Page 23 of Much Ado About a Scot

He drew a deep breath then exhaled it slowly as his hand fell to his side. “Then goodnight.”

She moved down the hallway, but turned back to see him standing in the kitchen watching her. The hunger in his eyes made her steps falter for a moment until she realized what she was doing. She fled down the hall and up the stairs until she reached the sanctuary of her own bedchamber. Shutting the door, she leaned against the wood, willing her erratic heartbeat to slow down. If she were to survive a liaison with the man she would call husband for only two months and come out of it with her heart intact, she had to start keeping herself emotionally distant. She’d known him only two days and yet he stirred her imagination and her desire like no man she’d ever met before.

Moving away from the door, Isobel returned the wooden box to her secret hiding place beneath the floorboards in her room. It had been safe there before she’d taken it out. It would be safe there again.

*

Xander watched Isobel slip into the shadows. He knew she was right to refuse him, yet disappointment lingered. His focus should be on Graham and who he might be harboring at Dunbar Manor, yet all he could think about was how soft Isobel’s skin felt against his own.

With a groan, he blew out the candle and waited in the darkness for his eyes to adjust. He would get little sleep tonight, but not for the reason he had hoped. He’d wait in silence until he knew Isobel was asleep, then he would slip out into the night to make his way to where Rhys had set up camp outside of Haddington.

If they were to finish the harvest tomorrow, they would need a lot more help. Using the funds Xander had left in Rhys’s care, his brother-in-arms would be able to hire a small army of villagers to help them. At the anticipation of the surprise on Isobel’s face, warmth curled in his stomach and a smile came to his lips. Then just as suddenly, he shook his head, dispelling the image. He frowned into the darkness. What was wrong with him? He had never allowed himself to be distracted by a woman before.

Silently, he headed for the kitchen door and stepped out into the night. He had to hurry if he were to reach Rhys and return to his bed before dawn.

As he made his way across the newly harvested stubble, he tried to rein in his thoughts. He was here to find Bothwell and to expose Graham for the traitor he was. That was it. Nothing else mattered.

Perhaps after a long walk in the dark he would remember that, instead of Isobel lying in his bed with a cascade of dark hair fanned out about her, a warm flush on her skin, and a welcoming smile on her lips.

“God’s blood,” he sighed into the chill night air. “It’s going to be a long, frustrating night.”

Chapter Nine

Xander and Brodie were ready to go to the fields with Isobel at dawn the next morning. They picked up where they had left off before. Isobel looked out over the endless waves of rye and barley swaying in the early morning breeze, and tried to tamp down her fears. It would take a miracle for them to harvest the rest of the grain today.

David Graham had harvested his fields two weeks ago. The grain had dried and was now ready to be brought in for threshing and winnowing. Judging by the hundred workers fanned out across his fields, he’d chosen today to accomplish that task. They would easily accomplish their goal in one day even though he had seventy acres to her thirty.

She’d sent a message over to the Graham estate first thing this morning, inviting all to attend the celebration they would have on the following day. As of yet, she’d received no response.

Focusing her attention on the task at hand, Isobel gazed at Xander as she gathered the stalks and tied them into bundles. He was laughing at something Brodie had said; his face was alive and expressive. He stood with his legs slightly astride as he swung the scythe from right to left. The muscles of his chest and arms flexed and relaxed as he fell into a rhythm in his cutting. It was hypnotic watching him, moving slowing across the field, conquering the rye as easily as she was sure he would an enemy with a sword.

A tingle of heat moved through Isobel and she hurriedly shifted her gaze back to her own labors. What had happened between them last night had been an earthy response mixed with the lack of physical affection either of them had had over the past years. Perhaps it was best forgotten by them both. It seemed as though Xander already had. He’d avoided looking at her all morning, reverting to the guarded, secretive man he’d been when they’d first met.

With a sigh, Isobel dismissed him from her thoughts and concentrated on the work at hand. But her attention to tying the stalks was fractured a moment later by the sound of voices coming from the main road to Gladmuir Hall. She straightened to see twenty-some men and women, some of whom she recognized from the village, carrying scythes and sickles fanning out toward them.

Fear leapt into her throat. Had the rumblings of her being responsible for her previous husbands’ deaths finally hit a fever pitch that had forced them to lash out at her? Had the villagers come to charge her with witchcraft, or to take matters into their own hands? Isobel looked around her for the sickle she’d brought with her to the fields this morning. At least with a weapon she could defend herself.

As she located the sickle and bent to retrieve it, a hand touched her arm.

“They are here to help you.” Xander’s voice cut through the frantic beating of her heart.

She stood and met his gaze. “How do you know? Why would they do that? They’ve never helped me before.”

“Because I asked them to.”

A swift, sharp stab of fear shot through her. “I cannot afford—”

“I already paid their wages.”

“How? Why?” Isobel said a little breathlessly.

“It matters not. They are here to assist. As mistress of the estate, go tell them what you would like them to do.”

“But it does matter. It matters to me.”

Xander hesitated before he finally said, “I had the means from working other odd jobs and wanted to help. If there was ever a place to spend what I had saved, it would be best spent on a wife and the things she desires, wouldn’t you say?”

“We are only to be man and wife for two months.” Isobel lowered her voice so no one else could hear. “That can hardly merit you spending your life savings.”