Amanda Scott (17 page)

“He always wants them,” she said. Then, against her better judgment, she added, “But they will not begin until the food is served. Still, someone might hear us if we go up there, and how would we get down again unseen?”

“You worry too much,” he said, pulling her into a tight embrace, his hands roaming over her body at will, sending delightful sensations through it. “Ah, lassie, my arms have ached to hold you again.”

A vision of Lady Margaret arose in her mind’s eye, but she pushed it away. Somehow, when she was with him, thoughts of propriety were merely intrusions.

Lachlan breathed in the herbal scent of her hair and skin. Having ridden only a half mile before realizing he was going the opposite way to the one he wanted, he had waited for her in the minstrel’s gallery, certain she would come.

His disappointment at her refusal to couple with him had been strong, although he had already experienced second thoughts about the necessity of his plan, because Hector’s words haunted him. Once he realized that he had become more concerned about hurting her or losing her good opinion than about winning points in their discussion, the decision had been easy. He had returned to Finlaggan only minutes after she had left the stables.

Except for servants, the place had seemed deserted, but knowing that she would likely look in on the preparations for the noonday meal in the great hall, he had gone there. Servants were scurrying to and fro when he entered, but aside from one or two who glanced his way to see if he wanted assistance, no one paid him heed as he slipped through the archway to the stairs and up to the gallery.

He watched with pleasure as she walked onto the dais and looked over the high-table arrangements. She walked the way a princess should, with her head high and her movements regal. He enjoyed the way her hips swayed, and the way she smoothed a wispy dark curl off her cheek. He had come to think that every move she made sent an enticing message to him. He had obeyed his instincts earlier, as always, in giving way so easily to her wishes, but he wanted her as badly as ever.

She still wore the temptingly low-cut blue kirtle, so sleekly formed to her seductive body that it stirred his to life and would likely stir the blood of any man worthy to call himself one. He shot a swift glance at the gillie by the fire to see if he dared cast his eyes her way, but the lad was safely intent on his task.

When Lachlan saw her step from the dais, he slipped back down the stairs to wait for her, and the moment he touched her, his body began to hum. He could barely wait to get her out of sight of the lad before kissing her, and as he urged her up the narrow steps ahead of him, he wished only that they had more time.

The gallery with its waist-high parapet was only large enough to contain three or four minstrels. The stone floor was bare, and without showing himself, he dropped his cloak, spreading it hastily and drawing her down on it beside him. Sitting against the wall, he pulled her gently into his arms and kissed her again.

She moaned low in her throat, making him ache to take her right there on the floor, but as the thought entered his mind, he heard voices below in the hall.

She stiffened.

His sharp ears caught a casual exchange of pleasantries, and he murmured reassuringly, “Just another gillie, come to fetch the one tending the fire.”

Both left the hall, but her amorous mood had vanished.

“We cannot stay here,” she said, her tone urgent. “It is too dangerous.”

“Perhaps,” he agreed, smiling at her and watching for the return smile he knew would come. In the shadows, as they were, her eyes looked black and huge. He kissed her eyelids, one after the other. “Sometimes danger improves an experience in much the same way that spices improve meat,” he said.

“Aye, perhaps, but too much spice spoils the meat.”

Chuckling, he said. “We’ll go, lass, for we don’t want to spoil what we have. You can just slip outside tonight instead, and we’ll seek a trysting place together.”

“I could never do that!”

“But I think you will,” he murmured. “I want to marry you, and you want me, too. We’re both agreed to that.”

“Aye, but agreement counts for naught when our union is forbidden.”

“As I said before, we must give his grace reason to change his mind unless the Steward’s son’s remote chance to sit on the Scottish throne sways you more than I’ve had cause to believe.”

“You know it does not.”

“Then go, and I’ll see you tonight. Wait until the Compline bell rings. Nearly everyone should be inside by then, and I’ll wait for you in the laird’s hall forecourt.”

“I can’t.”

“You can.”

