A Promise of Love (24 page)

The dream of out trading the English was their only way of retaliation, not to mention what would happen to Alisdair and the rest of the clan if insurrection could be proven. Alisdair's conditional pardon was exactly that - based upon a series of conditions, none of which Hamish was sure, included meeting in a deserted keep for the purpose of anarchy.

"Besides, Malcolm, what about the English wife you brought to the glen? It was your idea to wed her to the MacLeod.” It was Malcolm’s words, but he uttered the thoughts of all of them.

“An’ I’ll go to my grave regrettin’ it. Is tha’ what you want to hear?”

Hamish did not reply.

“It’s time to arm oursel’s, for each member of the clan to have a weapon to protect against the English. Are ye for me, or no?" Malcolm asked, turning and fixing them with a steady look. Hamish sighed, and reached out one arm, which was taken by Alex, who lurched forward with him. Old Geddes shambled towards them, his step as shuffling as before, echoing his reluctance.

Malcolm crossed the room swifter then the others, pushing back the rushes to expose the metal ring hidden in the floor.

"We're for ye', Malcolm," Hamish said, when his companions remained mute. "Please God, this decision will no' bring tragedy down on our heads."

CHAPTER 23

Alisdair and Malcolm had taken the first shipment of their raw wool to Inverness. Without a goodbye, without a word spoken, he had simply left. Judith couldn't say she was ungrateful to be spared Malcolm's presence for a few days, but the least Alisdair could have done was to inform her of his plans.

Judith had the whole day to think of the fact he had let Sophie do the chore for him.

"The chicken is already dead, Judith," Sophie said mildly. Judith only slammed it harder on the board. She wielded a mean knife, too and it was Sophie's sudden thought that Judith was wishing it was another body laying upon that board other than a scrawny hen with its neck about to be chopped off.

Judith looked down at the exposed neck of the chicken, took a deep breath, and closed her eyes. She hated this chore. But, they still had to eat and if she were to consume another meal consisting of colcannon, it would be one too many. Anything, even chopping the head off a chicken, was preferable to eating another turnip.

She was cutting the onions into fine dices when Fiona opened the seaside door, entering the kitchen as if she needed no invitation. Truth to tell, none of the women ever knocked, simply entered Tynan as if the laird’s home was as open to them as family. It was, after all, the clan system. Related or no, the clan was kindred and all its members as close as siblings.

Still, Judith frowned at the woman who dared to invade her kitchen.

"Yer daein brawlie wi the cloker," Fiona said, the sweetness in her voice at odds with the contemptuous sneer on her full lips. Her accent seemed oddly thicker, Judith thought, as if it were a thinly veiled insult at her nationality. Not that Fiona ever needed an excuse to mock her. The woman had been a splinter under her skin since the first moment she’d seen her, always sauntering up to Alisdair, rubbing herself around him like a purring cat.

Even now, when Alisdair was in Inverness, she’d doxied herself up for him. Her blouse was scarlet, loose fitting with full, gathered sleeves and a neckline scooped low in the front, revealing the swell of plump, uncorseted breasts. A woolen skirt, not long enough to cover her ankles, also exposed bare feet. Her curly black hair was artfully tousled, as if she'd just risen from bed, leaving the impression that both the sheets and their recent occupant were still warm, sultry, and scented with sex.

Douglas was perched on one hip, eagerly patting his mother's cheek. Fiona did not distract him, only smiled fondly into his infant face. A face which bore the unmistakable stamp of Alisdair's parentage.

"Douglas cam ta bide a wee wi' the laird," Fiona announced, not bothering to mask the sneer on her face.

"Alisdair's no' here,” Judith said, in a parody of Fiona’s accent. One hand held the onion steady, the other held the knife, a pose that would have given any other woman a reason to retreat.

Fiona, however, sauntered closer.

There was a faint smile on Fiona's lips as she lowered Douglas to the floor, fetched him a piece of bread from the table.

