“Sorry to disturb ye,” Finn said. “Just wanted to make sure nothing was amiss.”
“I’m surprised to see the new bridegroom out of bed at this hour,” his uncle said. “Come in and have a whisky with me. I’ve been wanting to have a quiet word alone with ye.”
Finn hoped this was good news for him and took a seat while his uncle poured him a cup.
“Tomorrow we’re going up to our hunting lodge at Helmsdale,” his uncle said. “We’ll stay there for a few weeks.”
“Ye should have good hunting up that way.” Finn could barely hide his relief. With the family gone, he would not have to keep up a pretense of newlywed bliss.
“I’ll leave most of my men behind to protect Dunrobin, as usual,” his uncle said. “But you and your lovely bride, of course, will come with the rest of the family.”
Damn, damn, damn.
“Ye must come to Helmsdale,” his uncle said, apparently noticing Finn’s lack of enthusiasm. His uncle leaned forward. “I need ye there to keep Alex safe.”
“You’re still worried someone may try to harm him?” Finn asked. “Even here in Sutherland?”
“There are still Sutherlands who wish one of their own ruled their clan and its lands instead of a Gordon,” his uncle said as he poured himself more whisky.
“You’re half Sutherland,” Finn said, though that did not carry water with those Sutherlands who considered the earl’s mother—and Finn’s grandmother—a traitor to her clan for usurping the earldom from the rightful heir. “I thought the resentment died down long ago.”
“Tensions have increased as of late.” His uncle sighed as he twirled the golden liquid in his cup.
“Why now?” Finn asked.
“Who knows what set them off this time?” his uncle said with a shrug. “And if not the Sutherlands, it could be the Sinclairs and the Mackays, who would also hope to gain if I lost my only son and heir.”
If the earl had no heir, there would be a fight among every Sutherland who had a weak claim to be the next earl. The chaos and infighting that would ensue would leave the clan vulnerable, and the Sinclairs and the Mackays would take advantage of that.
“I’ll do anything ye ask to protect Alex,” Finn said. “But with you and your guard at Helmsdale, I’m not sure why ye need me.”
“I’m his father. The men won’t respect Alex if they see me watching over him like he’s a bairn in leading strings,” his uncle said. “But no one will think twice when they see Alex sticking close to his older cousin, a warrior admired by the men for his fighting skills and—if the rumors are true—liked even better by the lasses.”
“Ye ought not believe all ye hear, uncle,” Finn said with a laugh. “But if the men know the threat to Alex’s life, they’ll not think any less of him because ye want to keep a close watch on him. In fact, they’ll expect it.”
“I haven’t told the other men.” His uncle paused and stared into his cup. “I can’t be sure one of them has not been bought off by our enemies.”
This was disturbing news, indeed. Finn hoped this was just his uncle’s suspicious nature and not that he had good reason to mistrust the loyalty of his own guard.
“There’s been another accident, and it happened here at Dunrobin,” his uncle said. “Alex was thrown from his horse.”
“Alex told me it was just a thorn in the horse’s hoof.”
“Someone could have put it there,” his uncle said.
That seemed unlikely, but Finn was persuaded there could well be a risk to Alex from the other clans.
“It would be better if more of your men were aware of your concerns and were keeping watch on Alex,” Finn said. “But I appreciate that ye trust me.”
“I know ye love my son as much as I do.” His uncle gripped his shoulder and looked Finn in the eye as he spoke. “And you’re the best warrior I’ve got.”
Finn was surprised by the compliment. His relatives did not hand them out often, particularly to him.
“’Tis a damned shame my brother doesn’t see what a fine son he has in you.” His uncle shook his head. “That Sinclair mother of yours has poisoned his mind.”
It would take a stronger man than Finn’s father to withstand his mother. But no good would come of dwelling on that.
“As for that brother of yours,” his uncle said with a grimace, “he’s all Sinclair.”
That poisoned Sinclair blood ran through Finn’s veins too.