She was still shaking her head as she moved to stand, but he caught her and kissed her again, hard, deep, and thoroughly. Then he stood, glanced down at the hall to be sure it was empty, and pulled her to her feet.

“I’ll watch from here whilst you go,” he said. “Just remember to behave as calmly as ever, for you have every good reason to be leaving the hall and walking back to the residence.” As he spoke, he smoothed the errant curl from her cheek, delighting in its soft, springy touch. “And, lass, when you change for the meal, leave your hair unbound. I prefer it so.”

Without another word, Mairi snatched up her skirts and hurried down the stairs and along the aisle to the anteroom and outer door. There, remembering his advice, she paused to draw a deep breath and release it before she opened the door wide and stepped onto the porch.

No breeze stirred now, and the sun’s warmth enfolded her in strong contrast to the chill of the empty hall, despite its now roaring fire.

The warmth calmed her and ordered her senses again. She strode across the yard and through the forecourt, forcing herself to think about what she could wear that would take little time to put on without undermining her reputation for elegance.

He had told her to leave her hair unconfined. Dared she obey him? It was one thing to defy convention when she rode early in the morning or tended her chores, quite another to do so at a meal in the company of noblemen, tenants, and servants—not to mention her parents.

“Good day to you, my lady.”

With a start, she realized that she had been so lost in her thoughts that she had failed to notice Niall’s approach from the residence.

“’Tis a fine day, sir,” she said, recovering swiftly.

She thought he looked narrowly at her, but he said only, “You will find his grace with your lady mother.”

“Then the council meeting is over?”

“Aye, though many stayed to talk more.” He frowned. “You must take more care, lass, with so many men about. I’m thinking you should keep your woman or one of our lads at your side. I’d not like anyone to trouble you.”

“Then you will not hamper me with attendants, Niall,” she said. “No one would dare molest me here.”

“Doubtless, you are right, my lady,” he said with a bow. “Pray forgive the undue concern of one who has cared deeply for you since your childhood.”

She knew that was true, and likewise meant to rebuke her, but she had detected an increasingly annoying, increasingly possessive attitude in him over the past year. Although the change had developed slowly, he treated her with less of the tolerant respect he had shown her as a child and more of what she had come to consider a fatherly manner or, indeed, one more intimate than that.

The memory of the day he spanked her leaped startlingly to mind. Pushing it aside and forcing calm reason into her tone, she said, “Thank you for your concern, Niall. I know you mean well, but I must hurry if I am to be dressed in time. I doubt that my father will delay his midday meal to await my pleasure.”

He chuckled. “Nay, lassie, that he will not, for I wager every man at the council meeting is as hungry as I am.”

“Then I’ll bid you adieu,” Mairi said, stepping past him. The strait look he gave her seemed out of keeping with their conversation, but she paid it little heed, her thoughts returning at once to memory.

Although she had spared few thoughts for the humiliating incident in years, suddenly it had been as if she were transported back to it, as if she could feel his big hand again on her bare, childish bottom. She had never told anyone that he had raised her skirt, and when the day came that she realized he should not have done so, the distance of time, the humiliation of even thinking about it, and the near certainty that anyone she told would laugh, had kept her from telling.

That the incident had returned to her thoughts so abruptly was troublesome, but she fixed her mind firmly on what she would wear and hurried upstairs.

Meg Raith awaited her impatiently, and when Mairi said casually that she had decided to leave her hair unbound, flatly vetoed the plan. “Ye’ll do no such thing unless ye want to endure the rough side o’ your lady mother’s tongue and a stern command t’ tidy yourself at once,” she said. “What her gracious ladyship would say about it, I dinna want t’ think. Such a notion!”

In that instant, Mairi was reduced to childhood status again, and she knew that Meg’s displeasure was nothing to Lady Margaret’s. Silenced, she wondered what demon had possessed her to make the suggestion. That a mere comment from Lachlan the Wily had stirred her to do such a thing without so much as considering the consequences was irksome, but even more so was that she had actually considered obeying his far more scandalous suggestion. Indeed, telling her to meet him in the forecourt at Compline had sounded more like a command.

