Seduced by a Rogue

by Amanda Scott

  The sun dipped below the horizon as the galley passed Southerness Point a mile west of the river Nith’s outflow.

  Although Jake Elliot had expressed skepticism about Rob’s decision to sail with what remained of the ebb tide, they had made it far enough, barely, to clear the sands. They took shelter as the tide turned by beaching the galley in an inlet northeast of the point, where they waited out the hours of turbulent inflow.

  They had rested and eaten their supper. But they still had nearly five hours before they would enter Kirkcudbright Bay.

  The weather had begun to concern Rob. The wind was blowing straight toward them from the open sea, forcing them to furl their sail and row hard to keep a westward heading. Jake suggested once that they make for shore, but his laird’s curt reply made it clear that a second such suggestion would be unwise.

  Rob would brook no delay now that he could avoid. In the west, clouds that had provided a spectacular sunset billowed black, and he already had seen a few flashes of lightning. But the storm remained distant, and the moon had come up.

  Unless the storm fell upon them with unexpected swiftness and ferocity, he would stay on the water. The wind had blown icily from the north earlier, had shifted often, and would shift again as the storm came nearer.

  He was aching to reach Trailinghail.

  In truth, though, he knew it was not Trailinghail he ached to see but Mairi. He felt himself stir just thinking about her, and wondered what demon possessed Dunwythie that he had not instantly agreed to anything that would bring her home.

  But he knew that that thought was no more complete than the one before it had been, because while he condemned Dunwythie for rejecting the chance to reclaim her, he had to admit lurking admiration for the man’s loyalty to his own people and to the stewartry of Annandale.

  “Laird?” Gibby’s tone was both wary and determined. “Jake Elliot says them clouds yonder be a great storm a-brewing.”

  “We’ll be home before it reaches us,” Rob said reassuringly.

  “Good then,” Gib said, and returned to his place.

  Rob hoped his prediction was right. He wished the contrary wind would shift round behind them and drive them to Trailinghail as fast as the early tide had carried them from it. The irritating sense of unease was still with him and growing stronger. He could not shake the feeling now that it had to do with Mairi.

  During the next hours, the fickle wind shifted several more times in front of the oncoming storm, more than once threatening to blow them to the English coast before its strength began at last to wane.

  The ebbing tide, however slow, and the dropping wind made it easier to maintain a steady pace and stay closer to the coast as they neared Kirkcudbright Bay. From time to time, the bright moon still peeked through the gathering clouds.

  As the galley entered the bay, Rob saw that the water was much too low for them to use the sea entrance. The moon vanished as he ordered his men to row for the beach below Senwick. But he could still make out the cliffs and the kirk tower lantern.

  The stormy black clouds had lowered and were leaking rain in huge drops that spattered on the wood deck of the galley and on the oarsmen. Although the wind had picked up again, blowing hard from the west, the cliffs on the western side of the bay blunted much of its force.

  Rob kept the sail up until the last minute, when two lads brought it down smartly in flapping protest as he shouted for the oarsmen to raise their blades. Jake Elliot disconnected the steerboard, and the galley glided neatly onto the beach.

  Pulling their oars inboard, the men leaped out and hauled the boat high onto the beach, burying its anchors under sand and rock to keep it in place at least until they could attend to it properly.

  “Look after the boat and the men, Jake,” Rob shouted. “Gib, you stay with Jake. I’m going on ahead.”

  Dashing up the steep path, he ignored the increasingly noisy, driving rain as his thoughts rushed ahead to Trailinghail and Mairi.

  Soaked and bedraggled by the time he reached the tower, he ran nearly to the gate before men atop the wall recognized him and shouted for others inside to open it. The wary expressions of the two men who did told him something was amiss.

  “What is it?” he demanded. “Damnation, talk to me! What has happened?”

  “Nowt, laird,” the elder of the two said hastily. “Leastways, we hope ’tis nowt. Just only that ye be in a gey grand hurry for a man wha’ ha’ left the lady Mairi behind ye to look after herself in this pelter o’ rain.”

