Page 10 of Claiming His Highland Bride (A Highland Feuding #4)

‘W ould you stay for supper, Dougal?’ Clara asked as Sorcha and Dougal arrived at the cottage after her visit to the keep.

‘I...’ Dougal hesitated in his reply.

‘I made the stew, Dougal,’ Sorcha said proudly. Had this been even five days ago, she would not have offered, but she’d learned so much these last few days.

‘Aye,’ Dougal said. ‘I would be glad of it.’

It was the least she could do for his acts of kindness to her. He had not again mentioned her habit of getting lost on her way through the village. He just appeared at her side when she walked on her way to or from the keep each day and wordlessly guided her steps along the right path.

They spoke of the village and all sorts of topics she experienced living here. His questions never strayed to personal matters, so she never truly had to lie to him. And they spoke of his father’s plans for the mill now that his two uncles had arrived to help with the expansion and repairs for it. And, sometimes, they just walked in companionable silence through the village.

This was the first time Clara had invited him to stay and she watched Clara for some sign of her intentions. Helping to bring the bowls and spoons and bread to the table, she sensed nothing amiss. Jamie arrived and continued discussing some repairs of the mill with Dougal as she and Clara herded the wee ones to their places for the meal.

The meal was filling and plain but pleasant. Several times, Sorcha looked up to see Dougal staring across the table at her, but he did not say anything when she glanced back at him. Inexperienced at such conversations and experiences with men, Sorcha waited for the same reaction to happen as it did when Alan stared at her so.

Yet, it did not happen. No heat. No spark of excitement that moved along her skin when their hands touched while passing a plate across the table. Clara kept a conversation going with bits of news and gossip and questions, so that, by the time they finished eating, Sorcha knew much more about Dougal than she had before.

He was the middle of three brothers and the only one who worked the mill with their father. He had a younger sister. He enjoyed his work. He respected his parents and wished to visit the other Mackintosh lands soon. And Dougal never gazed at her with the intensity she saw in Alan’s scrutiny.

She startled at that and Clara cleared her throat, for she’d missed something that Dougal had said as she’d been remembering Alan’s way of staring at her.

‘Dougal asked if you were going to the keep on the morrow, Saraid.’ Clara repeated his question.

‘Oh, your pardon, Dougal,’ she said. ‘I was thinking about something Father Diarmid said to me.’ And now praying for forgiveness for another lie told. ‘Aye, Lady Arabella asked me to speak to her on the morrow. After the noon meal.’

‘I will be there with Jamie in the morn,’ Dougal said, nodding to Jamie to confirm it. ‘Seek me when you finish if you wish to walk back together.’

Clara wore a strange expression when Dougal finished speaking and she exchanged some glances with Jamie before standing and taking some of the plates from the table. She did the same, putting the bowls and spoons into the large bucket they used for washing them. In a few minutes, the table was empty and the children sleepy and ready for their beds.

‘See Dougal out, Saraid,’ Clara directed. ‘I will get the bairns to sleep.’

Sorcha followed Dougal as he thanked Clara and Jamie for supper. Night had fallen while they ate and the village had quieted. He stepped away from the door and she watched as he turned back to her.

‘The stew was as good as my ma’s,’ he said with a smile. Though she had never tasted his mother’s cooking, she took it as a supreme compliment. For a son to say such a thing as that surely was one.

‘I am glad you enjoyed it, Dougal,’ she said. ‘Mayhap you can join us again? I am learning to make a new dish each day.’ She’d never explained why she was so late in learning to cook and he did not ask or look askance at her admission.

‘I would like that, Saraid.’

He had finally stopped calling her Mistress the fourth time she’d given him permission to do so. Of all the things that were different, not being called ‘lady’ was one she’d noticed. And by using a different name, she sometimes would not realise someone was speaking to her until they repeated it twice or even thrice. The people in Glenlui were going to think her hard of hearing if she did not pay heed. Dougal took a half-step closer and began to lean in slowly.

Puzzled, Sorcha watched as he neared and then stepped back away. Surely he had not been about to kiss her? She met his stare then and he seemed surprised by the action, too.

