The Intended (21 page)

“So you were raised like brother and sister?
Or rather like cousins? The way Mary and Catherine have been raised
here?”

“Malcolm is older than I by a wide margin,
m’lord. I was still just a child when he was sent abroad to study.
And there were long periods when I traveled with my parents to the
courts of Europe. Later, soon after Malcolm returned to Scotland, I
was sent to France. It would be difficult for me to say that our
paths have done much more than occasionally cross.”

“But you still cared for him enough to try to
save his life!”

“Aye, m’lord! I would have done the same for
you. Or for any poor soul! I was taught that true compassion has no
eyes, and yet sees all. I could not turn my back on him in his
condition, or on the folk that I know rely on him in his own lands
in Scotland. But it makes no difference, m’lord. He could have been
the stable boy who had once cared for my horse, or the cook’s girl
who used to steal the ribbons from my sewing. I would have done the
same for any of them!” Jaime paused and looked straight into
Surrey’s face. “And that day at Norwich Castle—after seeing the
pain and suffering in that horrible place—I would have brought away
every one of those prisoners, if I could!” She stopped as her voice
faltered.

Surrey’s face grew grim, and he and his wife
exchanged a glance. “I don’t know what my brother was thinking,” he
said quietly, “in taking you there.”

Jaime shook her head. “As repulsive as that
place is, I am not sorry that I went there. In fact, I am thankful
that he took me.”

“Aye,” Frances put in. “You were given an
opportunity to save a life!”

“And to add more gold to Edward’s treasures.
But all of these things, I’m sure,” Surrey added, his face a mask,
“must have only reinforced my brother’s sense of your worth.”

Jaime sickened at those words. She didn’t
care if Edward thought her worth a straw. That had not been the
motivation for anything she did, but she scarcely dared to glance
at Malcolm.

A knock at the door and the appearance of a
page holding a large book drew everyone’s attention.

“Ahh, finally,” Surrey cried, moving across
the room and taking the book. “And perfect timing, at that. Come to
the table, Malcolm. You and I can peruse these letters from our old
teacher and reminisce about old times. You see I’ve had them
mounted in this volume...”

The two men moved away to a table at the far
end of the room, and Frances motioned Jaime to the seat beside her.
As she sat, Jaime felt that she could breathe once again, and
worked at unclenching her fingers as she watched Surrey and Malcolm
conversing. Her gaze became a look of wonder as Malcolm, who
towered over the earl, visibly relaxed to the point of joking with
Surrey.

“You did well, Jaime,” Frances whispered.
“Much better than I would have done under the circumstances, I
should say.”

“What was...what was the meaning of all this,
Frances?” Her voice was barely a croak as she continued to watch
the men.

“Edward,” the young woman answered with a
meaningful nod. Frances cast a covert glance in the direction of
her husband. “Surrey, I am fairly certain, believes that he may
need to explain, when Edward returns, why he decided the Highlander
deserves better treatment than he was getting.”

“Then Malcolm is not going back to
Norwich?”

“Nay,” Frances said with surprise. “I hardly
think Surrey would consider that very hospitable. The fact is, my
dear husband and the Highlander have a great deal in common. I
believe he has been enjoying his company immensely. Nay! I’m
certain Surrey would find it difficult to part with him right
now.”

“I’m very...happy to hear that,” Jaime said
uncertainly.

“Aye? Well, I think Surrey asked you those
questions because he knows Edward would be far less amenable to the
Highlander’s relative freedom if there were something between you
and Malcolm MacLeod!”

Jaime entwined her fingers tightly in her
lap. “Then it appears my answers satisfied Lord Surrey’s
concerns.”

Frances nodded with a look at her husband.
“That appears to be so, my dear!”

Jaime followed her friend’s eyes to where the
two men stood bending over the volume of letters.

“If he is not going back to Norwich, Frances,
then where is he going to be kept?”

“Well,” the countess replied, her eyes
dancing with mirth as they looked back at Jaime, “at least until
Edward returns, he’ll be with us in the palace. In fact, Surrey has
already given directions that one of the best rooms is to be
prepared for his guest.”

