His Judas Bride (6 page)

There was still a limit to just how much, but so long as she stopped this, stopped everything
now, it would be fine. Why give him, of all people, the opportunity to suspect anything
was amiss, when it was vital she get Arland back?

These years in Edinburgh, a whirl of balls and parties, were meant to have turned her into a proper glen princess, the ideal chieftain’s wife, not some damned shrew, incapable of keeping her mouth shut.

“You know what I’m thinking?”

“Yes.”

He glanced up. To an undiscerning woman, his handsome face was cool and contained. But she was a discerning one. She was aware of his intent gaze and the utter stillness with which he regarded her. All of her. Top to toe. Although, of course she did not flinch.

His eyes narrowed. “Well then, half an hour, you be outside, fully ready to leave.”

“Fine.”

Well, so it was. Did he think she couldn’t marry his brother, when she had been locked in a dungeon and made, at the age of seventeen, to know far worse than him? Why blanch at this ruthlessness, when this encounter only made her welcome it?

She jerked up her chin. “We can go now if you want.”

* * *

Go now? They could. Callm was happy to, especially if it meant seeing the back of this troublesome piece. But wasn’t he the one who gave orders around here?

Cursing beneath his breath, he strode to the door to call Fallon inside. She shook her head and went on plodding back and forward in the snow, which made him clench his fist on the jamb. Was anyone prepared to do a damn thing he told them this morning?

He cursed even more foully. The thing was
he
couldn’t have got past Dug. But there she’d
stood cool as a mountain stream as if she’d no idea what she’d done. Locked Dug up and everything. An animal that had seen the heat of battle, chased and savaged McGurkie stravaigers, torn the throats and jaws of horse and dog alike, yet was terrified out its coat by
her.

A damned wisp who didn’t even reach his shoulder—something else that wasn’t his type either when it came to women. Morven was tall. And when she stepped out into the yard, what had she been planning exactly? To run after that damned army she’d brought along with her?

Well, within half an hour they
would
be underway. Yes. He would see how eager she was then, how long it took before she ran the same screaming mile all Ewen’s women did. The Brotherhood could make wagers on it. He gave her five seconds. If that.

Already she looked green as pea soup and her cloak looked as if she’d slept in it, for all she’d stood there coolly defying him. He knew because he frequently did such things himself. That was if she’d slept at all.

So really he must conclude for all her talk about things being
fine
and the cool way she’d glided past him into the chamber, her chin so high, the miracle was she didn’t strike her forehead on the lintel. She was up to something all right. Half an hour?

She would bed Ewen if he had to damn well hold her legs apart himself.

* * *

“The half hour is up.”

As her voice peeled across the hall with the clarity of a bell, Callm shoved a spoonful of steaming porridge into his mouth.

Damn, but did she have any idea what it was like eating breakfast in such congenial surroundings? A fire roaring in the hearth. Half a dozen or so Brotherhood men, those who had joined him this morning, and those who had been here last night, dotted around the table. Fallon darting about with plates of oat bannocks. Dug at his feet. Meg and the serving girls pottering in the background.

Dinner? Who knew what that would be? Or where it would be eaten. Tea? A joke usually. Supper? That depended.

Only there she stood, in the doorway, the topaz eyes like shards. The ruby lips he could unfortunately only think about kissing set in a defiant line. And the laughter at the long trestle table ceased, as if Wee Murdie, Snosh, and the others sitting there, had all just died.

His mother, Lady Breanne, had taught him about the rudeness of talking with his mouth full. He shoveled in another spoonful of porridge—a large one—and chewed it around. “What of it?”

If the chit couldn’t make out a word he said, so much the better.

“You said half an hour.”

She could tell the time. Well? Wasn’t that good? So she could also understand this, standing there pretty as she liked, for all her hair wasn’t even combed, he wasn’t for budging.

“Are you in some kind of a hurry?”

He frowned. Well, was she? Wanting to leave right away? Because hell, the half hour couldn’t be up
. Could it?
Not even five minutes of it. And even if it was, what was another ten minutes? Another fifteen for that matter? Meg’s porridge wasn’t just the best, the thickest, honeyed by the bees she let loose on Dunalpin meadow, it was the sweetest, the most delicious, which was why—he reached across the table for the ladle—he was having himself some more.

