Bride of the Beast (8 page)

Alec shook his head. "We searched every inch of the keep, every passage and cranny, all the outbuildings," he said, shrugging burly shoulders. "There's some that say the young lord must've imagined a second man. I swear to you, if there was one, he must've left the same way he came for he's nowhere to be found."

"We'll search again, nevertheless," Sir Marmaduke said, peering at his man's face for a long moment before he tore a strip of cloth from the bottom of his tunic and pressed the wadded linen to
Lachlan
's wound.

Caterine shifted her weight, grateful he hadn't fixed her with such an intense perusal, hadn't seen her eyes widen at the sight of him.

Faith, he may well have knelt before her naked!

So indecently did his hose and dampened tunic cling to his hard-muscled frame.

Every rock-hewn plane.

Every bulging muscle.

As if to make greater folly of her discomfiture, the breeze gusted suddenly, lifting the side panel of his tunic to give her a bold glimpse at yet another of his bulging muscles.

A most masculine one.

She drew a quick breath, the sharp intake of air prompting him to glance at her. " 'Tis a clean enough wound," he said, clearly mistaking the reason for her gasp. "My young friend will survive this day and many yet to come."

Caterine nodded, her heart hammering in her breast. His nearness, and the sheer male power he exuded, wove a spell around her, consuming her very senses so fully she required all her strength to wrench her gaze from his.

Turning her attention to the injured knight, she lowered herself to the ground beside him ... and forced a quiet calm she didn't feel. She reached for his hand, banishing the
cold
from his fingers with the warmth of her palms.

"Noble sir," she breathed, wishing
he
wasn't staring at her. She needed to take her mind off his disturbing English self and the curious way he unsettled her.

"Noble sir," she began again, focusing her attention on the pale-faced young knight, "would that Dunlaidir yet housed a full garrison. I would command them to scour the land and demand reparation for the ill-done welcome you've received to my home."

As she'd hoped,
Lachlan
pushed to sit up straighter and color began seeping back into his face. "Think nothing of it, my lady," he said, the strength in his voice pleasing her. "I have seen worse blood-letting."

He slid a sidelong glance at the Sassunach. "Before we return to Kintail, we will raise men and means enough to spare you future embroilments with such rabble as we saw this morn."

"And I t
hank
you for your chivalry." Caterine smoothed the sweat-dampened hair off his forehead. "Your valor shall be long remembered."

He
cleared his throat. "'Tis full kind of you to have come, lady, but we must see Sir Lachlan inside now."

The rich timbre of his deep voice wooed her, deftly banishing the morning's terrors and wrapping her in golden warmtii... until her ears discerned the faint coloration of his birth-land.

And hearing it soundly routed the breathless wonder whirling inside her ever since she'd spied his broad-shouldered self, unscathed and whole.

All male and glorious.

"We'll need wide strips of clean linen," he was saying, his voice irritating her now. Its Englishness offending her. "The most potent wine in your stores, valerian if you ha—"

"I ken what we'll need." She glanced sharply at him, appalled by her snippy tone, but unable to keep the edge from her tongue. "I've run this household and others for many a year."

Something inscrutable crossed his face but vanished in the time it took her to blink. She peered at him, trying to decipher the fleeting expression but he'd schooled his features into an unreadable mask.

No emotion showed at all save the concern for his friend reflecting in the brown depths of his good eye.

To her horror, though, other eyes stared at her over his shoulder.

Leering eyes.

Lust-filled English eyes and pawing hands.

Brutal hands tearing at her gown, ripping to shreds more than the linen of her kirtle and the tender flesh between her thighs.

She saw not the man who'd come to champion her, but many men. Barbarous marauders who'd not just defiled her body, but had crushed her soul.

And slain her first husband before her very eyes.

Blessedly, a barely audible wince and a slight tremor in
Lachlan
's cold hand vanquished her secret foes. "Who did this?" she asked, looking across him to Eoghann.

"A seditious Welsh dog named Cadoc," Sir Marmaduke supplied, ignoring the pang of annoyance that she'd asked the seneschal and not him.

"Cadoc?" Her eyes widened.

"Aye, and it cost him dear." Eoghann spat, a fierce scowl darkening his weather-lined face. "He lost his life for want of English coin and the saints know what else was promised him."

"Sir Hugh." Caterine slid a glance at Marmaduke. "He will be in a rage since your arrival," she said, contempt icing her words but not quite biding her fear of a malefactor powerful enough to breach Dunlaidir's walls.

Marmaduke fought back a curse that would've curled Duncan MacKenzie's toes. "No one will gain entry again," he said, pressing another handful of bunched cloth against
Lachlan
's side. "Not even in the unsavory manner this blackguard did. I will personally install an iron grid over the latrine chute opening."

She blushed. "My stepson told us how he entered. Not that we wouldn't have known after sme—
ah
—seeing James. Rhona is preparing a bath for him now." She looked at
Lachlan
. "One for you, too, my lord."

Lachlan
blanched.

Alec glanced heavenward and pinched his nose. "Dinna think to decline the lady's offer of a bath, laddie," he jested. "Your need of one is great."

"His
need?" Eoghann pushed to his feet and held his own sweat-drenched tunic out from his chest. "I warrant we all have need of a good soaking."

"I shall have extra water heated," Caterine said, standing. Her blue gaze lighted on each man save him. "Baths will be readied for each of you."

She turned to
Lachlan
, a half-smile curving her lips. "Once your wound is treated and sewn, you may rest in my late husband's solar," she said, holding up a hand when the young knight sought to demur. "Sir, you were injured within the walls of my home, do not deny me the honor of looking after you. It is my will and pleasure to do so."