  Stabbing fear replaced his unease. “What the devil do you mean?”

  “She doesna be in her chamber, laird, and them inside were a-thinking she must be wi’ ye. Did ye no take her wi’ ye when ye left?”

  “I did not,” he said. “I left her safely here. Where is Annie?”

  “Sakes, laird, she be safe in her own bed, a-sleeping.”

  “Have someone fetch her, now.”

  He wasted no time asking how Mairi could have escaped the tower, let alone got outside the wall. He would deal with those questions when he was sure she had succeeded in either endeavor. Curtly, he said, “How long has she been gone, and are you certain she did not leave by this gate?”

  The spokesman said, “Nay, sir, she didna go by us. They did come and ask did we see her, but nae one here did. Nor did anyone pass through this gate till ye came. In troth, though, we dinna ken when she went missing. Annie’s mam be sick, and the lady Mairi gave Annie leave yestereve to stay home wi’ her. But, sithee, wee Gib has disappeared, too. Mayhap he kens what became o’ her ladyship.”

  When the second guard nodded, Rob said, “Gib was with me. He and the others are close behind me. So stand by to open the gate when they get here.”

  Without another word, he hurried inside.

  Chapter 12

  Rob tried to think. Where would she go? How could she go? What dangers might she face? Was she daft enough to think she could escape from Trailinghail?

  If he roused everyone in the castle at such an hour and began questioning them, he would create the very stir he had worked to avoid and would learn no more than that they all thought she had gone with him.

  When he looked into her room—as if she might magically have reappeared there—he saw from its extreme tidiness why Fin Walters or others who had looked in had assumed that she was with him. Especially as Annie had apparently not come that day. Had Mairi purposely told her to stay with her mother?

  Only as he was about to return to the gate to question the guards again did he recall bringing her in through the cave entrance.

  Chills swept through him at the thought. If she had remembered how to find the cave door and managed to get outside the cavern, could she have been mad enough to try to swim or otherwise try to reach Kirkcudbright?

  On that thought, he lit another lantern in the kitchen and hurried down to the storage chamber, finding it as he had left it. Or so he thought until he noticed the pool of wax on the floor. Realizing that she must have put it there herself to hold a candle so she could use both hands to open the door, he noted with a new surge of fear that the latch chain still hung inside.

  Did she not know to put a latchstring through its hole before shutting a door?

  Sakes, as small as she was, had she even seen the hole?

  Unlatching the door, he ripped it open and caught her as she slumped across the threshold. Lifting her into his arms, he failed to see the kitten until it hissed indignantly at him, jumped to the floor, and darted out of the chamber.

  She felt icy cold, and her head fell back limply against his shoulder.

  Quickly shifting her weight in his arms to hold her closer, he saw her eyelids flutter, and breathed more easily.

  “You’re back,” she murmured with a soft sigh as he kicked the door shut and strode with her into the main part of the cellar, leaving his lantern behind.

  “Aye, I’m back,” he growled, heading for the stairway.

  “Put me down,” she said before he got
to the steps. Her voice sounded hoarse, and her teeth were chattering, although they had not been before. “It will be safer for us b-both, going up the stairs, and I’ll w-warm quicker, I think, if I m-move.”

  He doubted she would warm quickly. But as wet as he was himself from the rain, he did not argue. Setting her on her feet, he gestured toward the stairway.

  She took a step but lost her balance, stumbling and nearly falling.

  Rob quickly slipped an arm around her to support her.

  She clutched him, swaying. “My legs went to sleep,” she said. “Curse them!”

  Holding her close again, he could feel her shivering, or himself trembling. In the dim glow from the lantern back in the storage cell he could not tell which it was.

  “I’ll d-do now,” she said after what seemed to be both too long and too short a silence. She let go of him and stood a moment uncertainly, as if she were testing her balance, before she said, “Thank you.”

