It was going to be a hell of a eulogy.
“Would ye like tae hear it?”
“No,” she said quickly. Too quickly. “I’m sure whatever you wrote will be perfect. Just perfect. I wouldn’t mind hearing more about Frang though. Would you like to talk about him?”
His flat blue eyes lit with an inner light normally lacking in his gaze. “Ye’re a fine woman, Miss Maines. Allorah. Ye show a true interest in people. ‘Tis a rare quality. I find ye most amiable.”
“Uh, thank you. You’re very nice as well.”
He rocked back on his heels, his eyes dropping to her toes before rising once more. “I’ve enjoyed our conversations verra much. Ye listen, truly listen when others speak. Yet ye ne’er speak aboot yerself.”
“Well, I ca—”
“Frang was a serious man,” he cut in.
Al grimaced. Perhaps she never spoke and appeared to be a great listener because he didn’t stop talking long enough for her to get a word in edgewise. Ugh, she wasn’t a fine woman at all to think such thoughts. But in her own defense, she wasn’t used to socializing much either.
“He knew he was destined for the military from birth and took his occupation seriously. He fostered wi’ the earl of Athol and ‘twas his ranks he joined for the recent battle. Are ye sure ye dinnae want tae hear my eulogy?”
She should have stayed in her room, but no.
Al dropped down into one of the chairs and surrendered. “Sure. Go ahead.”
He beamed down at her in approval. “As I said, ye’re a fine woman, Allorah.”
* * *
“What’s all this?”
Al’s head shot up from where she’d been resting it—not at all snoozing—while Artair worked his way down the front page of the eulogy, pausing every now and then to make notes in the margin with a pencil. He’d even started over twice, after changing the wording of a sentence.
Even the old footman Archie’s random but forgetful interruptions hadn’t broken his flow.
Keir’s arrival was her salvation. Heavenly deliverance framed in the doorway to the terrace like a sunlit god.
She wanted to run to him, throw herself at his feet. Sob her eternal gratitude into the pleated hem of his kilt.
“Ah, Keir,” Artair glanced up from the paper. “Allorah was being kind enough tae go o’er Frang’s eulogy wi’ me since ye were nae aboot, but since ye’re back, perhaps I should begin ag—”
“No!” She bit her lip. “I mean, I told you. It’s just perfect. Really.”
“But I hae nae e’en progressed past his childhood yet,” he protested.
“Leave it, brother,” Keir spoke up, striding toward them. He unbuckled his scabbard and tossed it on his desk along the way. “I’ll read it o’er later.”
“But I…” Artair sighed and walked over to put the parchment on Keir’s desk. Moving the sword and scabbard to the side so that he could spread it over the center of the surface. He meant for it to be noticed, not forgotten. “Perhaps this evening, we can…”
Keir pinched the bridge of his nose. “Later, Artair. Please.”
With a brisk nod, Artair shuffled to the door. Pausing, he looked back, his lips parting as if he meant to speak again but eventually, he disappeared through the opening.
“Thank you,” she said. “You saved a life today.”
“Yers or his?” he asked with a half smile, as if producing a whole one might take too much effort. “Allorah is it, now?”
She shrugged. “He’s a mind of his own.”
“Aye, he does.”
A wave of concern washed over her. “Are you all right? You look tired.”
“It’s just been a long day.”
“I’m sorry.”
Acting on instinct, she rose and wrapped her arms around his waist, hugging him tightly. He hesitated only a second before wrapping his arms around her and holding her close. He buried his face in the crook of her neck and simply held her for a long while.
After a while, his arms relaxed somewhat and he shifted to loosen his hold enough to give her space to put her arms between them. She ran her hands up over his chest, marveling at his size and sculpted muscles. Up and up, until her arms were looped around his neck.
His hands ran up her back before tangling in her hair and drawing her head backward, forcing her to look up at him. Smiling invitingly, she complied, expecting him to take the kiss she had evaded last night.
