Seven
 

Kenneth woke slowly, trying to clear the fog from his mind. But his head felt as if someone had sheared a sheep inside it. Opening his eyes, he shot upright, startled by his surroundings. By the shards of light streaming through the planks of the door.

He winced at the knife of pain in his side.

Hell. Covering the offending area with his hand, he braced himself as he stood. Whatever dulling effects last night had worked on his pain, they were gone.

Last night. He realized three things at once: it was morning, he’d missed the feast, and he was alone.

He swore, not knowing what angered him the most.

What the hell had happened to him? It felt as though he’d been knocked out. The moment he’d closed his eyes, he’d slipped into a deep sleep. He hadn’t slept that solidly in years.

His mouth fell in a grim line when he reached down to pick up his tunic and saw a swatch of dark green silk. He knew what had happened to him. She had happened to him.

Why in Hades had she run off without waking him?

In many cases he would be relieved to wake up and find himself alone after a night of lovemaking, but damn it, this wasn’t one of them. He vowed to go back to uncomplicated and eager-to-please just as soon as he was done with her.

He jerked on his tunic, wrapped the plaid back around his shoulders—the fire in the brazier had gone out hours ago, and it was bloody cold in here—and picked up the offending veil.

He and Lady Mary were going to have a nice long talk about what he was going to expect from her—a little common courtesy, for one thing. And she wasn’t going to run off like that again. He would decide when it was time to leave, damn it.

He stalked out of the library, slamming the door behind him, and headed toward the Hall to look for her. But it seemed the morning meal had ended some time ago. There were only a few people milling about, and none was the one he wanted to see.

Just what the hell time was it?

He swore again. The morning was quickly going from bad to worse. If the morning meal was over, that meant he didn’t have much time until the wrestling competition got under way. One of the most important days of his life, and he’d nearly slept through it. His anger at his wee nun was growing. She’d distracted him. And had done a bloody efficient job of it, damn it.

He grabbed a piece of bread and cheese from a tray as one of the servants passed by and washed it down with a swig of wine. As he exited the Hall, he winced, shrinking back from the head-piercing rays of sunlight that blasted him. Damn, his head felt like he’d drunk far more than a tankard of whisky. Squinting, he scanned the courtyard, and then winced again. It wasn’t because of the sun this time, but who he saw striding toward him.

“Where the hell have you been?” MacKay demanded. “I hope you have a good explanation for disappearing last night. The king was furious.”

Kenneth ignored MacKay and greeted his sister, who had come up next to him.

“Are you all right, Kenneth? You don’t look well,” Helen said.

His side hurt like hell, but he wasn’t going to tell her that with MacKay standing there. “What did you give me?” he asked. “I fell asleep and just woke up.”

“Nothing that should have—” She stopped, biting her lip. “Did you drink any wine or whisky last night by chance?”

“I drink wine or whisky every night. What difference does that make?”

She looked up at him guiltily. “I must have forgotten to mention that mixing the draught with wine or whisky might make you a tad sleepy.”

Kenneth’s mouth tightened. “Aye, you seem to have forgotten that part.”

Well, at least he knew why he’d slept so hard. Although he suspected there was another cause that had affected him as much as the whisky. He’d slept the dead sleep of a man who’d been well satisfied. Too well satisfied. Instead of worrying about what had happened to his wee wanton, he should be preparing for the Games.

“I will explain what happened to the king after the competition,” he said to MacKay, who was still glaring at him from Helen’s side. “And apologize to Lady Mary.”

McKay gave him a hard look. “Aye, well in that you were fortunate. Lady Mary sent word late that she was not feeling well.”

Kenneth frowned, thinking it fortunate indeed. Almost too fortunate. A prickle of unease teased his consciousness.

“What’s that?” MacKay said, pointing to the veil.

Damn. “Nothing,” he said, scrunching the silk in his hand and tucking it more firmly against his side.