‘Good night to you,’ he said softly before calling it out a bit louder. ‘Clara. Jamie. Good night.’

Jamie came to the doorway now and Sorcha knew that whatever impulse had caused Dougal to even consider such a thing was done and gone. They watched as he made his way from the cottage towards the centre of the village. When he faded into the shadows, Sorcha walked inside with Jamie only a pace or two behind her. Clara stood waiting for them just inside. As the door closed, Clara untied her apron and tossed it on the table.

‘What do you think, Jamie?’ she asked. Sorcha looked over her shoulder, sidestepping to get out of their way.

‘Aye, love,’ he said, nodding at Sorcha. ‘He is wooing her.’

Of any words she could have heard, these were astounding and unbelievable. She was a stranger here. Worse, she was a deceitful stranger, telling everyone in this place a concocted story that had so little truth to it, it counted for nothing. Sorcha shook her head at both of them.

‘You are mistaken,’ she said forcefully. ‘He is being nice to me. As you have been. As Alan...as everyone here has been. Nothing more.’ Her words must have been strong for both Clara and Jamie blinked several times before responding.

‘Lady,’ Jamie began, using a courtesy that so few knew applied to her, ‘I have seen men woo women and that boy, that young man, is wooing you.’

‘Sorcha,’ Clara whispered as she reached out and took her hand, ‘I fear you have little experience in this. Your father had chosen a man to wed you and that man knew you would be his. Or he would have shown up at Castle Sween and made some overtures to you. As a man who wishes to marry a woman does.’

‘As Dougal is doing,’ Jamie repeated. ‘Watching and waiting for you to arrive or to walk past. Escorting you where you need to go. Talking about all manner of nonsense and things. Coming to supper with your family. ’Tis how it is done in most places by most people.’

Her mouth dropped lower with each of Jamie’s examples. She had not noticed or realised the implications of Dougal’s acts, but now, it was quite apparent—he was wooing her. Even while acknowledging this as a fact, something within her wanted it to be Alan who pursued her. Alan who...wooed her.

‘But I am going to the convent.’ She shrugged and shook her head. ‘He knows that. Everyone knows that.’

‘Aye. Everyone knows. But you are not at the convent yet, are you?’ Clara asked. ‘His actions are respectful. Well, they were until just now.’

‘Just now?’ she asked. She touched her fingers to her lips and understood that Clara had witnessed his attempt at a kiss. ‘’Twas nothing. A misstep.’

‘He almost kissed you.’

From her tone and the glint in her eyes, Sorcha could not tell if Clara was happy or shocked by Dougal’s attempt. No man had ever even considered such an act with her. For the first time in her life, she was exposed to men who were not kin and not approved by her father. Yet, in a way, she was complimented by his action. Or, rather, his almost-action. For he did it based only on what he knew of her during her time here.

‘I am certain that he did not mean such a thing,’ she assured Clara while not quite believing her own words. ‘He does not know me enough to want to kiss me.’

Jamie burst out laughing and Clara shushed him, but Sorcha saw the smile on her cousin’s face. She believed it.

‘You have no idea of your appeal, Lady,’ Jamie said. He walked closer and moved a stool for her to sit as he did. Clara stood at his back, her hands caressing his broad shoulders. ‘Part of it is that you are new here. Part of it is your beauty.’ Sorcha could feel the heat of a blush rise in her cheeks at his words. ‘And part of it is your plan to enter the convent.’

‘But why would that appeal to anyone? I am going to serve God.’

‘Aye, but to most men, that is a challenge they cannot resist. Oh, a God-fearing man will give pause, but he will still take it as a challenge to turn you to more earthly pursuits.’

Sorcha gasped then, comprehending how that could be.

‘Then there are your manners, Lady. Nothing about you makes a man think you are a common villager. Though you can hide your name, you cannot hide the way you walk and talk and even the way you eat,’ Jamie explained. ‘Your hands. Your hair. Your complexion. They all give away that you have not spent your life working as we have.’

