Page 55 of Promised to the Cursed Laird

"Ye needn't. I've six children and my own two hands, and I've managed more odds than that this week alone."

"I'm aware of exactly what ye've managed this week," he said, "which is precisely why I'm coming." He was already turning, already calling across the yard. "Lachlan. Bring four men. We're riding tae the village."

Lachlan appeared from the direction of the barracks with the alacrity of a man who'd overheard enough to already be amused. "An escort for a children's riding lesson. That's new."

"It's an escort for the road," Marcas said, "which hasnae been safe in a fortnight, in case it slipped yer notice."

"Nae, I noticed." Lachlan's grin didn't dim in the slightest as he signaled for horses. "I only find it interesting that ye're volunteering yer own sword arm tae supervise a pony parade rather than sending men and staying with yer ledgers."

"The ledgers can wait."

"Can they." Lachlan mounted, still grinning. "That's new too."

Neilina, close enough to have caught the whole exchange, gave Marcas a look of pure, unrepentant amusement as they fell in together at the head of the small procession. "Ye're only coming tae keep an eye on me, then. Nae for the children at all."

"I'm coming for the children."

"Ye didnae even glance at them when ye offered."

"I'm looking at them now." He gestured, somewhat pointedly, at the small line of ponies trailing behind them. She laughed and he found he didn't much mind being caught out, not when the alternative was watching her ride toward a village that had already proven, once, that it wasn't as safe as it looked.

"Whatever ye tell yerself, MacKinnon," she said, and nudged her horse forward, and he fell in beside her, and did not correct her, because she wasn't entirely wrong.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The village was busy at midday, carts and dogs and a dozen small distractions exactly as Neilina had predicted. Marcas watched her manage the children through all of it with a patience that made his chest go warm and tight every time he glanced over to see her steadying a spooked pony here, calling a correction there, never once raising her voice above what the moment required.

He left her to it once he was satisfied the street was as ordinary as it looked, and turned to attend to the handful of small matters that had been waiting on him since his last visit to the village. He heard a dispute over a debt, a question about the mill's roof, nothing that couldn't be settled quickly.

It was on his way back toward her that a smell caught him. It was honey and something baked, warm off a griddle set up near the kirk wall, and the old woman tending it caught his eye and held up one of the small sticky cakes with confidence.

"For the lady," she said, nodding toward where Neilina stood laughing at something one of the children had said. "She's been kind tae my grandson, teaching him his seat. Nae charge, laird."

"I'll pay regardless." He did, and carried the small cake back across the street, and Neilina looked up at his approach with open curiosity.

"What's this?"

"A local sweet. Freely given, on account of yer patience with someone's grandson." He held it out. "Ye've earned it, by all reports."

She took it, and bit into it without ceremony, and made a small, pleased sound around the mouthful that did something entirely unreasonable to his composure. He was still recovering from that when he noticed the honey caught at the corner of her mouth, a smear of it she hadn't noticed.

He reached instinctively, and brushed his thumb gently at the corner of her lips, and felt her go still, her breath catching audibly enough that he heard it over the noise of the street.

"Ye've a bit of honey there," he said, low, and didn't immediately withdraw his hand.

She didn't step back. Her eyes had gone to his mouth, then back up, the street and the children and the whole ordinary business of the village narrowing down, for both of them, to the small point of contact at the corner of her lips and the sudden, charged stillness that had fallen over the space between them.

"MacKinnon." Her voice had gone unsteady.

"Aye."

Neither of them moved. He rubbed his thumb over her lower lip and her breath fanned his hand. She shifted a little closer and touched the tip of her tongue to his thumb. He swallowed. When he stroked her tongue, the warm wetness made him go hard⁠—

"Laird." A clansman's voice, apologetic, breaking in from somewhere behind him. Fergus, from the mill dispute, wringing his cap in both hands. "Forgive the interruption. There's trouble at the Camerons', a boundary quarrel gone tae shouting, and Angus Cameron's brought a blade intae it. They're asking for ye tae settle it before it goes further."

Marcas let his hand fall, slow, reluctant, and saw the same reluctance mirrored plain on her face before she managed to smooth it away. He took a deep breath and took a step back.

"I have tae see tae this," he said.