The MacNaughton Bride (6 page)

Contrary to her,
Kell’s
responses rang out, strong and true, so that
everyone – even those at the back of the church – could hear
him.
 
The brothers responded with
unbridled glee when the clergyman asked who was giving the bride away, but even
that couldn’t get her to crack a smile.
 
When Burke produced the ring with a flourish that called forth titters
from their audience,
Kell
took her hand and could
barely get the thick gold ring onto her finger; it was shaking so badly.
 
Kell
felt
compelled to whisper, “Relax.
 
This
really isn’t the gallows.”

Biting her lip, and worrying
that she’d made a bad impression,
Aislinn
barely got
out, “I know.”

It wasn’t quite the
response
Kell
was hoping for.
 
She looked more nervous now than before
he’d spoken to her.
 
Sighing, he
patted her hand again as he tucked it back into his elbow.
 

When she looked back on it
later,
Aislinn
would realize she couldn’t remember
much of the ceremony, at least until they were pronounced man and wife, and her
husband turned her gently, reaching for the fringes of her veil and carefully
pulling it up and over her face.
 
Before he bent down that great distance between them and kissed her
though, he fingered the scrap of tartan at her shoulder.
 
“That was a very nice thing to do,
Aislinn
MacNaughton
.
 
Thank you for honoring us by wearing
our plaid.”

“You’re welcome,” she
croaked up at him.

Those big hands tugged her
just a bit closer, so that she was pressed up against him in a very
improprietous
manner.
 
One paw drifted up and cradled the back of her head beneath her veil,
tilting her head slightly as his face filled her vision.
 
The surprising thought that it was a
very pleasant face, indeed, flashed through her mind before he kissed the tip
of her nose, then softly pressed his lips to hers.
 
It was an exquisitely tender kiss, with his hand framing her
face as if she was made of the most delicate crystal.

When he drew back, she
smiled tentatively up at him, and
Kell
was lost.
 
He couldn’t believe she was his.
 
Caught up in the moment, he hugged her
tightly to him.
 
His parents had
been matched by their parents, yet they had grown to love each other
endlessly.
 
He was definitely
hoping that history would repeat itself for them.
 
They had a lot of “getting to know each other” to do, and he
had a very important decision to make about what would happen between them
tonight.

But he put that out of his
mind for the moment, and turned himself and his new bride to their guests,
starting down the aisle to the loud and raucous cheers of everyone around them,
and the melodic sounds of the piper, who followed them down the aisle after
their cobbled together wedding party.
 
Both sets of church doors were thrown wide open and, although her
husband was doing his best to shorten his stride to match hers,
Aislinn
felt as if she was gliding down the aisle under no
power of her own.
 
She could see
ahead of them that the small, plainer carriage in which she’d been brought to
the church had been replaced by a large, more ostentatious one with the family
crest painted prominently on the door, liveried footmen and four perfectly
matched white horses.

Her husband handed her up
into the carriage and then followed her in himself, tapping on the ceiling to
set the carriage in motion.
 
Aislinn
found herself sitting on the opposite seat from her
husband, a position she found infinitely comforting, but apparently he had
other ideas and joined her there, forcing her to scrunch herself either into
the corner of the carriage, or closer to him.
 
He seemed to watch her carefully as she struggled with her
decision as to which was the lesser of the two evils.

“I don’t bite.
 
I promise,” he whispered with a
conspiratorial wink.
 
Experimentally,
Kell
held his arms open to
her, hoping she’d trust him enough to come into them.

Aislinn
bit her lip, looking up at him, which she was only beginning to realize was
something she was going to have to get quite used to doing.
 
Very few people in her life had ever
offered her a hug, and she realized with a start that this man was her husband,
and he was simply doing his best to offer her comfort.
 
With that thought in mind, she leaned
herself gingerly into his arms, feeling their overwhelming strength as they
closed around her.
 
His body was
hard as a rock, and she was certain that she would find no comfort here, but as
his arms settled into place locked loosely at her waist, and she could feel the
heat seeping from his body to hers, even though the layers of clothing.
 
It was very nice to be held like this,
she decided, daring to wiggle a little to adjust herself better.

“There – that’s not
so bad, is it, lass?” His voice rumbled to her ears through his chest, low and
quiet.
 

“It’s wonderful,” she
sighed, and
Kell
smiled to himself.

“What about the
ceremony?
 
Was it to your liking?”

She tried to sit up and
away from him, but he wouldn’t let her. She settled for drawing back a bit,
enough to see his eyes. “Oh, dear me, it was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever
seen!
 
And your brothers coming to
walk me down the aisle, and Jenny being able to stand up with me . . . “
 
The tears that had never really left
her flooded back into her eyes.
 
“Thank you.
 
It was better
than I could ever have expected.”

One of his arms squeezed
her tight for a moment.
 
“I’m glad
you liked it,
Aislinn
,”
 
Kell
tipped her chin up, so that
she had to look him in the eye.
 
“This is the first time we’ve had to talk to each other alone, and I
just wanted to let you know that I’ll try to be as good a husband as I possibly
can.
 
I’m not the easiest man to
get along with, but I rarely drink and I’m not a spendthrift
 
- I’m too Scottish for that,” he smiled.
 
“I’m also not given to hitting women,
unless they misbehave.”

