Page 44 of Trapped with the Vicious Highlander
Ava could see her grip tightening on the blanket.
“I just put Margaret to bed,” she explained. “And Brod—the Laird said he wanted to see her as well.”
“Och…” Flora trailed off, and Ava could see the mild look of disappointment on her face.
“What is it?” Brodrick asked.
“I intended to give this to Margaret,” Flora replied, extending the blanket towards him. “I thought ye might give it to her for me… but ‘tis all right. I can always wait till tomorrow.”
Ava chuckled. “You can give it to her yourself, you know?”
Flora blinked. “Ye really think so?”
“Yes. You can check if she’s still asleep, otherwise just walk in and hand it to her. I think she trusts you well enough now to know you will not cause her any harm,” Ava reassured, her voice gentle.
“Are ye certain?” Flora asked, hesitation plain on her face.
“You’re her aunt, Flora. Of course, she trusts you. Walk in and hand it to her,” Ava urged.
Flora nodded, took a long and deep breath, bobbed a little curtsy, and made her way to the little girl’s room.
Ava sighed. It did not exactly look like Flora had seen anything. Or maybe she did and was choosing to ignore it? Something about that gnawed at her for some reason, and she wasn’t certain she would be able to ignore it for long.
“Ava—” Brodrick started again.
“Good night, My Laird,” Ava mumbled, cutting him off.
She knew what he was going to say, and she would rather he didn’t.
She stepped towards her room, pushed open the door, and walked in, refusing to spare Brodrick the briefest of glances. She shut the door behind her and walked to her bed, several intense thoughts still bouncing around in her head.
She’d come close today. She’d come really close, and she wouldn’t let it happen again. The resolution echoed loudly in her head as she pulled back the covers and slowly climbed into bed.
It was not going to happen again.
She was going to make certain of it.
* * *
The next morning, Brodrick stood with his men in the common room.
The common room was one of the biggest rooms in the castle. It was also one of the highest. This was where Brodrick held court with his men to discuss war strategies and plans. He had been discussing that with his men for the past few months, and so far their meetings had been rather fruitful.
Usually, his men were calm, gentle, and quiet whenever they listened to him speak, but for some reason, today the common room was in chaos. Men from all corners kept yelling at each other due to the giant difference of opinion they had.
“We cannae let them get away with this.”
“We have to strike harder and strike more. These people are get to learn their lesson.”
“Since they only understand violence, we must give it to them.”
“Enough,” Brodrick whispered, his ears practically unable to stand it anymore. The roars continued from all corners of the room.
“Maybe we can burn more roofs. That should get them talking.”
He’d been in this room for the past thirty minutes, and he had only been able to speak for twenty minutes. His man-at-arms, Darach McEwan, had gone to check on the armory five minutes ago because he had some suspicions.
“The armory is fine, Darach. It’ll be just as ye left it.”
