The Lover (27 page)

Without waiting for Niall’s assistance, Sabrina slid off her horse to place a hand on her dog’s head. “Come and greet him. He will not hurt you.”

She spent a moment letting the children and dog get acquainted. When she rose, she realized that a woman dressed in traditional Highland garb had joined them in the yard. She had raven-wing’s hair and a delicate, quiet beauty that made Sabrina’s heart sink.

Niall’s familiarity with the family was evident as he made the introductions. “Sabrina, this is the Widow Fletcher, and these worthless bairns”—he tousled the boys’ hair—“are her sons, Simon and Shaw.”

“We’re no’ bairns!” they protested, even as they clung to him like limpets and gazed up at him adoringly.

Studying the children of perhaps eight and six years old, Sabrina could not help but note the resemblance to Niall. With an ache in the vicinity of her heart, she wondered if he had sired them.

“I am Fenella,” their mother said in a soft, musical voice. “Please, my lady, will ye join me for refreshment?”

“I should be grateful,” Sabrina replied. “But I hope you will call me by my given name.”

While Niall went to inspect the crumbling stone of the well, Fenella guided her inside the cottage and offered her tea. Rab remained outside to play with the boys.

The widow had been sitting at her loom, Sabrina saw. “Pray, do not let me interrupt your work.”

“Oh, no, I will be glad to rest a wee spell.”

Lifting the kettle which had been left boiling over the hearth fire, she made a pot of tea while Sabrina examined the tartan cloth in the McLaren colors.

“How beautiful,” she murmured, admiring the exquisite workmanship.

Fenella smiled sweetly. Going to a chest in one corner of the room, she pulled out a long length of the plaid fabric and held it out to Sabrina. “For ye, mistress.”

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean…I could not take it.”

“Please. ’Tis a wedding gift. Ye should have yer own plaid, now that ye’re a McLaren.”

Sabrina smiled, forcing back her dismay at such generosity. “I should be honored to wear it.” She stroked the fine wool as she settled on an oaken bench. “Are all the ladies of Clan McLaren so talented with the loom?”

“Aye, most. And we can set a neat stitch as well.”

“Cloth as excellent as this should fetch a goodly sum at market in Edinburgh.”

Fenella glanced over her shoulder skeptically, as if Sabrina had suggested she fly to the moon.

Just then they heard shrieks of youthful laughter mingled with excited barks coming from outside the cottage. Sabrina glanced out the low window to see Simon wrestling on the ground with Rab, while Shaw attempted to mount the dog like a pony.

“Your boys seem fine children,” she said somewhat wistfully.

“Aye, they’re the delights of my life. Niall has been like a da’ to them since my dear husband Gowin passed on.”

“Was that some time ago?”

“Four years.” Before Sabrina could say more, Fenella volunteered with quiet sadness, “Niall’s elder brother Tom was best friend to my Gowin. They perished together at sea. Niall’s grief was nigh as great as my own.”

Sabrina was aware of a stab of sorrow deep in her breast. A twinge of envy pricked her as well as she gazed at the rough-and-tumble boys. She wanted children, and wondered if Niall felt similarly. He had treated Simon and Shaw with fond indulgence, but no more so than an uncle might.

The visit ended too swiftly to the boys’ mind, with Sabrina promising to call again with Rab soon. As she rode away with Niall, she remarked on the proficient job he had done repairing the well stone.

He grinned. “Confess, cherie, you thought me solely fit for wenching.”

Her mouth curved wryly. “The notion had crossed my mind.”

“I have a few other talents besides.”

“Mistress Fletcher seems to agree,” Sabrina said probingly. “She is exceedingly grateful for the care you’ve given her and her sons.”

Surprisingly, Niall answered more soberly than expected. “I’ve given her no more than is due the widow of my brother’s friend. Despite my dissipated reputation, I’m not a man to take advantage of a vulnerable woman.”

