“I’m sorry,” his hoarse whisper barely reached her. “I’m sorry I scared you, and I’m sorry I mistreated you.”
“Mistreated me? Scared me?” Maude dropped the gown and inched toward Kieran as though he were an injured and unpredictable wild animal.
“Yes. Just now. The way, I--”
“Made love to me?”
“That wasn’t making love,” Kieran shuddered.
“I thought it was.”
“That’s because you don’t know any better.” Kieran watched Maude bristle and reach for her gown once more. His next words were barely audible. “I meant I fucked you. I fucked my own wife.”
Just as she had a moment ago, Maude stood and moved toward him. “You’re right; I don’t know. And you’re not making any sense to me, but you are scaring me now.” When she stood before him, she witnessed a hollowness in his eyes that she’d never seen before. “Kieran?”
“That is nae how a mon is meant to treat his lady wife. I shouldnae have been so rough with you. I wouldnae even treat--” Kieran snapped his mouth shut before he made it even worse.
“You wouldn’t treat a whore like that.” Maude supplied for him, and her heart broke when he nodded. The shame in his eyes made her shake her head. “Did aught I said or did make you think I wanted you to stop? I thought I made it clear I wanted it just the way it was.”
“You’ll feel differently later in the morning when you’re in pain because I didn’t care for you properly.”
“I’d say you did everything properly. I never imagined such pleasure as you’ve shown me just now. Is it wrong that I enjoy each way we couple? Should I not want to join with you as much as I do? Does that make me a whore?”
“Don’t say that,” Kieran hissed. “Don’t ever say that again. You aren’t a whore, and that’s precisely why I shouldn’t have treated you as one.”
“But who says, other than you, that you did? I didn’t feel like one until right now.”
“Maude.” The remorse and pain in his voice was real.
“Does anyone have to know? I mean, will anyone find out I enjoyed coupling with you like that?” Maude’s face flamed red at the notion of anyone other than Kieran being aware of how much she enjoyed the sins of the flesh.
“No,” Kieran was adamant. “No one will ever see or hear us together. What we do is our business, and no one has a say in it but us.”
“Then why are you so miserable? Why do you fear not living up to some husbandly code? Who’s going to judge you? It certainly won’t be me.”
“Maude, I will take more care with you next time.”
“Does that mean it can last longer?”
Kieran’s mouth twitched. He grumbled as he began to come around, thanks to his wife’s practical nature. Passion sparked between them once more, and Maude shifted to join her body with Kieran’s again.
* * *
Despite the delay, Maude and Kieran entered the Great Hall as people continued to trickle in for the morning meal. Maude looked around, and her stomach sank as varying degrees of suspicion and hostility marked the clan members’ faces. She wondered what Adeline and Abigail said after her abrupt departure the night before. She glanced at Kieran, but despite standing next to her, he was already in a deep conversation with Kyle. She refused to appear like she needed her husband’s protection in her own home, so she climbed the steps to the dais as Abigail and Adeline descended from the second floor. Maude was relieved she’d arrived before them as she slipped into the lady of the keep’s chair. She smiled at Agatha as the older woman approached with a bowl of porridge and a small jug of honey.
“I wasna certain if ye prefer honey or extra cream in yer bowl. I can fetch ye the milk if ye’d rather.”
“Nay. Honey is my favorite,” Maude offered a tentative smile. She sensed Agatha would be an ally, but it was too early to tell. She’d met more than one lady-in-waiting who appeared interested in being her friend, only to tell tales to the others when Maude turned her back.
“Ma lady, would ye care for a tour after ye break yer fast?”
“I would appreciate that a great deal, Agatha. Thank you.” Maude had no chance to say more as Adeline walked behind her chair and flung her ring of keys on the table beside Maude. The rattle made many glance their way. Adeline took a seat at the end of the table too far away for Maude to say thanks, so she offered the warmest smile she could muster only to have Adeline turn her head away from Maude. She turned her attention to Kieran, who took his seat beside her.
