Page 71 of The Highlander's Auctioned Bride
“Woman?” she asked hesitantly. “Dae ye… dae ye suspect Lillian?”
He looked back at her, and something was shared between them in that gaze that made Maisie’s chest constrict. James said nothing, but she could tell they were in agreement.
She looked down as the healer laid a piece of white gauze over her belly.
“Leave that there for a few hours, m’lady, and dinnae get out of this bed at all until the sickness has faded. Nae more talkin’ now. Ye need to rest.”
“I am tired of restin’,” Maisie said stubbornly, but her eyes were already heavy. The sickening rolling of her stomach was abating at least.
She looked at the tankard of water, wanting some more, but James was already leaving the room.
“Where are ye goin?” she asked weakly.
“The council. This ends today!”
James slammed through the council chamber doors. He was greeted with a sea of worried and familiar faces. Every single one of them was now a suspect in his mind.
Despite his suspicions in the early hours of the morning, he was not at all convinced that Marcus was guilty.
It seemed too callous and too cruel to poison Maisie like that in front of the entire clan. How would Marcus have arranged it? Who in James’s staff would have agreed to it?
James cursed inwardly as something else occurred to him.
With a feast of this size, Mrs. Murray would have had to hire help from the village at short notice. Anyone could have come to the castle and worked in the kitchen without being properly scrutinized.
Ye nearly got her killed, ye blitherin’ fool.
“Sit down!” he barked. The entire council chamber creaked and scraped for a short while as all of the men before him took their seats.
Many looked wary, and well they might. Marcus’s gaze was fixed on the table, deep in thought. Could he have had help?
Could Lillian—sweet, mild-mannered Lillian—be this calculating?He hoped not.
James did not take his seat, pulling his chair out of his way and leaning over the table. He glared at them with all the rage he had kept beneath the surface.
It was late now, almost midnight, but no one in this room would be sleeping until he was certain that she was safe.
“None of the men in this room took the threat on me wife seriously, and now here we are. She was within a hair’s breadth of losin’ her life because ye havenae tried to investigate a thing. I had to find the man meself and slit his throat just to find out from his own lips that this is someone close to me.”
He kept himself hunched over the table, using his size and bulk to intimidate everyone closest to him.
Marcus, Bram, and Nathaniel were all watching him from a few seats down, and many of the other clan members were exchanging uneasy looks.
“Ideas!” James spat, waiting to see who might be brave enough to speak.
There was a heavy silence for almost a full minute before he scoffed and stood back.
“So, nae one on this council, the best men of me clan, can think of a reason why she might have been targeted? If I have to start taking heads until ye all start talkin’ dinnae believe that I willnae.”
“That’s hardly necessary, James,” came Marcus’s voice from the other end of the table. “Ye cannae truly believe that any of the men in this room would wish harm on yer bride.”
“None of ye—noneof ye—supported the match. Ye all thought I was mad to choose Maisie, ye most of all, Marcus. We all ken who ye wanted me to pick for me bride.”
Marcus’s face turned puce with rage as he rose to his feet abruptly, his pudgy finger pointing at James in an act of defiant fury.
“Ye truly believe I woulde’erharm the lady of this clan because?—”
“Because ye have always wished her to be Lillian? Yes, I dae. Ye were furious when I chose Maisie over yer niece, and dinnae try to deny it.”