###
Margaret felt out of sorts all morning. After Finn left their bed during the night, she lay awake for hours imagining him with another woman—as if she was not miserable enough after her disastrous attempt to pleasure him.
She had no claim on him and certainly no cause to blame him for seeking out a woman who would give him what she could not. It should not trouble her in the least that he did. In fact, she should be relieved.
And yet it did trouble her, and she was anything but relieved.
The woman Finn went to last night—and may still be with this morning—would be the sort he was accustomed to, the kind he liked, and nothing like Margaret. She would be a voluptuous and bold woman who reveled in her sensuality and knew just how to please him. Despite herself, Margaret imagined him kissing the other woman’s lips and throat the way he had kissed her, running his hands over the woman’s bare skin the way Margaret wished she could let him touch her.
She was not ready to face Finn and whomever he had been with first thing, so she asked Una to have one of the servants bring breakfast up and ate alone with Ella. She could not, however, hide upstairs any longer. Bracing herself to see Finn without showing the hurt she felt, she went down to the noon meal with Una and Ella.
Finn arrived late and sat with the guards rather than with the family at the high table. He looked disheveled and tired. Evidently, he had not slept much either, though for a different reason.
Margaret suddenly realized Helen had been speaking to her, perhaps for some time, and she had not heard a word. “I’m sorry, what did ye ask me?”
“Are ye packed and ready to go?” Helen said.
Margaret’s heart lurched in her chest. Was Finn sending her back? She struggled to calm herself. He had cause to be upset with her, but surely he would have told her himself. And Helen would not be asking if she was ready with a pleasant smile if they were kicking her out.
“Finn hasn’t told ye yet?” Helen asked, raising her eyebrows.
Margaret felt a blush creep up her cheeks. She could not very well say Finn had not spoken to her since he left their chamber in the middle of the night.
“I suppose he got distracted,” Helen said in a conspiratorial whisper. “Ach, newlyweds. I remember those days.”
Margaret managed a weak smile. “Where are we going?”
“To Helmsdale, our hunting lodge fifteen miles up the coast,” Helen said. “We leave in an hour and will reach Helmsdale before supper.”
A short time later, Margaret was in their chamber packing when Finn came in.
“Your Aunt Helen was kind to give me these so that I have something appropriate to wear,” she said to cover the awkwardness between them as she folded one of the gowns and put it in the satchel.
“Ye heard we’re going to Helmsdale?” he asked.
“Aye, for hunting,” she said.
Finn was standing too close. It was so distracting that she made a mess of folding the gown and had to start over.
“I don’t hunt,” she said. “Perhaps I could stay here.”
“And have everyone know I can’t keep a wife happy for even a fortnight?”
“They’ll know it’s me who can’t keep you happy since you’re already bedding other women.” She clamped her mouth shut, appalled at herself for saying that out loud.
“Bedding other women?” Finn spun her around to face him. “Did Curstag tell ye that?”
That was not a denial.
“I have no right to ask, but I hope you’ll be discreet,” she said. “Your aunt h
as taken a liking to me, and she’ll think ill of ye if she hears of it.”
“There’s nothing for her to hear,” Finn said. “I haven’t been with another woman since we met.”
She wanted to believe him. It should not matter so much to her when she could never be what he needed.
“If you’re asking about last night,” he said, “I had a talk with my uncle.”
“Ye did? What did he say?” she asked, turning around to face him. “Did he accept ye into his guard?”
She hoped so. Finn deserved that and more.
If the earl failed to make him a member of the guard, however, she could ask Finn to take her to her sister at Eilean Donan Castle. The prospect of leaving made her chest feel tight. She told herself it was only because it meant so much to Finn to have a place here—and not because she wanted to stay. Even if that was a lie, it was not safe for her to have what she wanted.
“He didn’t exactly tell me about being in the guard.” Finn paused. “He wants me to watch over Alex.”
“He believes there’s still a threat to Alex?” she asked.