  But when she took another wobbly step only to sway, he picked her up again. “You’ll do as I bid you,” he said sternly. “It will be gey easier for me to carry you than to catch you when you fall on those steep stairs.”

  He went carefully until he could see that the door at the top remained open. Light from the kitchen spilled down the steps, showing the way clearly and telling him the cooks were there, stirring up the fire and the bake ovens.

  He went quickly past the kitchen to the great hall, knowing that the kitchen servants would need its fire. They’d be preparing food for his supper and that of his returning men. The baker would also begin baking his bread for the morning.

  But the hall fire would be blazing now, too.

  Skirting men who slept on pallets in the hall, he carried Mairi to a wooden settle by the fire. As he set her on it, he could hear her teeth still chattering, and he saw that her lips were blue.

  His still smoldering temper ignited. “What the devil were you thinking?” he demanded, managing only with effort to keep his voice low. “By heaven, lass, you deserve… Sakes, I don’t know what you deserve for doing such a daft thing!”

  Her voice still raspy, she said wearily, “Are you consigning me to the devil or to heaven, sir? You should make up your mind. I did not know that door would shut. It was so heavy, I thought it would stay put. But a demon draft drew it shut.”

  A nearly overwhelming urge to tell her exactly what he thought of reckless women who took daft notions into their foolish heads brought the words right to the tip of his tongue. But before he could utter even one, her eyes shut.

  “Find Annie,” he shouted when Gib looked anxiously into the hall from the stairwell. “Go, lad, run! Tell someone to bring blankets to me here and dry clothing for her ladyship. Then fetch me some bricks to warm by the fire.”

  The lad hesitated. “Be the lady Mairi a-dyin’ then, laird?”

  “Go!” Rob roared.

  Gibby fled.

  Annie came running minutes later with a screen that Gibby, following her, helped her set up. Thus Mairi had privacy and warmth. With Gibby guarding the screen, Annie shooed Rob outside it, saying, “Get ye hence now, laird. Her ladyship will be more comfortable a-changing down here without ye hovering over her.”

  “She does not deserve comfort,” Rob muttered. But he obeyed Annie, pacing back and forth outside the screen until she announced that Mairi wore dry clothing.

  “Her hair do still be damp, laird,” Annie said. “I’ll just go and fetch her comb and brush if I may.” She eyed him speculatively before she added, “Nae doots, she’ll talk more sensibly after she has some supper.”

  “If you are daring to suggest that I am not to talk to her until then, you are wasting your breath,” Rob said.

  “Aye, well, ye’ll no be taking her ladyship to task here in the hall afore all these rough men,” Annie said stoutly. “I ken ye better nor that, laird.”

  “Do you?” He glowered at her. “Tend to your other duties now, Annie. I’ll look after her ladyship.”

  “Aye, sir,” Annie said. With a sympathetic look for Mairi, and her own dignity perfectly intact, Annie left the hall, sweeping young Gib before her.

  Rob shifted his gaze back to Mairi and saw that she was watching him. As had happened far too often with the lass, he could not quite read her expression. But her lips twitched as if she might dare any moment to smile.

  Rob still looked so angry that Mairi was tempted to thank the Fates that he had not found her until she must have looked as if she were teetering on death’s doorstep. The cave’s chilly dampness had penetrated bone-deep, making her fear for a time that she would never get warm again even if someone did find her.

  But despite Rob’s own wet clothing, her body had begun to take warmth from his much larger one as he had carried her up the stairs. Now that her feet were dry and she wore fur-lined slippers, a warm silk shift, and a woolen kirtle in place of her damp clothing and boots, she felt warm enough that she would have liked to take off the thick shawl Annie had wrapped around her.

  Common sense warned her, however, to remain at least a bit feeble looking until after Rob had had his supper. She had learned long since that a well-fed man was less likely than a hungry one to erupt in fury.

  The stern, speculative expression that had made him look as if he were trying to decide how best to punish her had changed to a worried look that for some inexplicable reason made her lips twitch as if they wanted to smile.

