Taming the Wild Highlander 04 (28 page)

"
What do you think you were doing?" Drummond asked, sounding highly agitated when he saw how pale Edana was, that she had to be carried into the chamber, and that blood streaked her temple. Bruising had already begun to turn her injured skin a soft purple, blue, and burgundy.

"
Rescuing you," she said, her voice resolute.

That earned her several chuckles from her brothers.

Drummond groaned. "And you see how well that turned out."

Her father shook his head
, then directed a comment to Angus. "You have your work cut out for you." He sympathetically patted Angus on his shoulder.

"
You have seen your brother is still going to live, Edana," Angus said, kissing her forehead, and headed for the doorway, anxious to get her settled.

"
Aye, and Drummond is getting better. He is always a beastly grouch when he does." Edana snuggled closer to Angus, and he tightened his hold on her.

"
Wait until you see how Edana acts when she is bed bound," Drummond hollered.

Thinking of Edana bound to the bed,
Angus paused in the doorway and turned to smile at Drummond. Her brothers all laughed, and Edana flushed beautifully. Her father merely grinned. And so did Niall and Gunnolf. But Drummond's face flushed as bright a red as Edana's.

"
Oh, do take me away from my brothers," Edana said, poking her finger into Angus's chest.

He
smiled at her and carried her out of Drummond's chamber and into the next one where a middle-aged woman waited for him to place Edana on the bed. He did and quickly divested Edana of her shoes and hose, though the maid raised her brows, and he suspected she believed she was to do the undressing.

"
Are you the healer?" Angus asked.

"
Nay. I am to make the lady comfortable."

"
I will take care of her," he said, dismissing the maid.

When she looked at Edana as if she thought his wife may have some other notion, Edana squeezed his hand.
"Angus will provide for me."

"
Aye, if you need anything…," she said, curtseyed and hurried out of the chamber.

Another woman, older,
her hair in gray curls, eyes as gray, her dress a light brown, the colors making her nearly fade into nothingness, entered, carrying a bowl of water, a leather bag slung over her shoulder. "I am Chantel, MacRae's healer. You have suffered an injury?"

"
Her head," Angus said. "Anywhere else, lass?"

"
Nay."

Chantel shut the door,
set the bowl on a table, then the bag next to it. She joined them at the bed and examined Edana's head as Angus held his wife's hand, caressing it with the other as he watched Edana's expression. The healer poked and prodded gently and Edana's mouth pursed and her eyes slimmed as she let out wee moans.

"
She has hit her head hard, it appears. She has a goose egg at the back of the head, some bleeding, and it will be sore for a while. The swelling will go down. I will need to wash her head."

"
Have a bath brought up for her," Angus said.

The healer frowned at him.

"I will wash her," Angus said.

The healer looked at Edana as if she wished her to say yes or no about the matter.

Edana gave a dramatic sigh. "Do as my husband wishes, please, Chantel."

"
Aye." The woman took her leave to ask the chief's permission.

"
You didna really mean it, did you, Angus?" Edana looked shyly at him, her lashes lowered partway.

"
Aye, lass. You gave me a scare. I want to see if you were injured anywhere else. I will be reassured if I bathe you."

Her cheeks flushed beautifully again. He sat beside her on the bed
, rested his hand on her thigh, and smiled at her. "We are wed. You have no need to be uncomfortable about it."

"
Men dinna bathe their wives." Her blue eyes were wide now.

"
How do you know?"

Her lips parted and he kissed her mouth, touched his tongue gently to hers, but worried about her injur
y paining her, he kept his kisses light and loving.

Her hands gripped his arms
, and she sighed against his mouth. "You need to break your fast."

"
I am certain MacRae will have food sent up to us."

"
Dinna you have anything else you could spend your time on more wisely?"

Never imagining she would be so shy with him now, h
e grinned at her, touched her hair lightly, and shook his head. "With you is the only place I wish to be."

S
omeone finally knocked on the door and he called, "Come in."

"
We brought the tub," a lady said, and then women began filling it with water heated over the fires in the hearth downstairs.

When th
ey were done, they stood watching as if Angus would change his mind about bathing his wife himself. "Thank you," he said, and dismissed them.

Eyes rounded, most of the six women hid smiles, then quickly left the chamber and closed the door. They giggled as they hurried down the corridor.

Edana's cheeks blushed anew. "They will tell everyone in the whole castle what you are about to do."

He smiled.

She slapped his arm in nothing more than a love pat. "They probably wished that you were about to bathe
them
and not me."

He laughed.
"I wouldna have been interested in bathing any of them. You are the only treasure for me. Didna I mention this before, when I found you in the abandoned shieling?"

"
You were probably talking about my mare."

He chuckled.

"You teased me."

"
I told the truth." Though he thought her father would consider her a treasure, Angus had denied that he would see her in the same manner. He had quickly come to realize she truly was a gem.

Angus helped Edana to stand and began to remove her brat, then he
r léine, attempting not to hurt her. But she sucked in her breath several times, and he knew he wasn't succeeding. When she stood naked before him, he checked her all over. "Your arm is bruised. MacRae's fingerprints, I assume." Angus was ready to knock the teeth out of the chief's head.

"
I struggled."

