The Bride

by Julie Garwood

  “I don’t have any fat,” Jamie argued. She watched him tear a strip from his plaid, yet still didn’t guess what his intent was. “Clear through, Alec? Oh, God, it’s going to hurt something fierce when it’s—”

  She never finished her sentence. Alec had the dagger out of her flesh as quick as lightning and was wrapping the strip of cloth around her arm before she could get enough strength back to scream.

  “There! That didn’t hurt, did it?” he asked.

  “It did!”

  “Hush, love,” he soothed. “You would have worried about the dagger coming out until you’d made yourself sick.”

  He was right and they both knew it. “If you had to get yourself stabbed, I imagine you picked the best spot. The dagger didn’t hit bone.”

  She let out a gasp. “I knew you’d think this was all my fault,” she told him. Her mind concentrated on his contrary remark and she barely noticed Alec had lifted her into his arms and was slowly standing up. “I didn’t get myself stabbed and you damn well know it.”

  “I know, love, but it’s good of you to remind me,” he told her. He was lifting her above his head now. Jamie started to look down. He felt her tense in his grasp. He thought to warn her not to look down, then decided against it. His caution would only remind her of her precarious position. “At least you found your dagger,” he announced, sounding outrageously cheerful.

  “There is that,” she snapped. “Alec, you’re hurting me,” she cried out when his hand accidentally brushed against her arm. She closed her eyes against the excruciating pain.

  “I’m sorry, Jamie. I didn’t mean to hurt you, lass.”

  The agony in his voice tugged at her heart. “It didn’t hurt overly much,” she said quickly. She felt someone lifting her away from Alec and opened her eyes again. Marcus had her in his arms an instant or two later, and then Alec was over the rise again and she was gently given back to him.

  It barely bothered her injuries at all when Alec gained his stallion. He kept her well cushioned in his arms. His strength was such a comfort to her. She sighed against his shoulder.

  “Why haven’t you asked me if I saw the attacker?” she asked him.

  “I know who it was,” he answered.

  “I think I know, too,” Jamie whispered. “But you’ll have to give me the name first.”

  She knew that didn’t make any sense, and Alec’s grim expression suggested he’d rather not discuss the topic now. She ignored the suggestion, of course, and asked, “Who was the witness?”

  “What witness?” he asked. His concentration centered on keeping his stallion at an easy gait, and he barely took the time to look down at his wife’s face.

  “The witness to Helena’s death,” she whispered.

  “Annie.”

  Two hours later, Jamie was propped up in her bed in the great hall. Alec had kicked the screen to the floor in his hurry to get her settled. The screen had been carried outside and the hall was now crowded with her clan.

  Alec tended to her injuries. She’d given him instructions about the proper powders to use, and made him refashion the bandage on her arm twice before she was satisfied.

  Gavin was awake, too. He had a fierce headache. Jamie wouldn’t let anyone give him any ale, though. She ordered cold cloths on his head and water to drink. He’d have to suffer through his headache, she dictated from her bed, and that was that.

  Jamie never made a sound or showed a grimace while she was being patched up. In truth, vanity was her real motive, not courage. She wasn’t about to act cowardly in front of her relatives.

  Father Murdock had made that task easy for her. The dear priest sat on the edge of the bed and held her hand all during Alec’s work. Little Mary Kathleen was carried in and settled next to her mother when Alec was finished. The three-year-old started crying when she saw the bandage on Jamie’s forehead. Alec soothed the child by telling her to give her mother a kiss.

  Mary immediately did as Alec suggested and was rewarded by her mama’s surprised announcement that she was feeling ever so much better now. The little girl fell asleep a few minutes later, cuddled up against Jamie’s side.

  Jamie saw Marcus motion to Alec. “You’ve found her, then?” she called out.

  No one answered her. Alec started toward the door. “Alec, bring Annie inside,” she said. “I want to ask her why.”

  Alec shook his head. “I’ll listen to what she has to say outside.”

  “And then?”

  “I’ll decide.”

  Father Murdock squeezed Jamie’s hand when she started to call out to her husband again. “Leave it in his hands, lass. He’s a compassionate man.”