He brushed the hair from her temple, tucking it behind her ear. “Ye’re such a bonny lassie,” he whispered, the gruff rumble sending a thrill down her spine. She wiggled closer.
She tightened her arms behind his neck encouragingly, but he didn’t take the hint. Instead, he drew her back into his embrace, tucking her head beneath his chin.
Confused but not disappointed by his display of affection, Al lowered her arms to his waist. It had been a great many years since she’d been so well hugged. Most hugs were brief squeezes in greeting between friends. Some awkward like those she shared with her mother. Being lost in his arms was paradise.
With a sigh, she melted against him. His heartbeat was strong and steady beneath her cheek. “So what did you do today?”
“I went tae see if I might retrieve Frang’s body from the mass graves there. Och, it was truly horrific, lass.”
How awful! She tried to pull away to look at him but he only held her tighter. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Nay.” His chin brushed back and forth across the top of her head. “Nae now. I’ve other news as well. I’ve found us a witness who will attest tae the fact that Hugh was killed in battle on the Drumossie Muir by some unnamed Hanoverian redcoat.”
Stiffening, she tore herself away and stared up at him in shock. “What?”
“It had tae be done, lass. There will ne’er be peace until he was put tae rest.” He sighed heavily, dropping a kiss on the top of her head. There was a sadness in his voice Al hadn’t heard in days. Another bout of mourning for the brother of his heart.
She was a piss poor substitute for an affection like that.
Chapter 17
“Ouch!”
“Sorry, lass.” Keir peeked beneath the wadded handkerchief he was pressing to her arm, then pulled it away. “I think the bleeding has stopped. Ye shouldn’t need tae be stitched.”
Al twisted her arm and craned her neck to squint down at the bloody nick across her upper arm. It was still oozing slightly but didn’t look too bad.
“I can’t believe she came at me with a knife.”
The fierce frown which had only just begun to fade from between his eyes returned with a vengeance, burying his narrowed eyes beneath his drawn brows.
“I’m ne’er imagined she would react so violently hearing the news. ‘Twas meant tae ease the threat against ye. Nae intensify it.”
His heart had stopped beating when Maeve had thrown herself at Al from across the drawing room. He’d gathered the family there together to hear of Hugh’s death from the witness he’d bribed to deliver the news. He’d thought it the perfect solution, a way to end the animosity running so rampant in the castle. To douse the suspicion of servant and cousin alike.
He’d flung himself into Maeve’s path even before knowing she wielded a small dagger. But he’d been just a fraction of a second too late, succeeding in deflecting the weapon from its path to Al’s heart at least. Despite his effort, the blade had sliced her arm right through the sleeve of her dress.
“Where is Archie wi’ the cluidy bandages?”
“Probably halfway to China by now,” she murmured under her breath. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just a little blood.”
A little blood? The sight of her precious blood had nearly turned him into a madman. He’d flung his cousin away as if she were nothing more than a sack of barley. Caught her under his arm, when she shot forward again, intent on completing her task. Wrenching the knife from her so violently, he probably sprained her wrist.
Whether it was too many years
living in the uncivilized wilds of the western isles or true madness afflicting her, he could no longer welcome his cousin in his home. It was only Al’s plea which had stayed him from clapping Maeve in irons and sending her to the dungeon for a bit of her own medicine.
He wasn’t feeling so kind. Two of his strongest, ergo youngest footmen had taken her away, to be locked in her rooms and guarded. On the morrow, Oran would accompany her home to the western isles. Gone from Dingwall, taking her threats with her.
That she would not be about to witness her own brother’s funeral was no issue with him, but he’d have to speak with Maeve’s husband about her troubling behavior. Her spells of madness were only getting worse since her son’s death.
His witness had fled at the first sign of violence.
“Anyone else hae anything tae say on the matter?” He turned to his brothers, to Ceana who managed to appear mildly amused by it all considering she’d just had her brother’s death confirmed and watched her sister attempt murder.