“Aye, and he suspects he may have a traitor in his own household.”
She knew all too well that it was usually someone close to you, someone you trusted to protect you, who betrayed you.
“The earl is right to be cautious,” she said. “I should finish packing.”
Turning her back to him, she attempted to withdraw the pouch of stones from where she had hidden it beneath the feather mattress without him seeing.
“What’s in that wee bag?” he asked, leaning over her shoulder.
“Nothing of value,” she said, but she should have known her attempt to discourage his interest would only fan the flames.
“’Tis the only possession ye brought with ye, so it must have value to you,” he said.
“There’s nothing in the bag but bits of broken stone.”
“Can I have a look at them?” he asked.
She stifled a sigh. Since he probably would not give up until she showed him, she upended the pouch into her hand.
“The stone was in a pendant my mother gave to me,” she said as she watched the pieces of black onyx fall into her palm. “My mother believed it had magical protective powers. She gave one to each of my sisters as well.”
“Onyx is a hard stone,” Finn said, picking up a piece between his thumb and finger. “How did it break into such small pieces?”
“My husband smashed it.”
Margaret swallowed against the emotion that clogged her throat as she was flooded with memories from that terrible day. Though she had begged William to let her stay home because she had been so unwell during that pregnancy, he insisted she go with him to Edinburgh. She miscarried in the midst of the Battle of the Causeway.
In her mind, she was once again lying on sweat-soaked sheets, listening to the sounds of the battle outside the shuttered window and fretting about her cousin Lizzie, who had gone out before the fighting began to fetch a midwife. She felt as if her heart had been torn out with the loss of the babe. And deep down, she felt guilty for wishing her husband would be lost too.
William, however, returned before Lizzie. The maid must have told him the child was stillborn. Without waiting to remove his weapons or bloodied tunic, he stormed into the bedchamber, shouting and berating her for her failure. When that was not enough to satisfy his temper, he grabbed the pendant from her neck, snapping the silver chain.
Don’t take it from me! she cried. Please!
This stone was supposed to bring good fortune, he said, clenching it in his fist. But all it’s brought is the devil’s own luck.
He dropped it on the floor and pulled the axe from his belt.
Not my pendant, she pleaded. Please, not that!
She should have known it was precisely because the pendant was the possession she valued most that William had to destroy it. When he slammed the wide end of the axe down with all his strength, bits of the stone shot across the floor.
After he stormed out, she crawled across the floor, weeping as she gathered the broken bits. Lizzie found her passed out on the floor with the broken pieces still clenched in her hand.
Margaret came slowly back to the present.
“I’m sorry he destroyed something so precious to ye,” Finn said. “I hope one day you’ll trust me enough to tell me the whole story.”
Finn closed her hand over the broken pieces of stone in her palm and enfolded her hand in his. She did not even know she was weeping until he wiped the tears from her face. Despite the time and distance from that day in Edinburgh, she was still as broken as her stone.
###
Finn’s thoughts were on Margaret as he went to the stables to collect Ceò for the journey to Helmsdale. Her former husband deserved a slow and painful death, and Finn would like to be the one to give it to him. How could he smash her pendant when he knew it would hurt her so much? As for Margaret’s family, they had been cruel to wed such a kind and gentle lass to a brute like that.
“I may not be good enough for her,” he confided to Ceò as he saddled him, “but I’m better than the wealthy and titled arse she was married to.”
After being at the mercy of such a volatile man, it was no wonder she built a cocoon around herself, hiding her feelings behind a mask of calm. Finn wished he could prove to her that she could trust him, that he would never hurt her.
He led Ceò out of the stable behind one of the lads who was bringing another horse out. When he saw who the lad was bringing it to, he groaned. Curstag was waiting in the courtyard, slapping her gloves against her palm.
“Finn!” Curstag called, and waved to him.
Finn gave her a nod as he passed her and continued leading Ceò toward the tower steps where he was to meet Margaret and Ella.
