‘What of an heir?’ he asked.
‘I will do my duty as is expected of me, my lord,’ she ground out in the only fit of temper he’d seen her display, ‘but I will not like it. So, you can do what you must until I conceive,’ she said, shuddering in distaste or disgust, ‘then I pray you will find your way to her bed and stay out of mine.’
He almost laughed. Aloud. He had hoped to find a bride who would understand, but this was even better. A woman who did not want to explore the joys of the marriage bed. But, why not?
‘Do you come to this untouched, lady?’ he asked.
Her eyes narrowed and she threw her frozen gaze at him. The fury there at his question nearly singed his skin. ‘I would never dishonour myself and do otherwise.’
‘Then how do you know that you will be content in an empty marriage bed?’
‘My priest has counselled me that it is the way God would like marriages to be, filled with prayer and not lust. I would seek that in my marriage.’
Aidan kept his tongue behind his teeth now and kept all the comments he wanted to make silent. He nodded at her and offered her his foot to regain her seat.
‘I appreciate your candour, Lady Margaret,’ he said.
‘As I would appreciate your accommodation if our families agree to this marriage,’ she replied.
They rode back to the keep in silence and Aidan could not believe his luck in this matter of marriage. Should he tell his parents that he and Lady Margaret would suit and end the speculation over the other two women?
Could he marry such a woman as this? Cold-hearted, cold-natured, a woman who would place her devotion to the Almighty between them? What kind of sons would she bear him? His stomach soured at the thought of taking her to his bed. Considering his history of bedding any woman willing, it made him cringe at the irony of it.
After meeting the first woman, he was more certain that taking another woman as wife would just not be possible for him. He understood his duty, especially as first-born son of the chieftain and the earl, but he was growing to dislike it.
As he guided the lady to the keep, he realised that the one thing Cat feared the most—being thought of as a whore—would then be true, for she would be sharing the bed of a married man.
Fear struck him then, for he was being the veriest of fools. He loved Catriona and did not want to soil that love by sharing a bed with another, even if the other was his wedded wife. No matter if the other woman gave her permission or not. He wanted only Catriona and must find a way out of this madness before he lost her completely. But then, this was for naught if he could not convince Catriona to stay.
* * *
As the visit continued for several more days, Aidan only knew he needed to see Catriona. His father had forbidden him to do so while the Sinclairs were staying with them. So, he bided his time, strained his control and good nature to be a good and polite host and prayed they would tire of Lairig Dubh and leave.
After a fortnight, Lord Sinclair announced they would be leaving in another day to travel to visit other kin before returning home. Aidan could feel the end of this torture approaching.
Now the truly challenging work would begin—to find a way to keep Catriona at his side. He could not figure out whether the more difficult person to convince would be her or the Beast of the Highlands. For very few crossed his father and lived to tell of it.
Chapter Eighteen
Munro watched as Lord and Lady Sinclair and their daughter rode through the gates. Their visit had extended for just over a fortnight and he’d observed as Aidan did what he did best—charmed and cajoled and convinced. To anyone watching the scene that had played out over the last weeks, they would think Aidan infatuated with the woman who was but one possible bride for him.
But he could see through the falseness of the mask his former friend wore to the cold-hearted, conniving bastard beneath. No matter his protestations that he had not dishonoured his father’s wife, the way he took her to bed as soon as he could get her proved Munro’s suspicions.
He slammed his fist into the stone wall at his back.
He’d always known she would be trouble.
When his father returned with her, he’d been ten-and-four years and he yet mourned his mother’s death a six-month before. How his father could bring another woman into their house befuddled him...until his own growing body and young man’s urges made it all clear to him.
Catriona MacKenzie had the body of the Greek goddess he’d seen when Aidan showed him a book from the laird’s collection. When he spied Catriona wet from the water splashing while she washed clothes, with the fabric of her gown plastered over her curves, his body reacted for the first time as a man’s would and he understood why his father brought her home.
Over that first year, she had gained some weight and her figure filled out, creating soft, lush breasts, hips and legs that would welcome a man between them. And, to his disgrace, he had wanted to be that man.
And so, with every timid smile or soft word to him, he hardened in lust for his father’s wife. As the years passed, his desire for her grew until he could barely be in her presence without reacting. Whether his father recognised it or not, Munro knew not, but he found himself assigned away more and more. When he fell in with the laird’s son and his small group of friends, Munro travelled more and more.
But even the women drawn to Aidan MacLerie and those he took did not lessen the desire he had for Catriona.
Then Aidan began sniffing around her as he did so many others. Munro knew she would be weak and end up in his bed, just like the rest had. When the son of the powerful, wealthy, titled Earl of Douran wanted you in his bed, there was no way to refuse.