“I’ll be in the lists this morning, then in my solar after the nooning. I have correspondence to catch up on and grievances to review before I arbitrate them tomorrow morning,” Kieran explained as he served himself a rasher of bacon. He watched Maude from the corner of his eye, pleased to see Maude ate with a healthy appetite. “Would you care to join me in my solar this afternoon? Perhaps to review the accounts or to read.”
“I would like that very much. Agatha’s taking me for a tour, and now that your mother has relinquished her keys, I’d like to get familiar with the running of the keep.”
Kieran winced at the mention of the keys. He hadn’t seen his mother drop them beside Maude, but he’d heard them. Everyone near the dais had. His gaze slid to his mother, who glared at him before turning a loathing expression on Maude. He reminded himself that his family and clan would warm to Maude once they grew to know her. They finished their breakfast with small talk about various places around the keep that Maude might want Agatha to show her. He suggested that she meet with Adam after her tour, since he could explain the accounts before she joined Kieran in his solar. Maude watched the clan eat and mingle at the tables below the dais before one after another left to complete the day’s work. She prepared to rise and seek Agatha, when Abigail’s voice carried to her.
“She inhaled that bowl so fast I’m surprised we didn’t hear her scraping the bottom.”
“I’d expect two or three wouldn’t fill that girth she carries around,” Adeline responded, her eyes locking with Maude’s.
“I hear her dowry is as fat as she is,” Abigail continued. “That must be what Kieran sees in her. I mean, why else would he turn down Laurel? And didn’t you say you were considering Mary Mackenzie? I mean, I know she’s the laird’s cousin, but she is beautiful.”
Maude swallowed as she struggled to maintain her composure. She realized Kieran was once more talking to Kyle and suspected he hadn’t heard his mother and sister, but the others seated near them did. They looked aghast before passing assessing eyes over her. She feared she was a miserable failure when the women smirked. The men gazed at her bosom, but their smirk meant something entirely different from the women’s. She pushed back her chair and made to step around Kieran’s, but he grasped her hand and lifted it to his lips. She smiled down at him, but when it didn’t reach her eyes, she saw concern register in his. He stood and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. His gaze darted to his mother and sister before he tilted Maude’s chin up.
“Summon me if you need aught at all, buttercup. Never fear interrupting or bothering me.”
“I will keep that in mind, but I must go. I don’t want to monopolize all of Agatha’s morning. She’ll have duties beyond showing me around.”
Kieran was reluctant to release Maude, but nodded before dropping a kiss to her lips. Her cheeks heated at the public affection, but she wouldn’t deny she enjoyed any kiss she shared with Kieran.
“Until the nooning, turtledove,” she murmured. She left the dais and joined Agatha, who took her to the kitchens first. The morning passed in a haze of new faces and names as she met the women who staffed the kitchens, the laundresses, the cooper, the distiller, the man who managed the buttery, the blacksmith, and the fletcher. She received greetings of varying warmth. While no one displayed outward rudeness toward her, they were distant and untrusting. Maude wondered if that was their nature, guessing the Hebrideans were just as cautious of new people as Highlanders from the mainland, but she suspe
cted word had already spread about her. She pledged she would work hard to earn their trust and respect.
She was hungry by the time the noon meal arrived, but as she sat next to Kieran, she nibbled at the chunk of bread he passed her, preferring to eat a few pieces of cheese and cold chicken before eating a handful of dried fruit. After her new family’s comments that morning, she was self-conscious about eating her fill. She would find an apple before joining Kieran in his solar. She wasn’t certain whether Kieran’s hold on her hand throughout the meal made things better or worse, since their clasped hands sat on the table as a display to everyone. At first, she assumed Kieran did it as a public statement of support for her, but as his thumb swept over the back of her hand in an absent-minded sporadic pattern, she realized he did it without thought. When the meal ended, Maude promised to meet Kieran in his solar after she collected the ledgers. She found her way to Adam’s office and nearly jumped out of her skin when she turned to leave and found Agatha in the doorway with a napkin in her hand.
