The harsh scrape of the dowager duchess’s voice was followed by the low rumble of Cam’s.
“Oh, dear.” Mari jumped out of the bed and searched for something to put on. After she knocked on the door to her maid’s chambers, Lucy rushed into the room.
“Oh, dear,” Lucy repeated Mari’s thoughts exactly.
“Hurry. I must get down there before she hurts him.”
Lucy laughed at the thought but swiftly laced Mari’s dress. “Did you sleep well, Your Grace?” Lucy asked with a sly smile.
A blush warmed Mari’s cheeks. “You shouldn’t call me that. I’m no longer a duchess, and the dowager won’t take kindly to hearing you refer to me as such.”
“The dowager can go suck an egg.”
Mari didn’t scold her, because she felt the same way.
“I’m so glad to see you happy,” Lucy said, quickly looping Mari’s hair up and pinning it.
“Yes. Being with Cam is worth whatever comes.”
Lucy’s lip quivered and Mari clasped her maid’s hand. “All will be well. You’ll see. And if not, I still wouldn’t have changed a thing.”
The maid nodded and bobbed a curtsy as Mari left the room, hoping to stop a domestic war.
Parkes stood by the door to the dining room looking uncomfortable as his mistress clung to his arm. When Mari got closer, she realized the dowager was pushing the poor man into the room.
“Get him out of here, Parkes, or by God, you’ll be out on your ear!”
“What’s amiss?” Mari interceded and placed a hand on Parkes’s shoulder to keep him from moving farther into the room. She didn’t think Cam would hurt Parkes, but it was clear the poor footman would faint if pressed into moving any closer to the looming Highlander…who was peacefully eating breakfast.
“What’s amiss?” The dowager laughed harshly. “It’s not enough I must share my home with you, but that you bring your brute of a husband here as well. I’ll not live under the same roof with that scoundrel.”
“And I told ye, a brute I may be, but I’m not a scoundrel,” Cam called from the table. He winked at Mari, looking incredibly rumpled and every bit the scoundrel. “Very well. We shall miss you when you leave.”
“How dare you?” the dowager sputtered, and Mari had to hide a smile.
“What? I will live where my wife lives.”
“Please, both of you,” Mari interjected. “I’m sure we can come up with a plan that works for all of us.”
“I want him out,” the dowager said obstinately. The poor woman obviously had not experienced the will of a stubborn Scot.
“I’ll not be going anywhere without my wife,” he said calmly.
“Then by all means, take her with you. I was happy here on my own.”
Mari didn’t understand how anyone could be happy being as alone as the dowager always was. It was as if the old woman had imposed her own prison. She could go anywhere, be with anyone, but the dowager always chose to reside in whatever house the rest of her family wasn’t inhabiting at the time.
Until now.
“As I’m sure you recall,” Cam pointed out, “she is being forced to stay here by the court.”
Mari put on a smile. “Perhaps you would be more comfortable at one of the country estates, Mother.”
“I’ve told you not to call me that!” the dowager snapped.
Mari thought she saw a flash of pain across her face, but it was gone before she could be sure.
“And I will not be forced out of my own home by the likes of Scottish heathens.”
“I believe I’ve mentioned that I prefer brute or barbarian over heathen,” Cam said, finishing up the food on his plate.
“You’re not helping,” Mari said crossly.
“I’d argue that I am, since I’m giving instruction on the proper epithets for Scots.” He held out his large hands in innocence.
God, he was infuriating. She’d deal with him later.
“Please consider going somewhere else more comfortable for the time being,” Mari advised the one woman here who could actually leave.
“I’m sure you’d be happy to send me traveling at this time of year. I’d no doubt catch my death in this weather.”
Mari felt a stab of guilt. It was true that the chill of winter was upon them. She sighed in defeat. “All right then, we’ll stay here together. It’s nearly Christmastide. We should all try to find a charitable spirit for the holiday.” She eyed her husband.
He took her hand and drew her closer to him. It wasn’t uncommon for a man to be protective of his wife. But she thought the gesture odd when faced with an aging woman who wasn’t even as tall as Mari, partnered with a frail house servant.
She patted Cam’s hand and tried again. “Perhaps we can start by sharing the breakfast table together. May I get you something to eat, Moth—I mean, Your Grace?”
“I think not. I’ll stay in my rooms until he is gone.”
“It will be quite a long exile, Your Grace,” Cam offered. “Mayhap you should take some sustenance first.”
“You’re really not helping,” Mari repeated in exasperation.
Cam laughed as the old woman sniffed and quit the room. “Aye. That time I wasna trying to.”
…
“I must admit, I like having a library,” Cam said while pouring whisky into a fancy glass. Good whisky, at that.
“You like to read?” Mari asked from her seat across from him. “Wouldn’t the dowager be surprised you are capable of such a civilized thing.”
They shared a smile.
“My parents used to take turns reading stories aloud to us each night. It was my favorite time of day.”
“And not just because your belly was full from just eating supper?” she teased.