“His
guest
?” Jaime asked in shock.

“Aye,” Frances nodded with a note of pride in
her voice. “That’s one difference between these two brothers. If
Edward is going to treat this Scottish laird as a prisoner, then
Surrey is sure to treat him as an honored guest.”

“Frances, you make it sound as though your
husband is doing all this simply out of spite for Edward!”

“I suppose there is some truth to that,
Jaime,” she said somewhat defiantly. “But more to the point, I
believe there is a genuine fondness between Surrey and Malcolm
MacLeod. Since last night, when Surrey went down to the surgery to
pay a visit, my husband has been quite cheerful. Perhaps Erasmus is
the bond that ties them, but I believe they delight in each other’s
company.”

Jaime’s eyes again returned to Malcolm. He
looked to be relating to Surrey some old reminiscence. Since going
to the table, he had never once glanced in her direction. It
occurred to her that she had all but ceased to exist for
Malcolm.

“I am glad you told Surrey the truth,”
Frances said, placing her warm fingers over Jaime’s folded hands.
“Surrey needed to hear it from you. Like everyone else, Jaime, he
respects you and thinks very highly of you. It would have been
painful for him to find that his trust had been misplaced.”

“I assume he asked the same questions of me
that he asked Malcolm.”

“He did,” Frances nodded with a smile. “And
your responses matched.”

Jaime stared at the needlework on Frances’s
lap, trying to think this through. There were birds in the pattern,
perched effortlessly in twisted vines of ivy leaves. Jaime looked
away. She knew she had every reason to be filled with joy since
Malcolm would be well cared for—at least until such time as Edward
returned. But she could not ignore the coldness she sensed in his
manner—the lack of acknowledgment of her very presence—that made
her heart shrivel with pain.

“Before I even came for you,” Frances
continued, “I knew that Surrey trusted all would be well.”

“How so?”

“He told Malcolm of your upcoming wedding to
Edward, and his reaction was...well...”

Jaime swallowed hard. “Aye? His
reaction?”

“Well, he seemed to view the match
favorably.” The countess glanced at her only briefly out of the
corner of her eye. “I believe he called it a union of two identical
souls.”

Jaime tried not to think of the distance to
the ground as she wrapped her fingers around the vine further up
the wall. The leaves of the ivy covering the castle wall brushed
against her face, smooth and cool. A stray tendril of new growth
searching bravely in the night air for a place to catch hold,
tangled in her hair and managed to pull back the hood of her cloak
as she herself inched ever higher on the wall. She hadn’t tried
anything this foolhardy since she was twelve. In spite of herself,
she smiled grimly at the irony of it. The last time she’d scaled a
castle wall had been for the same reason. To see Malcolm.

She’d been restless for two days, unable to
sleep and unable to eat. And it was her inability to have even a
moment alone with him that had led to this reckless midnight
climb.

It was obvious that he was angry at her.
Malcolm’s few glances in her direction had told of a cold fury,
intense and fierce.

But she had to see him. Having him now among
the host of knights, ladies, friars, clerks, courtiers, lawyers,
nuns, and travelers who shared every meal in the Great Hall brought
her happiness and distress. Seeing his handsome face always turned
to Surrey, so close to her and yet so distant, plundered her will
to hold back, to wait, to be patient. Malcolm’s public demeanor was
dignified, courteous to the point of being charming, but his
attentions encompassed everyone around them except her. Jaime felt
her composure slipping further with every encounter. She would go
mad if she couldn’t share in the warmth of his company.

But Jaime knew why he was so angry. Each time
a conversation flagged, each time a new person joined the group
eating at the head table, Jaime knew someone would launch into
another detailed account of the upcoming nuptials between Edward
and her. And each time she saw Malcolm’s face harden for a fleeting
moment before he turned away with that bored, disinterested
expression she was learning to know so well. Tonight, as the
visiting archbishop from Norwich had jovially offered the ceremony
here or at the Cathedral, Jaime had nearly broken down and told him
exactly what she thought of his damned ceremony.

