“Take yer paws off me, ye damned animal. I have a husband, and I don’t need another. I especially don’t need ye.” Maggie squirmed, attempting to break loose.
“Ye belong to me now, ye border vixen, and I’m going to very much enjoy taming ye to the point where ye will come when I call and eat from my hand,” Ewan growled against her mouth. Then he kissed her, but as he did, his grip upon her relaxed.
Maggie yanked her arms up. Her hands clawed down his face. She pulled away from him, the bodice of her gown sustaining a tear as she did. “Don’t touch me!” And she turned to escape him.
His face stinging from her nails, Ewan grabbed Maggie’s thick plait and jerked her back. He slapped her several times. “Ye dare to scratch me, bitch?” he said angrily.
Maggie slapped him back so hard his ears rang, and he actually saw stars. “I warned ye not to touch me, Ewan Hay.” Then she ran halfway up the stairs. “Next time ye attempt it, I’ll kill ye without hesitation,” Maggie warned him. Then she was gone.
Ewan Hay’s cock was hard and aching. He would bind her to the bed on their wedding night to prevent her from using her claws on him again. Then he would run his hands and tongue all over her body at his leisure before he fucked her over and over until she would beg him for mercy. The picture in his head was so graphic he knew he would have to satisfy his lust. Going to the stables, he called for his horse. Then he rode down to the village to Flora Kerr’s cottage.
He did not knock but walked directly into the dwelling, calling for her. To his surprise, the midwife, Agnes Kerr, came from the tiny bedchamber. “Where’s Florrie?” he asked. “I have a great need to fuck.”
“She’s dead,” Agnes Kerr said coldly.
“Dead?” He was astonished by her words.
“She aborted the bastard ye put in her belly,my lord,” Agnes said scathingly. “Only that her sister found her and called for me, she should have died alone.”
“She was enceinte?” He was surprised. Florrie had said naught about it.
“We have a perfectly good village whore. A willing good woman,” Agnes said. “But ye could not patronize her, could ye? Ye needed to shame a respectable lass.”
“She was a whore too,” Ewan replied. “She willingly opened her legs.”
“Flora offered a service to the men in this village whose wives were with child and could no longer have conjugal relations. She took no coin, or anything else for it. She did not want their men, or any entanglements. She had a need for cock, and they had a need for cunt,” Agnes said. “But ye forced her, and then made her yer mistress. Well, ye’ll not hurt her anymore,” Agnes told him. “Now satisfy that bulge in yer breeks at the edge of the village with Jeannie.”
Ewan Hay didn’t argue. He walked from the cottage, not even bothering to even take a last look at the woman he had used for a mistress. He found Jeannie’s cottage at the end of the lane, entered it, and then eased his lust on her before returning to the keep. She did not speak with him during the act, and saw him quickly off. It was obvious she knew something had happened and didn’t approve of him at all. He would have to find a more pleasant and cooperative woman to be his mistress. And he’d soon have a spitfire wife, but once he got her with child she would hold no fascination for him.
The Hay priest drew up the marriage contracts between Ewan Hay and Maggie Kerr, but she refused to sign them. Dugald Kerr would not sign them. Maggie would not even come to the hall any longer. As he did not patrol the Aisir nam Breug himself, he had no idea that she was riding it. One day as she came to the border between Scotland and England she spied her cousin, Rafe Kerr, riding towards her. He waved to Maggie, and the two of them dismounted their horses to talk.
Maggie told her English kinsman of how Ewan Hay was attempting to force her into a marriage. “He thinks once he has me for a wife he will have our portion of the pass. He’s already stealing from the tolls taken.”
“How do ye know that?” Rafe queried her. It was just as he had suspected when he warned his father against Ewan Hay. The man was not to be trusted.
“Grandsire taught me when I was twelve years old how to manage our accounts. Of course, Ewan doesn’t know that. He’s taken over everything, or so he believes. But I have kept a careful tab of the traffic since he took my account books from me. And since he has left those records in Grandsire’s old library, I wait until all are sleeping, and then go and check them. He has only recorded four travelers for every five who have come through, Rafe. He is stealing from Brae Aisir.”
“Aye, and from us as well,” her kinsman replied. “We have had complaints from several of our regulars traveling north that after they paid their toll to us, Ewan Hay extracted an additional toll at your end. He threatened to hold their cargo if he was not paid. I was coming to speak with yer grandsire about it.”
“The Hay has driven our Kerr clansmen from the keep and peopled it with his own men. He keeps the drawbridge up day and night. He has no idea that I ride out, because he doesn’t know about the little gate in the wall behind the stable,” Maggie said.
“Grandsire has grown frail trying to maintain control. Now several of the more important neighboring lairds have come and demanded of him that I be wed to Ewan. Despite my having managed our section of the pass before, they insist a woman cannot do it. They will not support me. Instead, they say I must wed and they insist Ewan Hay is the natural choice.”
“Are ye certain that Fingal Stewart is dead?” Rafe asked.
Maggie sighed. “I think I would sense it if he were, and I don’t. Yet there has been no word from him, or request for a ransom.” She sighed again. “I will have to kill Ewan Hay, Rafe, for I will not marry him.”
“Don’t use a weapon,” Rafe advised. “They’ll hang you for it. Poison him, and let him die a slow, lingering death so it looks natural. That is what Aldis did to my stepmother. Of course, many suspected, but nothing could be proved. Shall I find out for you what she used?”
“Aye, I would like to know,” Maggie said, shocked to hear herself asking for such help. But she simply could not marry Ewan Hay. The thought of him atop her made her sick to her stomach. And too, if he got her with child, and she delivered a son, Fingal’s lads would be in danger, she was certain.
“I’ll not come to Brae Aisir today,” Rafe said. “Having learned what I have from ye, I think it best I bring this to my father to learn what he would do.”
“Rafe, I dinna trust yer father either,” Maggie said candidly.
Her cousin laughed. “Ye shouldn’t trust him. He wants the whole of the Aisir nam Breug for himself. He also wants one of yer lads for my half sister. But he is still the master of Netherdale. I will do my best to influence him in the right direction, but I will not deny him his rule or embarrass him publicly.”
Maggie nodded. “I understand,” she said. “It is not a bad idea, matching my elder son with yer half sister, Rafe. I would seriously consider it.”