But MacKay wasn’t having it. His eyes narrowed on the swathe of fabric at his side. The very feminine swathe of fabric. “Don’t tell me you ignored the king’s invitation for a woman? What were you thinking? It seems you have as much discipline over your co—” He stopped, giving Helen an apologetic look. “Over your desire as you do over your temper.” He shook his head. “I bloody well hope she was worth it.”

Kenneth’s teeth clenched. Surprisingly, he realized, she was, but he wasn’t about to explain himself to MacKay. And he sure as hell didn’t like being scolded as if he were a wet-behind-the-ears squire.

Damn it, he was tired of this. He was tired of his boyhood nemesis lauding it over him as if he were his superior. He wasn’t. And today Kenneth was going to prove it.

“I need to get ready,” he said, refusing to let MacKay bait him. He needed to have his sister wrap his ribs. “Helen, if you would meet me in the barracks—”

“There you are,” Gregor MacGregor said, walking toward them from the loch. From the damp hair and drying cloth wrapped around his neck, Kenneth assumed he’d been bathing. Half the castle’s population—the female half—was probably still at the beach right now. “I thought you said you were going to escort Lady Mary to the feast?” His eyes were laughing. “I bet the king is wondering what happened to you both. I thought she wasn’t interested in a betrothal. But maybe you convinced her?”

Kenneth froze. The blood drained from his face. “Who?”

MacGregor’s brow creased with his confusion. “Lady Mary. I assumed after you saw us in the corridor that—”

“Mary of Mar,” Kenneth said tonelessly, feeling as if a stone had just dropped in his gut. She’d deceived him. The wee nun wasn’t a lady’s attendant at all, she was the widowed Countess of Atholl. The woman the king had picked out for him as a bride.

Why hadn’t she told him?

His mouth fell in a hard line, anticipating that he wasn’t going to like the explanation.

“You didn’t,” MacKay said under his breath, looking at the veil.

Kenneth stiffened. The tic in his cheek jumped. He glared at him, daring him to say a bloody word.

But like him, MacKay never backed down from a challenge. That was probably one of the reasons they were always at one another’s throats.

The bastard laughed. “My God, you didn’t even know who she was! I knew you’d find a way to screw this up. When the king finds out, your being champion isn’t going to matter.”

Kenneth clenched his fists, the laughter grating like nails under his skin. Worse, he knew MacKay was right. The king wasn’t going to take kindly to him seducing his former sister-in-law. So much for avoiding the gauntlet of dangerous women! He couldn’t have picked a more inappropriate bedmate if he’d tried.

MacGregor wasn’t any better. He let out a low whistle. “I doubt that was what the king had in mind to convince her.”

“There will be no reason for the king to find out,” he warned them.

Neither man disagreed, but neither did they agree.

Helen gazed up at him with a worried look on her face. She knew how much this meant to him and feared he might have just done something he could not undo. “You’d better do something to make it right,” she said. “And I’d do it quickly. Lady Anna told me Lady Mary is leaving soon.”

His blood spiked. Lady Mary wasn’t going anywhere, damn it. Kenneth turned on his heel and stormed toward the donjon, rage surging through his veins. He couldn’t ever remember feeling this much anger toward a woman. Women were easy. They didn’t give him trouble. He had no reason to get angry with them. But it seemed Lady Mary possessed a singular ability to elicit any number of strange reactions from him.

“Don’t take too long,” McKay taunted. “The Games are about to begin. You wouldn’t want to be late and forfeit your place in the competition.”

Kenneth shot him a black look. “Don’t worry. This won’t take long.”

He and his soon-to-be betrothed were going to have a very short conversation.

The flurry of activity going on around them didn’t stop Margaret from trying to question her.

“But why must you go now? I thought you planned to stay until after the feast tomorrow. There will be a great celebration to close the Games.”

