Warrior’s Redemption (14 page)

“I thought I’d find you here.”

Their youngest brother was persistent, if nothing else.

“Now that you’ve returned from yer”—Dermid slid a knowing glance from Patrick to Malcolm—“
personal business,
I’m assuming yer ready to deal with our brother’s demands. I’m offering myself as messenger to carry the tribute demanded back to Torquil.”

“We’re no going to—” Patrick began, but Malcolm held up a hand, stopping him midsentence.

He had no intention of disclosing to Dermid the fact that there would be no tribute, especially not in front of Rauf. There was something about the groomsman he simply didn’t trust.

“We’re no going to allow you to return to Tordenet Castle. Yer here with us, safe and sound now, and I intend to keep it that way.”

As he’d expected, Dermid bristled.

“There’s no risk to me in returning to Tordenet. Torquil trusts me. And it only makes sense to send me as I’m the one who kens his movements and his thoughts like no other you have here.”

That Dermid could ever think he had their half brother’s
trust proved more than anything else his youthful lack of judgment.

“We’ve enough to worry over with finding a way to convince Torquil to release Christiana into our hands. I’ll no allow him to hold you hostage as well.”

“All the more reason to send me. I could convince him to release our sister.”

“No.” Malcolm rose to his feet, hoping the lad would accept the finality of his decision. “My decision is made, Dermid. We’ll do this my way.”

Though his brother might not understand the danger he would be in if he were to return to Tordenet Castle, Malcolm had no illusions about it. Torquil was possessed of all that was most evil in their bloodline. He cared for naught but power and wealth, and Malcolm would not expose his youngest brother to that risk again, no matter that Dermid was older than he had been on his first campaign. Dermid was still his youngest brother.

He moved across the room and into the doorway, deciding as he did that he would be the decoy to throw Dermid off the scent of their true plans.

“And where do you think yer off to now?” the lad demanded, obviously not yet satisfied with the way things would be.

Since they’d gone to all the trouble to convince Dermid that Dani was here as his intended, he might as well make use of their duplicity. Keeping the lad busy spying on him would free up Patrick to see to all the arrangements necessary to ready their men to prepare for battle against Tordenet Castle.

“I’m off to see to some of that
personal business
.”
With a grin and a wink he walked out, closing the door behind him.

He decided not to put too much thought into why the idea of finding Dani and spending the day with her kept the grin he wore for Dermid’s benefit from fading.

Striding purposely toward the great hall, he reached his destination only to realize that he had no clue where Dani might be this time of morning. The hall itself was unusually quiet, with not a single person to be found.

No one tending the fires or working in the room at all.

He continued on, his footsteps on the smooth stone the only sound, heading through the small door in the back and down the dark maze of hallways leading to the storage rooms and kitchens.

Stranger than the eerie quiet of the great hall was the scene in the kitchen, with the better part of the women who worked there gathered at the back door, all jostling for position as if to watch some sort of great sport.

His sinking stomach alerted him it would be Dani at the center of that spectacle even before he pushed his way through the women and out the door.

“I dinna think I’d live to see the day when Cook herself would be skimming the ale,” the woman ahead of him confided to another at her side.

“Or carrying her own risen loaves to the ovens, aye?” the second returned, to the vigorous nodding of the first. “There they are!”

Two figures emerged from the alehouse, heads huddled together in conversation. Dani and the head cook.

“What’s going on here?” he asked at last, his curiosity no longer waiting to be satisfied.

“Laird Malcolm!” The woman who had been speaking earlier jumped, obviously surprised to see him here, and surrounded by the women of the kitchen at that. “We tried to discourage her, but she’d no hear of it, that one.”

She nodded her head so hard he wondered if she might not injure her neck.

“Discourage her from . . .”

He had no time to pursue his questions. Dani had spotted him.

“Malcolm!” She hurried toward him, a radiant smile on her flour-smudged face, two clay pots tightly clutched in her arms like battle prizes. “They use the skimmings from the ale for their leavening agent.”

