Chapter 6
When the laird’s grandson walked back into the hall, everyone was standing around just as he had left them, whispering to one another in hushed voices.
“Grandfaither, I have just come from the kitchens. No one is to leave this hall. The scrivener was poisoned.”
Then he went to stand next to Ada. His hulking presence made her feel safer at once. It had been very awkward standing in the hall with mostly everyone shooting mistrustful glances at her.
A great roar rose up from those in the hall, which was in complete contrast to the quiet murmurs that had gone before.
They were right! It was poison! And there was no longer any need for them to hide their suspicions!
Ada needed no help in being told what they were saying about her.
Without being aware of it, she shifted closer to Calvin.
“Have ye forgiven me for kickin’ ye out o’ the prison cell?” his deep voice drawled softly so that no one else could hear.
Ada pulled away from him at once.
“What would ye have me do?” she hissed. “One moment ye’re draggin’ me down there, an’ the next moment ye’re kickin’ me out!”
“Are ye still mad? Because from what Master Wilson told me, ye’d do well to cultivate me friendship,” the tall man continued to speak in his lazy, teasing way. “Especially with half the Castle thinkin’ ye’re a witch. Or was it a changeling? There are so many fantasy creatures ye might be, Ada.”
She darted a look up at him and then wished she had not. He was so handsome, it was distracting.
“I am an ordinary woman! An’ it was no’ kind o’ ye to send me away at the physician’s bidding. I ken ye wanted to scandalize about me behind me back!”
He shook his head. “Ye are the sweetest liar I have ever met.”
Ada gasped. “What are ye sayin’, Calvin!? Never tell me that ye believe the rumors folks whisper about me behind their hands.”
She watched anxiously as a smile came to his face.
“Nay, lass. Dinnae fash now. But I stand by what I said, for no one in their right mind would call ye an ordinary woman.”
A warm flush spread over her, starting at her stomach and flowing outward. The laird’s grandson had his own particular kind of charm, and no amount of frustration could deny that fact.
Ada hung her head down. “What are we waitin’ for?”
She wanted to know what was causing the delay, but before he could answer her, the doors opened and a troop of soldiers marched in.
“Stand against the walls,” Lachlan MacNair shouted out, stepping away from her so he might watch the men carry out his orders.
“All o’ ye are to submit to being searched!
Even me grandfaither.” He stopped to give a wink to Laird Calvin, who nodded in agreement.
“So no one can say they were no’ treated fairly or denied the dignity afforded to their status! ”
“Who will search the womenfolk, Lachlan?” Cousin Morag simpered from one side of the hall. “Because I cannae submit to havin’ a common soldier violate me maidenly virtue. I’m sure ye will understand.”
Ada could see that the thought of having the strapping man with the dark red hair run his fingers through her undergarments had taken Morag’s mind off the tragedy of the poisoning for now.
“That’s fine, Cousin,” Ada heard him say, but from the way he said it, she was instantly suspicious, which was confirmed almost at once when he turned around and grinned, his blue-green eyes twinkling with unholy amusement.
“I’ll just search Apprentice Ada here, an’ then she can set about checking the clothes an’ pockets on all o’ the women. ”
Ada saw many of the women’s mouths open in protest, and only then did she realize how much public sentiment had turned against her in such a short time. They did not want her feeling their pockets because they were already half-convinced she had poisoned the clerk!
This made her submit to Calvin’s suggestion more readily.
“Where do ye want to do it?” she asked him, not daring to look up into his eyes.
He bent forward slightly so he could murmur into her ear so no one else could hear, “How about we go into the alcove under the stairs?”
He stepped aside, allowing her to go before him.
The sentries on either side of the doors moved out of her way when they saw who her companion was.
The alcove under the stairs was dark and private, becoming even gloomier when he drew the drape over the entrance and closed it behind him.
It was a cramped space full of broken old stools and candelabra still stuck with dusty candle stubs, all waiting for refurbishment.
“Where d’ye want to start?” Ada asked politely, hoping the breathless repressed excitement in her voice was not discernible.
She wanted to get this over and done with, but she also wanted something else to happen, although she was not sure what.
He did not answer but moved so close that she had to tilt her neck back slightly to keep looking at him.
She noticed he had put one hand on the underside of the staircase tread to stop his head from brushing against it.
“Don’ stand there in silence, Calvin!” Ada stamped her foot. “My innocence is important to me! Hurry up.”
He was so close she could feel his warm breath as he replied, “If I dinnae ken ye better, Ada, I would think ye were impatient for me hands to start wanderin’ all over ye…”
All she could do was bite down on her lower lip to stop herself from snapping back a cheeky retort. He seemed to sense she was close to the end of her tolerance.
“Very well. Remove yer stays, kirtle, an’ that roll ye womenfolk keep tied around yer waist for some reason. It’ll be easier to search ye if ye’re standin’ in yer shift.”
Ada gasped. He was asking her to strip naked, but for the thin shift gown she wore as a shirt under her stays. It was unconscionable!
She stepped back, saying, “Give me some space that I might untie this an’ that, Calvin, you…”
She muttered a few insults at him under her breath, but all this did was make him laugh gruffly and say, “Och lass, ye must try a dash o’ sugar with all that vinegar ye have inside ye,” which had the effect of making her fall silent.