“Ye didna eat enough to fill a sparrow, lass.” Agatha stated as an explanation when she handed the napkin to Maude, who opened it to find three pieces of dried beef and a bannock. “The laird canna keep his hands off ye, so I imagine ye work up an appetite. Dinna let Lady Adeline or Lady Abigail scare ye from eating a proper meal. Neither of them have a braw mon chasing them aboot the bedchamber.”
Maude’s cheeks heated, but she appreciated Agatha’s thoughtfulness and said as much. When the older woman left, Maude inhaled the food before winding her way to Kieran’s solar where they passed the afternoon with only two intermissions from their tasks.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Maude’s days settled into a predictable routine. Kieran grumbled that Maude robbed him of his beauty sleep when she awoke before the sun, but it was the only way she would agree to start the day making love to him and still be in the kitchens as the servants arrived. Neither was willing to cease their nighttime couplings, so both dragged themselves through the day, exhausted but sated.
Maude went to the kitchens each morning and lit the fires, ensuring they were blazing by the time the head cook, and the servants arrived, many still rubbing their eyes. Most mornings, Maude had already kneaded the dough left out the night before to rise and had it in the ovens. She was stirring the cauldron of porridge as the women pulled cured meats and cheeses from the larder and prepared trenchers from the day-old loaves. The first few mornings the women eyed Maude with suspicion, but as they became accustomed to her smile and nod, they accepted her help. None were rude to her, but they also did little to involve her in their conversations. After she broke her fast alongside Kieran, she would make her rounds to ensure everyone who worked inside the bailey had all they needed to contribute to the keep’s smooth operation. The laundresses were not as reticent as the kitchen staff. They peppered Maude with questions, but she was never convinced the women took a sincere interest in her so much as they hoped for kernels of information that they might turn into gossip. She was careful what she shared, but kept a practiced naivety to her tone, hoping the women wouldn’t realize she recognized their motives. Maude made a conscious effort to blend in as she worked, rather than sweeping in and demanding changes. She made subtle suggestions or led by example as she attempted to assert herself as the lady of the keep.
She overhead more than one comment from the servants that made her heart sink as she tried to earn their respect through hard work. After years of Adeline swanning about and refusing to assist with manual labor, Maude’s efforts made her look more like the farm wife Adeline and Abigail called her than the lady of the keep. She attempted to balance her efforts, ensuring other women saw her sewing before the fire as people arrived for the evening meal. She had a loom brought to the ladies’ solar and began a tapestry, but it was a chamber Abigail and Adeline favored more and more, so she abandoned the room and asked that someone take the loom to a storeroom where she decided to work. She spent much of her afternoons gathering plants that served as medicinals as the gardens sprouted. She made the error of having only one guard accompany her when she left the keep’s walls to forage along the tree line that was within view of the wall walk. It was her first heated argument with Kieran, and to her great misfortune, it took place in the bailey.
“What were you thinking leaving the safety of the keep with only one mon?” Kieran demanded.
“Who would do me harm here? Do you expect a raiding party to come barreling through the trees and steal me away? You’re overreacting and making a scene.” Maude’s look of disbelief only angered Kieran more.
“That is what I fear. This may not be a large island and the MacLeods may control most of it, but we have known the Morrisons and MacIvers to raid. What better prize than to steal the laird’s beautiful bride?” Kieran was bellowing by the time he finished, only possessing a vague awareness that people gathered to watch. It had incensed him to return from the lists to learn Maude had left the walls with only one man. “How could you not imagine it would upset me? We traveled here with two score of guardsmen, and I would have brought the king’s army if I could. I insisted upon accompanying you when you had two guards on the way to see Father Michael, and I didn’t think that was enough.”
“And that was on the roads outside Stirling. Lewis doesn’t strike me as a place rife with highwaymen.”
