by Mia Marlowe
She laughed. “It doesna sound as if ye’ve learned much from your mistake.”
They zigzagged through the kitchen, trying to stay out of the way of Cook and her assistants. Breakfast might be nearly finished, but the laird of Bonniebroch was taking a wife this day and Cook was in fine fettle ordering the feast that would celebrate the union of Adam Cameron and Cait Grant.
“I understand your confusion,” Farquhar said as he ducked under an approaching tray laden with a haunch of venison. “My mistake wasna in running a game of thimblerig. My mistake was in no’ choosing my mark with more care. I ought to have let the steward win.”
“Ye didna ken he was the steward, I dare say.”
“He was someone who was puffed up with his own importance. It ought to have warned me, but the takings had been so lush that day, I wasna as cautious as I should have been. I usually read people better than that.”
“Read people? Ye speak as if they were a book.”
“Oh, aye. In many ways, they are just so,” he said as they continued to walk through the Great Hall toward the staircase that led to her chamber on an upper floor. “Unless a body’s a complete knave, and can lie with impunity, everything a person thinks generally shows on the face.”
Cait gave him a searching look. “I have no idea what you’re thinking, Mr. Farquhar.”
He laughed and patted her hand. “That’s because I’m a complete knave, o’ course. But I must confess ye have me a bit puzzled, milady.”
She nearly missed a step. Could he tell she’d had him gather that wolf ’s bane with murder on her mind instead of her maid’s stiff joints?
“What puzzles you, Mr. Farquhar?”
“Ye’re a bride—a condition much to be desired by every maiden, if my past experience is anything to go by. Ye’ve a fine strapping bridegroom who seems to dote upon ye. There’s a whole castle full of people who are ready to take ye to their hearts as their good lady.” He stopped walking and looked her squarely in the eye. “Ye ought to be brimming with joy, but ye’re not.”
“How do ye know I’m not?” She forced a brittle smile. “I might just be the sort who keeps her feelings to herself. Nothing wrong with that.”
“No, no’ a thing,” he agreed with a shrug. “But if ye were that sort what keeps to themselves, I dinna think ye’d have been forward enough to step up to the pillory when I needed a friend most desperately. No, ye’re the sort who has deep convictions and even deeper feelings. And despite that cat’s smile ye’re trying to foist on me, ye’re no’ happy.”
She yanked her hand away from his arm. “Whether I am or no’ is none of your business.”
“Perhaps no’. But I only say these things to remind ye that I’ve pledged my life to ye, milady.” He thumped his rather hollow sounding chest. “Callum Farquhar may be a cheat and scoundrel, but he’s no’ one to swear to something and then change.”
Since Cait was struggling with her own oath, she was impressed that Farquhar seemed determined to keep his.
“If there’s aught I can do for ye, whatever it might be, I stand ready to do it.” He capped this grand statement with an equally grand bow.
Cait brought her hand to her mouth and coughed to hide her snort of derision. Mr. Farquhar was no taller than she and if he outweighed her by a stone, she’d have been surprised.
“I ken what ye’re thinkin’, milady. Admittedly, I’m no one’s idea of a knight errant at first blush, but such skills as I have, I commit to your cause.”
She smiled, genuinely this time. Farquhar’s gift of self-deprecation made him impossible not to like. “What makes ye think I have a cause?”
“All women do. Maybe ye’d like my help in reforming whatever flaws ye see in your future husband’s character. That seems to be a popular feminine pastime.”
“If the laird of Bonniebroch has flaws, I’ve no’ seen them yet.”
It was a bit puzzling that Adam Cameron didn’t seem to be at all as her father had described him—despotic and power-mad. Of course, Lord Bonniebroch was a bit full of himself, but she’d never met a titled gent who wasn’t. And he did have the power of life and death over his retainers, but he wore that authority lightly and, if his actions toward Mr. Farquhar were any indication, with benevolence.
Perhaps he’s been on his best behavior since I arrived.
