Page 26 of His Wicked Highland Ways

Jeannie stood with the pale light of morning flooding in through the open door of the cottage and felt her heart break.

Finnan MacAllister had risen from her bed at the first hint of dawn while still Aggie slept, and donned his clothing with his back turned. Unable to guess the thoughts in his mind, Jeannie had scrambled up also, snagged her night rail from the floor where it lay in a heap, and crawled into it, her heart thumping all the while.

How could she persuade him to stay? She must persuade him.

But nothing she had said then or since turned his mind. She believed she spoke reason all the while she changed the bandages on his arm, when he bent over Danny who still slept fitfully, even when Aggie clattered down from the loft and gave her a shawl—and a shocked look—to cover her near nakedness.

It did not matter how she appeared; Finnan MacAllister would not stay.

“I’ll not endanger you,” he said decisively, even as he slung his bloodstained plaid over his shoulder and hefted his leather bag. “The Avries are bound to come looking. I will appreciate it if you keep Danny one more day.”

“And you will return to see him?” Jeannie leaned toward him as she asked, her whole body aching for his touch. Was this how men felt in the thrall of whisky, as if they might die without just a bit more? She experienced a flash of sympathy for her father, and Geordie.

She would not ask Finnan to return to her, no. But to Danny? Surely.

“I will try to collect him when ’tis dark. I hope he will be able to travel by then.” He adjusted the leather bag and winced when he moved his left arm. It must be painful, but she would never have guessed that, last night.

The memory of his touch still whispered over her skin as he stepped out the door with her following.

Morning mist clothed the glen and rose sluggishly, lit by the new sun. A fortuitous time for him to be away, but she wanted to bury both fists in his plaid and hold him.

“I will worry for you,” she said helplessly . Long for you . But she did not add that. Could he not see it in her eyes as he turned and looked at her?

Oh, and he appeared like a young god with the hazy light dancing around him, hair warmed to red, and that dangerous, seductive brightness in his eyes.

“And I for you,” he returned. “Danny makes a dangerous presence in your home. Should they come to your door, do not let them in for any reason.”

“How am I to keep them out?”

“Tell them your maid is ill, raving. Say it is some vile contagion.” He smiled ruefully. “I do not doubt Aggie can play the part. Meanwhile I will do my best to keep the hounds away from here.”

“How?”

“I will allow them a glimpse or two of me and then lead them a hare’s chase down the other end of the glen.”

Jeannie’s eyes widened in horror. “But you are not fit, hampered by that arm.”

“Fit enough for the task.” Just as in her bed. “And I can move much more quickly without Danny.”

Jeannie, not happy with the plan, did not know how to dissuade him, and fell silent in dismay.

His gaze caught hers. “Thank you, Jeannie.”

“For keeping Danny? I do not mind.”

“Nay.” He leaned forward, and she felt his lips, a source of warmth in the cool morning air, touch her cheek. In a whisper meant for her ears alone, he said, “For last night.”

Jeannie’s heart broke into still more jagged pieces, and she spoke the words she had vowed she would not. “You will return?”

“Aye, tonight. Keep him quiet till then.” And just like that he stepped away and disappeared into the mist as if he had never existed.

Jeannie stood on her doorstep a moment longer, arms wrapped about herself, eyes searching for a hint of him and but one thought in her mind: When he returned tonight, would she have him in her bed again?

She reentered the cottage, only to be met by Aggie’s accusing stare. The maid bent over the hearth, stirring a pot of oatmeal, but all her attention focused on her mistress.

“I am that shocked, mistress, truly I am.”

“Eh?” Had Aggie observed Finnan’s parting kiss?

Aggie waved a hand. “For you to appear so, barely clad, in front of a man. You do know, mistress, in strong light he could see right through that night dress?”

Jeannie drew breath to speak, but Aggie did not give her the chance. “And,” she added with heat, not like the servant she purported to be but the friend she truly was, “you were with him last night.”

How did Aggie know that?

She need not ask; all fired up, Aggie rushed on. “I woke in the night, and you were gone from the cot in the loft. I grew worried that the lad, here, had taken a turn for the worse and you had risen to help tend him. But when I peeked down the ladder, Danny still slept, and no one else was in this room.”

“Oh.”

“Oh,” Aggie emphasized, her cheeks turning pink. “There was but one other place you could be. And I heard whispers—”

Had she, by God? And what had Aggie overheard Jeannie say? She had done her best to keep quiet even in the throes of intense pleasure, but the small cottage afforded little privacy.

Her face, too, flamed with heat. She crossed her arms over breasts still tender from the ministrations of Finnan MacAllister’s mouth.

