The bloody beast just continued to stare.
A very focused stare. Rather unnerving. Aiden tried to ignore it and return to sleep, but a feeling of being watched continued to haunt him. Sure enough, when he opened one eye to check, he found the creature still staring.
“What is it you want?” he asked gruffly.
“Breakfast,” Isabail murmured sleepily.
“Not you,” he said, grinning into her silken hair. “It. What does it want?”
She lifted her head and spied the dog. “Gorm!”
To his great vexation, she pushed away from him and sat up, her face lit with happiness. “He’s on his feet. How splendid.” Grabbing up her shift, she pulled it over her head and stood.
Aiden was not convinced anything about this event was splendid. The beast had ruined a very promising morning. He pillowed his head on his arms. “Why is it staring at me?”
“John always took Gorm for a walk in the morn. No doubt he’s looking to you to continue that tradition.”
Aiden frowned. “Why me? Why not you?”
Isabail shook her head. “I’ve no idea. He must like you.”
A dubious honor, to say the least.
“Will you take him?”
Aiden looked at Isabail. She was braiding her glorious blond tresses, denying them to his fingers. “Nay. If I must get up, then I’ve other business to see to about the camp. I’ve no time to gad about with a dog.”
He rolled from his pallet and tossed the hound a pointed glare. To his mind, the morning should have started with a leisurely kiss and perhaps a bout of lovemaking. Not like this.
“I’ll take him, then,” Isabail said, tugging her blue gown over her shift.
“Do you not have any other gowns?” he asked. “You’ve worn that same one every day since—” He stopped there, searching for a neutral term to describe his capture of her and coming up dry.
A flush rose up her throat and into her cheeks. “Since you attacked my party and kidnapped me? Nay, I do not have any other gowns. All my things were taken.”
He frowned. “But we gathered some of your belongings.”
“And gave them to the other women in the camp,” she said sharply. “Nothing was returned to me.”
He watched her lace her boots, anger in every harsh tug on the leather cords. He’d never made it clear to his men that the clothing was to be given to Isabail, and he could see how they’d misinterpreted his request. The women in the camp had not seen new clothes for several months. Many of their gowns were threadbare from numerous washings.
“You’ll have plenty of lovely gowns when you return to Lochurkie,” he said to reassure her.
Unfortunately, that seemed to fuel her ire rather than dissipate it.
“Are you reminding me that all I have to do is provide you the names of my guests and I can walk out of this camp without a backward glance?” she asked, her voice the snarl of a wildcat.
“Aye,” he said. “Have I not said that from the beginning?”
Her blue eyes were like chips of ice in the pale beauty of her face. “Oh yes, you made that quite clear... in the beginning.”
“Then what is the source of your anger?”
She took several deep breaths before responding, calming herself. “In the beginning, we had not lain with each other,” she said.
He blinked. “But you are not a maid. Surely you did not have an expectation that our dalliance would lead to anything.”
“An expectation?” she asked coolly. “Nay, I am not a woman given to expectations. Few, if any, of my expectations have borne fruit. A hope that there might be more meaning attached to our dalliance than a simple roll in the hay? Aye,thatI had.”