He gentled and lowered his voice then. ‘I ken you have been trying your best. ’Tis clear to me that you cannot hide what you truly are for very long. And Dougal, or most unmarried men here, would have no chance of attracting Lady Sorcha’s attention. They would not even attempt such a thing.’ Jamie motioned to her. ‘But as Mistress Saraid MacPherson, widow, with intentions of leaving the world behind, well, they have a chance with her. And more than Dougal have enquired with me about your situation.’

Sorcha felt as if someone had knocked the very breath from her body with those words. She sank on the stool, absorbing his words and trying to understand what she could do.

‘So, I should leave now for the convent.’ She shook her head, pushing her kerchief off her hair. ‘I did not mean to...mislead anyone or lead anyone to false hopes or conclusions. I just wanted to hide until I could make my way to Skye.’ It was not the best way to begin a life of service to God.

‘Sor... Saraid,’ Clara said, glancing at the door leading to the bairns’ room. ‘You could not come here and announce who you were. I agreed to hide you and thought that hiding in plain sight would be easiest. I still do.’

‘As do I,’ Jamie added, covering Clara’s hands with his own. ‘Other than hiding in a barn or a cave, this is the best way.’

‘And rushing into a decision that could just make things worse for you is not the thing either,’ Clara added. ‘You were and still are grieving, Cousin. I just wanted to give you a place to rest and get strong enough to make your choice.’

‘And I have.’ She stood then. ‘But I must be doing something wrong if Dougal thought...’

‘Men will think what they want,’ Jamie said. ‘I just did not want you misunderstanding, or worse, missing the signs he or any other might be giving you. With no experience in such matters, it would be easy enough to misunderstand.’

‘I thank you for your concern and your help.’ Feeling overwhelmed by all of these new concerns, Sorcha needed to be alone. ‘I am just going outside for a few minutes,’ she said as she grabbed up her cloak and threw it around her shoulders.

They did not speak or try to stop her as she left. Though the moon was bright enough, she would not dare wander too far down any road away from the cottage. She did not have the surefootedness that Dougal and the others who’d lived here their whole lives did. As she walked away, she heard whisperings within the cottage and knew that Clara and Jamie now argued over her.

Sorcha found a bench next to a tree near Jamie’s smithy and sat there, listening to the sounds of night around her. During the day, Jamie would sit here cool from the unrelenting heat of the forge. Clara and the bairns sat here to watch Jamie work. Sitting here now, Sorcha realised how significantly different it was for her.

She’d never been permitted to simply sit outside by herself when she was still at home. There was always a servant or maid or guard or relative to accompany her every venture from the safety of the castle. Here, she could sit by herself in the quiet for as long as she wanted. Or as long as she needed, in this case.

Leaning against the tree, she loosened her braids and ran her hands through her hair to release it. Undone, it flowed over her shoulders and down to her hips in waves of brown so dark a shade that it sometimes looked black. Disguised as a widow, she wore it covered, but at home it would be loose like this, wearing only a circlet to hold a small veil in place.

She would be the first to admit that letting it loose would be dangerous as she worked alongside Clara cooking or caring for the bairns. Now though, with the cooler breezes rustling through it, she enjoyed the freedom for this short respite. Since no one could see her, there would no harm done.

Not like the harm that could be done if she were not more careful during her stay here. Sorcha closed her eyes and tried to remember back to a time when she lived her own life—an orderly, comfortable life.

To the time before her mother warned her.

To a time when she knew who she was and what she would do. She could see her mother’s taut and pain-filled expression as she explained her plan to free Sorcha from the bonds that her father would inflict on her. Before her mother died.

Before Padruig died helping her carry out her mother’s plan.

Was this God’s punishment for rebelling against the role she should have played? The one of dutiful daughter, obedient to her father’s will. The one of the nobleman’s heir who would marry to cement alliances. The woman who did and said what a woman was supposed to. Was she so foolish as to think that she could thwart those who were in power over her?

Her mother told her she was strong. That she could take care of herself. That she could live a life of honour and loyalty and courage. At this moment, she’d never felt so weak and frightened. And lonely. When the tears came, she could not stop them. Gathering her legs up under her gown, Sorcha wrapped her arms around her knees, leaned her head down and let them flow.