It was an unfortunate thought, because it dredged up memories of his “best behavior” in her chamber the night before. Heat crept up her neck and made her cheeks burn.
If Farquhar noticed, and she was certain he must have, he was at least politic enough not to mention it.
“I hope, milady, you will allow me to prepare the poultice for your maid’s rheumatism. I have some skill with herbs and would not have you come to harm through mishandling this one.” He gentled the basket containing the wolf ’s bane out of her hand. “The drying may take some time, ye ken. In the meantime, I expect ye’re aware that willow bark tea will give your servant some ease.”
He did know his herbs. Well enough that if she should try to hurry Adam Cameron to his reward with a tincture of wolf ’s bane, Farquhar was likely to recognize what she’d done. She doubted his oath extended to helping her murder a man, but she could hardly turn down such a well-spoken offer to process the herb for Grizel’s use.
“Thank ye kindly, Mr. Farquhar,” she said as she turned to ascend the stairs alone. “I appreciate your help.”
“Remember, milady. Whatever I can do, I will.”
Cait nodded graciously at him and climbed the staircase. Since the wolf ’s bane was no longer an option, she’d have to consider another, probably messier and riskier, way of ridding herself of the man she intended to wed in a few hours.
Why couldn’t Adam Cameron have been the petty tyrant her father claimed he was? It would make what she had to do so much easier if she could only hate the man as she ought.
When she entered her chamber, Grizel was already there, shaking out the green kirtle Cait would wear for the wedding ceremony later. The ensemble was the most elaborate Cait had ever owned. It would likely take Grizel an hour to dress her, what with the many separate pieces—corset, tight-fitting bodice, slim detachable sleeves, an underskirt and overskirt of scarlet sarcenet, all to be draped over a farthingale—a wicked-looking collection of stiffened cane hoops that reminded Cait of a fishing weir. There was also a lacy partlet to tuck into her bodice to cover her bosom and ensure she looked a suitably demure bride.
For a moment, she imagined what it would be like for Adam to remove the partlet and bare her breasts nearly to the nipples.
No’ a thing demure about that.
Cait’s wedding gown had been packed with lavender sachets and as Grizel fluffed the fabric pieces in the air to smooth out travel wrinkles, the fragrant scent filled the room.
When Adam caught a whiff of it later, would he recognize it as the smell of betrayal?
Cait gave herself a mental box on the ears. Nothing would be served by being double-minded. She’d sworn. She’d deliver.
“Och, there ye are, milady,” Grizel singsonged when she spied Cait from the corner of her sharp eyes. “Just in time to see what the laird brought round for ye.” She waved a gnarled hand toward the small wooden box resting on the foot of Cait’s bed.
“Why did he risk coming to my chamber?” Cait demanded, more tetchily than she ought. Perhaps Grizel would put it down to maidenly nerves instead of the frustration of a thwarted murderess. “Does the man no’ ken ’tis bad luck for the groom to see the bride before they meet in kirk?”
“But he didna see ye, did he now? So, no harm done. Besides, his lordship was quite insistent that ye have this gift before the wedding.” Grizel gave the kirtle another quick shake, making the fabric snap as the last of the lavender tumbled out of its folds. “Open it, child.”
The box was of dark wood, ornately carved with mother-of-pearl inset along the corners, but Cait approached it as if an adder was coiled inside. Instead, when she opened the
hinged lid, she discovered a breathtaking string of matched pearls. Each small orb had developed the luminous glow of age. A finely worked gold pendant in the shape of a filigreed “B” hung from the center.
“B for Bonniebroch, I’ll be bound,” Grizel said. She knew her letters, but had never learned to write much more than her own name. “He said as there’s a note for ye as well.”
True enough, a small roll of foolscap bound with a blue silk ribbon rested beside the pearls. Cait picked it up and walked over to the window for better light before she unrolled it. The script was rough and angular, and an inkblot marred one line of the missive. These were not the precise strokes of a scribe. Adam had written the note with his own hand.
