The MacNaughton Bride (14 page)

“Out!” he bellowed.
 
It was not the usual for him to yell
like that, but he was just overwhelmed by what he was finding.

Aislinn
looked up at him and scowled, making him feel as if he’d been scolded by some
schoolmarm when she was the one who had wronged him in the first place, not the
other way around, and she was the one causing this spectacle.
 
She then proceeded to take her time
finishing what she was doing, ignoring the fidgeting Mrs. Fitzgerald was doing
as she gathered her things and prepared to do exactly as she was told.
   
When she was finally
finished,
Aislinn
assisted the older woman onto her
feet, handing her
her
cane.
 
“There you go.
 
Keep it up and dry as much as you can, change the dressing every evening
and use this as well as the cleanest cloths you can find to dress it, all
right?”
 
She pressed a bag of
Kell
didn’t know what into the woman’s hand as she saw her
to the door.

“Please give my husband and
I a few minutes to talk, will you, everyone?”
 
Aislinn
asked in a sweet voice.
Turning back into the room, she addressed her maid.
 
“Jenny, would you go down to the kitchen to see if there’s
some tea and biscuits we can give to them while they’re waiting?”

Kell
was incensed.
 
“No!
 
You stay right where you are, woman,”
he roared as Jenny had hastened to do as she was bid by her mistress.
 
“We’re not going to get into the habit
of feeding the entire town.
 
They’ll never go home.”
 
Jenny stopped in her tracks, but didn’t move any further, frowning back
at the man who had accused her wonderful girl of awful things and locked her
away from those she loved.
 
Why,
Aislinn
hadn’t seen
Adelle
in a
terribly long time.
 
It was
unnatural – even in the worst times, they had seen each other almost
daily, and spent long hours together.
 
The sisters were very, very close.

Jenny had gathered her wits
about her and confronted Lord
MacNaughton
as soon as
she’d heard about what had happened.
 
She knew it was all her fault – if she’d left well enough alone,
things would have worked out fine, but how was she to know?
 
While he glowered at her –
managing to look like he was looking down at her even though she was standing
and he was sitting behind that huge desk of his – she spilled the whole
story and admitted her guilt, begging him to believe that
Aislinn
had nothing to do with it and no knowledge whatsoever about the subject.
 
That she was as innocent as the day she
was born.

He’d let the silence
stretch to exceedingly uncomfortable proportions, then said, as he guided her
to the door without touching her, “Apparently you don’t believe so, or you
wouldn’t have done what you did.”

Jenny was largely
unimpressed by their Lord and Master, so she stood her ground.

Kell’s
attention had turned to his errant wife.
 
He had deliberately stayed away from her for the past few days –
he was just too angry.
 
He didn’t
trust himself not to strangle her with his bare hands.
 
How could he have been so taken in by a
pretty face?
 
How could he have
given the
MacNaughton
name to a woman of lose
morals?
 
A harlot?
 
She was so damned beautiful –
that was all he saw.
 
And he could
still see it, and, to his complete disgust, he could still become aroused by
her.
 
She was in a dress that was
barely more than rags, stained with whatever concoctions she had been using on
his people, the ragged hem of her petticoat peeping out from under her full
skirt.
 
Her hair was up, but
several strands escaped the coiffure and curled around her face in a haphazard
but entirely enchanting manner.

He wanted her.
 
Badly, and it made him hate himself
almost as much as he hated her.
 
Or
tried to hate her.
 
He never quite
achieved the level of hatred his mind thought her actions warranted.
 
His desire always interrupted him,
settling into his loins and setting him to throbbing fit to drive a weaker man
crazy.
 
Alone in his chaste,
monk-like room down the hall, he tossed and turned for want of her, dreaming
about her all night and waking to find that he’d defiled himself in his
sleep.
 

Of late, he had come to the
realization that what was done, was done.
 
He decided that he would keep track of her monthly cycle, and once she
was over her next one, and he knew she wasn’t pregnant, he’d come to her every
night until she was pregnant with his son and heir.
 
It would be a much different relationship from what he’d
hoped for – what he’d pictured.
 
Certainly nothing like what his parents’ had, which had been his dream
for them, ultimately.
 
He would use
her so that he could get the heir he needed, but beyond that, she would remain
locked in her room, and firmly locked out of his heart.

He knew his brothers didn’t
agree with what he was doing – that they believed in her innocence,
despite that fact that he’d explained exactly what had happened and his reasons
for his opinions.
 
Somehow, she’d
bewitched them.
 
Too.
 
He’d heard about their outing
yesterday, and that her reception in town had been cool at first, but that she
had redeemed herself considerably by dispensing medical advice and suggestions
to those who were obviously ailing.
 
There was little else that could ingratiate someone to the townsfolk faster
than someone with doctoring skills.

What he hadn’t realized was
that she’d apparently set up shop in her room and invited the entire county to
come by for an examination.
 
He
practically yelled this at her, but she didn’t so much as move in reaction.
 

“Do you have nothing to say
in your defense, woman?” he roared.

Aislinn
shrugged.
 
“What do you want me to
say?
 
Aside from the fact that
we’re occupying your house, what do you care what I do?
 
I’m the lowest of the low in your
eyes.
 