But she had restrained herself at the last
moment. Such a spectacle would certainly be unwise—for a number of
reasons. She must speak to Edward about the matter first—she felt
she owed him that, at least. And Jaime certainly didn’t care to
bring any attention to herself at this point. She wouldn’t hazard
the chance of these people guessing at reasons for her “sudden”
change of heart—for that was assuredly how they would see it. Nay,
she wouldn’t jeopardize Malcolm’s newly attained position of
safety.

Jaime looked up at the small ledge outside
Malcolm’s room. The edge was only a short distance above her
outstretched fingers. And, of course,
this
behavior is
perfectly safe, she thought with a grim smile. Digging the toe of
her soft shoe between a vine and the wall, she pushed herself
higher toward the ledge. The ivy up here must had obviously been
cut away recently, for the vines were much thinner, and she could
feel them pulling away from the wall.

Mary’s chatter tonight had been the final
straw for Jaime. Returning together to their room, Mary,
dreamy-eyed and romantic, had spoken of nothing but Malcolm. She
had gone on endlessly about his chivalrous manners, his looks, his
talents, accomplishments, and charms. Jaime had found herself torn
between thoughts of being ill and tearing her cousin’s tongue out.
But then it wasn’t Mary’s fault, Jaime knew, to be so taken with
the rogue.

And that was exactly what he was. A scoundrel
of the lowest, most beastly type! A beautiful, battered, hatefully
irresistible rogue!

She wondered, brushing an ivy leaf away from
her face, if this was the way he intended to punish her.

As Jaime slipped the fingers of one hand over
the top of the hard ledge, the vine at her feet gave way, and she
dangled momentarily in the night air. Gingerly, she felt for a
toehold, found one, and reached up with her other hand. In an
instant, she had scrambled onto the narrow shelf and hidden herself
in the shadows with her back to the wall. Far below, on the stone
paving, she could just make out the forms of two guards conversing
in the moonlight. They certainly exhibited no concerns about the
Highlander. As she glanced back through the partially open panes of
the long, leaded windows into the darkness inside, she hoped Mary
would not decide to come down and visit her in the music room, two
stories below.

Jaime shivered a bit with anticipation of
what lay ahead, and at the rashness of the climb. Quietly pulling
open one of the windows, she stepped over the low frame and through
the heavy quilted curtains into the bedchamber.

The deadly silence that greeted her made the
blood run cold in her veins. The last embers of the small fire in
the hearth hardly illuminated the chamber at all. Moving cautiously
across the freshly woven mat of rushes covering the floor of the
room, Jaime almost cried out as her hip brushed roughly against a
small table. Jaime spread her fingers carefully across the wooden
surface and found a small wick lamp. As her eyes adjusted better,
the huge black shape of a damask-curtained bed loomed in one
corner. Fearful of calling his name in the dark, she took the wick
lamp to the fireplace to light it. If by chance Malcolm had been
moved out of this chamber...she shuddered to think of the
consequences.

Jaime shook her head, keeping sight of the
bed out of one corner of her eye. That he had been moved was highly
unlikely, but still she knew she would feel more comfortable with
even the smallest glimmer of light to assist her. She knelt before
the embers of the dying fire.

As she was rising, the tiny flame of the wick
lamp shielded by her hand, his rough, masculine voice startled a
strangled scream out of her.

“You are
late
!”

Jaime spun around, one hand raised in
surprise, the light of the lamp falling fully upon the Highlander.
As she stared at him, sitting in a chair beside the window’s heavy
curtains, her heart began to beat again with a vengeance, now
pounding fiercely in her chest. She must have passed right by him
as she entered the bedchamber.

Malcolm MacLeod was the image of elegance,
his white linen shirt open at the throat, and his booted legs
sprawled before him. But there was something about his expression
that caught her eye. His face displayed more than just aloofness
and indifference. Even in the lamplight, she could see fierceness,
hostility there. But she had ached so long to be alone with him,
that the thrill of this moment could not be subdued by the gleam of
an eye or the curl of a lip. Jaime was so much in love with him
that, for the moment, nothing else mattered.