Chapter 46

Alicia didn’t like the lass who’d come in this morn. Something about her was galling. The tawny wench was oversized and overbold. Too pretty for a servant. And she had a kind of fatal sensuality that only men and clever wives like Alicia could smell.

“I don’t like that woman,” she muttered, pouting.

“What woman?” Morgan asked.

Still claiming weakness from her ordeal, Alicia half-reclined against a bolster on Morgan’s bed. He was hand-feeding her bites of trout pottage.

“That nurse.”

“Bethac?”

“Not Bethac.” To be honest, Alicia wasn’t too fond of Bethac either. The old maidservant was always sticking her nose into Morgan’s affairs. But that wasn’t who she meant. “The other one.” She picked at the corner of the coverlet. “The one who was trying to force the infant upon me this morn.”

Morgan frowned. “I’m sure she meant well.”

“I don’t trust her.”

Alicia was almost certain she was the same woman she’d overheard challenging Morgan in the nursery. There was something disturbing about her. She looked as fierce and forceful as her bellowing. But she was also beautiful in a wild and intrepid way.

“Our son seems to like her,” he said.

Morgan was clearly trying to placate her. He lifted a spoonful of pottage to her lips. She wanted to spit it onto the floor. Instead, she gave him a coy smile.

“Infants always like the one who feeds them,” she said, accepting the pottage and dutifully swallowing. But she didn’t intend to be distracted. “Nay, I fear the woman doesn’t know her place. She’s bold and abrasive. Far too free with her words. And there’s a conceit about her that…”

She glanced abruptly at Morgan. Was that a smile glimmering in his eyes? Her breath caught. By the devil, her suspicions were correct. “You,” she breathed, narrowing her eyes perceptively, “you like her.”

Morgan was quick to reply, “O’ course I like her. I wouldn’t let her tend to our son if I didn’t.”

Alicia wasn’t fooled for an instant. There was more to it than that. The circumstances felt all too familiar. The tryst between Godit and Edward was still fresh in her mind.

Maybe things hadn’t progressed that far between Morgan and this maidservant. But too much was at stake for her now. He couldn’t be trusted. No man could be. She’d be damned if she’d let a man betray her again.

Rage bubbled inside her veins. But she dared not let Morgan see it. Gentle persuasion always worked best with him.

She lowered her head until her chin rested on her chest, hiding the livid glimmer in her eyes. When she spoke, it was in a trembling voice, one she hoped he’d mistake for fear, not fury. “Don’t be angry with me, Morgan, but…well…’tis only that she makes a mockery of your command. She defies your orders and doesn’t treat you with the proper respect.” She slid her gaze up slightly to gauge his reaction. “I think, for your own good…and the good of the clan…you should dismiss her.”

His brow clouded at once and his mouth turned down. “I fear that won’t be possible.”

She blinked. “Why not?”

“’Tis…complicated.”

Her jaw tightened. Complicated. What did that mean? “Unfortunately,” he explained, “she’s the only one who can keep the bairn from wailin’ all night long.”

His answer surprised her. “Does he? Wail all night long?”

“Aye. He probably misses his mother,” Morgan said, clearly trying to cajole her into a maternal role.

She refused to take the bait. “Can’t Bethac make him quiet?”

He shook his head. “Nay. Only Jenefer seems to have the gift.”

Alicia clenched her teeth. So the nurse had a name, did she? Jenefer. Alicia preferred to think of her as a nameless, disposable servant, easily replaced.

“But she’ll be gone soon, aye?” she asked. “After all, he won’t be a sniveling infant forever.”

She saw Morgan flinch at her words, and she made a quick correction, giving her head a little shake and resting a hand lightly on his sleeve.

“Forgive me, Morgan. I’m not myself. I’m testy and ill-at-ease. To be honest, I fear my faith has been shaken. Having been away from you for so long, I find myself uncertain of your affections.”

She thought she detected a telling hesitation in his reply.