“Mayhap nae highwaymen, but ye never ken if there might be lawless men wandering aboot,” Kieran’s burr slipped back into place as he became more agitated. The thought of someone emerging from the woods and capturing Maude made his chest burn. He rubbed a fist over his sternum, trying to ease the pain. Maude watched Kieran battle the fear that threatened to consume him and realized that, as always, his high-handedness and overprotectiveness came from his deep concern for her. She lowered her basket to the ground and stepped closer to Kieran, resting her hands on his chest. He covered them with one hand while the other cupped her nape. “I love you, Maude, and I will never be careless with your protection. I wish you wouldn’t be with your own safety. I’d never forgive myself if aught happened to you when it’s preventable by having a few more men escort you. Please.”
Maude nodded as Kieran rested his forehead against hers. “I love you, too, and I didn’t mean to scare you. It was thoughtless, and I’d even disappoint Da by only taking one guard. He wouldn’t have allowed it on Sutherland, and I should’ve known better here. I’m sorry.”
“Then why’d you only request one?”
“I didn’t want to inconvenience your men. Which of them would want to watch me pick flowers? That’s not a task any of them would wish to perform.”
“Inconvenience them? What do you think they’re there to do? They’re called guardsmen because that’s their damn job. To guard. You.”
“No. They’re there to guard the clan, not one woman traipsing through the grass.”
“You’re part of the clan now,” Kieran reminded her, but it was easy to forget when she knew she was still unwelcome. He pressed a deep kiss against her parted lips, aware now but uncaring of those who watched. He wouldn’t spare a minute to ignore his wife’s safety, and he wouldn’t turn down the opportunity to kiss her.
* * *
A week slid into a moon which slid into two, but despite Maude’s efforts to fit in, the clan still gave her the cold shoulder. She avoided Adeline whenever possible, but Abigail took any opportunity to question Maude’s choices around the keep. She complained when Maude ordered the doors to the keep be opened to air out the Great Hall each day. She whined about the lavender and rosemary mix that Maude added to the rushes. She complained that her nose itched while she refused to leave the Great Hall when Maude had the tapestries taken down and beaten outside, then the hearths scrubbed. Adeline joined the complaints when Maude ordered more tallow candles burned than beeswax. Maude agreed the smell of the tallow was unpleasant, but when she reviewed the accounts, she was astonished to discover how much they spent on candles alone. When her mother-by-
marriage’s complaints threatened to create a mutiny among the staff, Maude pulled out the candle making supplies along with dried rose petals she found in the spense. She ground the petals into a fine powder before adding it to the wax she melted and poured into the molds. She ignored the women who surrounded her as she worked, many shocked that she knew how to make candles. She grimaced when she ordered the new candles replace the fresh tallows she’d already had put in sconces around the keep and in the large overhead candelabras. She took the barely used scentless tallows to the blacksmith and cooper for them to use in their workshops. She didn’t dare comment that the reason for the smell was poor quality. She attempted a peace offering by sending several beeswax candles to Adeline’s and Abigail’s chambers, but it did little to remedy the growing rift between the women.
As the days passed, Maude retreated further into herself and ate less and less. The constant scrutiny wore on her nerves, but she struggled to determine how to improve her relations with her new clan. Kieran watched as Maude toiled around the keep each day, dark circles forming under her eyes and the skin pulling taut over her ribs. He commented more than once that she worked too hard, but she would offer him her half-smile before changing the subject. He was aware she was unhappy, but he was at a loss to how to remedy the situation. His endeavors to secure a betrothal for Abigail were futile. Word of Madeline’s fall from grace had spread, and many clans were leery of accepting a bride said to be similar in disposition to Madeline. He considered sending her to court as Madeline’s replacement, but one sister in disgrace was enough for him. When he suggested that he send his mother to her dower lands, Maude became upset and tears filled her eyes. She begged Kieran to give her more time to win over the clan, but he was coming to accept that he’d misplaced his optimism and faith in his people.
A Wallflower at the Highland Court: A Slow Burn Highlander Romance Page 23
