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“He told me about him.” She commented. “An authority in botanic, by the looks of it.” Her hand advanced down his spine.
“The biggest star in his life.” Taran did not hide a tad of prickliness.
A knowing grin came to her lips. “No need to be jealous.” Her other finger traced his ear. “You are still his hero.”
His lips grazed her over the silky fabric of her robe distractedly. “Oh, yes.” A trace of self-scorn here.
“The most important is he sounds happy.” She murmured soothing.
“Fit in as if he was born there.” Matter-of-factly. Neither doubted it would happen.
Palms stroked his bunched upper arm. “Christmas is just around the corner.” She said. “He will be here soon enough.”
Head gesticulating agreement on her wrinkled robe, his other hand touched her hip as he found repose in her warm generosity.
~.~.~
Father Robert, the priest that ended up not marrying them, suggested Taran call up the chieftains, tenants and villagers to introduce his new wife. Even busy as they were, he had no good excuse to skip it. And so it was that, on Sunday, they gathered in the church grounds in the village in a feast prepared by the families.
Dressed formally in his tartan, Taran led Aileen on his arm. She paraded his plaid and looked radiant with her glossy chestnut hair falling down her back. If he puffed his broad chest a breath more, he would go down as a peacock, so proud he felt to have her at his side.
The crisp mid-October day boasted an unusual sun painting the autumn colourful vegetation in intense tawny shades. A grassy tang floated in the cool air shuffling with a light breeze. The fires roasted meat and whisky from his distillery flowed liberally. Merriment marked the atmosphere.
He introduced her to his clan and kin, but people wanting a word with him soon led him away.
From afar he watched her talk to his people affably as if she had known them since she was a girl. No member of that feast doubted they represented a powerful alliance, and that few could stand up the them.
Then the first chieftain risked a word with her, being rewarded with undivided attention.
Taran’s guts snapped. The sight of her talking with another man sat uncomfortable in him.
A second chieftain joined in, encouraged by her treatment of the first.
Fierce irritation tore at him, even if he pretended to listen to what a tenant babbled on his left.
When Quinn, the one he encountered in her study, roamed to her group, bile rose in him so sulphurous he must lock all his body not to hurtle to them. And beat the three men to a pulp.
Still a fourth approached her, and men surrounded her, those who had been his acquaintances his entire life. Men who worked by his side, who supported him when Fergus plotted to take Taran’s rightful place. Men who had their families and lived peacefully.
He did not understand what happened to him.
Her group burst in laugher at something she had said and a suffocating fury threatened to detonate in thousands of splinters. His heart pounded a warlike drum, his fists clenched until they whitened, his rugged features crumpled into an unmoving scowl.
The pressure inside became so unbearable he needed to excuse himself and walk away. At the back of the church, he leaned against a wall, both hands raking his hair, lips pressed tense. Unseeing, his green enraged gaze followed a crystalline creek running across the lawn.
Incapable of finding sound logic in his reactions, he cantered the yellowish grass.
Perhaps, Fiona’s infidelity—or infidelities, he was not sure—had affected him more than he considered possible. He never gave much thought to this, but then, he never married again, did he? In the pit of his stomach, the fear of another nightmare match bubbled like acid.
He understood it even less, for he had not loved Fiona or she him. Her flighty actions did not hurt him specifically. His pride, yes. No more, though. His deceased wife became the experience of marriage he had. The sole one in his life. She came to symbolise what marriage meant. And it meant distance, indifference, abandon and adultery.
Fiona’s actions must not let him taint this match with his present wife, he admonished himself. Easier said, he scoffed. By the looks of him at this moment, it had been tainted from the start. An ugly picture, he reckoned, if he was to respond in this fashion every time a man came near her. Any man, with any intention. Good or bad. Innocent or malicious.
Rationally, he recognised Aileen differed totally from Fiona. Grounded, she took care of his manor, his son. Him. Especially him. The memory of them talking about Sam’s absence surfaced, causing him to re-live her warmth anew and how he revelled in it. She did not show the slightest inclination for city life, parties or flirting. On the contrary, she had thrived in working his fields, organising their daily life, without a word about doing anything other than this.
What he felt for Aileen? He did not have the damnedest idea. And preferred not to dwell on it. She instigated the most jumbled manifestations from him. He did not have a clue where to begin. Which made the whole thing seem even crazier.
People would find his disappearance strange. He obliged himself to go back.