“That might have been part of it.” He glanced around the room and inhaled the smells of paper and leather. “I’ve always enjoyed being around books. Being in this room, I can almost feel them tugging me toward their secrets. All the things they already know that are just sitting there, waiting for me to learn them, too.”
Mari smiled and rubbed her stomach. “I hope you will continue the tradition and read to our child each night.”
Cam nodded. “Aye. I will. I promise.” Neither of them spoke of the immediate future, but he knew they both thought about it often. That he would be reading to their child alone because she would be gone.
Perhaps it wasn’t too late. He hadn’t been enough to make her fight to stay. But maybe their child would be. Maybe…
It was time to tell her of his plans.
He took a seat across from her. “I want to tell you something. Though it hardly matters now, but it was a plan I’d wanted to share with you.”
She reached for his hand. “Tell me.”
“I asked Lach for a place for us. That field where we first met. I had planned to build us a proper home there. Nothing as extravagant as what you were used to here, but a home of our own. I didn’t want you living in a cottage or in my chambers in the castle. I wanted to give us a place that was just ours.”
She swallowed. “It sounds lovely.”
He let out a breath and flashed a smile. “I’d planned to have a library, too, for all the fancy houses have them.” He stood again and walked to the window, allowing his finger to trail down the glass. “It would have taken me forever to afford it. We would have been gray and wrinkled before we’d have been able to live there. Our children would be grown with their own little ones, no doubt.” He clenched his fist. “I’m grateful for this place and the time we have, but at times…my heart fills with rage at the unfairness of it all.”
She went to him and wrapped her arms around his waist, resting her cheek against his back.
“Pretending everything is wonderful isn’t working,” she whispered. “It was unrealistic to think we c
ould keep all of our fears inside and not be affected by them. I think it’s better that we are honest with each other and ourselves.”
He nodded and shifted to hold her. “Are you scared?” he asked quietly.
“Yes. Terribly.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Cam had gone on errands early the next morning and still arrived first for breakfast. He filled his plate and had just taken his seat when a woman’s scream had him running out of the room.
“She fell down the stairs,” Parkes said from the foyer, clearly upset.
Cam raced to get to his wife. The baby. But it wasn’t Mari lying on the floor at the bottom of the stairs, but the dowager. The prideful biddy was attempting to get up, using her cane to support herself and failing at the attempt.
“Be still, woman, until we assess how badly you’re injured. Parkes, send for a healer,” he ordered.
“At once, sir.”
“I’m fine,” the dowager barked, but winced and whimpered as the final word crossed her lips.
“Aye, I see that. Let’s check you over.” As he did on a battlefield with wounded soldiers, he went about checking her legs and arms.
“Unhand me, you savage! That is not the proper way to touch a lady.”
“Trust me, Your Grace. I well know the proper ways.” He winked at her to make sure she was thoroughly offended by his remark. When he could see she was in no great harm, he continued his campaign simply to ruffle her, now that he had the opportunity.
“Please just go back to your meal and leave me my dignity, so I might get back on my feet.”
“That will not do at all. Your foot is broken. I believe your wrist is, as well.”
As if to challenge him, she turned her foot and promptly hissed. Then she moved her wrist and winced.
“It’s back upstairs with you, Your Grace.”
He slipped his arms under her frail body and lifted her up, being careful because she might have lesser injuries in other places.
“Put me down, you brute!”
“I’ll do so soon enough.” With a nod to Parkes to lead the way, Cam carried the dowager up the stairs she’d just fallen down and into her elaborate suite of rooms at the farthest side of the house away from his and Mari’s.
He settled her in bed and removed her slipper, noticing how the skin was already turning purple.
“Well, you’ve gotten what you wanted,” she snapped at him when he propped an extra pillow behind her back so she could sit up.
“Nay, hardly. You didn’t break your neck, did ye?” Cam laughed so she knew he was teasing. It was so easy to rile her up, he couldn’t seem to help himself.
As expected, he was awarded a glare of surprised disgust.
“What has happened?” Mari rushed into the room.
“I stumbled on the stairs and your barbarian of a husband couldn’t stash me away in my rooms fast enough.”
Mari blinked at him as he chuckled. “Her foot and her wrist are most likely broken. A healer is on the way to confirm. I merely wanted her to be comfortable.”
“He wanted me out of the way,” the dowager muttered. “And we don’t have healers, we have physicians.”
“Ah, I’m sorry.” Cam crossed his arms. “A physician will have to do, I guess.”
Her lips pulled up tighter, and he hid a smile. He really couldn’t help himself.
“I’ll bring up some breakfast for you,” Cam offered.
“I’ll not eat anything you’ve touched.”
“I’m not planning to touch it.”
“Please stop.” Mari raised a hand at each of them. “I’ll bring you your meal—”
“Nay.” Cam shook his head. “I’ll not have another lass fall down those stairs. Especially not the one carrying my babe in her belly. I’ll get the food, and you will eat it, you miserable old crow.”
