“How many wives have you had?” she demanded outright.
“None yet.”
His eyes met hers once more and she caught herself searching for the truth in that direct gaze. Another rumour without substance? Or the devil giving her what she most wanted to hear?
Most wanted?
I must be losing my mind to think I care either way.
Disgusted with the both of them, Breghan spun away and ran to the spot where she’d discarded her shoes and hose. She quickly rolled the thin wool up her legs and donned her shoes. Hair prickled her neck and she knew his stare had followed her.
She turned to face him with a firm smile in place. “What made you choose McAllen’s daughter?”
“The lass has certain qualities I require in a wife.”
“You—you’ve met her?” Breghan tensed inside and out. Had he seen her someplace before? Did he know exactly who she was? Had he being toying with her all this time?
He shook his head. “Her reputation precedes her most favourably.”
Where there should have been only relief that he didn’t know who she was after all, came a sudden thrill.
Her virtues had been extolled?
Leave be. What does it matter anyway? No answer will sway my mind.
Her mouth defied her resolve. “What exactly did you hear of her?”
“The lass has twelve brothers,” came the flat reply. “Each one over six foot tall and built like a boulder.”
Confounded, she waited for more as she watched his face eagerly. “Go on,” she said to his silence. “What other qualities caught your interest?”
“None that come to mind,” he said with a shrug.
She was starting to hate that shrug.
And she was thoroughly dismayed with herself. That thrill had come from more than a desire to be acknowledged as a worthy individual.
What had she expected to hear? That he’d fallen in love with her from afar, from an imaginary picture painted by romantic fables of her beauty and gentle nature? An excuse to stop worrying, stop running, to believe that Arran Kerr could truly be a husband who’d cherish her?
“You want McAllen might on your side,” she said dully.
His eyes creased at the outer edges and his lips twitched suspiciously.
When he erupted into a guffawing laugh that had him bent double, her brows crossed. This man seemed to swing between moods like a pendulum without any apparent cause. She folded her arms and glared at him. “Are you laughing at me?”
“N—no, lass.” He started to come up, then fell into another bout of laughter. “’Tis just the idea of a Kerr wanting anything from a McAllen.”
“You want McAllen’s daughter.”
Her reminder sobered him at once and he unbent with a straight face. “I willna dispute that.”
Breghan tapped her foot impatiently. “You’ve still not explained why you chose her above all others.”
If she could uncover some foul motive, she could convince her father of his error in judgement and all would be forgiven.
“You’re mighty curious for a castle lass.”
“I’ve served the young mistress for many years,” Breghan said quickly. “Naturally her fate remains my concern.”
“McAllen’s daughter is your mystery lady?” Serious now, he gave her a long, absorbing look. “Very well, lass, I suppose I do owe you a boon after…” He shrugged.
“You stabbed me?” she offered.
“I’ve ridden alongside McAllen many a time,” he told her. “Most often Tristan, Kyle and Callum were there, sometimes Thomas and James. I knew McAllen had twelve sons, of course, each as strong and towering as the next. It was only when I attended our Queen Mary’s wedding feast at Holyrood, however, that McAllen mentioned a daughter. I admire the man his prolificacy and even more I admire his lady wife. So when McAllen hinted at the merits of a union, I found no reason to stall negotiations.”
Breghan raised a hand to interrupt. She knew very well that Arran hadn’t met her mother at Holyrood in July. “From where do you know McAllen’s wife?”
“I don’t. I admire the lady for bearing a dozen strapping sons and living to see them grow.”
Finally, he was beginning to make sense.
Breghan’s mouth fell open in disgust. “You don’t know the Lady McAllen. You’ve never seen her, never met her. The only thing you admire is her ability to produce a pack of hearty sons and you hope the daughter is made from the same stock.”
“Aye,” Arran stated without a blink.
“You don’t seek a woman to tend your home? To see to your comfort?”
“I have servants for that.”
“Someone to keep you company by the fire at day’s end? Someone you can laugh and talk with?”