“You told me, quite clearly, to be ready in half an hour—”

“That was then, this is now. Can’t a man eat in peace with his friends?” He sprawled back in the carved wooden chair. Even that was good to sit in when he thought about spending the rest of the day in the saddle. “Me and the boys here, are just having ourselves—”

“—forty-five minutes ago.”

Callm concentrated on ignoring the way her eyes smoldered, for the way Wee Murdie’s bulged out their sockets and Snosh sprayed oatmeal globules down his tunic.

When it came to who was in charge here, he refused to be undermined by the challenge that radiated from the tips of her prettily disordered hair, to the toes of her soft leather boots, peeking out beneath the hem of her midnight blue cloak.

She was going to marry the turd. Now that she was, his body responding as it did was one thing. As had been clearly demonstrated—forty-five minutes ago, when her insistence they leave now had quite rattled his assurance about who was in charge—he wanted no further dents in his armor. Although he didn’t like women who cowered in fear of him, he refused to be spoken to like this before his men by any woman. He especially refused to be spoken to like this by some Edinburgh educated tinker piece who had somehow imprisoned Dug.

“What are you?” Deliberately he worked a lump of porridge off his teeth with his tongue. “A speaking clock?”

“I hardly think so. Then I should have come in here fifteen—”

“Isn’t that good? Boys, she can count.” He reached for the ale jug. Yes, he would win this battle. “Just wait till she gets there. Then what she’ll be is down on those pretty knees of hers begging me to bring her back here.
Oh please, don’t marry me to Monsieur.
Oh please, don’t let him touch me.
”

The ribald laughter was fine. The laughter he could guarantee. Even bask in it a little when he knew the Brotherhood would always back him. That the ale jug was in danger of being ripped from his hand and smacked over his head, and what would happen about it if it did, he could guarantee too. This creature could do with taming.

The image that flashed in his head wasn’t exactly what he had in mind though. Well, certainly not here in front of everyone. His breath shortened. How the hell did she do that to him?

And not just that. How could he suffer any pangs about the indignant way her eyes brimmed as if he were a brute, when he sat here fighting to show her he was, of course he was, for five years he had not been able to afford to be otherwise?

All right, thoughts about how clever it was to guarantee the laughter, when he had a pretty fair idea what she was facing. Ewen, well Snosh was right about that. The kindness, if maybe she had been trying to run earlier, would have been to let her.

“Fine, fine.” He set the jug down on the table.

Anyway there was sure to be a rejoinder. Christ only knew what they taught in Edinburgh, but the baggage seemed even less familiar with the concept of a woman’s place than he was himself. It was only a case of waiting.

He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “Come here.”

“I beg your—”

He beckoned Fallon, before the chit thought he meant her and next got awkward about that. As if he’d lift her onto the table. Anyway why should he hurry away from Fallon just because Miss High-and-Mighty couldn’t contain herself? As it was he was lucky to call by once a week. It might change with this marriage. All that still remained to be seen. He still had his doubts. Certainly if she tried speaking to the turd like this, flaunting herself in that scrappy damned dress too, Lochalpin would have another war on its hands in two seconds flat. Another mess for him to sort out.

He pointed at his cheek. “Put it there. Missy has a kiss for her favorite sweetheart, doesn’t she?”

Fallon shrieked with laughter, cups and cutlery flying as she tried rolling away across the tabletop. As always he grabbed hold of her ankles. Still no rejoinder, except a stern one from Meg when the jug went over, ale frothing everywhere. Why was that? He couldn’t quite fathom it. Was
she
even looking? He pulled Fallon down onto his knee, wrapping his arms around her.

“No, Daddy.” Fallon’s laughter was deafening. Certainly in his ears.

“What’s this you’re meaning
, No, Daddy?
”

“Dinnae tickle. Dinnae tickle me.” Her squirming was uncontrollable, infectious.

“Is there some other sweetheart you’re giving your kisses to? Hmm? Because I’ll find out. I’m warning you. And then, then I’m going—”

“Please, sir, if you don’t mind, that
is
what I would like to do. Go.” The baggage’s voice cut like a blade all the way across the bustling room, silencing it, silencing Fallon. Him too, to some extent. “I’m very keen to meet my betrothed.”

