Page 35 of Sweet Home Highlander
“Three,” he answered. Fenella and his new cook, Mrs. Wingate, and all the kitchen maids would already be well underway with preparations in the kitchens. If Aisla hadn’t been so busy up here in the upper rooms planning her clever renovations, she might have noticed.
Aisla nodded. “Excellent. That leaves me plenty of time to finish freshening up around here.”
Niall didn’t ask what she intended, nor did he want to know. He turned at the door, his gaze flicking to the obscene painting. His placid voice was at odds with the roaring beast in his trousers. “I admire your taste, but I do prefer Rubens to Titian.”
Still, three days later, he was forced to bite his tongue as his clansmen and women arrived on Tarbendale grounds to find pink silky flounces draped over the front door arches, pots and pots of exotic flowers procured from God knew where, and several more ridiculous paintings hung everywhere…paintings of lanky hounds for some reason. Though he was grateful for the lack of lust-provoking nudes, he was getting sick and tired of dogs.
“What in the name of sweet Saint Andrew happened here?”
Niall had known he could count on Hamish to tell it like it was, and he’d been prepared. His friend stomped into the entrance hall, grimacing at all the new decor.
“A hurricane disguised as a female,” Niall replied, the longing for something to drink—something stronger than tea or coffee or water—unexpectedly sharp. Not only did he have to endure the revelry, but he also had to weather his wife. He hadn’t seen her all morning.
After waking from yet another uncomfortable night spent on the couch in the study, Niall had gone for a ride through the woods and fields, toward the mine on the ridge. It had been ghostly in its silence, the workers off for the day of feasting and games. By the time he’d returned to the castle, the place had been teeming and he’d retreated into his study again. The ride hadn’t worked. His stomach was still coiled tight with apprehension.
He wanted to know what his wife was thinking this morning as she prepared to face her clansmen and women for the first time. A number had already seen her, of course, but not all, and not so formally as they would today. Again, apprehension kinked Niall’s stomach.Bloody hell.He was nervous, he realized. For her.
The foyer wasn’t empty. Men and women were passing through, carrying trenchers to and from the great hall, and harp music filled the air.
“Yer lady wife, I take it?” Hamish asked.
Niall scrubbed a hand through his hair, letting down his guard some. “She’s no’ as I remember. Or as I expected.” He’d wanted her cowed and disheartened, easy to seduce and manipulate to his own ends, but instead she was like wildfire razing everything in her path. Unpredictable, and that made her dangerous. It was one of the main reasons why he’d spent his nights in the study rather than insisting on sleeping in his own bed and attempting to seduce her in the process.
“People are curious about her. There are rumors going around that she’s causing ye grief.”
The rumors likely referred to the upheaval at the castle over the last week as she “settled in.” He doubted anyone was thinking about the other, more indelicate side of the upheaval. The one that plagued him from dawn to dusk, and especially at night when he lay upon the study sofa, thinking of his wife sleeping in his bed. Going to her would have cost him more than his pride now; it would cost him a substantial sum in his wager with Ronan, and he was in this for the long haul. The wager with his wife should have helped his cause, but instead, it had made his own state worse. So he’d relieved himself in the darkness of his study more than once, expelling the fire in his veins, even though the embers of desire still remained.
“’Tis nothing I cannae handle,” he told Hamish, who grabbed a goblet from one of the passing maids and ogled the lass’s backside at the same time. She batted her eyes at him, giggling, and then bustled away.
Following Hamish, Niall made his way toward the great hall, and nearly crashed into the man’s back where he stood goggling at the painting along with several of Niall’s clansmen.
“Och,” he said, his big face going ruddy. “That’s randy.” Niall sighed, and moved past him. “Heaps better than yer ugly grandfather, I reckon.”
Niall ignored the guffaws of agreement and walked between the tables of food and drink, where he found the shiny new tea service Aisla had purchased. Shaking his head, he had a maid pour, and couldn’t help a chuckle as he took the small porcelain cup, with gold-painted flowers, in his big hand. He’d barely taken a sip when the raucous voices in the hall ebbed. Niall glanced up and saw the reason why.
Aisla stood within the great hall’s entrance, her chin held high, her expression serene. But it was what she wore that made Niall’s grip tighten, threatening the fragility of the thin porcelain cup. Wound around her deep blue gown was a long length of pinned and tucked Montgomery plaid. Not Maclaren,Montgomery. It was a punch in the gut, even for Niall. Her chin was held high, her beautiful, haughty face proud. Even in his rush of anger at her boldness in rejecting his colors, he admired her daring. This Aisla was a warrior incarnate, and she was here to do battle. He steeled himself as he rose to meet her.
“Bold choice, my lady,” he murmured, taking her hand and leading her to the chair beside him on the raised dais.
“I am a Montgomery.”
“Ye are a Maclaren for six more weeks.”
“Fewer than five.” A cool smile curved her pink lips. “If you can withstand it.”
“I can take anything ye choose to throw at me.”
Glittering copper eyes met his. “A dance then, in honor of your feast.”
A dance? Niall wondered at her game, the odd thought occurring to him that he could not recall dancing with her at Maclaren or at any other point. Had he been such a drunken boor that he’d never danced with his own wife? They hadn’t even had a proper wedding reception. He’d meant to have one, and then the days at Maclaren had run into each other. Niall felt a spurt of guilt, but squashed it.
He stood and leaned over her, his voice low. “If ye want to dance, then ye will leave behind that plaid. Ye’re still my wife, and that means ye should dress like a Maclaren.”
“It’s only a tartan,” she said primly, “and I don’t recall clothing having anything to do with our wager.”
“Neither were soaps, trinkets, and bawdy paintings.”
Something passed between them, a charged moment in which two duelists recognized and appreciated the skill of the other, and then she nodded graciously, unpinning the plaid from her shoulders. Niall’s throat went dry at the succulent display of creamy flesh revealed beneath the cloth. Good Lord, he almost asked her to re-pin the damned thing. Her gaze was calm, but satisfaction shone in their depths.
