Chapter 2
“I
only brought you here so that you can appease these bloody brutes that you call countrymen,” Ashbourne seethed as he picked up one item from his trunks, then put it down, only to grab at another.
He was making things much, much more difficult for the maids who were trying to unpack.
Not that he would ever notice such a thing, much less care about it if he did.
“But if you are not focused, Makenna,” he snapped, pivoting and surging into the space right in front of Kenna, hoping to make her startle and squeak. He’d played this trick too many times before, and she just blinked at him.
It was risky, not giving him what he wanted, but giving in was risky in another way.
To her self. To her soul.
“If you are not focused, Makenna,” he repeated, seizing her chin between his thumb and first finger, “then you are as useless to me in this as you are as a wife.”
He glared down at her flat midsection, looking like he wanted to spit. He never went long without reminding her that she had disappointed him with her continued failure to produce an heir for him.
“I will focus, my lord,” she said, feeling the Scots try to creep back into her accent. She’d gotten good at hiding it in London—not good enough that the ladies of the ton ever let her forget that she didn’t truly belong, but enough that it didn’t infuriate Ashbourne on a daily basis.
But ever since she’d come north again, ever since the voices around her had started sounding like home, like childhood… she’d been slipping. Her mask had been slipping.
“You had better,” he returned, already facing away from her. Just like that, she was dismissed. “Leave, now.”
This was one order that he didn’t have to give twice. She turned and left, wishing that her own bedchamber was more than one room away.
Her maid, Anna, was just finishing unpacking Kenna’s trunks. She looked up, worry on her face, when Kenna came in.
“Is everything all right, my lady?” she asked quietly, as though they might be overheard.
Kenna supposed that wasn’t ridiculous. She never felt truly safe in her husband’s London house, where Anna was the only member of the staff she trusted. She wouldn’t put it past Ashbourne to spy on her, even if only for the perverse pleasure of knowing how truly she was under his thumb.
“Everything is fine,” Kenna said, pulling off her travel-worn gloves and inspecting the bruises that bloomed on her wrists.
They were two days old, a relic of when Ashbourne had heard her saying ye and not you to a stableboy at a coaching inn.
He’d yanked her back to their carriage by the wrists, leaving a ring of marks.
“You might be some Highland whore sold to me for an alliance,” he’d shouted at her when they were back on the road, “but that doesn’t mean you will be allowed to comport yourself as such. Speak properly, or I will find a way to ensure that you cannot speak at all.”
Kenna wasn’t certain if he’d been threatening to kill her, but he threatened that all the time, and it had never come to pass, so she had just said all the things she was supposed to say: “Yes, my lord; of course you are right, my lord,” until he’d calmed down.
It was powerfully annoying that he’d grabbed her wrists this time, though.
She would have to be careful when she selected her gowns and gloves for the next several days if she wanted to keep the marks hidden.
Usually, Ashbourne was better about keeping her bruises in places that others couldn’t see.
Anna glanced down at the bruises, a grim set to her mouth, but she didn’t say anything. There wasn’t anything to say.
“The green frock, then,” she said. “The one with the sleeves.”
“Yes,” Kenna said. “Thank you, Anna.”
The maid hummed, a not quite satisfied sound. Kenna understood. She never felt quite satisfied, either, not even on her very best days, which, of course, were the ones when Ashbourne was elsewhere.
Kenna kept thinking about the guard as Anna combed and coiffed her hair, putting it up into a lavish updo that Kenna knew would look out of place in a Highland castle.
It didn’t matter, of course; Ashbourne would always want her looking like she was going to court with the king rather than have her fit in.
It was how he showed his wealth and prestige. She was no more than a little doll.
It would have driven her husband simply mad, the way that guard had mistaken Kenna for an attendant. A servant?
She didn’t know for sure, but it had been… almost flattering, that quick moment of mistaken identity. It had been a second in which she could pretend that she was someone else.
And there was something about his eyes.
“What do you think, my lady?” Anna asked as she fitted the final hairpin.
Kenna forced her eyes to focus on the looking glass, though she frankly didn’t care very much at all what she looked like.