My dear Cait,
The pearls were my mother’s. They have belonged to the Lady of Bonniebroch for as long as the tower has stood. Now, they are yours.
My old tutor taught me that a pearl is formed because something has irritated the oyster, a grain of sand perhaps or some other bit of flotsam, and over time the oyster coats nacre around this irritant until it’s too smooth to bother its host. In the process, it also becomes too beautiful to hide away in an oyster.
It occurs to me that we’re a bit like a pearl, you and me. We started by irritating each other but will, I believe, over time be left with a thing of beauty shimmering between us.
I ken that our union is not by your choice. Nor mine. But before God and man, I promise to love you, and I mean to keep that promise. If my body and my will purpose a thing, I’m convinced my heart will follow.
Until then, I am content to be . . .
Your grain of sand,
Adam Cameron, Laird of Bonniebroch
Her vision blurred with unshed tears. They trembled on her lower lashes but didn’t fall until Grizel said her name. The old woman scurried over and put her bony arms around her.
“Oh, my lamb, what has the wicked man said to make ye weep?”
She wished her maid could read so she wouldn’t have to recount the way Adam’s words took this already princely bridal gift and made it even more dear.
“It’s . . . I canna say, Grizel. Dinna make me, but . . . ’tis a far more lovely collection of words than I can bear.”
Grizel’s lips curled into a smile. “Oh, my lady, I’m so happy for ye.”
Cait put her head on Grizel’s shoulder and wept, sure the old woman thought they were tears of joy.
Instead they were tears of bitter realization. Her father and Morgan MacRath had lied to her. Adam Cameron was not a monster. He wasn’t a tyrant. He wasn’t cruel.
He was a man she might have learned to love.
Chapter 8
“Bide a while and I’ll riddle ye a riddle: How is a bridegroom at the altar like a felon on the scaffold? Both are about to have a noose slipped over their heads. But only the man on the scaffold kens what’s coming.”
From the journal of Callum Farquhar,
trickster, liar, and one who quickly
recognizes others who share those traits.
Adam was no judge of weddings, but he allowed that his was suitably joyful. His people stood shoulder to shoulder, filling the small kirk and craning their necks for the pleasure of seeing their laird take a wife. A trio of bagpipes played a spritely tune as his bride processed down the aisle. Even the priest seemed jubilant, tapping his toe under his cassock in time with the echoing melody.
He only wished Cait had met his eyes more than once or twice while the rite was intoned over them. When he took her hand, her fingers trembled, chilly as icicles. He enclosed her hand between both of his, but no matter how long the priest warbled on, Adam couldn’t seem to warm her.
As they knelt side by side, he snatched a glance down at her. His mother’s necklace rested on the smooth curve of her breasts.
“The pearls suit ye,” he leaned down to whisper when the priest turned his back to them for a bit.
Her lips twitched in a half smile. “No’ bad for grains of sand, aye?”
But then their fleeting moment of connection vanished in the ritual and droning sacrament that would unite the two of them into one. Strange that a few whispered confidences over his bridal gift felt more intimate and true than the recitation of their vows.
During the wedding feast, his bride scarcely ate a bite and spoke little. Adam hoped she was merely suffering from maidenly nerves over the coming night. If that was all that troubled her, he’d settle her fears easily enough. Cait was passionate once roused. He was confident they’d deal well together.
But Adam couldn’t focus on her when his people were intent on raising toast after toast to them. He could have kicked his own arse up between his shoulders when he didn’t notice that old Grizel and the two chambermaids, Jane and Janet, had spirited her away between one boisterous drinking game and the next.
It wouldn’t do to get foxed on his wedding night. He waited for only two more rounds of drinks, then left to the accompaniment of shouts and good-natured jokes. Once he quit the Great Hall, he took the stone stairs to the upper story two at a time.
Adam hadn’t been seeking a wife, but he was surprised to discover he was more than ready to have one. His father had always claimed Adam’s mother was the best part of him.
