Bradana knew her stepfather. She should, after no many years spent under his roof. Despite his many quarrels with Mam—small tiffs over equally small annoyances—he was not a man easy to anger. Waspish rather than violent in his disfavor. When he did express anger, it was often because in his heart he felt himself in the wrong.
Did he sit here now wanting someone to comfort him? To assure him that an old debt did not matter?
Mam said nothing, pushing her food around on the platter. Toren and Kerr exchanged glances. They had been well chastised for the hunting episode. Wisest, perhaps, to keep their mouths shut now. But neither of them had ever been particularly wise.
“The MacMurtray needs to be showed what’s what,” Kerr stated, “and sent on his way.”
Kendrick sent him a glare. “I want no more japes like the last, hear? Ye will keep awa’ from him. I will persuade him on his way in good time.”
The two brothers exchanged another look that Bradana felt did not bode well for Adair.
“Where is he,” she asked, “this cousin from Erin?”
Kendrick shrugged. “Somewhere about, I do no’ doubt.”
Kerr suggested, “I do no’ suppose he will venture far out o’ the settlement again.”
Toren offered, “I saw him this morning standing staring out over the ocean like he thought he could fly back to Erin.”
Bradana experienced a pang. Did Adair want that so badly? What of when he did go? Naught to her, surely. She was due to wed before long and move away to the north.
And yet—there was something between her and Adair, was there not? What had that been yesterday, when she touched his hand? When she’d received a glimpse of another man whose bright hazel eyes had anchored her soul.
She could not explain it. But she wanted quite badly to see Adair MacMurtray.
She asked, “Has no one thought to behave hospitably toward the man? Show the place off a wee bit. Prove we are civilized people.”
Kendrick took offense all over again. “Iama civilized man.”
Toren hurried to say, “The last thing we want to do is show the place off and make him want it more than he does already.”
“Nay, nay,” Kendrick said. “We do no’ want him going back to his father and saying what a prize we hold here. But hewillbe going.”
Bradana said nothing more. She fed the better part of her food to Wen and helped her mother tidy away before she went out, the hound at her side. From the doorway of the dun, she looked down to the sea.
The ugly weather was beginning to clear and a kind of calm spread out over the water, a slant of light from a passing goddess. Down off the rocky point of land a few boats rode, including the one in which Adair had sailed from Erin. The beauty of the late afternoon beckoned her like open arms.
Something else beckoned still more strongly.
“Wen, find him.” How many places in a settlement this size could a man hide?
The hound looked at her, then moved off steadily down the slope toward the shore.
They found Adair aboard the little boat with the two men who had sailed with him from Erin. At sight of them, Bradana’s heart leaped. Did they prepare to cast off? Perhaps he had taken Kendrick’s advice to heart after all.
“Master Adair?”
He looked up, saw her balancing on the rocks that fronted the pier. Light flooded his eyes, and he scrambled over to the side of the small craft.
“Mistress?”
“Are ye leaving?”
For answer, he splashed ashore, moving lightly, and joined her on the stones. He stood there with the soft light washing over him, and Bradana’s world suddenly came right.
Everythingcame right.
Chapter Ten