He watched keenly as she loosened her stay laces.
After she lifted the stomacher and backstay over her head, Ada handed it to him without a word.
When the man she liked to call Calvin began feeling every inch of the stays and laces to check for hidden pockets or linings, Ada began to realize how deadly serious the events that had happened at dinner were.
She tucked her hands under her armpits, watching him as his fingers probed the garment carefully.
He saw her concerned face and gave her a reassuring smile.
“Losh, Ada, don’ take a pet. ’Tis I who should be apologizin’ to ye for dragging ye into this mess. Even now ye would be back safe at yer home if I had nae invited ye to join me.”
His words put some courage into her. She was about to thank him, but he interrupted.
“Now it’s time for the kirtle.”
She untied her kirtle band and stepped out of the woolen skirt before handing it to him.
Again, he searched the material’s folds, a look of concentration on his face.
Next came the petticoat. Once more the search revealed nothing.
Ada was standing in her thin shift dress with woolen stockings tied over her knees and leather short boots.
Thank goodness it’s summer! This shift dress could nae keep a soul warm; it's so transparent. An’ if he pulls back that drape, the light will reveal my body underneath, of that I have nay doubt!
And yet, despite the heat, Ada felt her body responding to some subtle changes in the atmosphere. She was not sure what they were or why it was happening. Her nipples drew up into tight peaks as he looked down at her.
“As ye can see, I am hiding naught,” she tried to say in a light tone, “but I’ll need to sit down if I am to take off me boots.”
He looked around and found an old stool. Dragging it over to her, he said, “It has a wee crack on the seat but no’ enough for it to be unable to hold yer weight.”
Ada sat down and lifted her foot, but he was before her.
Bending down on the flagstones, he put her foot up on his knee and began to untie her boot.
It was such a sublimely gallant action that Ada could hardly speak.
Of course, she had had suitors kneeling down before her to ask for her hand in marriage, but that had happened so many times since she had become a woman that Ada no longer paid any heed to it.
Maybe that was because none of her suitors had been so physically blessed.
She watched, fascinated, at his dark head bent over her foot as he eased her toes out of the boot’s opening.
“I-I promise ye, I have naught hidden in between me toes, Calvin.”
She could hardly get the words out, her heart was pounding in her chest so hard.
He did not reply. He did look at her, however, and the expression in his eyes almost made her moan out loud with desire.
The firm clasp he had on her ankle did not lessen as he moved his other hand over her stocking up to her knee.
“An’ what about yer stockings, Ada? What d’ye have hidden under there?
” he growled, lifting her foot up from the ground as his fingers slid up her leg.
As if she were in a dream, Ada made no complaint as he pulled her garter undone and hooked his finger in the top of her stocking.
Slowly, oh so very slowly, he pulled the stocking off her leg, leaving the soft pale skin beneath exposed.
This time, there was no pretense of checking for secret stashes of poison inside the item.
Calvin let it drop to the floor, no longer interested in it. All of his attention was on her.
“Before I remove the other one”—his deep voice telling her what he was about to do made Ada tilt around on her seat as the excitement and anticipation built up inside her—“there is something I need to ken, sweet lass.”
If she thought his interrogation of her was going to continue, Ada was wrong. He brought her foot up to his mouth and kissed the arch on the sole.
“D’ye enjoy the sensation o’ this?”
A heavy fullness flooded between her thighs as his mouth moved up her foot to her ankle.
Ada had never before looked at her body as something that could bring her such ecstatic pleasure, but here she was now, writhing on the little wooden stool as the laird’s grandson’s mouth moved up the inside of her leg.
The words “stop” and “no” never entered Ada’s head.
Who on earth would want such a wonderful feeling to stop?
His hands moved in the most sensual way, following the pathway his mouth was creating.
When his fingers brushed the inside of her thighs, close to her womanly parts, Ada instinctually opened her legs slightly wider.
In a flash, the sweetest moment of her life was over.
His hands slid down and away, and he stood up.
“Come, we are done here—for now. We still have to clear yer name before we can take pleasure in one another’s company.”
He held out his hand toward her to help her stand up.
When she put a trembling hand into his own, he pulled her up abruptly, crushing her to his chest. Ada was flustered and a little shy.
His touch had such a strange effect on her.
And when he lowered his mouth down to brush a light kiss over her lips, Ada felt her body respond to him as it had never done with another man before.
This was so much more than allowing an ardent swain to plant a chaste kiss on the palm of her hand; it was more intense than anything that had come before.
She felt helpless and powerful at the same time, and she also did not want what he was doing to her to stop.
When he released her from his hard embrace, Ada knew the way his mouth had probed her inner secrets was how married couples comported themselves, and suddenly she began to see the appeal of marriage.
“I’ve been wantin’ to do that since I first saw ye, lass,” the laird’s grandson told her, a piece of information that made Ada shiver as she imagined what else he might want to do to her. “But we have a long road ahead o’ us until we can take liberties with one another again.”
“Why is that?” she wanted to know.
He frowned. “Because there is a murderer somewhere out there in the Castle, an’ I must catch him.”