You don’t want to be
anywhere near me.
 
Fine.
 
I, on the other hand, can help some of
your people with their ailments, and they apparently want me to.
 
As I understand it, the nearest doctor
is quite a ways away, and I’m not going to charge them an arm and leg.
 
Besides, I’m glad to be of service to
them in any way I can.”

He wished she wouldn’t talk
like that.
 
It would be easier to
sustain his hatred for her if she wouldn’t be so damned noble.
 
Would a whore be noble? He wondered,
then dismissed the thought.
 
That
didn’t matter.
 
“This is my house
not an almshouse.
 
You are not a
doctor.
 
I do not want you to treat
my people like this – “

 
“You don’t want me to help them?
 
Heal them?
 
Give
them any sort of relief from their pain?”
 
Aislinn
stood and met him, nose to chest,
without so much as a whit of concern for her own safety.
 
The people in the hall, who were
beginning to realize that they probably should leave, hung around because they
wanted to hear what the outcome of the fight would be, and if the Mistress won
and was able to continue to see them, they didn’t want to lose their place in
line.
 
“My, now I see it’s not just
me that you don’t like – you don’t even like your own people.”

He wanted to slap her, but
he didn’t.
 
He couldn’t.
 
He wanted to punch something or
someone, but there wasn’t anyone or anything available for that purpose.
 
“I do not need to explain myself to the
likes of you.”

“No,” she agreed with
complete calm, surprising him not only by her words but her tone.
 
“You don’t need to explain yourself to
me.”
 
She walked over to the door
and opened it, revealing the mass of humanity that was still milling
about.
 
“You need to explain
yourself to them.
 
They’re the ones
you’re hurting.
 
Not me.”

Kell
raised his face to the heavens, praying for calm and peace, and the wisdom to
deal with this completely aggravating woman.
 
“All right then.
 
You can see them.
 
Lord
knows I don’t want to be accused of consigning my people to lives of misery
when there’s someone around who can apparently help.”
 
A smattering of applause greeted his ears, but he wasn’t
looking at them, he was looking at her.
 
“But – only at certain times, and only when you’re properly
chaperoned – so you’d better sweet talk my brothers into spending some
time with you, because I don’t have the time to baby sit you.”

He turned and made as if to
leave her when she shot back, “Where?”

“What?”

“Where do you want me to
see people?
 
I am still confined to
my room – “

“Yes, you are.”
 
He would be lenient with his staff and
the townspeople.
 
Not with
her.
 
He figured he might as well
get some use for her, since she was living in his house and eating his –
“And that’s another thing – I’ve heard that you’re not eating.
 
I expect you to eat every morsel on
every tray.”
 
He wouldn’t have her
dying on him just when he’d decided to use her to get an heir, despite her
considerable shortcomings.
 

“I wouldn’t feed that slop
to a dog.”

“Hey!”

The outcry of indignation
didn’t come from
Kell
, it came from behind him
– from the cook, who was standing patiently in line to see if the Lady
could help her with a nasty sore throat she had.
 
“I do the best I can with what I have.”

The rest of the household
staff grumbled things along the lines of, “if that’s the best you can d0…“

Kell
turned back to
Aislinn
.
 
“She’s a perfectly fine cook.”

“Yes, but
Sile
would make a better one.
 
She enjoys working with food.
 
And if a person is happy in doing what they want, then the
results are better.
 
Cook?”
 
Aislinn
asked, trying to walk past her husband but finding herself blocked by his big
body so that she couldn’t get out of the room.
 
She craned her head around his side.
 
“Are you happy cooking?”

The older woman shuffled
her feet.
 
“N-no, Ma’am.
 
I always wanted to be a lady’s maid.”

“Well, then why don’t you
begin training with Jenny while she cares for me – such as she’s able
– “
Aislinn
threw in as a dig to her husband,
“and then
Sile
can cook.
 
She told me once, when I was dressing her burn, that she
used to cook for her whole family, and she’s won several contests at county
fairs for her dishes.”

“I am Master here, and I’ll
thank you to stop issuing orders.”

Aislinn
pulled herself up to her full height.
 
“And I am mistress here, supposedly.
 
And apparently, you don’t even know good food from bad, or
that your servants are miserable, or hurt or sick.
 
Some Master you are.
 
I’ve been here all of a week or so, and have been imprisoned for most of
it, yet I know them better and take better care of them than you do.
 
Your brothers said, before they walked
me down the aisle, that Jenny could be my maid of honor because you treated
your servants like family.
 
Well,
considering the way you’ve treated me, and the way you’ve treated them, I’m not
sure it’s even healthy to be a member of your family.”

Kell
had never been so angry in his life.
 
This little woman had the ability to insult his intelligence, assault
his honor, and intimate that he was a bad overlord, all in one breath.
 
He wasn’t sure that even if she had
been entirely innocent that he wouldn’t have wanted to shake her till she
rattled anyway, especially in a situation like this.
 
He was so mad he was literally trembling, and he didn’t
trust himself not to put her over his knee – and that would be getting
much too close for comfort.
 
If he
had her over his lap, as he dearly wanted right about now, he knew he would end
up inside her, and it was much too soon.
 
He had to know that any child they produced was his, and no one else’s.