Oran and Artair shook their heads. His cousin tossed hers. “I might say that if you’d have provided Miss Maines with gowns more suitable to evening wear, she might have had better armor against the blade. Why, a quality silk properly pleated can—”
“Anything else?” he asked, cutting her off.
“I’ll take Maeve tae Northton, Keir,” Artair offered. “Oran needn’t go. He’s tae return to university soon.”
“Nay, Artair. I need ye tae go on tae Rosebraugh, prepare for Hugh’s funeral once we’ve had Frang’s.”
He nodded. “Will we wait for Father then?”
“Aye, we’ll wait tae hear from Mathilde as well.”
“She’ll want tae hear this news,” he pointed out.
“I will write her. If there’s nothing else?”
It wasn’t so much a question as a toll ringing to bring the discussion to an end. As one, the three of them exited the drawing room, leaving Keir and Al alone.
“You have a hell of a family, my friend,” she said as he dropped down next to her.
“Al. Lass…”
How could he possibly apologize for such an appalling incident? He should have known Maeve was more unstable than he’d thought. They’d seen the signs of her madness growing over the past few months. She’d been volatile toward them all but saved her violence for Al.
“Thank you for saving my life.”
“‘Twas nothing.”
Her tiny hand slid into his. “It was my life. And twice in one day, too. One more time and this might become a habit.”
She offered a smile he wasn’t quite yet willing to return.
“I wouldnae hae let her harm ye. On my own life.” It was on the tip of his tongue to say something more but what exactly escaped him. Instead, he raised her hand, pressing it to his lips. Then to his cheek as he bowed his head.
“You’re all worn out, Keir.” Her sweet voice was soft with caring, as if her ordeal were somehow insignificant compared to a long day in the saddle. “Why don’t you go to bed and get some rest?”
She truly didn’t believe herself worth caring and effort. What kind of life was there in the future where one didn’t know their own value?
“Nay, lass,” he said, lifting his head. “I’ll make sure ye’re well abed ‘ere I seek my own.”
“Will you now?” A wicked innuendo laced the words.
Now she flirted with him? He shook his head and drew away. As if he could consider loveplay when she was injured.
“The bandage ye asked for, laddie,” Archie grouched from the door, thrusting out a wad of gauze. After Keir took it from him, the old man shuffled away, grumbling and itching at his thigh.
Returning to the sofa, he folded a bit of the gauze into a square and replaced his bloodied handkerchief with it. Taking another length, he began to wind it around her arm.
Al sighed—in regret? In fatigue? “I don’t suppose you have any bacitracin or an antiseptic laying around anywhere?”
Unfamiliar with the words, he only shook his head. “What do ye need, lass? Something for the pain?”
“No, it doesn’t hurt too bad. I’m mostly worried about it becoming infected. I mean, who knows where that knife has been?”
“Ah.” He retrieved a bottle of his best Scotch from the sideboard. Making another linen square, he doused it thoroughly and pressed it against the wound beneath her bandage.
A shudder ran through her wee body. Though she didn’t make a sound, he felt her pain as if it were his own. Rewinding his work, he tied the outer bandage securely around her arm.
“I could kill her for this.”
“Oh, pooh. You wouldn’t hurt a fly,” she responded with a short laugh.
She didn’t know him at all. The rage that had swept through him would have ended with him snapping Maeve’s neck if Al hadn’t stayed his hand.
“I can’t believe she tried to stab me,” she repeated, softly now. He doubted she even knew she was expressing her disbelief aloud. “What a bitch.”
Feeling the anger boiling up within him anew, he filled a tumbler with Scotch and downed it in one swallow to douse the violent rage. He refilled it then poured another for Al and held it out to her. “Tae heal ye from the inside as well.”
She grimaced at the glass but didn’t take it. “I don’t drink hard liquor, but thanks.”
“Why is that when I ken ye drink wine and plenty of it wi’ dinner?”
“There’s nothing wrong with a glass of wine or two, but that stuff… my stepfather…”
A vague memory nearly whisked away by the high emotion of that day in the dungeon returned to him. “Ah, aye. What did ye call him?”