Angus kissed her arm lightly.
"He gripped you too hard, the bastard. You shouldna have had to struggle against the tyrant." He helped her into the warm bathwater, and then he had her sit forward so he could run water over the back of her head and clean the wound. She barely breathed.

"
Are you all right, Edana? Does this hurt too much?"

"
It stings."

He cleaned her wound and washed the rest of her hair, then
found strips of fabric the healer had left in her pouch to bind Edana's head. "Lean back now, lass."

"
The wound is clean. Is it no'?" she asked, her eyes growing wide.

"
Aye, lass. No sense in letting the bathwater that the maids carried all the way up here go to waste."

"
I can wash myself."

"
Nay. You have been injured. Let me do this." And with tender care, he washed every inch of her skin, trying his darnedest not to be so tempted by the lass. It was of no use as her body reacted, her nipples hardening, her breasts appearing as if they had swollen in size, just as fast as his cock thickened and hardened. He was grateful she had closed her eyes and was resting as comfortably as she could, while he fantasized about making love to his bonny wife.

When he pushed her legs apart and dipped the
wet cloth between them, her eyes popped open.

"
I missed a spot." His voice was too husky as he tried for lighthearted, knowing his smile was too wicked by far. Then recalling the way she had looked at Keary outside, Angus asked, "Keary disturbed you in some manner. What was that about, lass?"

"
I saw two of him," she said, sounding relaxed.

"
Two…of…him."

"
Aye."

"
And how many of me, do you see?" he asked, worried her head injury was worse than he had at first suspected.

She smiled.
"One. But when he approached me, there were two of him. He wanted to help me down from the tree, but I didna wish to go to him. Even if I had, I couldna tell which of him to go to. Then you were there, and the matter was decided."

"
There was more to it than that," Angus said, suspecting it was so.

"
I…I was afraid to go with him after he had locked me in a chamber at Lockton Castle before. The fear was unfounded, I am certain, but…I didna see you or anyone I knew, only him and his men, and I feared going with him."

"
Aye, lass, 'tis good you listened to your instincts." As she had said, her fears may have been unwarranted, but Keary had already proved untrustworthy.

O
nce Edana was clean, Angus helped her out of the tub and carefully dried her. She was nearly limp with relaxation—and he was glad for that—as he tended to her. Then he scooped her up in his arms and conveyed her to the curtained bed.

A knock at the door made him say,
"Just a minute." He covered her in the furs and then said, "Come in."

"
I apologize, but MacRae asked me to bring you porridge to break your fast." The maid held a tray in her hands and lowered her gaze to the rushes on the floor.

Angus was g
lad for it as he couldn't get his own rampant need for Edana that quickly under control. It took him a moment to reach the door, then he accepted the tray from her. "Our thanks."

The maid
curtsied, then hurried off, and he shut the door.

"
Are you ready to eat something, Edana?" He turned to look at her.

Her eyes were closed and she
was already sound asleep.

***

Three days later, Drummond and Edana were well enough to travel. They planned on staying at the Fitzburn Tavern on their way to Craigly Castle. Keary and his men parted ways with them before they reached the village. Yet, the way Keary had continued to look at Edana as if he were a besotted lad, Angus hadn't trusted him. He was glad Keary and his men finally left for Lockton Castle.

Angus had thought he would
be traveling with his wife, his cousin, and Gunnolf as before when he headed home this time, but Tibold would not hear of it. He had ten men as escort and vowed to get them safely to Craigly Castle without further trouble.

When they
arrived at Fitzburn Tavern that eve, Angus wanted to take Edana up to a room and eat with her there, not have strangers looking at her as if she was a commodity to be bought.

But Edana said,
"Nay, Angus. You made me stay in the chamber at MacRae's keep the whole time we remained there until I felt well enough to travel. I am tired of hiding away in a bedchamber. I feel well."

"'
Tis no' your health I am concerned about, lass." Angus glanced around at the men in the smoky tavern—all eyes on
his
wife.

He suspected
that Edana being a woman had more to do with it, and not just because she was so bonny. Except for the tavern keeper's own daughter, Angus hadn't seen any women frequent the place. Una would join them in the morning before they left for Craigly Castle.

Against his better judgment
that he should insist Edana hie herself up the stairs to their room, he moved her to a table sitting in the very back of the tavern with a view of all who entered. He was torn between having her sit with her back to the wall and having her seated where her back was to the view of any man sitting in the tavern. She took the option away from him as she moved the furthest from any men, making herself comfortable with her back to the wall.

Niall, h
er da, and three of her brothers joined them. Gunnolf took a seat at another table across the room. He didn't sit with the rest of Edana's brothers either. Something was wrong, but Gunnolf wasn't giving him any indication of what, as if he was distancing himself from Angus and the others. Angus suspected Gunnolf attempted to learn of some vile misdeed that would be directed toward Angus or some member of Tibold's family.

When Edana
's hand touched Angus's thigh, he quickly looked at her, all thoughts of what Gunnolf was doing slipping from his mind. Edana gave him the most wicked of smiles. And he gave her one back. She leaned over to speak to him private. "You are worried about something?"

"
Gunnolf."

She turned her attention on him, but kept her hand on Angus
's thigh. He covered her hand with his and moved her fingers higher toward his groin. She quickly turned her head to look at him. He smiled. "Your head is feeling better?"