  Jamie nodded. “He doesn’t like admitting it, but he is compassionate. Annie’s mind is twisted,” she whispered. “Alec will remember that.”

  And then the sound of that horrid, inhuman laughter filled the hall and she found herself clutching the priest’s hand for comfort. Annie’s words lashed out with the sting of a whip. The venom she screeched was made worse by her singsong tone of voice. “I’ll be your wife, I will. No matter how long it takes me, Kincaid. It’s my right. My right. Helena took you away from me. I challenged you then, Alec, and I’ll challenge you again.”

  Jamie heard another loud burst of laughter, and then Annie started chanting again. “I’ll kill again and again and again until you’ve learned your lesson. It’s my right to stand beside you. It’s—”

  The sudden silence, after such demoniacal sounds, was startling to Jamie. She tried to get out of the bed.

  “Stay where you are, Jamie,” Gavin ordered from the foot of the bed. He loomed over her like an angry avenger. His command was ruined when he put his hands to his head and groaned. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you, milady, but Alec wants you to stay put.”

  “You shouldn’t have yelled at me because it made your head pound,” Jamie countered.

  “That, too,” Gavin admitted.

  Jamie moved her feet out of the way just in the nick of time. Gavin collapsed on the foot of her bed and let out another pitiful groan as he fell back. She guessed he was trying to turn her attention away from the happenings outside by demanding her sympathy.

  “I have complete faith in my husband,” she told Gavin. “You needn’t carry on so to turn my concentration.”

  “Then I can have a drink of ale?” Gavin asked.

  “You can’t.”

  “The bed is getting damn crowded,” Alec announced from the top of the steps.

  Jamie smiled. She waited until he’d kissed her properly before asking, “It’s finished?”

  He nodded. “Alec? You were supposed to marry her, weren’t you?”

  “Edgar had planned to unite the Kincaids with their clan to gain peace. I was pledged to Annie, aye.”

  “But she’s so much younger than you . . .”

  “She’s only one year younger than you, Jamie.”

  “She seems so much a child still,” she whispered. “Edgar changed his mind after Helena’s husband died?”

  Alec nodded. “He did. Helena was carrying her babe, and the king wanted to give her a good home.”

  Jamie nodded, understanding. And then she gave him a magnificent smile. He had to shake his head over her strange reaction. “She didn’t want to leave you either, Alec.”

  He still didn’t comprehend her joy until she turned to Father Murdock and said, “Tomorrow you’ll have to bless Helena’s grave. She must have a requiem mass, too. The entire clan must be there, Alec.”

  “Do you want her to be reburied in consecrated ground, Jamie?” Father Murdock asked.

  She shook her head. “We’ll extend the consecrated cemetery to include that whole section. Alec and I will, of course, be buried next to Helena. It is fitting, isn’t it, husband?”

  “It’s fitting,” Alec announced, his voice husky with emotion.

  “Don’t sound so pleased,” Jamie teased. “I’m leaving instructions for you to be placed in the center, Kincaid. You’l
l have a wife on either side to keep you ‘settled in’ for all eternity.”

  “God help me,” Alec muttered.

  “He already has,” Father Murdock announced. “He’s given you two good women in your lifetime, Alec, and that’s a fact. Our Maker has a sense of humor, too.”

  “How’s that?” Gavin asked between his groans.

  “The sweet lass Alec happens to love comes from England, if you’ll all remember, and if that isn’t a trick on God’s part, I sure as spit don’t know what is.”

  “Oh, God, he’s starting to sound like her,” Gavin said with a laugh he immediately regretted, for his head started aching again.

  Jamie noticed Edith across the room then. She could see how upset the woman was. “You aren’t really meaning to send Edith away, are you, Alec?” she asked.

  When Alec shook his head, Jamie motioned Edith closer. “Edith, you aren’t leaving us. It was just a plan to get Annie to try to kill me again.”

  “Again, wife? Then you knew the fire—”

  “No,” Jamie interrupted. “I didn’t know until I heard Annie laughing just now. I recognized the sound. It was the same I’d heard when I was trapped inside the hut.”