Mary turned to give instructions to one of the maidservants on in which trunk to place the limited jewels she had left, before answering. “As I said, King Edward has given the bishop leave to stay in Scotland for a few more months to try to effect a truce, but he is eager for a report, and the bishop thought it best if I give it to him personally.” At her suggestion, of course.

Margaret didn’t look convinced. “Are you sure that is all? You never did say what happened to you last night. I sent one of your ladies to see what was wrong, but she didn’t find you in the room.” Margaret paused meaningfully. “It’s strange. I noticed Sir Kenneth was missing as well. The king was quite vexed by his absence.”

Mary hid her blush by turning to give another instruction. Margaret suspected what had happened, but for some reason Mary couldn’t bring herself to confide in her. She didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to think about it. Being wicked no longer seemed like something she wanted to laugh about.

By the time she finished speaking with the servant, she’d managed to compose herself. “It was probably when I was at the beach. I needed some fresh air.” She knew she needed to give her sister-in-law more, so she added, “David will be at Alnwick Castle soon, and I should like to be there when he arrives. It’s been nearly a year since I’ve seen him.”

The longing in her voice left no doubt of the truth of that, and Margaret was instantly contrite. “Of course you do! I’m sorry, I can see why you are anxious to go. I can’t imagine what it would be like to have one of my babies taken away from me.” She shivered as if the mere thought had sent a chill through her blood.

How could Mary tell her it was so much worse than that? You couldn’t imagine the pain until you experienced it. It was one of the worst things any mother could ever go through.

“You are still young, Mary. Have you ever thought about having another child?”

The dull ache in her chest turned into a hard stab. A merciless stab. Even if she let herself admit that she yearned for another child, the price of having one was too high. Independence. Control over her own fate. “I believe you need a husband for that,” she said wryly.

Her words were punctuated by a crash, as the door slammed open.

A half-dozen faces turned as Sir Kenneth Sutherland strode into the room like some conquering barbarian.

Mary froze, feeling the blood drain from her face. He was looking right at her. Nay, “looking” was too benign for the fierce, all-consuming black glare that seemed to reach across the room and capture her in a steely grip.

Instinctively, she took a few steps back.

Despite the fury emanating from him, he cocked a lazy brow. “Going somewhere, Lady Mary?” The emphasis he put on her name sent chills racing up and down her spine. “I hope you weren’t planning to leave without saying goodbye.”

Mary wasn’t fooled by his pleasant banter. He was looking at her as if he’d like to throttle her. Every word was a threat, a challenge. An invitation to do battle.

His gaze skidded over the piles of clothing and open trunks. “There’s something we need to talk about before you finish packing.”

Her heart drummed frantically in her throat. This was how a deer must feel when it turned and found itself in the hunter’s sights, an arrow pointed at its heart. Trapped. Cornered. With nowhere to run.

She managed to find her voice. “You can’t come barging in here like—”

“Leave,” he ordered the other women in the room. “Your mistress and I have something to discuss in private.”

To Mary’s horror, they scatted like terrified mice. Only Margaret paused. But even she recognized his authority.

He had no authority, blast it! This was exactly what she sought to avoid.

Her sister-in-law gave her a worried look. “Will you be all right?”

Mary was tempted to say no, but she read the determination in every inch of his furious, combative face. From the clenched jaw, to the tight lips, to the piercing blue gaze locked on her, she knew that he was going to say his peace—with or without Margaret in the room.

She nodded. Margaret gave her a long, searching look and left.

The shock of his arrival had dissipated, and the brief pause while the others left was long enough to restore her courage. She straightened her back and turned to face him coolly. “What right do you have—”

She stopped, eyes widening when he tossed something on the bed. The dark green billowed in a silken cloud before landing in a pool on the ivory bedsheets, a stark, damning reminder of what she’d done.

“You forgot something before you ran off last night, Lady Mary.” There it was again, that hard emphasis on her name. “Or should I say, Countess.”