"He'll be the laird one day, will my Douglas."

Judith did not bother to respond, only began disemboweling the chicken with a fierceness far in excess of the need.

"De ye no' ken he looks like Alisdair?"

Judith's temper was pushed one notch higher.

Fiona smiled down into her son's face. For a long moment, Judith did not raise her eyes from the much abused chicken.

"Alisdair says he is not Douglas's father."

Fiona only shrugged and then looked meaningfully at Judith's apron covered stomach. "He'll ne're have another, though, will he? Ye wi' yer empty womb. Two husbands afore Alisdair an’ nothin’ to show for it."

It was too much.

Judith simply did what she had wanted to do for weeks. She retaliated. She picked up the chicken by its still attached neck and threw it at the other woman.

Fiona shrieked as the chicken hit her, dripping blood and entrails over her best blouse. The noise was enough to rouse Sophie from her doze in the chair by the fire. His mother's scream was enough to send Douglas into a rousing wail.

Judith lost what composure she had left. As Fiona continued screaming, Judith continued throwing. Whatever was at hand was hurled at the woman who had the nerve to flaunt her relationship and her child in front of Judith. Chopped onions followed the greens. The boiled oats and stale bread were next.

At each successive hit, Judith grinned broadly. Fiona's face was flushed with ugly blotches of chicken blood, her hair was streaked with guts and boiled oats, the swelling bodice of her blouse was filled with chopped onions.

Fiona went for her throat.

Judith was ready for her.

Douglas cried louder.

Sophie started laughing, an odd cackling sound that sputtered and then stopped, as she gasped for breath.

Alisdair froze in mid-step.

He retrieved Douglas from the floor, set him on Sophie’s lap. Then he returned to the women, neither of whom he was disconcerted to note, had ceased in their efforts to throttle the other. Fiona was smaller, but heavier, while Judith's rage had given impetus to her strength.

"Enough!" he shouted, but even that was not enough to part them. They had to be bodily separated. Malcolm, with a frown, managed to restrain his daughter while Alisdair hauled Judith up against him until she felt his full length against her body.

"Ye should have let the English take her, lad," Fiona shouted, "she doesn't belong here a' Tynan. She's no for the likes of you."

She smiled, a curve of full, carmined lips, and dropped her lashes, a coy imitation of a maiden's distress despite being restrained by her father’s arms. It would have been more effective if she’d not had a gizzard stuck in her hair.

Alisdair, however would never have been enticed, despite how well she dressed for seduction. It was his own father who’d counseled his son - "Animals never foul their own watering hole". Advice he’d always heeded.

"Since when do you know what's right for me, Fiona?"

"Since ye were a lad, Alisdair," she said softly, her sultry voice evoking thoughts of warm flesh and cool nights, "I've known what you wanted." She had the right of it, he supposed. Once, when he was just a boy, he'd flushed whenever she came around, her plush beauty and plump curves fueling his adolescent fantasies. He'd longed for a sight of her, near panted when she'd artfully stretched, or accidentally showed a length of leg. He could not be around her without wondering if her breasts would fill his hands to overflowing, and how they'd taste.

But that had been years ago, when he was a youth and starved for the touch of a woman, any woman.

He had become more discriminating with age. Now he longed for wit as well as upthrust breasts, for intelligence which sparkled behind sultry blue-black eyes, for long legs and a challenging smile. He craved the sound of throaty laughter and an unflagging courage as laudable as any man's. He wanted affection with his sex, and a touch of spicy wit, and something else. He wanted loyalty, unquenchable passion, and love. He suspected that only one woman was capable of giving him those things.

The look he gave Fiona was not as sharp as it should have been, nor as condemnatory as his wife would have preferred. She was not only his clanswoman, she was a companion of his youth. The look, however, carried with it such indifference that even Fiona noted it.

