My Fierce Highlander by Vonda Sinclair Page A

earlier
today. I hope you’ll find it to your liking.” Without waiting for
her to answer, he limped in and lit a candle with his own.
    The meager light revealed a spacious room
with a large, heavily-draped poster bed in the corner and a thick
Turkish carpet before it.
    “Oh, I cannot take this room,” Gwyneth said,
taken aback by the finery. “Don’t you have something smaller, less
ornate?”
    “What’s wrong with ornate?” An almost
imperceptible grin quirked his lips. “I would wager, m’lady, that
when you lived in England you had a room far grander than this
one.”
    She stared at the floor, refusing to reveal a
glimpse of her past to him. What he said was too close to the
truth, and she did not wish to take a step back in time. Rising
above her station for a brief time and enjoying such luxury could
only be more painful in the end, when she had it no longer.
    “Did you not?” Alasdair asked.
    Gwyneth was glad when a panting Busby stopped
in the open doorway.
    “Mistress Carswell, I have the herbs. Seri
was out birthing a bairn, but one of her daughters said these would
be what you’re wanting.”
    Gwyneth rushed toward him and took the tiny
sacks of crushed herbs. She sniffed them, their distinct pungent or
bitter aromas confirming their identities. “I thank you. If you
would be so kind, could you ask Tessie to bring me some fresh,
clean water and whisky?”
    “Busby, also please tell MacDade to come up
as well. I would have him guard,” Alasdair said.
    “Aye, m’laird.” Busby scurried away.
    Alasdair stood at the mantel, his back to
her. “You’ll be needing a fire in here. ’Tis chill.” He set about
building one himself. Why would he not have a servant do that?
    Gwyneth turned down the fine linen and wool
covers on the bed. “Get in, Rory.”
    Her sleepy son complied.
    Minutes later, she wondered how long Alasdair
would stay. Did he want to oversee the care of her wound?
    He stood, his attention still cast toward the
small fire he’d built. “If you should require other clothing, you
shall find some in that trunk in the corner.” He nodded to his
right, still without looking at her.
    “You are too kind. Whose clothes are
they?”
    A long moment of silence stretched between
them, and she thought he wouldn’t answer. The fire caught the
tender and popped.
    “They were my wife’s,” he said in a
monotone.
    “Your wife’s?” He’d never mentioned a wife
before. Was this the Leitha whose name he’d murmured in his fevered
sleep several nights ago?
    “Aye, she died two years past. She was a wee
lass, much like you are, so I’m thinking the clothes may fit.
Anyway, you came here with naught more than the clothes on your
back. You’ll be needing something else to wear.”
    “I thank you.”
    “’Tis the least I can do.”
    Gwyneth wanted to disagree. What did this
cost him? Had he loved his late wife so much that giving away her
clothing pained him? Or did he have no emotional attachment to
her?
    At any rate, he was far more generous than
her father or her late husband had ever been, but discussing such
matters did not seem appropriate. The atmosphere of the room
already felt too intimate by far. She stood in a bedchamber, in the
middle of the night, with a handsome man who dangerously lured her
without even trying. One glance from him could draw forth the
sensual side she tried to keep bound and hidden.
    Her son snoring in the bed, along with the
pain in her arm, kept any shameful thoughts at bay.
    “Have a seat, m’lady, afore you fall down.
You’re pale as a specter.” Alasdair motioned toward a chair, then
paced to the door. “Where is Tessie?”
    Gwyneth sat. “I’ll wait for her. Please, you
should go back to bed. It is late.”
    “Nay, I cannot sleep now anyway.” He rubbed
the back of his neck. “I should’ve let Mistress Weems go years ago.
She’s a right olkeyr .”
    Gwyneth wasn’t sure what an olkeyr was, but it didn’t sound pleasant.
    “She was in