“Pardon? What?” she asked dreamily as someone touched her elbow.

Mr. Fitzgerald smiled. “Your butler,” he said, nodding at someone over her shoulder.

Margot forced her gaze away from Mr. Fitzgerald and around to Quint. “Yes?” she asked impatiently.

“Your father asks that you join him in the family dining room.”

Margot blinked. Of all the rotten timing! “Now?” she asked, endeavoring to sound angelic but hissing a bit.

“Shall I hold your champagne until you return?” Mr. Fitzgerald asked.

Margot hoped she didn’t look as ridiculously pleased as she felt. But still, she didn’t trust any number of the young women who were presently circulating about them like sharks. “Umm...” She looked pleadingly at Quint. “Perhaps Pappa might wait?”

But as usual, Quint returned her look impassively. “He asks that you attend him at once.”

“Do go on,” said Mr. Fitzgerald with a warm smile. “We shall have that dance when you return.” He took the flute from her hand and politely bowed his head.

“You are too kind, Mr. Fitzgerald. I shan’t be but a moment.” Margot whirled about, and with a glare for poor old Quint, she picked up her skirts and sailed out.

When she entered the family dining room, the smell of horse and men assaulted her, and Margot had to swallow her aversion to it. She was surprised to see her father seated with the rough-looking men who had arrived at Norwood Park earlier. Her brother Bryce was there, too, watching the five men as one might observe animals in the wild. Four of the men were devouring their food, sounding a bit like a pack of animals who had not eaten in quite a long time.

“Ah, there she is, my daughter, Margot,” her father said, standing and holding out his hand to her.

She reluctantly walked forward and took it, curtsying to him. Up close, she noticed the man with the ice-blue eyes bore the dirt and grime of what she guessed was several days on the road. He wore a dark, unkempt beard, and she wondered idly if perhaps he’d lost his razor. His gaze presumptuously raked over her, from the top of her coiffed hair—the paper birds seemed to interest him—to her face and bodice and down the length of her body.

How rude. Margot narrowed her eyes on him, but her glower seemed to please him. His blue eyes sparked as he came slowly to his feet, towering almost a foot above her.

“Margot, may I introduce Chieftain Arran Mackenzie. Mackenzie, my only daughter, Miss Margot Armstrong.”

One corner of his mouth turned up. Did he not know that to stare so intently was impolite? Margot dipped another perfect curtsy and extended her hand. “How do you do, sir?”

“Verra well, Miss Armstrong.”

His voice had a deep, lilting brogue that was quite unexpected and tingled at the base of her skull.