Page 7 of Twelfth Knight’s Bride

Enough about that.

The silence in the wake of his demand was deafening. Grant wouldn’t marry a sister to him. Still, he chewed the unleavened bread, swallowed, tore off another bite, and chewed, remaining impassive even though the spark that had ignited in Lady Aileana’s eyes intrigued him further. He’d heard that Clan Grant bred fetching women, but this one… He’d been unable to look away from Aileana’s untamed beauty since she’d squared off with him, her chin high, her auburn waves bonny on the breeze.

What fool had allowed her to think herself plain? Aye, she was fresh-faced, unpainted by makeup, but she looked like Scotland would look as a person. Wild. Unyielding. Proud. Beautiful around every curve, every edge, as the crags and straths appeared in the glowing sunset.

“Too bad ye’ll never ken a whit about my tongue…” Christ above, didn’t Lady Aileana know a remark like that would do nothing but pique a man’s curiosity and heat his blood for a challenge? Add brazen to her list of qualities. That comment had repeated in his mind like a bell tolling. He couldn’t shake it away. What gently bred woman spoke like that, challenging him to pick up his sword of words and parry with her?

Yet wouldnae that be the ultimate conquest? To determine more than a whit about her tongue for myself?

No. He’d never been one to play at intrigues with women. In fact, being raised a bastard had instilled fear in him. How could he ever be flagrant with his male urges and make bairns out of wedlock on a woman, shattering her reputation and shrouding his seed in a lifetime of shame, to be raised in the shadow of criticisms, whispers, and gossip, as he’d been raised?

“Mine ears must have misheard ye, friend,” Laird Grant said, seething.

Ha! Friend indeed. More like a knife in me back the first moment I turn around.

Aileana snorted, too. Damned lass. “Aye, a friend who leaves wreckage in his wake.”

“Ye want to act like a victim, lady?” James challenged, taking the bait, and did he hope for her rebuttal? “Yer brother rode on Tioram Castle and helped the Frasers evict me to instate their own choice of chief, a cousin of mine so distant, and with so thin a claim to the lairdship he was easy enough to quell, thank God—”

“I willnae dare believe yer accusations that Seamus is guilty of the cruelties ye’ve bestowed on others. And it nay changes the fact that ye reaved against us, stealing our cattle, our stores of grain—”

“Aileana, for bloody’s sake—”

“Aye, as was deserved.” James cut off Seamus’s attempt to interrupt the argument. “Because yer brother rode on us, too, stealing ours,” he retorted.

“And ’twas yer faither who maimed mine,” she seethed, sitting forward in her seat as if she wished to claw her way across the damned table into his lap to scratch at him. He wouldn’t mind her in his lap. “He—”

“Enough, both of ye!” thundered Seamus, shooting to his feet.

Aileana jumped at her brother’s outburst, and again, the strange protectiveness that had afflicted him when he’d watched Seamus scold Aileana outdoors flared in his stomach. Why? Because of Marjorie… Nay, Aileana could clearly hold her own. He was daft to fear for this hellion, who would just as soon see a dirk lodged in his heart at first chance.

Grant jerked his belts straight and eased back into his seat.

“Yer ears have nay misheard me,” James finally replied. “I need a woman. Ye have two sisters, Seamus, neither of whom ye can afford.”

Horror dropped Peigi’s mouth wide, as it did to the silent Lady Elizabeth. Aileana gaped at him.

Ye, James mouthed at her so boldly, it was a wonder he wasn’t a randy stag who regularly bedded wenches.

Her eyes widened farther. Why does needling the lass please me so? Aye, his curiosity was piqued. He watched sunbursts erupt on her creamy cheeks, sprinkled with endearing freckles… “Fairies’ wee kisses,” Marjorie had always told him when he was a lad and his own face had been plagued with freckles—now faded. He swallowed at the stab of pain thoughts of his oldest half sister always induced, willing the memory away. Why hadn’t anyone made Aileana believe the truth? That they made her beautiful? His blood stirred at the mere thought of pecking kisses upon each one. A man would think them kissable, until she opens her mouth and tells him off. He harrumphed to himself.

“I’ll consider the debt owed me paid. It would ease yer purse strings to have one less mouth to feed.”

Seamus harrumphed now, too. “Try again, man. Why the hell would I give a beloved sister to such a bastard?”

James swallowed the anger that flared at the insult and sat still.

“Surely ye would be cruel to her out of spite,” Grant added.

Hell, he’d never been cruel to a woman in his life. He thought of Marjorie again, one of the two older sisters who’d doted on him, despite their mother’s hatred of him. She’d been married off to that brute… In sooth, Marjorie’s lot had made him think closely about his. Would he be able to remain tempered? Careful? Rational? With a woman of his own? Or did all men turn into unfaithful husbands like his father or violent beasts like Marjorie’s?

“The absolute horror,” whispered Peigi to Aileana, whose hazel-green eyes were still wide.

His brow knitted. Shock and surprise were understandable. But horror? He knew these people disliked him, but was he really so repulsive, too? Still, he felt an ounce of satisfaction. So it is possible to render this hellion Aileana speechless. The satisfaction induced a fleeting smile he tried miserably to suppress as he filled his mouth with another bite of bread.

“And besides, what does needing a wife have to do with anything?” Seamus Grant growled, rising slowly from his seat. “My sister stole vegetables. Coin is a sufficient compensation. She ought no’ pay with her life.”

“That’s a fatal way of putting it,” James replied. “No one aims to send her to the gallows. I seek an accord, ’tis all. Yer clan wronged mine. I need a wife. Ye have two unmarried sisters with no dowries, no doubt.” He eyed Lady Aileana again. “And I’d never harm a woman—”