Sabrina raised an eyebrow, yet strangely she believed him. “I wonder, then, why you claimed to have no qualms about taking advantage of the serving maids.”

When Niall gave her a quizzical glance, she said with sugary sweetness, “You deliberately encouraged me to believe you were seducing Jean that day I discovered you naked with her in the herbal. But she has since told me you had injured yourself and she was tending your wounds.”

Niall showed no sign of remorse for misleading her. “Mayhap so, but as I recall, you had tried and convicted me before I could plead my case.”

Sabrina shrugged, pretending nonchalance. “It is a matter of supreme indifference to me, whom you dally with,” she lied.

“You wound me, sweeting.”

“I doubt it.”

He gave a warm chuckle. “You truly must learn the knack of flirtation, Sabrina. It isn’t politic to display your apathy so baldly to a man. You would do better to try and persuade me to change my licentious ways.”

She grimaced wryly. “In the first place, changing you would be nigh impossible. And in the second, I haven’t the talent to attempt a flirtation. I’ve never professed to possess your amorous skills.”

“Even so, you can learn. In fact, I mean to teach you.”

“Do you, indeed?”

“Aye. In a flirtation, your primary goal should be to pique a man’s interest.”

“And just how do I go about doing that?”

“’Tis not so difficult,” Niall observed thoughtfully. “You laugh and smile at even the most inane remarks a gentleman makes. You pretend an attraction, hanging on his every word, while lowering your gaze coyly. Now and then you flash him a longing look, as if you cannot help your feelings of desire. In short, you make him feel as if he is the only man in the world.”

Much the way you make a woman feel,
Sabrina reflected. “It seems such a frivolous exercise.”

“But first,” Niall insisted, pointedly ignoring her comment, “you begin by sweetening that tart tongue of yours. Honey will gain you more than vinegar.”

His eyes danced with the laughter that was so much a part of him. Niall was goading her, she knew, yet it was impossible to take offense, or to resist his notorious charm.

He exercised that lethal charm fully in the days that followed. During her first week at Creagturic, Sabrina even began to hope their uneasy alliance might blossom into a worthwhile union, if not a true marriage.

Her days began to assume a pattern. Niall was away much of the day, seeing to clan affairs, but he usually returned for supper, which he spent conversing with her about his clan and hers or giving her lessons in dalliance. Afterward she often took up her needlework while he read—sometimes aloud to her. The first time he opened a serious volume, Sabrina was startled enough to express surprise.

Niall gave her a long, level look, his eyes laughing at her. “I do enjoy pursuits other than carnal ones. I’ll have you know that in my misspent youth, I applied myself to my studies with nearly as much seriousness as I did my amorous endeavors.”

At this subtle reminder that he had been educated in the finest universities of Europe, Sabrina felt an unwilling admiration. If she’d once thought him shallow and frivolous, she was having to revise her assessment. Niall McLaren was much more complex than she had ever suspected, showing depths she could only begin to fathom.

“It must have been supremely taxing,” she said dryly, “to be forced to labor at such mundane chores as studying.”

“Indeed, it was.”

“I fear you will get little sympathy from me, sir,” Sabrina advised.

“You’re a hard lass, mistress.”

She shook her head ruefully, surprised to realize how much she was enjoying their exchange. “No, merely truthful.”

“I’m not half as debauched as you prefer to believe.”

“Well…perhaps not
half
.”

She was pleased to win a wry chuckle from him. It was exhilarating to be matching wits with such a man, like challenging a swift-moving Highland storm. And Niall encouraged her in their verbal skirmishes with scandalous remarks bordering on the outrageous.

His instruction in the art of dalliance gave her more enjoyment than she anticipated. To her bewilderment and dismay, though, her marital bed proved her greatest disappointment. After the first night, her husband made no attempt to make love to her.

