Page 60 of The Laird’s Wrong Wife

“Release our lady,” Paisley demanded.

“Aye,” Tommy said. “She has bannocks to cure me.”

Oscar opened his hand. The children marked his back with flour-dusted fingers while he pretended to turn too late, their shrieks filling the kitchen. The cook watched him for a heartbeat, then struck the wooden knife against the table.

“The bannocks need to be flipped before they burn.”

Ceana returned to the girdle and spread warmed honey across each bannock. Tommy received the first and requested another before swallowing two bites.

“Me knee may require a second,” he said.

“The first has cured yer knee,” Ceana replied. “A second would be just greed.”

Paisley chose the least even bannock and set it before Oscar. “This one is yers. Ye interrupted me shapin’.”

He ate it at the kitchen table.

Tommy forgot about his wound until he jumped from the stool and hissed. Ceana set him back on it with a reminder that feeling better did not mean he had healed, while the maids resumed their duties around them.

Mairi appeared in the doorway, saw Oscar seated with his flour-streaked family, and withdrew without interrupting. Paisley laughed again without searching his face because honey was stuck around Tommy’s fingers. Across the table, Ceana smiled at him with flour still on her cheek.

Oscar wanted this noise to greet him whenever he entered his home. He also wanted the woman who had made it possible more than anything. Another night with her could put a child inside her, and he had sworn never to stake her life on that chance.

The thought tightened his chest. He flexed his flour-streaked fingers against his knee.

Ceana noticed the flour near his hairline. “Ye will need a bath, husband.”

Oscar looked at the flour on her cheek. “Aye.”

He could remove the flour. Keeping his hands off her afterward would require more effort. Far more effort.

Ceana retreated to their chamber after the children fell asleep, the taste of honey still on her tongue and Paisley’s laughter fresh in her ears.

Tommy had declared himself fully healed after several bannocks. Paisley had repeated the tale of Oscar’s flour-covered face twice before allowing Ceana to draw the blankets over her shoulders.

Oscar had left the children’s rooms ahead of her. His bath had yet to be cleared away, the water rippling as it cooled, and the rough map of the eastern border covered the table beside it. Lennan’s report lay in one corner, while Oscar’s sword weighed down the other. A charcoal mark showed where the cattle had gone missing. Beyond the table, the bedcovers had been turned down.

He stood beside the bath with wet hair and a loose linen towel knotted low around his hips.

Ceana stopped in the doorway.

Oh.

Water slid down Oscar’s chest and followed the pale scar beneath his ribs. Ceana had traced that scar with one finger on their wedding night and felt his breath deepen beneath her touch. She knew the feel of his chest against hers and the hardness of his stomach beneath her palms. The low knot of the towel drew her gaze because she knew what it covered.

A mild soreness lingered between her thighs. It brought back the warm cloth Oscar had slid over her tender skin afterward and the care with which he had helped her into her nightgown.

His mouth curved when he caught her staring.

“Did ye manage to remove all the flour?” she asked.

“I believed I had until ye began inspectin’ me.”

Heat rose into her cheeks, though the humor in his voice kept her from turning away. “Tommy considers himself cured. Paisley stopped him from stealin’ a fourth bannock, and the cook believes the kitchen may recover.”

“Good. I couldnae write the conclusion better if I tried.”

Ceana glanced at the map. “Did Lennan’s scouts find anythin’?”