* * *

The soft sobbing echoed across the clearing and brought him to a halt. He thought his sight had adjusted to the moonlight and yet he could not see the source of the sound. Alan was close to Jamie’s cottage and remembered the wooden bench that his friend positioned under the large tree across from the smithy. They’d drank many cups of cold water or cool ale under that tree after working close to the powerful fires in the forge.

Now though, it was the place where someone, where Mistress MacPherson, sat crying.

He was reluctant to invade her private moments, but she seemed in true distress. He walked several paces closer, not caring about the noisy steps he took, waiting for her to hear him and raise her head. When she did not, Alan knew he must break the silence and seek to aid her.

‘Mistress?’ he said softly. ‘Mistress MacPherson? Are you well?’

The crying ceased then and he thanked the Almighty for he could not bear to see a woman crying. She slowly lifted her head from where she’d rested it and rubbed her arm across her face, first in one direction and then the other. Then her voice whispered in reply, carried like mist on the wind to him where he waited.

‘Nay.’

So many choices ran through his mind in the moment after that one word. Alan’s first reaction was to go to her, pull her into his arms and soothe whatever fears or ailments afflicted her. His next reaction was the opposite to that—he should bid her a good night and walk all the way back to the keep without seeking out Jamie as he’d planned. Rather than the one extreme or the other, he chose the middle path.

‘Is there anything I can do? Should I fetch Clara for you?’

An offer of help without forcing his way into her private matters. He thought that was what she would want him to do. Her next word ruined his chance of being successful and of walking away before he acted on the growing desire he felt for her.

‘Nay.’ And then nothing else.

She was sitting there in the dark, in the night, under a tree. He could not tell whether she was looking at him or not, for the shadows under the tree’s branches were too deep for the moonlight above them to illuminate her.

‘So, you are not well, you do not wish me to aid you and you do not want your cousin either?’ he clarified her answers with his questions.

‘I just want to be alone,’ she said after a long sigh. Her voice gave every sign that she was not being truthful.

Now that she knew of his presence, he walked closer and could finally see her better. She did not appear to be ill or harmed. Then he noticed that her hair fell around her like a fine, silken curtain, covering her form all the way down to the bench’s surface. Alan’s hands wanted to touch it and he began to reach out just before gaining control over himself and those wayward hands.

‘Then, I will leave you,’ he said. It was the smartest thing to do—leave a woman alone when she told you to do so. But her voice had trembled and was filled with uncertainty and sadness when she’d spoken. Surprising even himself, Alan walked to the bench and sat next to her. ‘If that is what you want?’

A sigh that told him of a world’s weight bearing down on her was her reply. He turned to her and waited for words. When none came, he spoke.

‘Has something happened? Have you received ill tidings mayhap?’

She shook her head and it created wondrous little waves that moved through her curls as she did. After a moment, she slid her legs down and let her feet rest on the ground. The urge to reach out and touch her grew stronger.

‘I fear I am allowing self-pity to overtake me,’ she explained. Then she reached up and gathered her hair back over her shoulders. ‘It will pass.’

Although drawn to the way her hair moved around her as she did, Alan knew she was lying. Somehow he knew she was avoiding whatever had caused her upset. She did not have to reveal anything to him, but he found that he wanted to know what had brought on this upset.

‘Did someone say something unkind?’ he asked. He slid his hand across the bench to where her hair pooled and touched it, hoping the darkness covered his movement. It was as silky as it appeared.

‘Nothing like that. Everyone has been kind and helpful. Nay,’ she said, as she stood. He stood as well, releasing her hair from his grasp. She was much shorter than him, shorter even than Clara. She smiled then, a watery, weak one that faded quickly. ‘Actually I should feel complimented, but considering my status and my plans, it does not feel like that.’

Now, he was intrigued as well as concerned. ‘And this compliment was...?’

‘Dougal, the miller’s son,’ she began.

‘Aye. A good fellow.’

‘Dougal has decided to woo me.’