“Ye’re my wife, Alicia. O’ course ye have my affections.”

“But I fear that…” She stopped herself, then lowered her gaze, murmuring, “Nay, you’ll think me a fool.”

“Never.”

“Just a silly lass.”

“Nay. Just tell me. What is it?”

“I fear…” She bit her lip. “I fear that nurse has designs on you. The way she looks at you…”

“Looks at me?” He seemed sincerely surprised.

“Not that I can blame her. Who wouldn’t wish to be with a man like you?” Before he could respond to her flattery, she tempered it with a pointed remark. “Especially a man with a title and a magnificent holding?”

Just as she’d predicted, doubt slowly formed a furrow in his brow.

“I’m sure ye’re wrong about that,” he said. His eyes, however, betrayed uncertainty.

“And she’s already earned the trust of your infant.” Watering the seeds of his misgiving with the elixir of shame, she amended, “Our infant.”

She allowed herself a secret smile. She was in control again. She had Morgan back under her thumb. Penitent and malleable. Riddled with guilt.

Her blood cooled to a low simmer as she took another bite of the trout pottage. She might not be able to get rid of the troublemaking lass. But knowing Morgan, she could get him to do it himself.

Morgan couldn’t possibly let Jenefer go. Not only because she kept the bairn’s weeping at bay. But because, at the moment, she was his hostage, his leverage against war.

But he couldn’t tell Alicia that. She’d never understand.

He didn’t want to talk about it anymore. So he continued to feed her in silence.

It troubled him to think the attraction between himself and Jenefer was so obvious. Yet in their brief time together in this chamber, even his wife had sensed the connection between the two of them.

Morgan knew, if the clan found out about his indiscretion, none would blame him. Everyone had believed that Alicia was dead, that Morgan was a widower. It wasn’t as if he’d been intentionally disloyal.

He could even forgive himself for falling in love with Jenefer. She’d seemed so devoted to his son, so forthright in her passions, so genuine in her affections.

But now Alicia had sown doubt in his mind. Her words haunted him.

Had he been plied by the warrior maid? Had she only charmed his son to make herself indispensable to Morgan? Had she only seduced Morgan to insinuate herself into his life? Had she only pretended to care for him in order to…

His eyes dimmed. The only thing Jenefer had ever claimed to want—nay, demanded to have—was Creagor. Were all her actions only a clever ploy to win his holding?

His heart caved at the thought.

Mostly because it had almost worked.

He’d been ready to marry her, to share his son with her, to bestow his wealth and land upon her.

And now?

Now his mind was filled with mistrust.

He steeled his jaw.

It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. Whatever had happened between them was in the past. Alicia’s return had sealed all their fates. There was no point in dwelling on the motivations behind anything. It served no purpose.

What he needed to focus on was taking vengeance on the brute who’d hurt his wife.

Alicia took one last bite of the pottage and refused the rest with a dismissive hand. She’d always been a light eater, nothing like…

He shuttered his mind against the thought and set the pottage aside.

“Alicia, sweetheart, I need to get that name from ye,” he said gently.

“Name?”

“The man who did…this…to ye.”

Alicia’s face crumpled. “Can’t it wait but a little while?” she begged. “I haven’t seen you for weeks. I want to spend as much time as possible together.”

She peered at him from under her lashes and ran a speculative fingertip across her collar bone. He knew that look, that gesture. It was Alicia’s way of saying she would be amenable to his advances.

“I’ve returned from the dead,” she said. “Is it not a time for celebration and not rancor?”

The plea in her wide eyes convinced him to defer his revenge again. But he knew better than to imagine Alicia wished to celebrate their reunion now. She would never accede to swiving him by the light of day. She was far too modest for that.

By nightfall, they would make a symbolic renewal of their wedlock, restoring the sanctity of their union. And that was exactly what he needed to forget Jenefer, the fiery temptress who had intruded upon his placid marriage as briefly and powerfully as a bright, destructive spark.