“Which is just ridiculous,” Dwyn muttered to herself as she slid into the garderobe and closed the door. She hadn’t even conqueredGeordie. He was the one who had ended both embraces she’d enjoyed with him. But until he had, she’d felt glorious, Dwyn admittedon a sigh.
Chapter 5
“It looks as though I have a bit o’ a wait,” Geordie said dryly as he and Aulay entered the great hall and he spied the peoplelined up by the garderobe doors.
“Aye. Everyone wants to use them ere they sleep,” Aulay commented, and then said, “I doubt there is a lineup fer the one abovestairs though. Use that one.”
“Ye got it finished?” he asked with surprise. Jetta had been pestering Aulay to install a garderobe above stairs for weeksbefore Geordie had left to help Conran and Evina at MacLeod. And his brother had finally agreed just before he rode out. Butit was a large undertaking. They’d had to wall off the end of the hall just past the last of the bedroom doors to make a largegarderobe, then build the stone shafts that would carry the waste away to the moat below, which had been the more difficultpart of the endeavor.
“Aye, we finished just in time fer the arrival o’ our guests,” Aulay said dryly. “Which, as it turns out, was why she wantedthem.”
Geordie thought Jetta was clever to have thought of it. From what he’d seen last night when he’d arrived and first enteredthe keep, there were so many extra servants and soldiers presently here that everyone had been forced to sleep on their sidesbelly to back, and even then there had been little if any space between the sleepers. There certainly hadn’t been the customarypath left to the stairs, and from there to the garderobes and kitchens. Nodding, he said, “I’ll use the upper one, then.”
“Do ye see me wife?” Aulay asked before he could move away.
Geordie glanced over the people in the hall. There was no one at the trestle tables. In fact, those had been taken down andthe pieces were even now being carted over to lean against the wall.
“Nay,” he said finally. “But I do no’ see any o’ the would-be brides or their families here either. They must have all retiredfer the night.”
“Aye,” Aulay said, and walked with him to the stairs, adding, “A messenger arrived today. Yer brothers should be back theday after tomorrow.”
Geordie arched an eyebrow at that as they started up the steps. “Why bother sending a messenger if they would be practicallyon his heels?”
“I gather the man was sent several days ago, but ran into trouble on the way. He was fine,” Aulay added before Geordie couldask. “But his horse was killed and he had to walk quite a way ere meeting up with a slow-moving merchant who was kind enoughto allow him to ride on his wagon with him. I loaned him a horse for the return journey.”
“Rory was attending the labor o’ Lady Ferguson, was he no’?” Geordie asked.
“Aye.”
“Well, then, I hope ye kissed yer horse fare-thee-well ere ye sent it off,” he said dryly. “Ye ken those bastards’ll justkeep it.”
Aulay shook his head. “They’ll no’ start a war with us o’er a horse. He’ll return it.”
“Oh, aye. We have influence and eight armies at our back,” Geordie said with a shake of the head.
“Exactly,” Aulay said with a grin, and opened his mouth to say something else, but paused abruptly as a cry of pain reachedthem from the upper floor.
They were only a couple of steps from the landing, but both men hurried up them and looked along the hall to see what hadcaused that sound. Geordie’s eyes widened, his heart slamming into his chest, when he saw Dwyn on the floor near the garderobe.Even as he recognized the spray of golden hair around her, she planted her hands on the floor and pushed her upper body halfwayup and then twisted her head to peer back toward her feet, her long hair falling to curtain her breasts as they bulged fromher top.
“Dwyn.” Rushing forward, Geordie started to kneel next to her and then paused when he saw the broken glass littering the flooraround her and noted the bloody cuts on her bare feet. Then he bent to scoop her up, asking, “Did ye drop a goblet, lass?”
“Nay. I just came out o’ the garderobe and stepped on it,” she said on a sigh, and he couldn’t help noticing that her drawingthe breath in and then pushing it out had her breasts creeping upward out of her gown again. He was beginning to love hergowns, Geordie acknowledged.
“Ye stepped on an unbroken goblet and it shattered?” Aulay asked as he reached them.
“Oh, nay. It was already broken and all over the floor when I came out,” she explained quickly. “I meant I just stepped onthe broken pieces. They were no’ there when I went into the garderobe,” she added with a frown, glancing down at the glassstrewn across the floor. “Someone must have broken it while I was in there. No doubt they went to fetch a maid to help cleanit up.”
Aulay grunted at that and moved to Geordie’s side to lift Dwyn’s feet and examine them.
“I am sure they are fine, m’laird,” Dwyn murmured with embarrassment. “And ’tis me own fault anyway. I should have put meslippers back on ere I left our room.”
“There should no’ be glass all o’er the floor either,” Aulay said grimly, and then let her feet go and glanced at Geordie.“Bring her to our room. Jetta will want to get the glass out and see her bandaged.”
“Oh, no!” Dwyn cried with alarm. “Just take me to me room and me sisters can tend it.”
“Nay,” Aulay said abruptly, and then added, “Jetta has been learning from Rory. She will insist on seeing to them herself,and if we take ye to yer room, she’ll just go