“There’s more ’an fifty men at Ferniehirst at any one time, lass. I’ve all the company any man could need.”
Breghan’s voice grew faint as her throat went dry. “Someone to share your worries with?”
“A man takes care of his own troubles.”
Breghan stepped back, needing more distance between them. This…this was what her father had given her to. “You don’t want a wife. You want a brood mare.”
He started forward. “Every man has need of sons to inherit the land and responsibility.”
For that any female of marriageable age would serve. But Arran Kerr didn’t want an heir or two, he wanted a stable full. For that only she, with the proof of her mother’s dozen sons, would do.
He reached out, placing his hands on her shoulders. Breghan shuddered free and took off at a run. Never in her life had she been so insulted.
So degraded.
So determined.
She stumbled into the campsite and dropped down beside the fire.
Duncan looked up from tending the spit in surprise. “Be there trouble? Where is the laird?”
Arran stomped up, muttering, “Women. I’ll never understand them.”
“I heard that.” Breghan turned to Duncan. “Your laird’s reputation is as black as Satan’s soul and yet I thought much better of the man before I met him face-to-face.”
Duncan’s shout of laughter was quickly silenced by Arran’s scowl. “Eh, I’m thinkin’ Broderick could do with a hand at gatherin’ firewood.”
As soon as Duncan left, Arran took his place, hunching over the flames to carve a strip of meat with his dagger. “I have upset you.”
Now there was an understatement. “Is that an apology?”
He looked at her from across the fire. “If that’s what you’re seeking, then you’d best tell me what I’ll be apologising for.”
Breghan stopped herself from deriding him with her list of ready wrongs. As much as that appealed, avoiding marriage to this man appealed more. He’d keep her belly full with bairns year on end and death would be her only respite. ’Twas all he thought a wife good for.
There’d be no companionable nights before a fire.
No shared laughter at the little quirks each day brought.
“Save your apologies for the morning,” she said at last. “You can use them on yourself once you meet your bride.”
“You speak in riddles.” He looked as though he might demand further explanation, tasted the meat instead and declared it done.
The roasted hares were laid side by side on a blanket of fresh leaves. Breghan didn’t refuse when he sliced a generous portion for her. She’d eaten nothing since the previous night.
In between bites, she chose to inform him, “In all your haste, didn’t you stop to consider why McAllen’s daughter reached the grand age of nineteen without any offers of marriage?”
He gave her a blank look.
“The daughter runs to fat,” she declared. “She is mean tempered and as ugly as a wart. ’Twould be an awful trial to beget your heirs on her.”
“My wife should certainly be buxom to carry my offspring. Besides, I prefer my woman with a bit of flesh to hold on to.” He tore off a juicy leg and ripped into it with a
hearty appetite.
“She has a small forehead, a sharp nose and no chin at all,” Breghan went on. Once she was done, he’d consider it a blessing to find his brood mare had fled the pasture.
“If her appearance isn’t to my taste, I’ll douse the candles before climbing into bed at night.” He shrugged those massive shoulders.
It was confirmed.
She hated that noncommittal shrug.
“She has a vicious tongue that none can escape. Everyone from kitchen servant to castle lord falls foul to her scathing rants.”
“If I canna keep her screams sweet in bed, I’ll keep her mouth busy elsewhere.”
Breghan had no idea what he meant by that, but everything else was perfectly clear. Arran Kerr had no interest in his bride’s character or looks. Only one thing filled his mind and she refused to play third party to a union between this man and her womb.
She was back to believing he’d buried six wives. He was clearly capable of using one up and then going on to the next. “Do you plan to spend any time out of bed at all?”
“If McAllen’s daughter is half as bad as you say, then no, at least not with my wife.”
Arran tossed his chewed bone into the fire, his eyes never leaving her. The warm satisfaction in his belly had little to do with roasted hare. She wants me for herself. Bree wasn’t concerned or merely curious, she was jealous.
“As an only daughter, she grew up cosseted and spoilt,” Bree said.
