After her parents, Egan enveloped her in a soft bear hug. She was still irritated at his barbaric behavior at the Black Hog’s, although it had lost all of its fire. But being overbearing and highhanded was the way Egan showed he cared.
“I trust Slade with my life. He will make a fiercely protective husband for you, dearest sister. It’s there in his eyes. He loves you. But if he ever makes you cry, or hurts you in any way, you only have to say the word, and I will take immense pleasure in flattening him into shape on your behalf,” Egan said.
Phoebe chuckled, instantly forgiving him for Black Hog’s. “I am sure that will not be necessary, but I love you for saying it.”
As Phoebe watched her family leave in a Dunbar coach escorted by twenty retainers on horseback, her chest squeezed partly from love, but partly from regret. Was not telling them what Ross had done to her seven years ago protecting them from the redcoats should her family retaliate? Or was it born of herown selfish need or perhaps fear, that it might tarnish their love for her.
After Egan and her parents left, she had to pacify an overly concerned Aunt Penelope who was fearful there could be only one reason Phoebe and Slade got married so hastily.
“Only the most scandalous marriages take place with such haste, without even reading the banns. Such a shocking disregard for custom could only mean one thing, my dear,” Aunt Penelope said, her face unbending and her brows arching in obvious scorn.
“Rest assured aunt, I am not with child. Slade and I are just terribly eager to begin our new life together, with the full support of our families,” Phoebe said. She smiled so sweetly at her aunt, her face hurt.
Her aunt looked convinced by the end of their conversation. And Phoebe had to marvel at how good a liar she’d become after training with the Movement.
Then it was time to bid dear Lucia and Breena adieu because they were heading to Eileanach, Breena to be with Egan and Lucia to be with Peter, who was pitching custom made muskets to her father and Egan.
“Your solicitous advice on what to expect in the marriage bed was very useful,” Phoebe said to Breena and Lucia, hoping they couldn’t tell she was lying. Their unfiltered talk on lovemaking in preparation for the bedding had gone to the wayside. But she wasn’t sure she believed their tales of pleasure.
“I knew it! You and the colonel were fated to be together. The way his smoldering gaze follows you, and the way he chivalrously rescued your reputation after Black Hog’s is proof, he loves you,” Lucia said.
Lucia had become more than just a chaperone and well-to-do wife who was overly concerned with fashion. She had become a cherished friend.
“I’m happy the wedding night was a success,” Breena said, towards the end of the conversation.
Although Breena sent her a second glance before they left for the Hanbury conveyance, as if she wasn’t entirely convinced with Phoebe’s story. What was it Falcon had said?A lie is nothing but the truth in disguise.
The rest of the day in the south wing passed in a blurry haze with thoughts of Slade squeezing her chest every few minutes, leaving her entire body in a bundle of nerves.
The south wing of Garraidh Castle was elaborate and busy. It contained the chapel and a complete set of residences for the laird, his extended family, guests, and their servants. As she made her way back to the quieter north wing, she wondered why Slade had chosen it for their residence. It had its own library, solar, kitchen, great hall, garderobe and a skeleton staff of servants, including Aila, who’d come with Phoebe from Eileanach. Though it wasn’t as elaborately furnished as the south wing, Phoebe herself would take quiet and peaceful over elaborate and busy, any day.
CHAPTER 51
As the sun slipped below the western horizon, Aila lit a candelabrum on the sideboard, as well as a robust fire in the hearth of Phoebe’s bridal chamber. She laid out Phoebe’s change of clothes and arranged for a large wooden tub filled with steamy water to be sent up from the kitchen for Phoebe to wash. Aila added a few drops of bergamot oil to the water and placed a bar of orange blossom pressed soap and fresh folded linens by the side of the tub.
Aila helped Phoebe remove her high-necked day dress with corset stays, underskirts, shift and hose, then left the chamber pulling the door closed behind her. Phoebe pinned up her hair to avoid it getting wet and stepped into the deliciously warm bath, settling into its bone-melting luxuriousness, some of her earlier stiffness easing.
But then the door to the chamber pushed open.
Phoebe didn’t turn. Her reclined position was far too soothing and comfortable. “Did you forget something, Aila?” Phoebe asked.
When the door bolted shut from the inside without an answer, Phoebe’s heart dropped into her belly, and she jerked around. Slade stood there, his majestic height almost equalingthat of the door. A dark pained look flashed across his arrestingly handsome features before becoming shuttered. He was dressed in a long greatcoat and leather riding boots, his warm green gaze darkening to the color of juniper leaves in winter.
Phoebe swallowed back the intense shudder of awareness at her nudity. She forced herself not to shift or make any move to cover herself. She was a wife now.
But as his eyes traversed the length of her in the bath, something inexplicable clouded them. She silently thanked all the saints she hadn’t driven him away with her unforgivable but unavoidable behavior. She vowed to do better.
For some strange reason she didn’t trust the relaxed smile stretching his lips or his banal next words, something was too contained and restrained about his movements. “How was your day?” he asked as he divested himself of his waistcoat, then unbuttoned the first few buttons of his shirt, apparently getting comfortable. His exposed neck created an air of intimacy. But then again, she was completely naked, under the bath water.
“I tended to the remaining wedding guests most of the day. And bid farewell to Egan, my parents, Lucia and Breena. How was your day?” she said, utterly mesmerized by the graceful way he moved to stand by her tub.
“I spent most of the day conducting training sessions with the guards, part of my duties as new warlord. I also had an unexpected visitor today.”
She straightened with interest. “Oh, who was it?”
“Mistress Willoughby, the mother of my late betrothed, visited this morning to congratulate me on our nuptials,” he said.
Surprise and sympathy contracted her chest. “She is well, I hope?”
