Page 62

He liked her too.

Nay. He loved her.

And would tell her so.

“I am glad you can see beyond her surname, Angus,” he said, unused to sharing such things with the stalwart steward.

“He will come around to her,” Angus said without acknowledging Niall’s words.

“And if he does not?”

Both men remained silent. The implications of such a thing were too great to contemplate. Neither would the problem be solved that eve. Another, his absence from Lina, could be more easily overcome.

Niall clasped Angus on the shoulder. “You are a good man, and I am grateful for your service here. And your treatment of my wife.”

“No thanks are necessary,” the old man said. “Now go to her. Glenhaven may be her home now, but the manor is foreign to her.”

“A fine suggestion,” Niall replied.

He intended to do just that. And would have, if his friend and steward had not reached one hand to Niall’s shoulder to steady himself, grasping his chest with the other one.

Beads of sweat formed on Angus’s head as he suddenly struggled to breathe.

His beloved steward, friend, clansman, was going to die.

Chapter Thirty

“Pheasant pie?” Avelina asked as she walked into the kitchens.

“Aye,” said Cook, a woman twice Avelina’s age who had been as kind to her as everyone else here at Glenhaven. “I was told we would double the number in our hall by eve?”

It had been three days since Angus had fallen ill. Thankfully, today was the day Duncraig’s healer would arrive along with a “party” that none knew who it included. Niall had immediately sent a message of Angus’s condition, that he did not appear to be improving, when the messenger returned last eve saying “all were on their way to Glenhaven.”

All.

Did that mean his parents too?

Niall believed so as they both held a special fondness for a man they considered to be family. Suddenly, her reception at Glenhaven meant little compared to the question all had been asking for days.

Would Angus survive?”

Niall admitted he thought the steward was going to die in front of him that night they’d arrived, and Lina had little to say to comfort him knowing the incident was most upsetting. She’d held him, made love to him, and done all she could to ensure theirs was an easy transition coming into the role of lord and lady of Glenhaven. The healer, apparently not as skilled as Duncraig’s, said there was naught to do but accompany him while Angus sometimes lay peacefully and at other times seemed to be in pain. He spoke little, but his eyes said all.

Despite herself, Avelina found she’d developed a kinship with the man who would make his passing as difficult to bear as if she’d known him for many years. Unexplainable, aye, but a fact nonetheless.

“I was told the same,” she told Cook, “and am here to ask if you need anything at all.”

“Nay, my lady,” Cook said. “Many thanks for asking.”

“They’ve arrived,” a young serving boy called from the entrance of the kitchen. “They are here.”

Avelina picked up the hem of her gown, one Mairi had given her, and hurried up the stone stairs of the kitchens to the courtyard above. As the boy had said, a riding party had just arrived. And it included the one person Avelina did not wish to see so soon.

He looked directly at her. Avelina, never one to look away, raised her chin and walked toward the group. She curtsied along with the others as a sign of respect for the chief, even if Avelina wished to do anything but. Thus far, the people here had been kind to her, and she’d not give them any reason to do otherwise. A slight to their chief would not do well.

It seemed all from Duncraig had come. Niall’s parents, his brother, so many she did not know. Including a woman her husband watched so carefully, wearily, that it could only be. . .

The healer.