Her voice deepened in what sounded like desperation as she contrived to turn him off his bride. Arran found the huskiness arousing.
“Do you really want to subject your household to screaming fits? Wouldn’t you prefer a biddable wife?”
“There are ways to tame a wilful hoyden.” But Arran was no longer thinking on McAllen’s daughter and he wasn’t sure he would prefer biddable at all.
His gaze lingered on Bree, drinking in her beauty. Her eyes had an exotic slant and the memory of that startling clear blue enticed. He hadn’t allowed himself more than one small taste of those delicious lips, hadn’t trusted his control. Passion lit a fire in her, be it from anger, delight or excitement, turning tempest to temptress.
By God, he was tempted.
She was so slim, her hips so narrow, his hands could easily span her waist. Bedding Bree would be an exercise in tortured restraint, holding back, thrusting slow and staying in control. His shaft swelled at the picture and Arran knew slow and gentle would never be a problem. He’d go to hell and back for the sheer pleasure of making love to her.
He clenched his jaw, clamping down the insanity. Even were he a free man, Bree could never be more than a quick toss in passing. Only one bride was meant for him and she awaited him at Castle Donague. Now he’d learnt of the close association between Bree and McAllen’s daughter, there’d be no bedding tonight either.
It was time to end both their delusions.
“Bree,” he said carefully, “even had I not set my mind on the McAllen lass, I could never have you.”
“Why, of all the insufferable, inexcusable—” Her mouth hung open, as if she’d run out of thought midstream.
“I shouldn’t have kissed you.” Resisting temptation was hard enough without the memory of her lips on his. “It would be best if we both forget it ever happened.”
She shook her head at him, slowly, her hands curling into tight fists at her side. “Your conceited arrogance appals me.”
“’Tis not my arrogance, but the act of begetting you with child that is truly appalling.” The words were out before Arran could stop them, and they were all wrong. He watched her chest heave in fury and tried to make amends. “What I meant to say—”
“You’ve said far too much already.”
Arran could only agree and was relieved when his men chose that moment to return, arms piled high with wood enough for three fires.
“I told you the meat was long ready,” grumbled Broderick.
“The meat, mayhap, but no’ the laird and lady.” Duncan rolled his eyes at the way Broderick dumped his bundle and made a direct line for the fire and food. He saw that Bree had retreated to the outer limit of the clearing and he saw the grim scowl of his laird.
“Then again,” he muttered, “staying away did little to no good.”
Arran awoke with the dawn. He spied Broderick sitting guard against a tree stump, then rolled his head the other way to where Bree had made her bed at the boundary of the clearing, insisting the bush offered some protection from the southeast breeze.
He grinned when he remembered how earnestly she’d gathered leaves and loosened undergrowth to soften the ground beneath her. Once she’d fallen asleep, he’d thrown an extra plaid over her and now she was still deeply tucked beneath the layers. He couldn’t even see a strand of hair.
As he came up from the ground, he dusted the night’s dirt from his own plaid.
“All quiet?” he called out to Broderick.
“Beside Duncan’s snoring?” Broderick stood as well, stretching and yawning as he crossed to Duncan and nudged him sharply with the tip of his boot. “Up with you, sleeping beauty.”
A hand slid out from beneath the covers and grabbed the insolent boot. With a sharp twist, Broderick landed on his rump with a grunt.
Arran left them to it and strolled to where his horse was tethered. He untied the leather bundle that held his personal items and donned the shirt he’d kept clean for this day. Tension nestled low in his abdomen as he brought the length of plaid over his shoulder, fastening it with a silver clasp.
Today he’d meet his bride.
By day’s end he’d be a married man.
A state he’d have avoided forever, if time hadn’t eroded his iron will until his most primal urge lay bared.
We came over wi’ de Bruys, laddie, and none dare say we didna earn our right. I’ll be damned ta let the Cessford runts take from me and mine. Do ye ken, laddie? Ta the devil wi’ Thomas Kerr an’ his kind. They canna wait ta get their bloodied paws on Ferniehirst, but ye’ll no allow that.