Once again she told him what to do. Well, he wasn’t having it. Or her thinking she could face him up as she had yesterday. Hard as a pair of crisp new leather boots. Hard as…he tried not to dishonor Morven’s memory thinking what else the damned piece had been hard as. Although, by Christ, it was something that hadn’t been hard often enough in the last five years.

He jerked his chin up and wished he hadn’t. She hadn’t said something else like
If you’re finished
making a fool of yourself with that child
,
but had been quite amenable—for her anyway.
She was
appealing to him, standing there gazing at the floor, her hands like hopeless fists, her slender throat fluttering like a trapped bird. When he hadn’t got her where he wanted in front of his men, he didn’t need this, did he? To think he shouldn’t have opened his big mouth about the half hour.

He huffed out a breath. But he had, hadn’t he? So, now that he had, in front of his men too… He nodded across the table at the Murdies.

“Daddy’s got to go, sweetheart. Take the pretty lady to see Uncle…” He hesitated over the word Turdygub. That would be to bring further complaint from Meg down on his head in an already difficult situation. A situation where he was now going to have to take the chit to Turdygub. “…Ewen up at the castle. You be good. No more swearing. You promise me? Hmm?”

Fallon wrapped her arms around his neck. “Yes, Daddy.”

“Because, sweetheart, if you’re not—”

He ruffled her hair before setting her down. His boots seemed to echo for an eternity across the flagstones, past the stag heads watching dully from their mounts on the draped walls, the pewter shining on the dresser.

The thing was, despite all he’d said he hadn’t expected her to march in here and call him out in front of his men. So now he had no choice but to saddle Satan, didn’t he? So then, tonight, if not before, she and Ewen… Turdypus, not gub…

Christ, what the hell was wrong with him? He could hardly bear to think it, his heart haunting his hollow ribcage with beats that were irregular and too fast. Not when she stood there, her chin lifted, every curve, every fold of her cloak, every shimmer of her gown, every bit of her, brimming, glittering with something that looked remarkably like tears. Not when he wanted her. When he thought, just maybe this way she carried on, what if she was nervous of Ewen touching her? No more. Hell, what woman wouldn’t be?

It all went back to that apology she’d leeched from him. Him, who never gave such a thing. Not even before God.

The anger that raged in his veins had nothing to do with her locking Dug up. It had to do with what had gripped him in that second when she stood there beneath his gaze at the door. The unquenchable desire for her. For the skeins of disheveled silvery-gold hair and her rose-petal perfume. The lust that gripped him now.

That was why in determining he was now going to saddle Satan, he equally determined to stop this advance on his body. As only he knew how. She wasn’t for him. Whatever the reason, he didn’t trust her. He couldn’t explain it. He just didn’t. As for these shrewish Edinburgh manners of hers. Oh, the five damn years of pure enjoyment that must have been, partying and dancing every night on the graves of many of his clan. His own wife’s included.

“Th-thank you.”

No. He wasn’t about to be fooled by these brimming eyes she turned on him, into returning her stare. If she now regretted her rash demand to take her to the castle, it was no odds to him.

The door creaked as he dragged it open. “My pleasure.”

She made to brush past him but he clasped her arm. The way his pulse tripped was unfortunate. It was however something he would quell as opposed to having his palms sweat, although the feel of her, the scent, they did that anyway.

“But let me tell you something, Princess, just so we’re clear. Next time you talk to me like that before my men I’ll kill you. Do you understand?”

Her glance held daggers for all its cool regard. “Perfectly. Now can we go?”

* * *

Oh, and what was he going to do, kiss and tickle her to death? A pussycat like him? Excuse her while she trembled in her boots. Of course, it was not about that. The fact he wasn’t quite as she’d heard. It was about her complete failure to be amenable, so even now all of this had spiraled out of control.
She
had spiraled out of control. That scene, that damnable scene with the little girl. Oh, the devil was clever. Far cleverer than she gave credit for despite having lived in hell herself for years. She should have known she would be outwitted. An empty soul was worthless.