Highland Moonlight (22 page)

settle. “Are we to end our first night together here on a note of anger then?”

Mary’s silence had him turning to confront her. She lay curled on her

side, her hands tucked beneath her cheek. Her breasts rose and fell with

the slow, steady rhythm of a deep exhausted sleep.

As he leaned over her, a humph of self-deprecating irritation escaped

Alexander. With a murmured oath, he rolled onto his back and closed his

eyes.

Mary rushed down the wide passageway to the landing above the

great hall. For the third time in as many days, she was late for the morning

meal. It had once again taken longer than she had expected to bathe the

men’s wounds and see them fed. She hesitated at the top of the stairs to

draw a deep calming breath in preparation of joining the company of men

filling the tables below. Brushing back the wisps of hair that had escaped

her braid, she descended the stairs.

“So brother, the bairn has served as a bridge between you as I

suggested,” Duncan said as she approached the table. She paused, her

attention arrested. The realization that Alexander had sought his brother’s

advice on a private matter between them hit her like a slap.

“Aye,” Alexander agreed. “A womanly breast did prove most

comfortable to rest my head on whilst my hurts healed as well.”

“Having your
coileapach
near to spark a bit of competition will do no

harm either,” Duncan said. “Women, though they would not admit it, are as

territorial as the rest of us. I will wager you will reap rewards from that, if you

have not already.”

“And what sort of rewards would you be speaking of, Duncan?” Mary

asked, unable to hold her silence any longer.

The men stiffened then turned to look over their shoulders at her. Their

identical expressions of guilt did nothing to sooth the hollow ache in the pit

of her stomach.

Her gaze focused on Alexander and she searched for some form of

reassurance in his expression that would ease the outrage and hurt

bubbling inside her. He had tricked her to get his way. Shaking her head,

she backed away toward the stairs from which she had just come.

Alexander rose, alarm in his expression. “Mary__”

Mary spied the aumry against the wall close to the stairs, its shelves

stacked with wooden platters, bowls, and brass tankards and pitchers.

She armed herself with a wooden platter as rage rose up overtaking

her pain. “Knave!” She spun the wooden disk.

Alexander ducked beneath the edge of the table at which he and

Duncan sat. It struck the wooden planks of the top, bounced upward, and

struck the stone wall behind them with a dull thud.

Clansmen at neighboring tables looked up at the disturbance then

dove for cover as a large wooden bowl spun wildly across the room out of

control.

“Judas!” Mary yelled, her pain and outrage affecting her tone. She

threw another platter in Alexander’s direction, but it sailed off harmlessly to

turn on its face then slide across the floor.

“Deceitful, swine!” A platter that took her both hands to heave, crashed

into the midst of a wooden bowl of eel porridge. It splattered across the

table sending a large glob across the side of Duncan’s face from his ear to

his nose. His laughter nipped at her raw feelings and spurred her on.

She saw Alexander punch Duncan in the stomach, driving the breath

from him, cutting off his sounds of mirth. “Damn you, Duncan for the advice

you offered me! And damn you for speaking of it!” His voice carried to her.

“I was not to know Mary was behind us,” he wheezed as he held his

middle.

“Ham-handed, rogue!” She spun another platter in Alexander’s

direction. His quick jerk to the side saved him from being hit in the head.

“‘Tis your bairn you’ve been using agin me for your own purposes,”

Mary cried, her voice beginning to shake as tears rose up clog her throat.

She threw a tankard with better aim and nicked his ear before he could

duck.

Unable to catch her breath and shout at the same time, she ceased

calling him names and took closer aim instead. A brass pitcher made a

hollow clanging sound as it stuck the edge of the table close to his head

and ricocheted striking his shoulder giving her only a momentary

satisfaction.

Tears broke forth, blurring her vision and she threw the next wooden

disk with only a half-hearted aim. The platter spun in a graceful wobbling

curve landing flat on the table.

Silence settled over the great hall. When nothing else followed,

Alexander eased upward to see what Mary was about. His stomach

plummeted with anxiety. She was gone.

Heads appeared from other areas about the large chamber. The men

rose from their places of cover like so many phoenixes rising from the

ashes of the mid-morning meal. A servant ran forth to right a pitcher and

blot up the milk that had pooled beneath the table.

Duncan accepted a damp cloth and wiped the remnants of porridge

from his face.

“‘Twould seem you have done something to displease the mistress of

the house, Alexander,” Tobias, one of the older men commented, as he

picked up a wooden platter from the floor. ‘Tis grateful you should be no true

weapon was at hand.”

“Aye, I am. Her aim is as good as yours with a bow and quiver,

Tobias,” Alexander quipped with greater levity than he felt and brushed past

him. He had to find Mary. His heart beat in a sickening rhythm.

He took the stairs to their chamber two at a time. The room stood

empty though a young chambermaid swept the corridor outside. “Have you

seen Lady Mary, lass?” he demanded.

“Aye. She took her cloak and ran back down the stairs, m’lord,” she

answered.

With every overheard word racing through his mind, Alexander bound

down the steps. He cursed Duncan’s loose tongue again. She would never

understand what had driven him to trick her, nor would she forgive it. But he

had to find her and try to explain.

He ran across the courtyard to the stable built against the east wall

and saw the head groom shoveling up a clump of manure. “Cory have you

seen, Lady Mary?” he asked the head groom.