  She paused to give Alec a good frown. “It was most unkind of you to use me as your bait, Alec.”

  “It wasn’t supposed to happen that way,” Alec replied, his tone hard. “Gavin was supposed to stay with you and Marcus was supposed to keep Annie in his sight at all times.”

  “It’s my fault,” Edith blurted out. “I didn’t know you were planning a trap. I thought Annie was ill. She took to her bed after we were told we were being sent away. I was so upset, I didn’t notice when she left.”

  “No, sister,” Marcus interjected. He walked over to stand at Edith’s side. “It’s my fault. I take full responsibility.”

  “But I told you to ready the horses,” Edith argued.

  “It wasn’t anyone’s fault,” Jamie said. “Edith, you do want to stay with us, don’t you? I can’t get along without you . . . until you decide on a proper husband,” she added.

  “You were never meant to leave,” Alec told Edith. “But I wanted Annie to believe I was sending you both away because of your relation to Helena. You’ll remember when I ordered you to leave, I said I didn’t want any reminders of my first wife.”

  Edith nodded. “I do remember.”

  Alec smiled. “You never questioned me. Didn’t you wonder why Mary Kathleen wasn’t included?”

  Edith shook her head. “I was too upset to think it through,” she admitted.

  “I thought of it,” Alec returned. “Though only after I’d left your cottage.”

  “Forgive your laird for causing you such distress,” Jamie advised Edith.

  Edith quickly nodded. “Oh, I understand now.”

  “Would you mind taking Mary up to her room now?” Jamie asked, guessing Edith was close to losing her composure.

  Jamie waited until Edith was carrying Mary up the stairs before she asked Alec the question most worrying her. “What will you do with Annie?”

  He wouldn’t answer her.

  Alec was being impossible. He wouldn’t let Jamie out of their bed for almost a week. He expected her to nap the days away and then sleep soundly through the nights. She thought it rather odd she was able to accommodate him.

  Her convalescence was made easier by her sister’s daily visits. Mary helped her sew the tapestry of Edgar’s likeness, finally taking over the task in full when she realized Jamie didn’t have the patience or the skill for the job.

  During Mary’s first visit, she whispered the news that Daniel had still not bedded her. Jamie was more upset over this announcement than Mary was, but once she’d explained how truly wonderful this intimacy was—in carefully chosen, general terms, of course—Mary’s interest was piqued.

  “He keeps a mistress,” Mary confessed. “But he sleeps in my bed each night.”

  “It’s time to clean your house, Mary,” Jamie advised. “Throw the woman out.”

  “He’d get angry with me, Jamie,” her sister whispered. “I’ve grown to like his smiles too much to prick his temper. He’s being very kind to me, too, now that I’ve quit crying. The man can’t stand tears. I am beginning to care for him.”

  Jamie was thrilled with that admission. “Then ask him to bed you,” she suggested.

  “I have my pride,” Mary countered. “I have thought of a plan, though.”

  “What is it?”

  “I thought to tell him he could keep his mistress and have me, too.”

  “You cannot mean to share the man,” Jamie argued.

  Mary lifted her shoulders in a helpless gesture. “I want Daniel to like me, Jamie,” she admitted.

  She started crying then, just as Alec strolled into the great hall. Jamie held her smile for Mary’s benefit, but she did have to struggle. As soon as Alec saw Mary’s condition, he turned around and walked back outside. “Men do hate tears,” she said in agreement with her sister’s earlier statement.

  “Tell Daniel he must keep his mistress,” Jamie advised. “Now don’t look at me like that, Mary. Then you’re to tell him you think he must need the practice and when he’s gotten it just right, he can come to you.”

  Alec returned to the hall when he heard Jamie and her sister laughing.

  Mary didn’t come to see her sister for two long days. Jamie was in a fretful state, worrying about her sister, but when Mary finally did pay her call three days’ later, she could tell by her happy smile that all was well.

