“After the misery I suffered at Garty, ye think I want it?” Finn said as he backed toward the door. “I never want to see that goddamned place again.”
“I swear ye won’t have it! Bearach will recover,” Isabel shouted. “Get out! Get out!
But Finn was already gone.
###
Finn tore out of the room, stunned by his brother’s poisoning and his mother’s accusations. In his blind rush, he nearly crashed into Curstag in the dimly lit stairwell. At the last moment, he caught her. When he tried to release her, she wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest, sobbing.
He wanted to beat his fists against the wall and run until his heart could take no more. Most of all, he wanted to be alone. But Curstag feared she was losing her husband. She needed and deserved what comfort he could give her. Tamping down the feelings raging inside him, he forced himself to put his arms around her and hold her while she wept.
“I feel so alone,” she said. “What will I do if…”
“Shh. You’re not alone,” he said as he rubbed his hand up and down her back. “And ye mustn’t give up hope.”
He heard a light step above him and looked up. Around the curve of the wheeled stairs, he saw Margaret’s silhouette outside his brother’s door. With the light behind her, her face was in darkness and he could not make out her expression.
Before he could untangle himself from Curstag, she disappeared back inside his brother’s chamber. He told himself Margaret was a levelheaded lass, and she would see this for what it was.
CHAPTER 24
Margaret spent the rest of the day moving between the two chambers of the ill, directing the servants and giving what comfort and help she could. Most of the time she was too busy to dwell on what she had seen in the stairwell, but every time she went up and down the stairs between the two chambers, the image of Curstag in Finn’s arms came back to her.
With three members of the household poisoned and fighting death, it would be petty to let that embrace trouble her. Curstag was in need of comfort, and it would be unkind for Finn not to give it. And yet Margaret could not help thinking there was something between those two that Finn had not told her.
By the end of the day, Margaret was weary to her bones. Most of the household had already gone to bed, and the castle was quiet as she climbed the stairs one last time to take a fresh pitcher of water to Bearach’s chamber and ask Isabel if she needed anything else for the night. Isabel could not be persuaded to leave Bearach’s bedside and let the servants care for him even for a few hours so she could rest.
The door to his chamber was slightly ajar, and a thin shaft of candlelight shone through the crack into the dark stairwell. When she heard voices, Margaret paused outside the door. Despite the vinegary concoction Isabel had forced down Bearach’s throat, his condition had worsened through the day, and Margaret was hesitant to intrude on what could be one of their last conversations.
“What have ye done, Mother?” Bearach’s voice reached her through the crack. “What have ye done?”
Was he upset that Isabel had turned Finn away? Perhaps, fearing death, Bearach wished to reconcile with his only brother. Margaret hoped so. Isabel only wept in response.
Careful not to make a sound, Margaret left the pitcher beside the door and left.
The image of Finn holding Curstag came back to her once again as she climbed the last set of stairs to the bedchamber she shared with Finn. Even if that embrace meant nothing, it was a reminder that she was one of a long string of women Finn had taken to bed. That day outside Huntly Castle, Alex had told her Finn was not the sort of man to stay with one woman for long.
That should not make her feel like a blade was piercing her heart, since their affair could not last anyway. Once this crisis with his family passed, Finn could take her to Sybil, and that would be the end of it. She had risked too much already and ought to end it now. She had a glorious night to remember, and that would have to be enough.
Her resolution melted like butter on a hot skillet when she opened their door and saw Finn leaning against the bed waiting for her. The moment their eyes met, that fiery blaze ignited between them again.
Without a word, she walked into his arms and into the flames.
###
The earl and Helen died the next morning.
Finn sat with his father while the women prepared the bodies for the eventual burial, washing them and dressing them in their finest clothes. Once again, Curstag and Isabel left the task of organizing the women to Margaret.
Finn did not know what they would have done without her. The last two days had been hellish. While Curstag lay in bed making demands on the servants, and his mother alternately wept and forced more of her vinegary concoction down Bearach’s throat, Margaret took care of the sick and kept the household running.
All Margaret had wanted was escape, and he had brought her to this. As if his family were not difficult enough on their own, there were poisonings and a murderer on the loose. And now, she was washing dead bodies.
He rubbed his forehead against a pounding headache and stole a glance at his father. Though it was not yet noon, his eyes were bleary, and his sweat smelled of whisky. His father was coping with Bearach’s illness and the death of his brother and sister-in-law the same way he coped with all of life’s challenges and disappointments.
“At least we have a bit of good news about Bearach,” his father said, raising his flask.
Whether it was Isabel’s odd remedy or Bearach’s strong constitution, he did appear to be improving.
