Claiming His Highland Bride

by TERRI BRISBIN

  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.’

  Chapter Ten

  Of all the things she could have said, of all the things he’d considered that could have happened to make her so miserable, being wooed was not one of them. But at least her misery seemed to be tied to Dougal. Not that he himself was wooing her.

  ‘He kens you seek the convent’s walls, does he not?’

  She nodded.

  He’d never thought Dougal a stupid or stubborn man, yet wooing a woman promised to God was one or the other of those. But here he was, doing something that had not even crossed Alan’s mind. Not that he had not been attracted to her, for he had. Even knowing his uncle would make arrangements for his marriage had not made her unappealing or convinced him not to admire her.

  ‘Yet, he is wooing you?’

  ‘Aye. Even Jamie and Clara said so.’

  ‘And you did not know it?’ he asked.

  ‘Well, I have not been thinking on that possibility lately,’ she snapped at him. ‘Your pardon, I pray you. I was taken by surprise for a number of reasons.’

  ‘And his wooing made you cry?’

  Alan swore he would never, ever comprehend the workings of the feminine mind. He thought women liked to be fawned over and complimented. He thought they liked soft words and gestures. She shook her head at him.

  ‘Nay, his kind attentions brought up other considerations and memories and I ended up out here trying to sort things out.’

  ‘You ended up out here crying.’

  ‘Aye. Sometimes, ’tis the only way to make sense of things.’

  He reached out and took
her hand, smiling when she did not refuse him the gesture. As he stroked her with his thumb, Alan tugged her a little closer. He suspected she did not even realise how close she was to him now.

  ‘Have you reconsidered entering the convent then? Do you wish to accept his attentions?’

  He’d hesitated to ask that question, but he truly needed to know. Had she changed her mind about seeking the religious life? Had Dougal won her while Alan had been travelling hither and yon to his uncle and his father? Part of him did not like that possibility at all. Part of him wanted to take her and claim her and push any memories of Dougal’s wooing out of her thoughts. Another part of him...

  Alan entwined their fingers and he leaned down. He would kiss her. He would taste her mouth and—

  ‘Alan, is that you?’ Jamie’s voice called out, interrupting before she could answer. Sadly, she pulled out of his grasp and moved too far away for him to kiss.

  ‘Aye,’ he called back. ‘Come,’ he said to Saraid, ‘let me walk you back inside.’ She looked at his outstretched arm for a moment. ‘If you are ready to return?’

  She placed her hand on his arm with the grace of a lady allowing a laird to assist her. Something niggled at him as he watched her walk at his side. She walked liked someone noble-born. As a woman trained to the gentle manners and bearing of a lady. One born and raised in the keep and not the village.

  She stumbled then and Alan reached out to steady her once more with his other hand on hers, forgetting about the strange impressions he was having about her. Jamie stood by the door, holding a lantern to light their way now. When they reached him, Jamie studied Clara’s cousin closely.

  ‘Are you well, Saraid?’ he asked.

  ‘I am well, now, Jamie.’ She lifted her hand from Alan’s arm and nodded at him. ‘My thanks for coming to my aid.’

  Alan did not reply, but instead watched her enter the cottage. Clara waited there for her. When the door closed, Alan turned to his friend and spoke before Jamie could say anything about what he must have seen there in the moonlight. ‘Dougal?’ he asked.