  Mary wanted to give Jamie the details. Jamie didn’t want to hear them. Mary was insistent, and right in the middle of her whispers about how wonderful Daniel was, Alec, Gavin, Marcus, and Daniel came into the hall. They wanted to be included in the conversation. The topic immediately changed.

  Alec kept Jamie up most of the night, making love to her. He wouldn’t let her be as aggressive as she wanted to be, fearing her strength wasn’t fully restored. In the end, he admitted to her the sorry fact that although he was stronger, she certainly had more stamina.

  He left the following morning on duties King Edgar required, and wasn’t due back home for a full week. Jamie used his time away to make another little change in his household.

  She had the bed and its platform moved out of the great hall. The screen now enclosed a buttery. It was yet another English tradition, but once the soldiers realized it would make the ale easier to get to, they went along with her orders without voicing too many complaints.

  Alec came home three days later. The soldiers took their place in line again, ready to defend her.

  Alec sat at the head of the table. His jaw was clenched shut while she explained the necessity of a buttery to him.

  He did have trouble accepting change. Jamie was pleased with him, though, for he hadn’t raised his voice at all. She knew the effort cost him dearly. His face became flushed and the muscle was flexing in his cheek again. She was full of sympathy for him, too. For that reason, she didn’t even bat an eyelash when he asked her in a low, controlled voice to leave him in peace for a few minutes.

  Alec knew she wasn’t upset with his request when she didn’t pause to take a coin from the box atop the mantel. He’d caught on early to her subtle way of letting him know whenever he’d made her angry. She’d never say a word, just give him a good glare and then grab one of her shillings. She didn’t know Father Murdock replaced the coins in the box each night.

  She was still having trouble settling in. Some nights, Father Murdock had as many as nine shillings in his hand.

  Jamie’s sister was just dismounting when Jamie came outside with Mary Kathleen on her hip.

  “I’ve the most horrible news,” Mary rushed out. “Andrew’s on his way here.”

  “Andrew?”

  “The man you were pledged to,” Mary reminded her. “Honestly, Jamie, how could you have forgotten him already?”

  “I haven’t forgotten,” Jamie answered. She handed Mary K
athleen to Mary when her sister reached for the child. While Mary hugged the little girl, Jamie tried to stay calm. “Mary, why would Andrew be coming here? And how did you find out?”

  “I heard Daniel talking to one of his men. All the Highland clans know he’s coming, Jamie. He and his army had to pass through their lands.”

  “Oh, my God, he’s coming here with an army?”

  “He is.”

  “But why, Mary?”

  “The loan,” Mary whispered after she’d put her niece down. “Remember the coins Papa borrowed from Andrew?”

  “How could I forget? Papa all but sold me to Andrew,” she wailed. “Oh, Mary, I can’t be humiliated in front of my clan. I can’t let Andrew shame me this way. Good God, Mary, Alec is bound to kill Andrew.”

  Mary nodded. “Those were Daniel’s very words.”

  “Then he knows the reason Andrew is coming here?” Jamie asked, clearly appalled.

  “Yes. Andrew has had to explain his reason for being in the Highlands. He wouldn’t have gotten very far without being killed already if he hadn’t explained. Sister, haven’t you noticed the Scots don’t like the English very much?”

  “Well, spit, Mary, who doesn’t know?”

  “Jamie, you shouldn’t be talking so unladylike.”

  “I can’t help it,” Jamie cried. “I’m always the last one to know anything around here. Do you think Alec knows Andrew is coming?”

  Mary lifted her shoulders in a helpless gesture. “Daniel says all Scots know when someone comes near their holding. I would guess—”

  “I can’t let this happen. I won’t be responsible for starting a war with England, too.”

  “England? Alec will probably only kill Andrew and his followers.”

  “You think King Henry won’t notice one of his barons is missing, Mary? He’s bound to think it odd when he calls up his army and no one comes. . ..”

  She didn’t bother to finish her explanation, but snatched the reins out of her sister’s hands and quickly mounted Mary’s horse.

  “What are you planning, Jamie?”

  “I’m going to find Andrew and reason with him. I’ll promise to send the coins to him.”