  However, his deepening frown banished that sensation.

  She said, “You must be tired after such a long journey, sir. Surely, you also want to change to dry clothing before we sup.”

  “Aye, I do,” he agreed. He looked around the hall, which was beginning to fill with more hungry men than just the soggy-looking ones who had traveled with him. “When Annie comes back, I will,” he added.

  She let herself smile then. “I ken fine that you are angry with me, and I deserve that you should be,” she said. “But before you say all that you want to say, I must tell you that I have never been so happy to see anyone as I was to see you when you opened that wretched, contrary door.”

  He grimaced, and she knew he was struggling again to keep his temper. But then Annie returned with a hairbrush in hand, as if he had never told her to tend to other duties. Instead of objecting, he visibly relaxed when he saw her.

  Even so, he shifted his gaze back to Mairi and said in a calm tone more alarming than she had thought such a tone could be, “You and I will talk later.”

  Annie bobbed a curtsy and said, “Shall I see to her hair afore ye sup, sir?”

  “Aye, and stay with her until I return.”

  Mairi watched him stride away. It was a pleasure to watch the man move. His damp leather breeks hugged his thighs and buttocks so that if one watched only those parts, one could imagine him as a rather magnificent beast of the forest—a very strong beast, capable of making one feel warm and cosseted even when it snarled.

  Annie cleared her throat loudly.

  Startled, Mairi felt heat flood her cheeks as she met her gaze. Sure that she must have missed something Annie had said, she said, “Did you speak to me?”

  Eyes atwinkle, Annie replied, “Will ye be wanting me to sit beside ye to do me brushing, m’lady? Or will ye turn so I can get to them tangles more easily?”

  “Fetch that stool yonder,” Mairi said, gesturing toward one standing near the wall on the opposite side of the fireplace. “I should sit nearer the fire so my hair can dry as you brush it, but I shall grow too hot if I do not take off this shawl.”

  “Aye, m’lady, your cheeks look gey hot now,” Annie said with a grin.

  Men still slept, but those who did not were sitting at their own tables when Rob returned. Mairi and Annie sat at one end of the high table, the latter looking uncertain to be there. She eyed him warily as he strode to the dais to take his place.

  After speaking the grace before meat, he sat down and riveted his attention to his food. Nevertheless, he could hear every move
ment Mairi made, every breath and swallow. Her silence seemed contagious, too, because the usual bustle and chatter died away. It was, he thought, as if every man there were watching her and wondering about him and what he meant to do.

  Word had clearly spread that she had done something to displease him, and they all knew their laird well enough to be sure he meant to learn just how she had done it and who had helped her. They were doubtless also certain that those who had helped would suffer for it, as she would.

  Annie ate quietly, but she, too, kept glancing at him.

  Gib came in with the kitten draped over a shoulder and a mutton chop in the other hand. Ignoring the adults, he went to the settle and sat down to share his chop.

  Only Mairi seemed content in the silence. She looked toward him once, and he had to fight to keep from looking away like a lad caught staring at something he ought not to see. He forced himself to meet her gaze only to feel a strange shifting inside, a physical sensation that nearly brought tears to his eyes.

  Had the sea taken her, he knew he would never have forgiven himself. Focusing firmly on the men in the lower hall, he noted with some satisfaction that as they caught his eye on them, they swiftly returned to their quiet conversations.

  When he had finished, he stood. “We will go upstairs now,” he said to Mairi. “We have much to discuss. Annie, Fin will collect Gib and see that you get home.”

  Mairi drew a long, steadying breath and exhaled it slowly before she stood to follow him from the hall. At the stairs, when he gestured curtly for her to precede him, she did so without comment.

  She was grateful for his silence, chilly though it was.

  At least, she was no longer cold. Her hair was dry and loosely plaited beneath a simple white veil. Her thirst was gone, and her stomach no longer grumbled emptily as it had for hours before he had found her. She knew his anger was due to her actions, and she had known from the moment she looked out of the cave and saw only water there that she would have to face him.