Mary cringed inwardly at the confirmation of her suspicions. He’d learned her identity. She’d known he wouldn’t be pleased when he discovered the truth. But she hadn’t expected this kind of extreme reaction to a little tweak of pride.

He closed the distance between them in a few steps, but she stood her ground, refusing to back away even though every instinct in her body urged her to run. Her heart slammed in her chest. Well over six feet of hard, angry warrior looming over her wasn’t exactly unintimidating.

But he wouldn’t hurt her. Somehow she knew that. For all his fire and quickness of temper, she sensed an undercurrent of control.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you lie to me and let me believe you were one of Lady Margaret’s attendants?”

She gave a far more careless shrug than she felt. “It was your assumption. I saw no reason to change it.”

His eyes narrowed. She could tell he didn’t like her attitude. What had he expected? That she would get down on her hands and knees and beg his forgiveness? Probably. It was no doubt what most women of his acquaintance would do. Women who were eager to please him. Well, she wasn’t one of those women.

She had nothing to apologize for. It was he who’d started this with his wickedness in the stable, and then by taunting her with the feelings he’d aroused in her. He’d gotten no more than he’d given—and exactly what he’d asked for.

“Not even when you knew what the king intended? That he has proposed a betrothal between us?”

Her back stiffened. She looked down her nose at him. Unfortunately, as she had a rather small nose it lost some of its dismissive effect, although from the way his fists clenched it was enough. “Especially then. I am not in the market for a husband.”

His eyes flashed like a lightning storm. The fury of his temper was truly something to behold, and she wondered if she’d been too quick to assume she was in no danger.

“But you are in the market for something else?”

She executed a perfect Gallic shrug of indifference that made a muscle jump in his jaw. She knew she was pressing against the limits of that control, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Something about this man brought out every instinct in her to fight. “Why are you acting the aggrieved party? You made an offer, I accepted. It’s something I’ve no doubt you have done many times in the past.”

He grabbed her arm before she could turn away, hauling her up against him. The heat of his body engulfed her. “What is that supposed to mean?”

She tried to wrench away, but his grip was like a manacle. Did he have to smell so good? It was confusing her. Reminding her of last night. “It means I’m sure it’s not the first time you’ve enjoyed a meaningless liaison with a woman whose name you do not know or can’t remember.”

A hard, angry flush had risen to his cheeks. “So you wanted a tumble in the hay, is that it?”

Mary felt her cheeks heat at the crassness of his language, even if it was the truth. “Is that not what you wanted?”

His clenched mouth came closer to hers, and she couldn’t stop the reflexive shudder that ran through her. Her body didn’t seem to care if he was angry; all it recognized was hot, fiercely aggressive masculinity. “What I wanted? I prefer to be made aware that the woman I’m taking to my bed is going to be my wife.”

Mary stiffened. Perhaps if the word had been uttered with any hint of softness it might have been different. But it wasn’t, and she bristled at both his tone and his assumption. She met his glare with one that was every bit as fierce as his own. It seemed she had a temper as well. “You presume much, my lord. I believe it is still the custom to ask for a lady’s hand before assuming a betrothal.”

His eyes flared at the challenge. “And I believe I did all my asking last night.” He pressed his hard body to hers, reminding her of exactly what he meant. She jolted at the intimate contact. “And you answered. A most enthusiastic ‘yes, please yes’ if I recall correctly.”

His voice was low and mesmerizing, sending a blast of melting dampness to the place that remembered him the most. She shuddered, seeing from the wicked smile that curved his mouth that he knew what he was doing to her.

Big and possessive, his hand slid down her back and over her hip to cup her bottom, bringing her more firmly against him. “Should I ask again, Mary?” he whispered, his mouth only a hair’s breadth from hers.

For one treacherous instant she wanted to say yes. She wanted to lift her lips up to his and take the pleasure he offered. Her body vibrated—pulsed—with a restless energy.