“Aye, m’lord, but I can not be sure which direction she took from here.”

The gray haired man pointed upward. His gaze shifted to the ladder leading

to the loft.

Alexander nodded as relief steadied his racing pulse. At least she

hadn’t had time to escape. “I shall look about,” he said, his tone loud.

****

and folded her arms against her waist. Her anger simmered as pain at

Alexander’s deception rushed in to squeeze her heart. She turned at the

sound of someone climbing the ladder.

“You’re causing your own pain by believing the worst of me, Mary,”

Alexander said as soon as he reached the top. He squatted down blocking

her only escape route from the loft.

She raised her gaze to his face though it was hard to do so without

crying. She searched his expression seeking reassurance, even as she

damned herself for a fool. Her voice shook when she spoke. “I do not know

what has been truth and what has been trickery. Am I to believe in anything

that has passed between us, Alexander?”

He rose in one slow graceful movement. “‘Twas not for the purpose of

tricking you that I favored the injury to my leg. I but acted a wee bit more

helpless than I was, so you would not be so wary of me. That was all.”

Mary probed his expression for several moments. Her anger and

distrust began to drain from her when he continued to meet her gaze

unflinchingly. Then Tira came to mind and her anger surged again.

“What gains did you hope for by parading your
coileapach
before me?

Did you mean for me to compete against her for your attentions?”

Alexander’s features stiffened, anger and impatience easy to read in

his expression as he stalked toward her. Catching her about the waist and

bringing her against him, he grasped her hand and guided it beneath his

kilt. “Does this not feel as though I have made my choice between you,

Mary?” he demanded, his amber eyes pale gold with heat.

Mary jerked, shocked by the feel of his warm distended flesh. She

might have pulled her hand away had his not held it.

“I have done all I can to earn your trust and end this damnable wait! I

can do no more! ‘Tis you who will have to make a choice, or live with the

consequences!” His mouth descended on hers, anger and desire making

the pressure of his lips hard and his tongue swept her mouth with

possessive thoroughness.

The raging heat of the kiss stole the strength from Mary’s limbs and

blazed a path of sensation down her body to the center of her being. He

released her so suddenly she staggered and had to brace an arm against

the rough wooden wall of the stable to retain her balance. Her legs felt as

wobbly as spun yarn.

Alexander’s angry strides took him to the ladder. With one final glare in

her direction, he descended the ladder.

****

Alexander strode to the table and took a seat next to his brother.

“You do not mean to be harsh with the lass?” Duncan asked as

Alexander reached for a boiled egg.

Alexander bit back an impatient retort.

“‘Twas my fault Mary believed herself wronged, Alexander.”

He glared at Duncan in mute warning.

“You said ‘twas my words that caused her anger.”

“I will not allow my wife to challenge my authority, Duncan. She is mine

to do with as I see fit. You’ll be offering me no more advice about how she is

to be treated.”

Conversation among the men momentarily lulled alerting him to

Mary’s entrance. He followed her progress across the hall his thoughts

dwelling on how her hand had felt wrapped around him. He grew hard as

stone. As she gained the stairs, she glanced in his direction. Alexander

knew some of his feelings were evident on his face when her cheeks

blossomed with color. She quickly lowered her eyes and continued up the

stairs in the direction of their chamber.

“She is my sister. ‘Tis my duty to see to her well-being as well as I

would see to yours,” Duncan argued.

Jealousy and frustrated desire rekindled Alexander’s anger. “I have

never known you to be so protective of a woman, Duncan.” He searched his

brother’s features. “You have been my brother for a good many years.

‘Twould grieve me sorely should I have to split your skull over this one.”

Duncan’s gray eyes turned the color of lead, his features hardening.

“Do not let the fact that I am your brother keep you from trying,” he retorted,

his voice flat and his gray gaze steady. He rose to his feet. “Mayhap Mary is

wise to be wary of such a fool.” He stalked out of the great hall.

Swearing beneath his breath, Alexander set aside the boiled egg. He

could no longer allow Mary to bewitch him so. When with her, his body

craved the taste and feel of hers as surely as it craved food and drink. He

could not sleep for wanting her. He could not be apart from her without

wondering what she was about. The time had come for her to face her

responsibilities and serve him as a wife.

His hastily spoken words rose up to plague him for they taunted him

with a threat he had not intended. He had no intension of seeking out

another. No other woman could fill her place.

His absence over the past two months had left too many clan

problems unsolved. Now they demanded his attention. He weighed the

possibility that she might take advantage of his distraction and attempt to

leave him, as she had a want to do in the past. He motioned to a servant

and sent word to Grace, Mary’s maidservant, to join him in his

antechamber.

Once he had given his instructions to the maid, he felt more certain he

had the situation in hand. Mary would not be pleased with being confined to

her room, but his concerns were temporarily eased that she would not

leave the castle.

****

chamber. Her anger over being ordered to stay in her room had long since

cooled. The punishment was less harsh than she could have expected.

She had embarrassed Alexander before his men and it was within his

rights to choose a more severe reprisal.

As she opened the door, her maid, Grace, bobbed up from the chair

where she sat just outside the portal. “Would you be needing something,

Lady Mary?” The girl, little more than a child, shifted nervously from foot to

foot. Her light brown hair, hanging in stringy strands on either side of her

small face, swayed back and forth with the movement. The smattering of