Page 43 of The Highlander Steals a Virgin
He didn’t respond.
The door opened anyway, as he thought it might.
Nina stood in the threshold, her mouth a hard line, a linen apron still tied around her waist. She looked tired. Irritated. Determined.
“She dinnae touch the food,” she said without preamble.
Rhys looked back down at the map, pretending to study the inky curve of a river. “I assumed as much, Nina.”
“Assumed and accepted, did ye?”
He exhaled slowly. “Is that all?”
She tilted her head. “I came to tell ye what I saw this evenin'.”
“And what’s that?”
“The lass barely moved from her bed. And when she did, she was quiet and hollow-eyed like a ghost.”
Rhys didn’t answer.
“Ye left her there, dinnae ye?” Nina continued, voice sharper now. “Last night’s dinner. This mornin’. And again this afternoon.”
“She’s nae a prisoner,” he muttered. “She’s free to walk the keep.”
“But she’s nae welcome in it, and ye ken it well enough as ye have orchestrated and encouraged the inhospitality even yerself.”
He slammed the goblet down hard enough that it sputtered and rolled off the desk, clattering to the floor. “She was getting’ too close! A line had to be drawn.”
Nina stared at him for a long moment, unmoved by his temper. Then she stepped closer, slowly, until she reached the edge of the desk. “She’s nae a wild pony to be broken and tamed.”
Rhys’s jaw clenched.Who does she think she’s talkin’ to? How out of line —
His thoughts were caught in his throat before they could be spoken as Nina continued. “But ye’re treatin’ her like one. Like if ye push just hard enough, she’ll fall into line.”
“She’s dangerous.”
“She is nae dangerous. Ye are scared, me laird. It’s plain.”
Rhys stood, his chair scraping loudly against the floor. “Careful, Nina. I like ye, well enough, but I will have ye sacked ‘fore the morn’.”
But she didn’t flinch. Instead, she picked up a small carved ornament from the corner of the desk, a polished wooden stag that he had whittled himself.
With no hesitation whatsoever, she threw it with all her might and it smashed against the edge of the stone fireplace across the room.
Rhys watched the antler cracked clean off and the legs shatter.
Silence dropped over the room like a blanket.
Rhys stared at the fragments on the hearth.
“Last night, ye destroyed a chair in front of the entire hall because yer men were inhospitable to her. Tonight, ye did far worse than what any of those men did. Should this be me last moment workin’ in yer employ, tell me, me laird, was that ornament more deserving of protection that she is?”
Rhys didn’t speak. Or move.
Nina took a step back, letting her hands fall to her sides.
“I’ll bring her another tray in an hour,” she said gently. “But she willnae eat it. Nae until she believes she has a place here, as a guest in the very least. Alive and well.”