With that he left. He passed the physician on the stairs as Parkes led him up to the dowager’s room. The man’s eyes went wide, and he moved to the far side of the steps so as not to risk brushing against Cam’s kilt.
Bloody English.
Cam offered the man a menacing smile, and he practically ran the rest of the way up the stairs.
Had Cam known being in London would be so much fun, he might have visited sooner.
…
Mari sat with the dowager as the physician checked her over. Cam had been correct. Her foot and wrist were both broken.
Her former mother-in-law looked close to tears when the man told her she would need to stay in bed indefinitely. “People who stay in bed never leave them,” she complained.
“You’ll be up and around soon enough. Sooner if you mind what I say and stay off that foot until it’s healed properly,” the physician scolded.
“These people—”
“I used to live here,” Mari reminded the woman stiffly. “And I can assure you I have no need for any of your fancy possessions. I’ll not be able to use them where I’m going.”
That shut them up.
The dowager looked away and let out a breath. “Very well. I’ll stay up here and hope for the best.”
“I’ll make sure you’re taken care of,” Mari promised.
She didn’t know why she felt the need to see to the woman’s health and comfort. The dowager had been nothing but nasty to Mari every time they’d ever shared the same space.
But there was something about facing death that made Mari want to treasure every bit of life while she had the chance. She would make sure she had no regrets over how she’d lived her life at the end. Caring for people—even surly dowagers—made her feel needed. As though she actually served a purpose here on Earth.
She rubbed her stomach as she remembered her true purpose.
To love her husband and child for as long as she drew breath.
…
“I feel sorry for the dowager,” Mari told Cam a few days after the witch had been settled in her rooms.
Cam’s eyes widened. “You must be joking.”
“No.”
“Then ye have the kindest heart imaginable, to care for someone so prickly.” He kissed the top of her head, knowing his words were true.
“I think she is deliberately mean. It’s her way of keeping people at a distance so she doesn’t have a chance to care about them.”
Cam thought about it and realized Mari might be right. No one could be that hideous unless they were trying hard to be. “Or mayhap she’s just a miserable crow, as I’ve said.”
“No doubt we’re both correct. But my guess is she wasn’t born this way. People seldom are. I think she grew to be this way from experiencing constant hurt and disappointment. I know her son, the late duke, never treated her well. The new duke, Richard, doesn’t seem to want her around, either.”
“Can you blame them? I think you may be putting the chicken before the egg. Mayhap they didn’t like her because she’s a miserable crow, rather than she became a miserable crow because they didn’t like her. You see?” Cam held out his hands to make his point, earning a laugh from his wife.
“Still, a little kindness on our part might help her see she doesn’t need to be nasty with us. That she’s safe. Maybe once she realizes it, she’ll be nicer.”
“We have been forced to live here, so I’ll do my best not to cause you distress by fighting with the old crow. But I think you are setting yourself up for disappointment if you expect friendly conversations between me and the dowager. She hates me as much for where I’m from as for who I am.”
“You get enjoyment from pestering the woman, Cam, and I’m asking you to stop.”
He dropped the innocent smile on his face, since it hadn’t served him well, and reluctantly agreed to stop antagonizing the biddy. Though it was a rare bit of entertainment in this place.
“Fine. I’ll relent.”
“Thank you. Now, why don’t you bring her down so she might eat with us this evening?”
He stood and bowed. “Certainly, wife.”
He left the room and went upstairs. After knocking on the door twice before he entered, without a word he went to the dowager’s bed and picked her up.
“What are you about?” she complained in alarm and squirmed in his arms like a slippery pig.
“I’m taking ye downstairs so you can sit at the table and eat like the civilized lady you are.”
“Put me down at once!”
Of course he did no such thing but instead carried her down to the dining room so they could share a meal together. He didn’t do it just because his wife had asked it of him, though that would have been reason enough. He did it because he understood why a person might want to wrap themselves in bitterness and not allow anyone else to enter.
When his Mari was gone, he could see how such a refuge might offer him protection from those who wanted to force him to move on when he didn’t wish to.
He was in a perfect position to become just like the dowager. He only hoped if he did give in to the pain and anger, someone would try to help him find his way back to life.
The days turned into weeks. He and Mari visited the dowager daily so she wasn’t alone all day. She wasn’t much for conversation, but she thanked him each time when he left.
Eventually she was well enough to leave her bed and regularly join them for dinner. Sometimes she’d even stay as they sat next to the roaring fire enjoying an evening together. She always said it was because of the warmth, but he thought it was a different kind of warmth that drew her.
“Tomorrow is Christmas,” he said to test the waters a few days later.
As expected, the dowager’s head shot up and her eyes went wide. “You can’t possibly think to celebrate in this house.”
Cam chuckled at having prodded a response from her. “I’m an unwanted war chief married to a murderess. Do you not think I’d risk Cromwell’s rule to ensure a good pudding?” He laughed harder when she just glared at him.
Her Accidental Highlander Husband (MacKinlay Clan) Page 24