped her hand against her pounding chest, sure her heart was going to punch its way out of her body and land at his Italian-leather-covered feet. ‘You didn’t half give me a fright. Aunt Elsie told me you wouldn’t be back until November. Aren’t you supposed to be working in Tuscany this month?’

      She hadn’t seen him since his grandfather’s funeral in September. And she figured he hadn’t seen her even then. Layla had tried to offer her condolences a couple of times before and after his grandfather’s service and at the wake, but she’d been busy helping her great-aunt with the catering and Logan had left before she could get a chance to speak to him in private.

      But the upstairs-downstairs thing had always coloured her relationship with the McLaughlins. Logan and his brother and grandfather were landed gentry, privileged from birth, coming from a long line of aristocratic ancestors. Layla’s great-aunt and her, by default, were downstairs. The staff who were meant to stay in the background and go about their work with quiet dedication, not share intimate chit-chats with their employers.

      Layla could never quite forget she was the interloper, the charity case—only living there out of Logan’s grandfather’s pity for a homeless orphan. It made her keep a prickly and prideful rather than polite distance.

      Logan scraped a hand through his hair as if his scalp was feeling too tight for his head. ‘I postponed my trip. I have some business to see to here first.’ His dark blue gaze swept over the dust-sheeted furniture, the crease in his forehead deepening. ‘Why are you doing this? I thought Robbie was going to hire someone to see to it?’

      Layla turned to pick up one of the folded dust sheets, flapping it open and then laying it over a mahogany table with cabriole legs. Hundreds of disturbed dust motes rose in the air in a galaxy of activity. ‘He did see to it—by hiring me. Not that I want to be paid or anything.’ She leaned down to tuck the edge of the dust sheet closer around the legs of the table and flicked him a glance. ‘You do realise this is my job now? Cleaning, sorting, organising. I have a small team of people working for me and all. Didn’t your grandfather tell you? He gave me a loan to get my business started.’

      One brow came up in a perfect arc. ‘A loan?’ There was a note of surprise—or was it cynicism?—in his tone.

      Layla pursed her lips and planted her hands on her hips like she was channelling a starchy nineteenth-century governess. ‘A loan I paid back, with interest.’ What did he think she was? An elder abuser? Exploiting an old man dying of cancer with requests for money she had no intention of paying back? She might share the genes of people like that but she didn’t share their morals. ‘I wouldn’t have agreed to the loan otherwise.’

      His navy-blue eyes narrowed. ‘Seriously? He offered you a loan?’

      Layla moved past him to pack up her cleaning basket. ‘For your information, I have never taken your grandfather’s largesse for granted.’

      Feather duster. Tick. Soft polishing cloths. Tick.

      ‘He allowed me to live here with my great-aunt rent-free and for that I will be grateful for ever.’

      She shoved the furniture polish bottle in amongst the other cleaning products in her basket. She had become closer to the old man in his last months of life, coming to understand the gruff exterior of a proud man who had done his best to keep his family together after repeated tragedy.

      Logan let out a long breath, still frowning like he didn’t know any other way to look at her. Story of her life. One look at her scarred leg and her limp and that’s what most people did—frowned. Or asked intrusive questions she refused on principle to answer. Layla never talked about what had happened to her leg, not in any detail that is. ‘A car crash’ was her stripped-down answer. She never said who was driving or why they were driving the way they were, or who else had been injured or killed.

      Who wanted to be reminded of the day that had changed her life for ever?

      ‘Why didn’t he just give you the money?’ Logan asked.

      Layla’s old friend pride steeled her gaze and tightened her mouth. ‘Oh, you mean because he felt sorry for me?’

      Logan’s covert glance at her left leg told her all she needed to know. Just like everyone else, he saw her damaged leg first and her later—if at all. Layla was fiercely proud of how she had made something of herself in spite of impossible odds. She didn’t want to be seen as the orphaned girl with the limp, but the gutsy woman with gumption, drive, ambition and resourcefulness.