Cullen came to her and took her face in his hands. ‘The ride agrees with you. Your cheeks are pink, and you look uncommonly well, lass.’ He kissed her, and his hands started to roam. Lowri gasped when his mouth trailed down her neck, but she pushed him away.
‘Plenty of time for that later. I need to wash off the road and change.’
Cullen threw himself on the bed as Lowri began to peel off her clothes. ‘Aren’t you going to turn around?’ she said.
‘Not for anything. I like looking at you.’
He became very still as she washed and donned the red dress he had given her. She left her hair loose, combing it with her fingers to get the knots out, put there by the wind.
‘I don’t tell you how beautiful you are often enough,’ said Cullen with a catch in his voice.
‘Well, you show me, I suppose,’ she said.
‘I will be the envy of every man at the tavern this night.’ He eased off the bed and presented her with a leather bag. Inside sat a necklace with a pendant hanging off it.
‘Are those…?’
‘Aye, rubies. Only the best for my wife.’
Why was he talking as if they were really man and wife, and not in some infernal arrangement? Lowri stared at the heart-shaped pendant - gold, heavy and studded with red.
‘I chose it because it looks like a heart bleeding for love,’ he said.
‘Is that not bad? No one should bleed for love.’
‘Sometimes that is what it takes.’
‘Takes for what?’
‘To show someone you are worthy of them, lass.’
‘Is this stolen, Cullen?’ she said, handing it back.
But he would not take it from her. He just mumbled a curse as he turned away. ‘Let us go and enjoy the fleshpots of Larne,’ he said.
Lowri fastened the clasp around her neck. She had never bothered with pretty things and trinkets, but she had to admit the necklace was exquisite, and her response was ungrateful, bruising Cullen’s pride. The heart lay heavy between her breasts, cold against her skin. Lowri sighed and followed Cullen.
It was a rare, balmy evening, and the tavern was bustling and noisy. Lowri’s heart lifted. So much to see, smell, hear – ale and whisky, tobacco smoke hanging over tables where men played dice, a gaggle of voices and accents from Ireland and beyond, sweat and lust and life itself. A fiddler was jammed into a corner by the blazing hearth, sending a lively tune out into the place. His fiddle whined to a halt, and many pairs of eyes swung towards them.
There was one lass in particular whose gaze spat venom Lowri’s way. She was moon-faced and mousy-haired, and curvy, with a lusty sway to her hips, and fulsome breasts overspilling her bodice. She sauntered over and blocked their path, a sneer curling her lip. The fiddler took up his tune again.
‘So this is your whore, Cullen,’ said the woman.
‘She’s no whore. Lowri is my wife.’
‘Wife. Aye, so I heard, yet she’s all in red – a whore’s colour.’ The lass spat at Lowri’s feet and said, ‘He was tupping me but a few weeks ago, you know. What do you think of that?’
Lowri bit down hard on her temper and replied, ‘I am disappointed that my husband showed such bad taste.’
With a snarl, the lass launched herself at Lowri, but Cullen held her back. ‘Enough. ‘Twas nothing between us, Elsa, and so it would always have been. Take yourself off.’ Cullen released the red-faced, squirming lass, and she stormed off into the throng.
A man rushed over, and Lowri recognised him as the captain of the Alainn. ‘What’s amiss, Cullen?’ he said. ‘Leave my daughter be.’
‘She’s in her cups, and she insulted my wife, Rabham.’
‘Aye, well, she was sweet on you.’ He grabbed Cullen by the arm. ‘Do you think I didn’t know you were riding her below decks?’
Cullen’s face grew hard. ‘I was not the only one, and why let it continue, if you knew about it?’
