“I won’t tell ye again,” he said. “If ye can’t be civil to each other in front of my daughter, we’ll leave and we won’t come back.”
* * *
Things were going from bad to worse. Ach, why did Mary have to come to the feast?
Alex felt lower than dirt as he greeted her husband. Now that he was a husband himself, he saw the whole situation quite differently. Mary’s husband was a sniveling ass, but that did not excuse Alex taking his wife to bed. Alex would kill any man who did the same to him. The mere thought of another man’s hands on Glynis sent murder roiling through his veins.
Through seven courses, Mary tried to catch Alex’s eye. Alex steadfastly ignored her and tried his best to converse with Glynis.
“I’m sorry for all the guests tonight,” he said, leaning close to Glynis’s ear.
“Why would ye be sorry?” she said, her back as stiff as a board. “Is it me or your daughter that ye are ashamed to have them meet?”
Alex clenched his jaw to keep from shouting at her.
“Ye know damned well I’m no ashamed of either of ye,” he said, when he could manage to speak in a low voice. “Can ye no meet me halfway and attempt to be pleasant?”
“If ye wanted a pleasant wife, ye should have picked someone else,” she said in a fierce whisper. “I warned ye from the start about my sour disposition.”
With that, Glynis turned her back on him to talk to his mother, who sat on her other side. Ach! His head was already pounding when Mary got up and gave him a broad wink over her shoulder as she left the hall. Damn it, at least he could put a stop to that.
He waited in the vestibule for Mary to come back from the privy. When she came in and saw him, she broke into a wide smile.
“Alex—”
“Quiet!” He grabbed Mary by the wrist and hauled her outside into the dark courtyard. As soon as he had her around the corner of the house where they couldn’t be seen from the door, he jerked her around to face him.
“So ye did miss me,” she said and started to run her palm up his chest.
“What in the hell are ye doing, Mary?” he said, pushing her hand away. “I brought ye out here to tell ye to stop this foolishness before my wife notices.”
“Frankly, your bride doesn’t look as if she’d care one way or the other.”
“She would,” Alex said, though he was beginning to doubt it himself. “She just isn’t as obvious in her attentions as some.”
Mary gave a light laugh. “Indeed.”
“I want ye to go home now and don’t come back,” he said, keeping his voice low.
“Where do ye want to meet, then?” she asked.
“Keep your voice down,” he hissed. “Ye are no understanding me. I’m a married man now, and I’ve no intention of starting another affair with ye—or anyone else.”
“Ye know what they say about good intentions,” Mary said with a smile in her voice.
“I mean it, Mary,” Alex said. “I don’t want to make trouble for ye, but I will if I have to.”
“I was made for trouble.” She laughed and leaned against him.
“I’m warning ye,” he said, pushing her away from him by her shoulders. “Take your husband and go home.”
Alex left her standing alone in the dark and stomped up the steps of the house. God in Heaven, what had he seen in such a woman?
* * *
Glynis was certain everyone in the hall was laughing at her behind their hands. All evening, that woman named Mary had been glancing and winking at Alex. Mary’s husband must be half blind, but there was nothing wrong with Glynis’s eyesight. When Alex and Mary both disappeared, Glynis should have had too much pride to follow them—but she simply could not stay in her seat. She had to know for certain that Alex had truly gone to meet a lover on the second night of their marriage.
When she stepped out into the vestibule and saw neither of them, her chest felt too tight. Though Glynis had feared Alex had left with the woman, she had wanted to be proven wrong. Still, she told herself she must not judge him without actually seeing him with the wretched woman. There were only two places one could go from the vestibule—outside or up the stairs to the bedchambers.
Glynis could not face finding them in a bedchamber, so she slipped out the front door, taking care to not make a sound. As she eased the door closed behind her, she heard a murmur of voices. She followed the sound down the steps to the corner of the house.
Her heart sank as she recognized the low rumble of Alex’s voice. Though he was speaking too low for her to make out his words, Glynis had no trouble hearing the woman.
“Where do ye want to meet, then?” Mary asked.
Nay, this could not be happening. Glynis squeezed her eyes shut and took openmouthed breaths, trying to gain control. Somehow, she had to go back inside without looking as if she’d had her guts sliced open and ripped from her body like a caught fish.
“I was made for trouble” was the last thing Glynis heard. The words rang in her ears as she stumbled blindly to the door.
Now she knew what Alex’s “usual sort” of woman was like—she was the kind who was soft and easy and incited a man’s lust.
A woman made for trouble.
CHAPTER 39
Alex returned to the hall to find his wife’s seat empty.
“Where is Glynis?” he asked his mother.
“She said Sorcha looked tired and took her upstairs,” his mother said. “I told her I’d be happy to take Sorcha home with me, but Glynis wouldn’t hear of it.”
Damn. Damn. Damn.
“Ye can’t leave as well when we have all these guests,” his mother whispered.
“Ye invited them, Mother, so ye can entertain them.”
Alex left without a backward glance and took the stairs two at a time. He expected to find Glynis tucking Sorcha into bed or telling her a story, but the room was black.
“Glynis, I know ye can’t be sleeping yet,” Alex said.
Glynis’s voice came out of the darkness. “Shhh. You’ll wake Sorcha.”
“Then come out and talk to me.”
“I have nothing to say to ye,” Glynis said. “Sorcha is in the bed with me, so ye can make yourself comfortable on the floor.”
“I apologize for last night,” he said in a low voice. “I wanted to make it up to ye tonight.”
“To me and who else?”
“I don’t deserve that,” he said. “I haven’t even had time to do anything I shouldn’t, even if I were inclined—which I’m not.”
“I don’t believe ye,” Glynis said. “And I don’t want to talk about it tonight.”
He tried to make Glynis see sense, but it was like bailing the sea with a creel. Eventually, he tired of talking to himself in the darkness, so he lay down on the cold floor and wrapped his plaid around himself. He was tempted to tell her there were other beds in this house that he wouldn’t be turned out of. But he thought of his parents’ vicious fights and bit his tongue.
Clearly, he wouldn’t be getting his deepest desires fulfilled tonight.
After tossing and turning on the hard floor all night, he awoke abruptly to a room filled with sunlight and sat up. The bed beside him was empty.
So, for the second morning of his marriage, Alex went looking for his wife. As he was crossing the hall, his mother poked her head out from behind the screen.
“Get your father,” she said. “I must speak with the two of ye alone.”
Being trapped alone with his mother and father was the last thing he needed right now. “Later, Mother. Have ye seen Glynis?”
“It’s about her that we need to speak,” she said. “This is important, Alex, so get your father. Now.”
His father was in his bedchamber—alone, for once. A short time later, the three of them were sitting at the small table that was behind the screen in the hall. Alex would rather be boiled in oil than sit with the two of them in a small space, but here he was.