In truth, his disinterest was no more than Sabrina expected. She was not the sort of woman to inspire lust in a man of Niall’s legendary passions. Yet she could not claim he had abandoned her entirely. She slept naked in his arms, since he would not allow her to wear her night smock.

Their physical intimacy grew little by little, with nudity becoming more natural between them. Sabrina grew accustomed to seeing the whole of his magnificent body, and grew familiar with his touch as well, for he made it a point to caress her casually and often.

He seemed highly concerned about her arm wound, and each night checked its healing himself. His solicitous regard, however, disturbed her more than neglect would have done. He was infinitely more dangerous than she’d feared, and she was far more vulnerable.

Her relationship with his clan at least proved satisfactory. To Sabrina’s surprise and relief, they appeared to accept her willingly. She felt welcomed in her new home, while the magnificent Highlands had captured her soul.

Later that same week Niall took her to explore the mountain valley that had been in possession of Clan McLaren for generations, introducing her to lofty peaks and tranquil lochs and magical glens, and watching with amused indulgence her expression of delight and awe.

With such splendor, she could almost forget that danger and bloodshed ruled the Highlands. Peace had not come with her marriage to Niall, yet she had reason to hope. The terrible feud with the Buchanans continued, but Clan Duncan would be safe, now that Niall had been designated Angus’s successor.

The morning immediately after the ceremony, Sabrina had learned, Niall had paid a visit to his archenemy; she heard about it from Geordie when he came to call.

“He warned the Buchanan most harshly,” Geordie claimed. “Clan Duncan is to suffer no more raids. ’Twas odd, though. Owen claimed he wasna the one to resume the feud, that he never lifted our cattle. Wheesht, ye canna believe such blethering.”

Niall refused to discuss the Buchanans with her, however, and grew testy whenever Sabrina even hinted at the subject.

He did approve of her becoming involved with his clan, at least. Her visit to the Widow Fletcher had given Sabrina an idea, which she broached to Niall one evening at supper.

“The tartan cloth Mistress Fletcher has woven is quite beautiful. I have rarely seen such fine quality, nor have the markets of Edinburgh, I suspect. I would very much like to write my stepfather, asking him to propose an arrangement with the merchants there.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“If our kinswomen could be persuaded to produce enough woolen cloth to sell, they could make a small fortune. It would perhaps ease their burdens by providing a steady income.”

“I am impressed, sweeting,” Niall remarked seriously. “You do indeed have a head for business.”

His praise warmed Sabrina more than she cared to admit. She wanted to prove herself worth more than just the wealth her dowry would bring, and aiding her new clan in some small measure was a start.

As for her duties as mistress, she had plenty to occupy her time seeing to the household and clan concerns that were not a male purview. Mrs. Paterson helped greatly, as did the Widow Graham.

Eve paid a visit two days after the wedding, offered her advice on dealing with the tenet crofters and suggesting they make plans for the May Day celebration that would be held the following week.

It was a tradition for the castle to supply food and drink for the populace during the pagan festival of Beltane. When Eve accompanied her to the open market in Callander to shop, Sabrina felt quite domestic choosing giant wheels of cheese and ingredients for meat pasties.

By silent consent, they avoided the subject of Sabrina’s husband. Yet he was constantly in her thoughts. Despite her best efforts to ignore him, she was not proof against his bewitching appeal.

Her emotions swung between elation and dismay whenever she considered the future of their relationship. Niall McLaren was the most charming, infuriating, fascinating man alive, and against her will, she was falling under his irresistible, tender spell. It frightened her to realize how very vulnerable she was to him.

It was the fourth day of their union when they had their first argument. To her dismay, she learned at breakfast that Niall had ordered a half dozen gowns made up for her from her stepfather’s gifts of fabric and some other bolts he himself had chosen.

Despite the large dowry she would bring to her husband and his clan, Sabrina’s sense of frugality rebelled at the unnecessary extravagance.

“The material is already paid for,” Niall replied when she objected. “Your stepfather obviously intended it for you.”