Page 7 of A Virgin for the Vicious Highlander
Cecilia swallowed. She was already too far into the lie to back out now, but perhaps Mairie would be satisfied that no justice could be obtained from such a man and would urge them to depart at once.
She clung to that hope as she said, “I apologize, Auntie. I didnae hear him properly. I meant ‘aye,’ I did make such a claim.”
Mairie sniffed in satisfaction, jabbing a finger in Murdoch’s direction. “Well, I would hear it from the source. Did ye or did ye nae kiss me niece at Laird Cairn’s weddin’, M’Laird?”
“I did what now?” Murdoch’s half-concealed face was as blank as his mask, his gray eyes flinty and unfeeling, holding Cecilia’s defiant ones as if challenging her to look away first.
She would not. She would not repeat her weakness at the wedding festivities. If he wanted her to stop looking into his eyes,hewould have to drop his gaze.
He lowered his head slightly to the side of her face that hid his profile from Mairie’s view. “Did yewantme to kiss ye, lass?” he whispered harshly.
When Cecilia did not answer, he whispered again, “Foolish creature. I’m nae the stuff of anyone’s fantasies, nun. I’m the very worst of yer nightmares.”
And ye dinnae frighten me,Cecilia wanted to reply, but she needed to be cleverer than that if she hoped to get out of there unscathed, with her aunt in tow.
“I told ye we shouldnae have come here, Auntie,” she said, affecting a slight hitch in her voice and what she hoped looked like hurt in her eyes. “I kenned it would come to naught. Now, it’s just embarrassin’.”
“Nay more than bein’ accused of ruinin’ a pure and innocent lass, I assure ye,” Murdoch retorted, pulling back.
Somehow, his gray eyes were even colder than before, like two perfect circles of mountain ice.
The lie had caught up to her, and worse, it had outpaced her. What had she expected? That Murdoch would just play along? She doubted he even knew how to, his very being devoid oflightness and merriment. She would have had more chance of getting the abbot to go along with the ruse and admit that he had kissed her.
And after Paisley told me, all those months ago, to be nice to ye.
Cecilia remembered her friend’s generous spirit, suggesting that Murdoch’s demeanor was, perhaps, not something of his own choosing but a result of unfortunate circumstances. And she had just added to the beastly myth of him by calling him a reprobate who went around kissing nuns.
She needed to salvage this somehow. If not for her own sake, then at least for that of the Laird, whose name she had just dragged through the muck.
“Auntie, might I have a moment alone with the Laird? I’ll explain everythin’ to ye once I’m done.”
Mairie huffed and puffed, still glaring at Murdoch as if she thought he was a demon sent to test the very limits of her faith. “I think ye bein’ alone together has caused quite enough trouble. Whatever ye have to say to him, ye can say in front of me.”
“Please, Auntie,” Cecilia urged. “If ye do this, I promise I willnae ask ye for anythin’ ever again. It’ll be to yer benefit.”
Her aunt clenched her hands into fists, took a deep breath, and expelled it violently. “Very well, but I’ll be just outside that door, a step shy of earshot. But rest assured that if there’s even a hintof tomfoolery, I’ll hear and I’ll be back in here with the fury of God pushin’ me forth!”
She turned on her heel and stormed across the entrance hall and back out into the cold, with her wimple flapping and one hand gripping the cross on her scapular, no doubt praying for a quick solution to the ongoing issue of a wayward niece.
“I’m terribly sorry, Laird Moore,” Cecilia whispered, meaning it. “I didnae mean to entangle ye in this, but I was runnin’ out of excuses nae to take me vows, and?—”
“And ye thought to trap me, of all people, in marriage?” Murdoch interrupted in that throaty, rumbling voice, his expression implacable.
Affronted, Cecilia threw all courtesy out the window. “What? Of course nae!” She kept her voice low, entirely aware of her aunt’s keen hearing. “I’m nae some silly lass with silly dreams of becomin’ a Lady. I told me aunt I’d kissed someone at Paisley’s weddin’, as that would prohibit me from joinin’ the order, and she insisted on findin’ out who.”
“How did she ‘find out’ me name?” Murdoch asked flatly.
He clearly did not believe her, and she could not exactly blame him; she understood how it looked.
“Because I panicked,” she shot back in a hiss. “She wouldnae stop askin’. She was houndin’ me, and yer name popped intome stupid head because I didnae think she’d march out of the convent to confront a laird, much less one like ye. I was mistaken, obviously.”
He tilted his head, his eyes narrowing with doubt. “So, ye didnaewantto be kissed by me? This wasnae some strange and unwelcome invitation?”
“Kissed by theBeast?” Cecilia snorted, masking the sting of his insult with her annoyance. “And here I was, certain that ye were incapable of bein’ amusin’.”
His eyes flashed.
“I just wanted me aunt to be too afraid to do aught about it,” Cecilia added in a hurry. “But, apparently, she’s nae as swayed by infamy as everyone else.”
