The Laird's Lady

He strode to her and, before she knew what he was about, clamped her shoulders in his heavy palms and held her a scant foot in front of him.

The heat of his hands permeated her thin summer kirtle. His touch confused her, for, although it was hardly gentle, neither was it threatening.

“If our talk was more successful, I would see no need for this.” A look akin to regret crossed his face. “But as it stands, ye will have to be confined to yer chambers until we can come to a more favorable understanding.”

Her heartbeat thrummed in her ears. “Favorable for who?”

His grin was slow and deliberate. “For me, of course. Sooner or later ye’ll be coming around.”

He actually winked at her before striding out of the solar.

Rosalind picked up a pillow from her chair and threw it at the door. The gesture helped vent her frustration, but did not take away the tingling she still felt where he’d touched her.

Chapter Four

“If the steward remained with us, he could have bloody well handled the harvest.” Malcolm squinted out over Beaumont’s fields, which were ripe with grain. His brothers stood beside him.

Beaumont had been his for a mere seven days, and already problems arose from all sides—disputes among the tenants, angry whispers among the servants about his treatment of Lady Rosalind, who remained confined to her chambers. Still there had been no news from Robert the Bruce. And now the obstacle of organizing the harvest.

Usually, Malcolm could count on his family to help him with most any crisis, but even the three McNairs together couldn’t seem to solve Beaumont’s current dilemma. Experience in battle did not prepare a man for the demands of the land, it seemed.

Malcolm nudged his younger brother as he leaned back against the low rock partition separating the wheat fields from a cow pasture just outside the keep’s walls. “Ye dinna know anything about bringing in crops, Jamie?”

“I never took an interest in such things. I was meant for more lofty pursuits from the time I was the smallest of lads.” Jamie plucked a cherry from a nearby tree and took a tentative taste.

Ian laughed, a deep rumble that fairly rattled the low branches. “More like ye were afraid to soil yer hands.”

“I didna ever see you helping with the harvest at Tyrran.” Jamie snatched another fistful of cherries, popping them into his mouth in quick succession. Ever the well-bred McNair, he topped his brothers in refinement, but he ranked as fierce a warrior as the elder two.

“Too busy making war,” Ian returned, a shadow crossing his features as he reached to try the sun-warmed fruit, as well. “And then last year, Mary was in her confinement….” He looked into the distance before the flash of sorrow in his eyes dissolved into a scowl.

Malcolm clapped his brother on the shoulder, powerless to alleviate his grief. Although Ian had left Tyrran, their family seat, to join his brothers on the Beaumont campaign, Malcolm knew that Ian’s late wife still claimed his thoughts.

Given Ian’s darkened mood, Malcolm welcomed the interruption of a stout female trundling out of the keep with a basket in hand. “I hope you are saving some cherries for the rest of Beaumont, my lords. Cook uses the fruit in dishes more tasty and refined than any of the crude fare you’d find in the north.”

Malcolm stood back to make way for the nurse, who seemed to preside over the household with Rosalind. “Ye’re speaking heresy to a Scot’s ears, woman. Perhaps ye need to pay a visit to a Highland keep to change yer mind.”

“You seem to have brought the Highlands to Beaumont in spite of my lady’s most fervent hopes, haven’t you?” Still grumbling, Gerta worked to fill her basket with fruit, her weathered hands moving over the branches with quick efficiency. “And even your own Lachlan Gordon admits the superior flavor of Beaumont’s dishes, or he would not have begged me to gather more cherries for the cook. But then, I should not have been surprised he could not pick his own cherries, when even the mighty McNairs seem to be flummoxed by the matter of the coming harvest.”

Jamie straightened, looking offended enough for all of them, but Malcolm elbowed him before he could quarrel with the presumptuous old nurse.

“The McNairs are warriors, not farmers, as ye well know.” Malcolm would allow Gerta to have her moment to gloat. The elder woman had been practical enough to see the merits of submitting to his rule as soon as he’d arrived in Beaumont’s great hall, after all. “Do ye know how the work is orchestrated?”

Cackling, Gerta shooed away a bird intent on stealing from her basket. “Nay, my lord, but Lady Rosalind can tell you all about it.”

Malcolm heard Ian mutter beneath his breath at the mention of Rosalind’s name. No doubt he and Jamie were still disgusted with her for stabbing him. Loyalties ran deep in their clan.

As for Malcolm, he had found forgiveness for the blade in his thigh easily enough, even if the wound still ached like the devil. Years of battle had taught him to ignore physical pain. If only he could ward off the unwelcome desire for her so simply.

“Dinna jest with me.” He took his responsibilities to Beaumont seriously, since Robert wanted the keep in good working order. For that matter, Malcolm had a very personal interest in maintaining the lands if there was a chance the Bruce would grant them to him. “I may nae know much about reaping a harvest, but I know the work is done by men, nae noble maidens.”