She babbled, so overpleased with her discovery, her eyes glistened with happiness.

“What have you done to yer hair?”

It appeared to be wadded onto her head somehow, with a stick protruding from a spray of golden curls.

“I stuck it up out of the way.” She shook her head, dismissing his question. “The whole concept is brilliant in its simplicity. I should have guessed. It totally explains the tang I tasted in the bread. Here I was thinking sourdough. I can’t believe I wasn’t able to identify it.”

“I’ll take those, lass.” The old cook reached for the pots
Dani carried, tucking them close to her chest. “You’ve had yerself a busy day. Best you go grab a bite to eat now, aye?”

“I
am
hungry,” Dani agreed, her wide grin belying any discomfort she might have felt.

“Lady Danielle and I will adjourn to the gardens. Have one of the serving girls bring something to her there. And send along a wrap as well.”

Though the weather had cleared, there was still a bite of chill in the air.

“Aye, Laird Malcolm. Right away.” The cook agreed with a dip of her head before hurrying inside, shuffling all the gawking women ahead of her like a mother hen with her chicks.

“Thank you, Ada!” Dani called out as she took the arm he offered, allowing him to direct her toward the gardens.

“Is that Cook’s name? I don’t believe I’ve ever heard it used before.” No one had ever dared address the woman as anything other than Cook, so far as he knew, not even in the days when she’d served in his father’s home.

“We’ve had this discussion before, haven’t we? You really need to get over the whole call-you-by-your-job-not-your-name thing.”

Yes. He should have remembered. If there was anyone out there who could convince Cook to use her given name, it didn’t surprise him that it would be Dani.

He led her to the garden, bidding her to take a seat
on the bench in the corner while he relaxed on the ground, his back against a tree.

“So.” She had clasped her hands tightly together in her lap, looking everywhere around her except at him. “What do you grow here in your garden?”

He didn’t really know. “Whatever is needed in the kitchens, I suppose. Herbs, greens.”

It was impossible to tell now, with the first frosts of autumn already past. All that remained were dead brown stalks and stems.

She turned to look at him at last, a hint of a smile in her eyes. “You’re more forager than farmer, huh?”

“So it would seem. And you? What were you doing in the kitchens so early?”

At this she laughed, as if he’d said something amusing. “Early is the only time to be in a kitchen if you want to find out how things get done. And if I’m going to stay in this time, as Elesyria says, I need to learn how things are done.”

“You’ll no be working in the kitchens, Dani. You’ve my word on that.”

Since she’d been taken from her own world and sent here because of him, he’d never see her spend her life as a servant. He’d marry her himself before he’d allow that.

The thought flittered through his mind, shocking him even as it did.

He’d sworn he’d never marry again, never be responsible for another woman. But, as he already seemed to be responsible for her, he could think of
worse things than to spend his life with a woman such as this.

She leaned down toward him, lowering her voice almost to a whisper. “That man of your brother’s is watching us. You know that, right?”

Rauf. He had expected as much when he’d left Dermid with Patrick.

Flour smudged her nose and cheek and, this close, it felt only natural to wipe it away. He reached out a finger, stroking it down her nose, cleaning the powder from her skin.

The dark centers of her eyes enlarged like those of a doe he’d happened upon in the forest and he was sure he heard her breath catch.

With his thumb, he gently stroked the fine dust from her cheek, his fingers resting at the base of her jaw where her pulse beat against his skin like a drummer in the heat of battle.

Before he knew it, he was on his knees, his mouth lightly covering hers. She made no move to pull away and he deepened the kiss, his tongue running across the contours of her lips, sampling the taste of her.

She might have groaned, but he couldn’t be sure; the rhythmic pounding of his own blood echoed in his ears, driving out all sound.

All sound save that of a throat clearing as a young maid arrived with a basket of food.

Dani launched herself away from him, back up onto the bench she’d somehow slid off of, her hands splayed across her pink cheeks.

Oh, yes, at this very moment he could think of many things worse than spending his life with a woman like this.