But it wasn’t only pleasure. It was far more. Succumbing to him would mean giving up everything she’d achieved the past few years and losing herself all over again.

She hated how weak she felt. How much she wanted to say yes. How easily he could make her forget herself.

Kenneth Sutherland wielded a power over her that was far more dangerous than the girlish infatuation she’d felt for her husband. The desire she felt for him was that of a woman, a woman who had learned exactly what he could do to her, and how it felt to experience the pleasure of passion.

But no matter how badly she wanted him, she would not let this control her. She would not let him control her. This too-handsome, too-arrogant warrior who didn’t think she could resist him. Who couldn’t even trouble himself to ask her to marry him but just assumed she would jump at the chance. Why wouldn’t she? Look at her. An unexpected blast of heat pricked her eyes.

For once she didn’t have to think about what her sister would do. She pushed back. “Let go of me!” Surprisingly, he released her. “How dare you manhandle me like that! I will not be bullied by you or anyone else into a marriage I do not want. I told you before I don’t want a husband, and as difficult as it is for you to understand, that includes you. Especially you.”

A glint of steel sparked in his eyes. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that if I were ever to marry again, which I certainly have no intention of doing, it wouldn’t be to a profligate with a penchant for taking women in stables or storerooms.”

Though his expression betrayed nothing, she could feel the fury radiating from him in hot, pulsing waves. “I think you mean libraries.”

She flushed. “Be that as it may, we wouldn’t suit.”

“On the contrary, I think we suit quite well.”

The heat of his gaze left no doubt as to what he meant. He was right. Even now, the attraction snapped and crackled between them like wildfire.

But it wasn’t enough. “As you pointed out last night, what does that have to do with marriage?”

She forced herself not to wither under the intensity of his gaze. His voice when he spoke was deceptively calm, but she sensed he was one hair’s breadth away from snapping. “Are you saying you would be my mistress but not my wife?”

She lifted her chin, forcing herself to meet his gaze. “I’m saying I will be neither. I’m returning to England, and that is the end of it.”

She turned away, but not before seeing the dangerous white lines tightening around his mouth. He was struggling to control his temper, and she knew her dismissiveness was testing the limits of that control. She suspected it had been a very long time since someone had refused Kenneth Sutherland anything, and coming from a pinched sparrow of a woman past her youth, she wagered it stung. But she knew it was better this way. He was a fighter, and showing any weakness or vulnerability would give him a place to attack.

“And the king?” he said. “Have you informed Bruce of your intentions?”

“Robert understands my position. He knows I have no wish to marry anyone—Scot or English. Nothing has changed that.” When he looked as if he might challenge that point, she added, “He will not learn of anything else from me, and even were he to discover what happened, such interludes are hardly uncommon.”

His teeth clenched so tightly, she could almost hear them grinding. “Aye, I believe you’ve pointed that out.”

Something in his voice made her uneasy. If she weren’t certain it was his pride speaking, she might think her refusal had genuinely hurt him.

She picked up the veil that was lying on her bed like an albatross and carefully folded it. “Now, if you will excuse me. I need to finish packing.” She peeked out at him from under the edge of her lashes. From the way his muscles were bunched up at his shoulders and his fists were clenching and reclenching, she thought he might argue with her. Her heart raced; she needed a way to be rid of him. “Don’t you have a competition to win?” She glanced out the window at the stands, which even now were beginning to fill. “It looks like they will be starting soon.”

He took a step toward her, and she held her breath when he reached out as if to take her arm again. But he glanced out the tower window behind her and let it drop.

For a long moment he stared at her as if he wanted to say something. Say quite a lot of something, actually. But then, he seemed to think better of it. He gave her a mocking bow. “My lady.”

And in one hard tug of a heartbeat, he was gone.

She thought she should feel relieved, but standing there alone, the room suddenly empty, she felt a loss that didn’t make sense. Nor could she escape the feeling that she’d just made a terrible mistake.