“Begging your pardon—” Gerta bristled visibly “—but Lady Rosalind organized the work after her father’s death. She needed her steward’s guidance the first year, but she can do it on her own now.”

“Ye lie,” Ian accused, whistling to the same birds Gerta tried to wave away. “Her brother would have been taken under the steward’s wing, no matter how young he was at the time. Why would the steward bother with a female who would have no use for such learning? Ye insult us with yer tales.” He swiped a few cherries from Gerta’s basket and grinned. “Ye grow excellent fruit, however.”

“I do not lie, Ian McNair,” she huffed, yanking the basket out of his reach. “You may choose not to believe me, but do not call me a liar before you have tested the truth of my words. Ask Lady Rosalind what she knows about the harvest and she could well weary your ears till dawn.” Gerta scurried away as quickly as her aging legs would take her, muttering about the lack of manners in arrogant Scots.

Ian watched her depart for a moment before he exchanged a wink with Jamie. “I am thinking Malcolm would rather enjoy the opportunity to listen to the fair Rosalind till dawn.”

Malcolm glowered at them, frustration building every day he spent holding a keep that he didn’t know how to run effectively. “Lady Rosalind is a coldhearted English noblewoman, nae some pleasing Highland wench to pass a night with.”

“’Tis nae only the English who are coldhearted, McNair. Yer Isabel has been wed nigh on four years. Ye shouldna let yer bitterness over her prevent ye from enjoying the warmth of another’s arms.”

“I havena spared her a thought since her unfortunate marriage.” The conversational turn made Malcolm remember one of the few reasons he sometimes preferred wartime to peace. Running hell-bent for your life to keep an arrow out of your arse ensured there would be no discussion of women.

Ian jabbed Malcolm in the ribs with a brotherly shove. “I suppose ye were nae thinking of her when ye risked yer neck to free her from her English cage?”

“I am sworn to protect our people from the English fury.” Refusing to think about his failed attempt to free Isabel, Malcolm banged his boot against the rock wall to loosen caked soil from the sole. “I feel nothing for Isabel anymore except admiration for her courage and pity for her captivity. But as I know her well, I dinna fear for her. She will find a way to be free of the English king whether her blackguard husband helps her or nae.”

Malcolm had done all he could as a warrior to save her, but since the woman remained in English hands, he’d found it difficult to come to peace with his efforts. Hellfire. He’d grown as morbid as Ian of late, and without half as good a reason.

“Think ye there is any truth to Gerta’s words?” he asked, eager to leave behind all talk of Isabel. Perhaps speaking to Rosalind would cheer him. She might be as ruthlessly ambitious as Isabel, but Malcolm took perverse comfort from knowing that at least Rosalind was safe under his watch. “Might the good lady of Beaumont know something of the harvest?”

“Very likely.” Ian laid out a row of cherries on the rock wall, enticing a little bird to hop closer and closer to him.

“Then ye were cruel to call her a liar,” Malcolm admonished, wondering how Ian could be patient enough to let wild creatures come to him.

“Aye, but riling her surely yielded some useful insights.”

Grudgingly, he had to admit Ian could be very wise at times. Malcolm only hoped he could maintain some of the family wits about him tonight when he confronted Rosalind. He would need to be clever if he wanted to extract information from the stubborn former mistress of Beaumont.

Malcolm finally sought Rosalind’s solar some hours later, hoping he had not delayed the task so long she would be abed.

Rosalind engaged his thoughts all too often this past sennight. He had almost enjoyed his last visit with her, though he knew she had not. She was practically hissing by the time he departed.

It was unfortunate they were on opposite sides of the Scots-English dispute, for he had to admit she would be an admirable ally. She was a fierce fighter, a loyal kinswoman and, if Gerta were to be believed, exceedingly sharp.

But those same reasons kept her his opponent. She would never forsake her English heritage to swear loyalty to him, he realized. He could lock her upstairs until doomsday and she would not relent.

Candlelight shone from under her solar door when he reached it. Anticipation gripped him as tightly as he clenched the master key in his hand when he inserted it into the lock and turned.

A tempting vision greeted his eyes. All traces of the bow-wielding warrioress vanished, Rosalind now stood in the center of her private chamber surrounded by flowers of every hue. Like a forest sprite with only nature to adorn her, she presented a charming picture.

She held delicate blue flowers—damned if he knew one clump of petals from another—in one hand as she arranged another bunch of spiky red blooms in a tall vase. A basket of pale yellow blossoms sat at her feet. Other containers, already filled and arranged, were perched on every available table and chest. The room smelled heady and sweet, like a hothouse at midsummer.

This gentle creature was his ambitious, blade-wielding enemy? He could scarcely reconcile this woman with the Rosalind who’d cursed and railed at him the week before.

For a long moment, she did not hear him, absorbed as she was in her task. The flowers, the scents, the feminine chamber—even the lady herself—fit into his recurring dream of a home.