“A mean drunk,” she said, her voice clipped.
“That’s it. Was he…?”
She snatched the drink from his hand and thanked him briskly. “I’ll take it but only because I’m sure there aren’t many other forms of painkillers handy.”
“There’s some laudanum aboot, if ye’d care for it.”
A shudder ran through her body and she shook her head more vehemently than he thought the offer warranted. Just another question to put to her. Once she was in a better mood. Or if he ever managed to have an inquiry of a personal nature satisfied at all.
She sniffed the whiskey then sipped cautiously, wrinkling her nose so adorably a spark of humor returned to him. “I take it ye’ve ne’er been stabbed before?”
“I stepped on a nail once when I was ten,” she said, taking another sip with only marginally less nose wrinkling. “My grandma had a farm with this creek running through it. She warned me I should have worn my shoes. Personally, I don’t think it would have mattered. It punctured my foot all the way through. Eight stitches. Five on the bottom and three on top. How about you? Ever been stabbed?”
“Just once. A rapier through my side. Mother made nine stitches of it, I believe.”
“Of course there were nine to my eight. So competitive,” she teased. “What was it? A duel with an angry husband?”
“Nay, fencing lessons with Hugh,” he said with a grin. Lifting the tail of his shirt, he pointed to the scar left behind. Felt her gaze on his exposed flesh like a physical caress. He dropped his shirt and fell into a chair across from her. “The tip fell off his blade. We dinnae notice until it was too late.”
“Was he a better fencer than you?”
“Nay, only luckier.”
“Geez,” she said with a low chuckle. “You do arrogance better than anyone I’ve ever met.”
He winked and they laughed together.
With another sip and a sigh, she kicked off her shoes and stretched out on the sofa, cradling her tumbler. “What is with your family, Keir? I’m beginning to think they’re all half-cracked.”
Another of her curious terms. There’d been so many over the past few days, he had half a mind to begin cataloguing them into a sort of dictionary of future terms.
“Half-cracked?”
“Nuts. Bat shit crazy,” she said. �
�Maybe it runs in the family.”
“Are ye implying I’m… er, half-cracked as well?”
A little giggle escaped her. She took another drink of her Scotch. Ah, the joys of a superb whiskey. The old Scots proverb said, alcohol does not solve any problem but then, neither does milk. Though it seemed to be working for his sweet Al just then.
“No, you’re your own special brand of crazy.” She pointed her tumbler at him. “The academic. The one who voluntarily cracks the spine of text books for the fun of it.”
“Would yer own sanity nae be called intae question then as well?” he asked. She twirled a long lock of her hair around one finger. So distracting, he almost lost track of the conversation.
“Probably. But I don’t mind. I think I would’ve been a professional student if I could.”
“Professional student?”
She turned on her side to face him more fully. She hadn’t rolled onto her injured arm, at least, though she did wince slightly at the movement. Tucking her arm beneath her cheek, she curled her feet under her skirts. In all his days, he’d never had a conversation with a woman at her leisure like this. It felt comfortable. Intimate.
Chapter 18
Relaxed by the Scotch, Al curled up on the sofa and smiled at him. There he went, poking into her personal life again. This time she didn’t mind.
She nearly had her life taken away from her far more effectively than any mere wormhole could manage. Or even boredom. He’d saved her. She supposed he deserved some sort of reward for that.
“Yes. Most people I know hated school. I loved it. And would love to just stay in college forever. Go to medical school, law school, maybe. Study archeology. Oh, I’ve always wanted to study volcanology. That would be fun.”
“Why dinnae ye?”
“It’s incredibly expensive. That’s why. And a girl’s got to work.” She sipped more of the now-excellent whiskey. “At least you’ve had the opportunity to study at will. Who knows, with all the research you’ve done and discoveries you’ve made, you might make the history books one day.”
Love in the Time of a Highland Laird (A Laird for All Time Book 3) Page 11