"I'd never thought ta see the day, my laird," she said, her pride stung, "when you'd prefer an English bitch ta warm your bed. Tell me, do the English do it differently?" Her smile was mocking, the look in her eyes wicked, taunting.

"Do not presume upon our kinship, Fiona," he said, his voice as somber as a gray day, no emotion in its depths. The very lack of it stilled her in the act of pulling away.

"So, it's like that, is it?" she said, her look searching the depths of his amber eyes. Whatever she saw in them dissatisfied her.

"It's like that," he agreed. From this day forward, things would not be the same between them and both of them knew it. He would no longer be able to accept her flirtation for the innocence it was not. She would not be able to be around him and remember he'd rejected her. Their bond of kinship had been traded for stronger emotions. Love, pride, desire, and anger.

He wished it were not so.

She pulled away from her father’s grip and straightened her blouse. "'Tis a pity, that," she said, not looking at him as both hands smoothed the material down over rounded breasts. "'Tis a shame she's not more comely."

Her own beauty was never in doubt. She had been raised with the notion that she was the clan's reigning beauty the way a person born with brown eyes is conscious of that color. Her beauty simply was, like an appendage, or a name, or a talent. Even Ian had been no match for her wiles, nor had Douglas's father.

Alisdair met Malcolm's eyes over the heads of the women. Malcolm nodded to an unspoken command and removed Fiona forcibly from the kitchen. He returned a moment later for Douglas, who had still not ceased his wailing.

Only then, did the kitchen begin to resemble the oasis of peace and quiet it had always been. All except for the bloody chicken and a medley of vegetables strewn across the floor.

Alisdair turned his wife in his arms.

The flush was still on Judith’s face, damp tendrils of hair fell below the bodice of her dress.

His eyes were flecked with gold, and a small, wry smile appeared on his face, as he continued to study her. Judith could see the day's stubble of his beard and despite her intention, one hand strayed to that bristly chin.

"Fiona is a kinswoman," he said softly, the touch of her palm on his face fueling desires never quite dormant around her. He had only to smell her scent and he felt needy, hot blooded, stallion-ready.

She pulled away from him, and turned her back, blinking away the sudden sting in her eyes. It was the onion, of course. Everyone knew they made you cry. It was not the sudden show of loyalty from Alisdair which prompted her tears.

“Kinswoman or not," Judith said, “that woman has to go. It is my kitchen, MacLeod," she said, stooping to pick up the chicken, chunks of onions and greens from the floor. “I’ve a right to who comes in it.” Chicken blood was splattered over the stone and she washed out a rag to begin cleaning it.

Alisdair had waited for the day when Judith felt secure enough with him to express her anger. He had expected it, anticipated it. Yet, he could not reconcile the stiff, silent woman he’d first met to the virago he’d seen when he walked into the kitchen.

He grinned, the effort of restraining his laughter almost too much. He reached for her, but she evaded his touch.

She didn’t like the twinkling light of merriment in his eyes. It was not funny. Fiona was a constant thorn in her flesh.

“Come here, wife,” Alisdair said, his smile still in place, a different note in his voice. Not so much teasing as it was promising.

Instead, Judith backed away slowly, toes of one foot placed carefully behind the heel of the other. It was a gentle gesture of escape that did not go unnoticed.

"Come here, Judith," he said, still in that calm, reasonable tone. She distrusted it. Each time Alisdair adopted that unhurried, narrating tone of voice it meant he was about to do something bizarre or wicked.

She did not mean to, but when he raised his hands to put them on her shoulders, she flinched. It was as if time itself stopped at her unbidden gesture. The very stillness of his stance made her look up, to see his eyes fixed steadily on hers.

An eternity of speech passed between them in those long seconds, words unvoiced, yet spoken all the same. Trust me - his look said, I will not hurt you. I know - she answered, but there are times I forget. An admission that was as hard to reveal to him as it was to herself. She wanted to shut her eyes against his tense regard. Instead, she allowed him to see what she felt, exposing herself in a way she’d never done before.