“It’s lovely,” she said. “You have outdone yourself, as always.”
Anna patted Kenna’s shoulder in a sisterly sort of way that made Kenna’s heart ache for the sisters she hadn’t seen in years now.
God, coming back to Scotland was making her downright sentimental. It was a dangerous thing. She couldn’t afford to let her feelings get the best of her. She couldn’t afford to feel, not if she planned to make it through this trip with her soul intact.
When she returned to the corridor, she was forced to stand and wait for several long minutes before her husband emerged from his room. She didn’t dare complain, though he would have been blazingly furious if he’d been asked to wait for her for even a handful of seconds.
“Hm, satisfactory,” he said, looking over her appearance. “Proper silk, not any of this heathenish nonsense the women wear around here.”
There was a guard standing at the end of the hallway; he stiffened ever so slightly at the insult to his people. Kenna didn’t even dare catch his eye in sympathy.
“Now,” Ashbourne said, grabbing her arm none too gently. This was the peril of sleeves; he always took them as an invitation to manhandle her without fearing leaving marks.
“Tonight, at dinner, you will call me Edmund three times. Once should be a personal remark, a compliment about my dress or some such. Once should be to comment upon my estates. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that this comment should be approving.
The last one should be a question. Not about anything related to business; women have no head for such things, and you will only make me look stupid.
But you can ask how I like the pudding, perhaps.
Just don’t interrupt. Women should be domestic, but they should know when to keep their mouths shut. ”
“Yes, my lord,” Kenna said.
They’d done things like this before at countless other dinners designed for Ashbourne to make himself look more important. She was, of course, not permitted to address him by his given name unless specifically directed to do so.
“The rest of the evening, you will use my title when speaking to or about me,” he instructed.
“This will show that you possess both tender sensibilities and the appropriate respect for a man of my rank. If these clansmen—”He said the word like it tasted disgusting—“See how I have elevated you with my regard, perhaps they will understand that appropriate respect and deference will give them the same opportunity.”
Sometimes, Kenna thought back to the games that the men of MacBrae Keep would play; games where, every time this event or that one occurred, they would take a drink.
She wondered how quickly she would drink herself to death if she imbibed every time her husband said “appropriate respect.” She wouldn’t count on making it longer than a week.
“Of course, my lord,” she murmured.
All this obedience stung at her pride, but most of that had been ground to dust long ago. Now, her only scheme was survival. She just had to make it through today. Tomorrow, she would do that again. And again, and again.
She feared, sometimes, that one day she would wake up without the determination to get through the hours. She couldn’t think of a plan for what to do if that day ever arrived.
Laird Callahan awaited them in the entryway, flanked by the same set of guards as before, now wearing dinner clothes instead of their military garb. The Laird wore a small smile, and he offered Ashbourne a bow as they approached.
“Lord Ashbourne, Lady Ashbourne,” he said. His voice was polite, but not warm. “I hope you have rested and feel restored enough to dine with us. My lord, if it pleases you, I would love your advice on the wine for this evening.”
Kenna had to give it to Callahan—it had taken her weeks to figure out how susceptible her husband was to flattery.
The Laird had figured it out in no more than a quarter hour’s acquaintance.
In her defense, she’d been just eighteen years old, in a new country, and utterly terrified, so she had been at a bit of a disadvantage.
Ashbourne smiled smugly.
“Of course I would be most pleased to offer my expertise,” he said as if bestowing a grand favor.
“As I am sure you know, we get only the best in London, not like these remote outposts, where you must rely on secondary shipping routes. But we shall see what is the best we can do, given the limitations with which we find ourselves.”
It took all of Kenna’s years of practice not to react to this particular bit of rudeness, but she knew that the consequences if she failed would be dire.
“Much appreciated,” Laird Callahan said, without so much as a note of irony in his voice.
Kenna wondered if he’d had reason to learn to hide himself, too.
“Makenna, come,” Ashbourne said, snapping his fingers at her like she was a dog. She pressed her tongue against her teeth until it hurt, but she was preparing to cross to his side—because, God help her, maybe she was like a dog, one that had been kicked too many times—when Callahan interrupted.