The order from his father’s deathbed had been promptly followed with the promise, “Never, Da. Rest now.”
Arran didn’t regret his promise. He’d been born into the power struggle between the Kerrs of Cessford and the Kerrs of Ferniehirst and no doubt it would continue long after he was gone. Neither could he pretend only that promise drove him now.
He wanted sons and daughters, blood of his blood. Before he left this world, he’d stamp it with his legacy. He named it for what it was. Arrogant pride. Selfish obsession. But the ruthless instinct to root Ferniehirst to his seed had grown by bounds with each passing year and he truly hoped the cost wouldn’t be greater than he was willing to pay.
He’d taken great care in his choice of wife to ensure it wasn’t.
Arran’s gaze lifted to seek out Bree with a measure of regret. When he found that she was still curled up in sleep, a line of tension pulled at the back of his neck. He slowly scanned the campsite, listening to Broderick and Duncan’s banter as he searched for the cause of his unease.
“When did you eat the last of the oatcakes?” Duncan demanded. “Before or after you devoured one entire hare by yourself?”
“Wheest, mon, I would have saved the bloody oats if I’d known we’d be stopping for the night!”
The lass didn’t so much as stir at Broderick’s roar of protest. By God, had her wound festered during the night? With dread coursing through his veins, Arran stormed across the campsite, tripping on the log pile, knocking over a flask, oblivious to all but the unnaturally still form.
“Arran?”
“Is aught amiss?”
Ignoring the calls, he dropped down and stripped away the plaid layers. The grip on his gut released when he saw she’d not been rendered unconscious by high fever. And in the next moment tightened tenfold as his mind processed the mound of dead leaves and dirt arranged in the shape of a body.
The lass had fled during the night.
&nbs
p; Chapter Three
Palms blistered from holding the reins too tightly, Breghan guided Angel alongside the water in the struggling light of dawn. She’d stayed with the Tiviot for expediency, placing haste above caution. There was no need to worry about her muddy tracks; Arran Kerr wouldn’t hunt her down. She was merely a woman he felt mildly responsible for, a woman he wouldn’t have. But if he caught up to her on his way to Castle Donague, no doubt he’d once again feel obliged to exert that arrogant goodwill and insist on seeing her safely home. Even if the very thought of bedding her appalled him.
Not nearly as much as it appals me.
At last we have one thing in common.
The grey skies slowly melted into morning and with it came the glorious view of Castle Donague standing proud and alone atop its craggy mound. Breghan cast a longing look at the square tower as she left the river walk, slowing Angel to a trot through the tall pines and ancient oaks as she approached Magellan’s cottage from the rear.
The cottage was set far apart from the others, deep within the woodland. She dismounted and secured Angel’s rein to a sapling surrounded by thick bush. Then she continued on foot. Where blue harebells and pretty wildflowers decorated the village doorsteps, Breghan had to pick her way carefully through the thick blanket of dry nettles and sharp pine needles that led to Magellan’s door.
While the villagers weren’t above seeking Magellan out for potions and cures, they were leery of the white-haired woman who’d travelled from the Isle of Mull with the laird’s new wife and two-score years had done naught to soften their minds. This arrangement suited Magellan and right now it suited Breghan just as well.
The low door swung open before Breghan could knock.
“You’ve come,” Magellan stated.
That she was expected came as no surprise. Nothing was ever unexpected in Magellan’s home.
“I know the predicament I’m placing you in,” Breghan said as she entered the cluttered room, “but please…” She turned to Magellan with tears of exhaustion watering her eyes. “I need you to hide me for a few days.”
“Sit, child.” Magellan closed the door and moved to the small window, twitching back a corner of the roughly woven covering to peer outside. The fabric fell back into place as Magellan turned to where Breghan shifted uneasily in the stool she’d chosen. “You slept outdoors last night. You haven’t been home yet.”
The Devil of Jedburgh Page 3