From that point, she paid scant heed to the pale green gown Meg helped her don, or to the arrangement of her hair under a proper caul and veil. She turned when Meg said to turn, sat when she said to sit, and chose between two pieces of jewelry that Meg held out to her without heeding what either one was.

What had the man done to her? He seemed to negotiate everything, and he seemed to win every negotiation. If she gave an inch, he pressed for an ell. Already he had pressed her to exploit the freedom of movement she enjoyed, dismissing her qualms as if they were of no concern. She seemed to have no defense against him. Indeed, even now, as she considered the likely consequences of meeting him later, she felt no trepidation. Instead, her traitorous body sang, apparently finding the secrecy of the tryst as delightful as the tryst itself promised to be.

She could not do it. That much was as plain as could be.

Assuring herself that she was a sensible, obedient daughter, and not a mouse to dance at every move of the lion’s paw, she went to her mother’s solar, where she found the rest of the family on the point of descending to dine.

At table, most of her father’s councilors stood on the dais, ready to take their seats, and somehow Lachlan Lubanach, despite being absent from the council all morning, stood in the place next to hers. Tempted as she was to make Elizabeth switch places with her, to teach him he could not always win, she did not. The right to sit at Lady Margaret’s left was hers. Elizabeth would take her usual place, flanked by the Rose and the Weed, at the end of the ladies’ side.

At a truly formal meal, with other noblewomen present, the men would all sit on her father’s right, strictly by rank, the women on his left in a similar manner. As a child, when the Council of the Isles met, Mairi had not dined with the councilors, nor had her mother. But as his grace’s daughters reached marriageable age, Lady Margaret insisted that they dine at least once or twice with everyone during council days, if for no other reason than to draw the attention of powerful councilors to the fact that his grace had daughters available to marry their sons.

Keeping her gaze modestly fixed on her mother’s back, Mairi followed her to the table and stood at her place while her father’s chaplain spoke the grace before meat. She could not continue to ignore the gentleman on her left throughout the meal, however, because they shared saucepots and courtesy required him to serve her from various platters as the gillies presented them. Only her father had a body servant to attend to such tasks for him and his lady.

The minstrels in the gallery began to play as the company echoed the chaplain’s “amen,” but the sounds of lute and harp were nearly drowned out by the shuffle and bump of so many taking their places on the trestle-table benches.

At the high table, the taking of seats was quieter and more orderly. MacDonald’s servant assisted both his grace and Lady Margaret, but when Lachlan signed to the gillie behind Mairi’s chair that he would assist her, she did not object, telling herself that she could scarcely do so without drawing unwanted attention to them both. As it was, she saw Niall look their way with a thoughtful frown.

The procession of food began as soon as everyone was seated, and Mairi bit her lip as the pantler, under Niall’s stern eye and followed by the butter lad, strode to the high table with his basket of manchet loaves and offered the first to her father and the next to her mother. When Mairi’s turn came, she took one of the small loaves as casually as everyone else, certain that her parents would be no more distressed than she to know that the manchets had fallen for a few brief moments onto the baker’s well-scrubbed floor.

In the lower hall, the pantler’s minions were distributing bread trenchers to the company, and the butler and his many helpers were already bringing in that heady drink of the Isles called brogac, as well as claret for the high table and beer and ale for the lower hall.

“You seem unusually fascinated by the gillies today, my lady,” the gentleman to her left said, his tone touched with laughter, as it so often was.

Looking straight ahead, she said, “One of the men caught a huge salmon this morning, sir, and it is to take pride of place in the first course.”

“That would explain your considerable interest, ’tis true.” The laughing tone had altered slightly to mockery, but still she refused to look at him.

She wanted to think, but with him so near, it was impossible. His brother sat at his other side, but Hector might as well have been in France for all the good that did. Beyond him sat Sir Ian MacSporran, his grace’s hereditary purse bearer, and Mairi wondered why MacSporran, a man of higher rank, sat farther from his liege than the sons of Gillean.