“Finn!” Curstag called again. When he turned, she gave him a pointed look, evidently expecting him to help her mount.
“Let the lad do it,” he said.
Curstag, however, was a lass accustomed to getting her way. She took the reins from the lad and brought her horse to Finn.
“I thought we could ride to Helmsdale together,” she said. “For such old friends, we’ve hardly had a chance to talk since ye arrived.”
“Don’t play games, Curstag. Ye know damned well that would make Bearach jealous.” God only knew why his brother was so sensitive when she had chosen him over Finn. “Go ride with your husband.”
“Bearach isn’t going with us to Helmsdale.” Curstag tilted her head and looked up at him from under her eyelashes. “He’s gone to visit your Sinclair cousins at Girnigoe Castle.”
“I hope he enjoys his visit with them more than I did,” Finn said.
“I fear I’ll be desperately lonely while he’s gone,” she said as she ran her fingertips down his chest. She was teasing him as she used to, but he was no longer interested.
“If you’re lonely, get yourself a dog,” he said, and removed her hand.
“I know you’re still angry with me after all these years, but I want to make it up to you.” She rose on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear, “Tonight I’ll give ye what ye always wanted.”
“You’re married.” Then he remembered to add, “And so am I.”
“If we’re careful, they won’t find out,” she said with a light laugh, and laid her hand on his chest again.
He suddenly realized they were standing in the courtyard where anyone could see them and get the wrong idea. By the saints, Margaret might see them. He grabbed Curstag by the wrist and pulled her behind the stables where they would be out of view from the tower.
“Listen to me well,” he said, pressing her against the wall by her shoulders. “I would never do that to Maggie—or to my brother.”
“Come, Finn, ye know ye want me,” she said, cocking her head. “Ye always have.”
“I used to. I don’t anymore.” He meant it. For years, he had envied his brother and imagined Curstag’s face on other women he bedded. But
no more.
“I don’t believe ye,” Curstag said.
“I was blind to your wicked heart for years, but now I see ye for who ye are,” he said. “Maggie is the only woman I want.”
“Ye don’t look like a satisfied man to me.” Curstag gave him a sly smile as she touched her fingertip to his bottom lip. “I know you, Finn, and a wicked woman is exactly who ye want in your bed.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath behind him. Nay, his luck could not be this bad. With a sinking feeling, he turned around to find Margaret standing there.
“Good afternoon, Curstag,” Margaret said without a flicker of annoyance in her voice, but when Finn started to help her up onto Ceò, she stepped back from his reach.
“There’s no need for Ceò to carry us all,” she said, fixing her gaze somewhere over his shoulder. “I’m sure the earl can spare a horse for me and Ella to ride on our own.”
Margaret had definitely seen them and drawn all the wrong conclusions.
“Maggie!” Finn called after her when she turned her back on him and walked toward the stables. He caught her arm when she was just inside. “That wasn’t what it looked like.”
“I’m not a fool,” she said. “Ye can do what ye like. I don’t care who ye bed.”
“I think ye do.”
“All I asked was that ye be discreet for the sake of your family as much as for me,” she said. “But it’s your business if ye want to embarrass yourself with your brother’s wife.”
Despite his intention to be patient and understanding, he was beginning to become irritated. Hell, he’d done nothing wrong. He had not even looked at another lass, let alone bedded one, since they met. Even if he had, Margaret would have no cause to complain, since she did not want him. At least, she did not want him enough to lower herself to bed a mere warrior.
“I’ve told ye you’re the one I want, but I’m no monk,” he said. “How long do ye expect me to live like one?”
“Bed as many women as ye like,” she said. “Bed them all!”
By the saints, they were having a real argument. In all the time he’d known her, Margaret had never once shown she was angry, let alone shouted at him. Though he wished Curstag had not upset her, it was rather refreshing not to have to guess what was going on inside Margaret’s head.
Kidnapped by a Rogue, kindle Page 17