W
HAT THE HELL
had just happened?

Dani ran her hands over her hot cheeks before lacing her fingers together in her lap.

One minute she’d been warning Malcolm about that creepy groomsman spying on them, and the next she’d been about to eat his face.

Good Lord. When the Faeries had transported her over, she must have left her self-control on the other side. At least any self-control where Malcolm MacDowylt was concerned.

He accepted a basket from the young woman who had—thankfully!—interrupted them, and spread out a selection of bread and cheese on the bench next to her. When he leaned in close to wrap a plaid around her shoulders, her heart beat so loud she was amazed he couldn’t hear it.

Perhaps he did. The lopsided grin he wore had been put there by something.

The breeze blew a curl across her face and she realized that somewhere along the way the stick she’d used to hold up her hair had failed her.

Probably about the same time her good sense had.

She lifted a shaking hand to remove the stick she’d threaded through her hair, wincing when the bark tangled.

“Allow me.” Malcolm stood and leaned over her, carefully separating the hair from around the stick.

Only when he stepped away, once again seating himself on the ground with his back against the tree, was she able to fully fill her lungs.

“Our watcher seems to have disappeared. Perhaps the serving girl frightened him away.”

Or perhaps he’d just had an eyeful.

Which would have been Malcolm’s intent.

Dani wanted to slap a hand to her forehead. What a dunce! It was as if she’d completely forgotten they were trying to convince Dermid that they were an item. No wonder he’d kissed her right after she’d told him they were being watched.

And here she’d allowed herself to think he might feel . . .

She seriously needed to get a grip. After all, the whole idea of using her as a distraction had been
her
idea to begin with. She must have spent too long breathing in those fumes from the vats of ale this morning.

Hopefully, he’d assumed she was acting too. But just in case he hadn’t, she needed to keep it light and breezy now.

“Do you want some of this?” She held out a piece of bread, willing her hand to stop shaking. “Sitting out here with our meal is just like having a picnic on a date, isn’t it?”

He refused her offer with a shake of his head, his hands busy with his knife and a small stick. “Picnic?” His brow wrinkled in confusion as his eyes darted up to hers and back down to the idle whittling of his hand.

“Picnic. It’s when you pack up some food to take
with you to eat outside. For enjoyment.”

“Hmmm,” he responded, as if he were trying to understand the concept. “And for this you set a meeting. A date, you called it.”

“Meeting? Not exactly.” Even though the Faerie Magic had done something so that she could communicate with people in this place and time, there were still many differences in their understanding of individual words. “Where I come from, a date is when two people spend time together to help determine if they really like each other. Sort of a bonding experience. To help you find the person you want to marry. Or just to have a good time.”

“And this . . .” He lifted his chin, motioning around them. “This is what a date is like?”

“More or less.” It was certainly uncomfortable enough to qualify as first-date territory.

“Well then . . .” Malcolm pushed up to his feet, straightening his plaid and replacing the small knife he’d used into the bag he wore at his waist. “I’ve work to do today, lass. Work that’ll no get done as long as I sit and enjoy yer company. Here.” He held out the stick he’d been carving. “To catch up yer hair. Without the bark to snag and pull.”

She accepted the token, surprised that he’d thought to do something like that for her. “Thank you.”

He shrugged and started off, stopping a few feet away and turning to look back. “I propose we picnic another date in the spring. With the plants coming up.
So you can see what grows here, aye? Since yer curious about it.”

Picnic another date?
She held back the laughter that threatened. Laughter that had nothing to do with his mangling of her terminology and everything to do with the intent behind the words.

“I would love to picnic another date with you in the spring.”

No question but that it was she who put the smile on his face that time. With a nod of his head, he turned and strode away, leaving her to stare after him, even after he’d turned the corner.

“It’s lovely to see the two of you coming together so nicely. Though of course it couldn’t be any other way.” Elesyria wandered into the garden and dropped to sit next to Dani. “Not that I was eavesdropping, you understand.”