Page 9 of Twelfth Knight’s Bride

Aye, Seamus Grant the peacemaker, the one to first draw his blade. James snorted.

He took his time deciding a course of action, then lumbered back to the dais. Aileana’s gaze was fixed on him. He assessed her, watched her sip more wine, watched the moisture make her lower lip glisten, watched her tongue run along the flesh to clean the remnants of drink. That tongue. He wanted to know much more than a whit about it. He wanted to silence it with his.

He, too, scooped up his drink to take another sip, still standing. “She’d be taken care of in a rich house, would want for nothing, and would have a position of rank. And yer debt to me would be paid.”

Seamus scoffed, but it was obvious by the thoughtful furrow capturing his brow that he was beginning to consider the merits of the offer. Seamus sighed. “I’ll need to discuss the matter with my sisters—”

“Ye cannae be serious!” Aileana exclaimed. “Did ye nay hear a word that I said? The nàmhaid is coercing ye!”

Her wild hair was fraying in wisps about her face, and her pert nose wrinkled. She’d be a handful as a wife, for certain. Peigi would make a more agreeable woman, and she was clearly a cultivated beauty who would do her duty. But James’s eyes remained trained on Aileana.

“I’d never make either of ye marry a man who ye didnae wish to wed,” Seamus said, trying to placate Aileana, though Peigi, to her credit, looked just as mortified.

“Come, sisters, let’s leave the Devil to his meal for a moment—”

Ah. “Devil.” They use the ugly moniker, dubbed me by my enemies, right in front of me.

“I’d like to speak with ye privately. Wife? Will ye see to the laird’s companionship whilst I’m away?”

Grant’s eyes flitted to the man, Sir Donegal, at his back, more the intended companion than his wife, James assumed. He shifted in his seat to keep an eye on the guardsman’s blades.

Lady Elizabeth frowned but nodded once in acquiescence, and Seamus led his sisters down the servant hallway that led to the kitchens. James sipped from his goblet, glancing at the pregnant lady who took measured bites and did nothing to engage him, rather, sat stiffly like a statue. He scooped up a spoon of the watery broth, letting it dribble pathetically back into the bowl. Was this honestly all that the Grants had to offer a guest? True, they liked him about as much as they liked cattle dung cached to their boots, but customs of hospitality were never shirked, and the best meal a laird could provide was always offered.

Which meant these people had naught. Except for a couple chunks of carrots and spring onions that looked suspiciously like the ones stolen from his camp, the flavorless liquid was barely salted with a sparse sprinkling of venison. A glimmer of the desperation Aileana felt infiltrated his mind, as did memories of the raid that had seen him evicted, his cattle stolen, his goods depleted before he could fight his way back within and chase away the usurper that Seamus Grant had helped to instate.

Damnation, but if it wasn’t the MacLeods of Skye bombarding him from the water, it was this bloody clan attacking by land.

He ought to feel more pissed than he did. He certainly shouldn’t feel guilty for turning back on the Grants what they’d turned on him. Christ, he needed to let this sympathy go to hell where it belonged. A laird had no use for it regarding his enemies. Being firm, bold, direct, and unapologetic were the qualities that held up a man’s continued repute.

“How could ye, Seamus?” Aileana whined from within the bowels of the corridor, before her voice fell muffled again.

A whine? This woman wouldn’t whine unless she felt desperate. He strained to listen, since Lady Elizabeth was disinclined to speak and sat trembling like a leaf in his company. Seamus’s voice rose, too. Clearly, they were in disagreement.

“And sweet Peigi? What on earth has she done to deserve such a sentence?”

“If our brother asks it of me, then I must do it out of duty,” Lady Peigi replied, though James noted the forlornness in her voice. “We’ve erred, and yer skills would be missed here—”

“As has he! He eats the very food we cannae afford to spare, after he put us in this position of poverty,” Aileana argued.

“Yer brashness isnae helping, sister. And I dare say, if I agreed to marry ye to him, ye’d start an all-out war before the sennight’s end. Peigi is the better choice.”

Disappointment caused a tumble in James’s stomach. Grant was going to give him Peigi?

“Ye cannae mean this,” Aileana now said, though her whisper was so impassioned, her voice bounced off the stone. “Seamus, what ye propose is cruel, especially when it was my fault. James lies. A man like him would be just as cruel to a woman when she errs as he is to an adversary. Peigi would never survive.”

A swell of irritation bloomed in James’s chest. He’d taunted Aileana about women, but he’d spoken the truth. MacDonald women were kept well, and sweet Marjorie, who had not been so loved by her husband…had been avenged. He couldn’t abide a man who lorded over the fairer sex, for in truth, it was only weakness in the man’s heart that compelled him to do so.

“Sister, I ken no’ what else to do, and—sister? Aileana, come back—”

Aileana blazed out from the corridor to James’s side so quickly, he jolted with surprise and instinctively reached for his dagger.

“I’ll do it,” she breathed.

“I accept.” He nodded.

A strange wave of relief overtook him. Aileana’s bonny eyes were resigned, and rimmed with…redness. Hell, was the lass going to cry? This was a business deal. But the fear he saw on her face made more guilt nip at his conscience. Force the enemy woman to marry him so he could claim his inheritance? Except… Ah, he was daft. Why had he not thought about this before?

I can either marry an enemy Grant by this Twelfth Night or unite these lands to gain it. Would this marriage sufficiently satisfy both conditions for his inheritance in one swoop? He’d always thought the MacDonalds must conquer Grant land, but now that he thought about it, nothing in the documents said a whit about ruling Urquhart—only uniting it with MacDonald lands. This could work. And was far less violent than a raid.