“I went back to my bed,” Aggie said self-righteously, “not knowing what to think. I never heard you come out of your room till dawn.”

“But Finnan heard you snoring.” Finnan, holding her against his muscular body, all of him hard.

“That,” Aggie said with dignity, “was Danny.”

“Ah.” It seemed passion had fogged both their minds.

“Mistress, what were you thinking? I know you are a widow and have had a man before”—Aggie lowered her voice—“although you and Master Geordie never did share a room.”

“It is certainly none of your business, Aggie,” Jeannie said gently. But it was—the two of them had thrown their lot in together here, and she represented Aggie’s only security.

Aggie drew herself up. “Maybe not. But I worry for you, mistress. A man like that! All the other women he has had—it is wicked.”

“And…” Jeannie held Aggie’s gaze. “Can you blame me? Have you looked at him? I cannot help myself, Aggie. In truth, I cannot.”

For once in her life Aggie seemed at a loss for words. She turned back to the pot of porridge and stirred fiercely.

“It may well end in tears,” Jeannie admitted, “but until then…”

Until then she would be left wanting Finnan MacAllister.

****

Danny’s fever broke late in the afternoon, and he awoke clear-eyed and full of questions.

“Where is Laird Finnan?” he asked even as Aggie fussed over him, adjusting his blanket and sponging his brow. “There was a terrible fight—”

“There was,” Jeannie told him, and took the seat beside his cot. “He brought you here, and I patched him up before he left again.”

Aggie shot her a scandalized look but said nothing.

“He means to come and call for you tonight,” Jeannie went on.

“Unless the Avries catch him,” Danny moaned. “I should be wi’ him, standing at his back.”

It occurred to Jeannie that Danny, now clear-headed, might make a wonderful source of information about the man who wholly occupied her mind—and Finnan MacAllister did so occupy it.

“Bring a cup of that broth,” she bade Aggie, “and see can we get it inside our patient.”

Aggie bustled and obeyed; she still refused to meet Jeannie’s eyes.

“Tell me,” Jeannie urged when Danny had taken his first sip of broth, “of this quarrel between the Avries and Laird MacAllister.”

Danny considered her with an intelligent gaze. “Surely you know? The story is all over the glen.”

“We have had only bits and pieces of it. I would know the truth.”

“Aye, mistress, but you may not like the truth.”

“Try me.”

Again the lad measured her with his eyes before he spoke. “This glen has been MacAllister land since time out of mind. Laird MacAllister’s father’s father’s father reigned here, and Finnan is the last in a very long line. When I met him—” Abruptly, Danny’s gaze clouded. “When I met him he had been dispossessed, his father foully murdered by those who should have been loyal to him, and his sister either stolen away or murdered also.”

“Sister?” Jeannie could not help but exclaim.

“She disappeared the same night his father was murdered. He never did discover whence. Try as he might, he has not been able to glean word of her, and he fears her dead.”

“The Avries,” Aggie breathed, caught by the tale despite herself.

Danny’s expression softened as his eyes found her face. “No doubt.”

“But why?” Jeannie wondered.

“Why did the Avries commit such foul deeds against their sworn lairds?” Danny shrugged. “For years they were ghillies to the MacAllisters, both favored and protected by the chief’s house. But a strain of madness, so I think, entered the mind of Gregor Avrie, he who was father to yon Stuart and Trent, and turned his heart and mind. He decided he had some claim to the position of laird. And he took control, murdered my laird’s father, and drove Master Finnan from the glen.”

“Someone must know what’s happened to the sister,” Aggie insisted.

“And,” Jeannie objected, “wouldn’t the former laird’s men stand with him?” She had heard tales of how these highland clans were ready always for a fight or vengeance.

“Aye, and so they did. My master says this glen was a far different place then, full of clansfolk both MacAllister and Avrie, many joined by ties of blood. Most are gone now, chased away or dead, for Gregor Avrie brought in a hired army, and after the old laird’s death blood flowed right well.”

Aggie voiced the question Jeannie longed to ask. “But Laird Finnan came back and murdered Gregor Avrie?”

“Aye—after ten years away serving as a mercenary, and after Culloden broke the backs of the clans.”

“Those at Avrie House,” Jeannie said softly, “claim Finnan MacAllister fought on the wrong side at Culloden—stood against the clans.”

Danny’s face closed abruptly. “Anyone who can say that does not know him. His heart is all for loyalty—though not necessarily to any prince.”

And that did not make an answer, Jeannie thought ruefully, even as Danny buried his face in his cup and went suddenly silent.

It seemed she would have to get the rest of the story from the man himself—if she ever saw him again.