After she died when Adam was a boy, he was convinced his father was right. Without her gentle influence, the laird of Bonniebroch grew increasingly hard-fisted and hard-hearted. Always a strong leader, his father stopped directing his efforts against those who might threaten his people and turned on his people instead. He controlled every aspect of their lives and enforced his will without pity.
Adam hoped he wasn’t likely to run roughshod over his people like his father had. But just in case his authority grew into a license for cruelty, a woman like Cait, one who had the courage to stand up to a mob, should provide more than enough of a conscience to keep him even-keeled.
Of course, at the moment, he was thinking about other attributes besides her character. Memories of silken limbs and soft skin made him quicken his pace down the corridor.
When he flung open the door to his own chamber, the servants were still fussing around his bed. Cait was sitting in the middle of it while her women brushed out her hair, giggling and whispering words of advice. The covers were tucked under her armpits, but her shoulders were bare.
Except for the pearl necklace, she was naked already. The thought of Cait in naught but her skin gave him an aching cock-stand between one step and the next.
“Leave us,” he ordered. When the women didn’t scurry away quickly enough to suit him, he thundered, “Now!”
So much for not being a tyrant, but a man ought not to be tried when he was in such straits.
The servants bent to snatch up the discarded pieces of Cait’s wedding dress and skittered out of the chamber, dropping curtseys and covering their mouths with their hands to hide their smiles as they went.
When the door closed behind them with a hollow thud, Adam finally turned back to his bride.
Cait was not smiling.
What was wrong now? He’d never felt less welcome to a woman’s bed. And this was the one who ought to have been most receptive to him. She was his wife, for God’s sake.
Still, the woman was naked when she might have been swathed in flannel up to her chin. He ought to count his blessings, but would it strain her to unbend and give just a bit?
“Once again, ye have me guessing, Cait.”
“How so?”
“Ye greet me bare as Eve in glory, but ye’ve no invitation on your face.”
“Ye ought no’ be surprised at my state of undress.” One of her brows lifted. “Ye ripped my night shift to pieces, remember? I didna wish to scandalize Grizel by asking her to repair it before we were wed.”
He chuckled. “That’s probably as well. The old woman did threaten to put an adder in my boot if I gave ye grief. She might think a ruined night shift deserves a visit from a snake.”
“Grizel would never harm ye,” Cait
said quickly. “Dinna say such a thing. No’ ever, no’ to anyone, d’ye hear?”
That was more of a scolding than he’d received since he was a boy. But Cait was talking to him at least, which was several steps up from the aloof way she behaved at their wedding feast. He sat on the foot of the bed and tugged at his boots. They didn’t slide off as he’d hoped.
“Some husbands might expect their wives to help them,” he grumbled.
“Some wives might be dismayed that their husbands are so far gone with drink they are incapable of undressing themselves,” she said in a maddeningly pleasant tone. “But I have confidence in ye, Adam. I believe ye’ll figure out how to unlatch your own buckles.”
Buckles. That was the problem. He’d have thought of it directly. He bent down, unfastened them, and was able to toe off the boots. Then he undid the leather straps that held his sporran and deposited it on the floor.
“I’m no’ so far gone with drink,” he said, grateful his words didn’t slur. He might be a bit fuzzyheaded, but he wasn’t drunk.
“’Tis no matter to me if ye are,” she said. “Of course, it may mean ye’re unable to consummate the marriage. Excessive drink can do that to a man, I’m told. But dinna fret. I’ll prick my finger and leave enough blood on the sheets to satisfy the watchers that everything’s been done as needs to be.”
Adam stood and unwound his plaid from around his shoulders. In a few blinks, he’d unwrapped it from around his waist and was wearing nothing but his long shirt. Despite the fact that the woman was more irritating than any grain of sand could ever have been to an oyster, he still sported an impressive cock-stand.
“Ye willna have to prick your finger, lass.”
He pulled his shirt over his head to stand naked before her and was rewarded by the look of maidenly dismay on her face. He was generously sized and he knew it. Then his conscience needled him.