Aislinn
was stunned.
 
If he decided to take
his fists to her, she wouldn’t last past the first punch.

Kell
saw the terrified look on her face and rushed to clarify his meaning.
 
“No, I would never belt you one as some
men seem to have a fondness.
 
I’m
speaking of the right of a husband to correct his wife – I believe the
English term is ‘rule of thumb’ – that a man may use a rod no thicker
than his thumb with which to chastise his wife for misbehavior.”
 
She was still looking at him goggle
eyed.
 
“I doubt I’d use any
implement on you – you’re too small.
 
Even a
tawse
would surely wrap
around to areas that are much too tender for such abuse.

“But make no mistake,
Madam, if you misbehave, you will find yourself taken over my knee in an
instant and I will deliver the swiftest of justice to your bare behind with the
flat of my hand until you repent and beg my pardon.”

Aislinn
was finding it hard to breathe, or swallow.
 
This man was going to spank her?
 
She had felt she’d long outgrown spankings.
 
Why, she’d barely been spanked as it
was – her father was too much in his cups to deliver much in the way of discipline.
 
Arthur had tried, once, to spank her
for nearly setting fire to the house by playing with a lit candle near the
curtains of the front window in the parlor of her father’s house, and he had
even succeeded in getting her over his lap . . . but not for long.
 
Aislinn
was
like a whirling dervish, and kicked and bucked and finally bit him on his calf
before he gave up and let her go.

She wasn’t under her
Uncle’s thumb long enough, and he didn’t pay enough attention to her anyway,
for him to have taken any sort of an interest in disciplining her.
 
She had grown up doing very much as she
pleased, and she had never considered that her husband might expect to exercise
his right to control her behavior as he saw fit.
 
Come to think of it, no one had successfully accomplished a
spanking that they intended for
Aislinn
.
 
It just wasn’t done.

Unable to even begin to
process his statements,
Aislinn
shut her mouth slowly
after only just realizing that it had been hanging open like a barn door.
 

Kell
watched her carefully as she absorbed what he’d said.
 
Apparently it wasn’t something she’d considered before, but
it wasn’t at all unusual in this neck of the woods.
 
He didn’t know how things worked in the land of the English,
but around here a man kept close track of his woman, and if she didn’t behave
herself, he was expected to take matters into his own hands and deal with
it.
 
Most Scottish cottages had a
tawse
hanging from a hook in the living area, for use by
the man of the house on his wife as well as their children.

Now
Kell
knew full well that some men abused their wives and used their rights as an excuse
to do so.
 
But he was not now nor
would he ever be that type of man.
 
His wife didn’t know that, however.
 
She had only his word to go on, but she would soon learn
that his word was worth more to him than all of the titles or bank accounts in
Scotland.
 
He was a man of his
word, and everyone around these parts knew the truth of it.
 
Eventually, she would know, too.

They had arrived at the
castle, but
Kell
made no move to get out of the
carriage, or even let her go.
 
He
wanted to bring something up before they went in that had bothered him.
 
“
Aislinn
, I
always want you to tell me the truth, do you understand?
 
Lying is something I won’t tolerate
from anyone, much less my wife.
 
It’s one of the things that’ll get you a spanking that’ll leave you
standing for a month at least.”

Aislinn
nodded, becoming more and more concerned about all his talk about hitting her,
open fisted or not.

“Well, I want you to tell
me why you delayed in coming into the church?
 
I’m not mad about it, or anything, but I just want to know
what made you wait so long to come in?
 
Were you ill?”

His new wife shook her head
“no”, looking down at the hands in her lap as she fidgeted with her wedding
ring, as if it chafed her.

Kell
sighed.
 
He hated guessing
games.
 
“Were you nervous?”
 
He put his hands over hers, surrounding
them completely and enfolding them in his warmth.
 
“Thinking about running away?”
 
Kell
felt her start at his words,
and knew he had hit the answer on the head.
 
“I know that what I’m saying is just so much talk right now
– you have to get to know me.
 
But I’m not an ogre, and I’m not insensitive to your situation.”
 
He couldn’t believe that he was even
considering saying what he was going to say, but it came out anyway.
 
He couldn’t stand that scared little
girl look in her eye another minute.
 
“We’ll take our time and get to know each other.
 
Do you understand what I mean?”

Aislinn
had no clue, but what he was saying sounded very good to her – not being
rushed and taking their time.
 
“I
– I would appreciate the opportunity to spend some time with you.”

He could see that she was
as innocent as he’d feared, and sighed, patting her hand.
 
“Don’t worry, lass.
 
I don’t want you to think that I’m
going to push you into something you don’t want.
 
But – “ he leaned down and looked deeply into her
eyes.
 
“if you had run away, you
would have been learning your first lesson over my knee this very moment.
 
You are never to run from me.
 
Am I making myself completely clear?”

She nodded, more out of
habit than anything else.
 
It just
seemed like the right thing to do.
 
His eyes were so dark and mysterious; she was losing herself in their
unfathomable depths.
 
She’d never
felt so overwhelmed by anyone, and yet, at the same time, so safe and
secure.
 
He made her feel that he
would never let anyone hurt her.
 
That the only person she had to be on her guard around was him, because
if she truly let herself go around him, she’d fall in love with him, and be the
most vulnerable she’d ever been in her life.