"Come, my lady, I'll see you inside." Eoghann joined her. "I don't trust those fool idlers in the kitchen to boil water lest I'm there to watch o'er them."

The moment they moved away, Alec gave
Lachlan
a bold wink. "I daresay it will be well worth losing a few drams of blood if it means having the lady and her friend bathe you, eh?"

Leaning forward, he wiggled his ears. "Tis a lucky knave you are, laddie. I'd not mind two pairs o' soft hands a-washing my old bones."

"I am none too keen on a bath, sir."
Lachlan
flushed bright pink.

Marmaduke's blood heated, too, but not in embarrassment.

He 'd not mind two pairs of soft hands washing him,
Alec had jested.

One pair would serve Marmaduke quite nicely.

The self-same hands whose light-as-air touch had filled him with such wonderment when she'd traced her fingertips along his scar.

What bliss would he know were she to smooth those hands over the scars on his back? What rapture would be his were she to caress his aching muscles?

Most especially the one surging to bold life beneath his braies.

"I can wash myself,"
Lachlan
protested yet again.

"Ladies always tend injured men of the castle garrison," Marmaduke reminded him. "And esteemed guests."

Before the others could glimpse just how much the lady stirred him, he leaned down and lifted
Lachlan
into his arms. "There is naught untoward in letting them bathe and care for you."

Lachlan
didn't appear convinced. "'Tis the way of things, I know, but..."

"To refuse would be an insult," Marmaduke said, his tone closing the matter.

Without further ado, he carried his friend across the bailey, gladful of the morning's cooling mist on his heated flesh. More grateful still, of the long years he'd spent learning to shield his emotions.

insolent, full of
folly and disrespect.

Too fond by far of men of steel.

Swayed by smoldering gazes, her mind turned by fanciful dreams of strong men hewn of blood and fire.

Caterine stood in the comforting circle of warmth thrown out by the great arched fireplace in Dunlaidir's kitchen, a near-full pail of heated water clutched in her hands, a round dozen accusations burning the tip of her tongue.

And each one vied to be the first to fly at her meddlesome companion for bringing her to this pass.

Unfortunately, an equally damning charge, one aimed at her own fool heart, kept her lips pressed firmly together.

Of late, her own dreams echoed with the allure of mail-clad men.

One mail-clad man in particular.

Outrageous imaginings that burgeoned into splendiferous bloom the instant she closed her eyes to sleep. Disturbing wanderings of the mind ever ready to pierce the cloak of indifference she attempted to wear by day.

She slanted a look at Rhona. Blissfully unaware of Cater-ine's simmering agitation, her friend busied herself spreading thick woven matting around the bases of three wooden bathing tubs.

James, already submerged to his shoulders in one of them, followed her every move, his dark eyes carefully hooded to shield his adoration.

A condition Caterine suspected she alone was aware of.

"This should do it," Eoghann's gravelly voice drew her attention. He filled a small bucket with hot water from an iron cauldron suspended over the cook fire, then poured the bucket's steaming contents into her larger pail.

Newly bathed himself, but with cold water drawn from the cistern just beyond the kitchen wall, the seneschal returned the scooping bucket to its hook above the hearth. "The good sirs will have baths worthy of any great lord's hall," he said, a note of pride in his voice.

"And you, dear sir, aught not have to serve as a common bathman." Ire pricked her conscience at seeing the loyal retainer thus demoted.

"Nor should you be doing the work of a kitchen lad, my lady." The deep voice, so English yet irresistibly compelling, laid fast claim to the torch-lit kitchen and all within its smoke-stained walls.

Caterine whirled around, hot water spilling onto the floor. He stood in the open doorway, the stone-walled passage to the keep looming dark behind him. Fire glow from the wall torches gilded the length of him, emphasizing the wide set of his shoulders and his great height.

With his injured friend cradled in his arms, he looked more the lord of the castle than her late husband ever had, even in his best years.

A wave of heat washed over Caterine, an inner blaze that had nothing to do with the room's smoky warmth.

She'd half-dreaded, half-desired this moment ever since the need to offer heated baths arose, yet now her heart lodged firmly in her throat and despite her best efforts, she couldn't squeeze the simplest greeting past it.

"Set down the pail," he said, and she obeyed, any refusal she may have attempted made futile by the sheer intensity of his gaze.

Stayed by his piercing perusal and the obvious care with which he held his friend.

A depth of concern even one who loathed the English couldn't deny, though acknowledging its portent, that he possessed a good heart, held ramifications she didn't care to consider.

Fisting her hands against her attraction to him, she squared her shoulders and lifted her chin.

Even Leo appeared awed. The instant the English knight came forward, the little dog scurried away to a dark corner where he scooted beneath a chair to growl at his latest foe from a safe distance.

"God's eyes, man, put me down."
Lachlan
squirmed in the Sassunach's arms. "By the Mass, I've but a wee scratch and you coddle me as if I've lost a limb!"

"Moderate your words, my friend," Sir Marmaduke said, the camaraderie in his tone cushioning the reprimand. "Or would you have the ladies think you are of the same cloth as the beggarly varlet who cut you?"

He eased the strapping young knight onto one of the backless benches set against the wall as if he weighed no more than a sack of goose feathers.

His friend comfortably settled, if scowling at the unwanted attention, he crossed the kitchen with long, purposeful strides, reaching Caterine's side before she could so much as blink.