He wondered what the Storwick woman was doing in the kitchen. Probably scheming to poison him.
‘Well, I’ve saddled myself with the woman. And if they don’t know I hold her, it’s for naught. Would you go to Carwell Castle to tell him?’
‘You’ll not go?’
He shook his head. He had not spoken to the man since the Storwick raid. Nor to his sister Bessie. He was not ready to start now. ‘Not the time to leave the tower undefended.’
Johnnie eyed him for a moment. ‘We could take the girl with us. Give her to Carwell for keeping. She’ll be surrounded by a moat and out of your hands.’
‘And held beside her father. Together, the two of them would make an irresistible target.’ Based on Stella’s questions, they did not know where Hobbes Storwick was held. That could not last for ever. ‘If I hold her here, she protects our tower and makes them think before they ride to Carwell Castle.’
To protect the tower. No other reason he was keeping the woman. In truth, he’d as soon be rid of her and her haughty air.
Johnnie rose. ‘We’ll leave tomorrow. Cate will be happy to see Bessie again.’ He paused, waiting.
Rob averted his eyes.
‘I’ll tell her,’ his brother said, finally, ‘that you asked of her.’
‘Tell her I asked for her recipe for lamb stew.’
Family was all. Protecting it, not loving it.
Love made you weak.
The thought of Bessie’s stew reminded him that the Storwick woman was in the kitchen and he crossed the courtyard to see how she fared. Drizzle had dissolved yesterday’s sun, along with his good mood, and he began to doubt that today’s meal would be any more edible than yesterday’s.
At the kitchen door, he stopped.
The room—pots, hearth and floor—was white as if a snowstorm had hit.
And in the midst of it, the Storwick woman clutched an empty sack of flour.
Both women turned to him.
‘Take her away,’ Beggy shrieked, when she saw him. ‘I’d rather cook alone.’
Stella blinked. Rapidly.
Mercy. He had no patience for crying females.
He stepped into the room, sending a puff of flour over his boot. ‘What’s going on here?’
‘First, she let the stew burn. Now, she’s spilled half our flour!’ Beggy’s voice danced on the edge of a scream. ‘Get her out of here.’
He took Stella’s arm, but she looked back at Beggy. ‘I should help you clean …’
‘No! Don’t help,’ the girl said. ‘Or there’ll be nothing left to eat.’
He pulled Stella out of the kitchen and into the courtyard. ‘Did you plan to starve us all?’
‘I do not cook at home.’
He stared. All women cooked. Didn’t they? ‘You were the one who complained of the food!’ Criticising the lack of foolish luxuries, of no importance to anyone except to her. ‘And you don’t even cook?’
‘I didn’t think it would be so hard.’
‘For most women, it isn’t.’
‘Then why don’t you marry a woman who can cook?’
Her words hit as hard as horse’s hooves on rock. ‘And why don’t you marry a husband who’ll keep you from roaming the Borders alone?’
She licked her lips, crossed her arms, lifted her chin, all as if to fill the space where there should have been words. But flour still clung to her sleeves and her apron and her shoes and he couldn’t help but think she looked ridiculous instead of haughty.
‘I will,’ she said, finally. ‘Soon. Someone worthy. Special.’
Special. She said the word as if to insult him. ‘Who is special enough for you?’ The words curdled on his tongue. Why even ask? He didn’t care. Not really.
‘No one you would know. No one the least bit like you.’ She turned away, as if she could choose to end the conversation. ‘And no one who would interest you.’
Suddenly he wanted to know who would possess this infuriating woman. ‘He interests me if he will ride to rescue you. Or if he won’t ride as long as I keep you.’
She looked back at him, eyes wide, as if both ideas were new to her. He was not skilled with women, but this one was hiding something.
‘Then you will have to wonder at it, won’t you?’
And he did wonder. She was more than of an age to marry and more than passable to look on. Why was she not yet wed?
And as he looked at her, trailing white dust from her apron, he was also wondering why he had ever thought taking Stella Storwick was a good idea.
Stella kept her fists tight and her chin high, but her smile stiffened.
He would have to wonder because there was no one. Not yet.
There would be. Some day. It was hard to find the person good enough to join with a child saved by God.
‘Well,’ he said, a touch of pride in his voice, ‘the woman who marries a head man must be special, too.’
Relieved at the shift from her imaginary husband to his imaginary wife, she rolled her eyes heavenwards. ‘The woman who marries you will have to have very special patience.’
‘The man who marries you will have to be a saint.’
A saint. Yes. That’s exactly the kind of man her parents were looking for.
Her stomach growled, loud enough that Rob looked down. ‘Next time, eat what’s put before you.’
‘Next time, put something before me I can eat.’ And dinner would be worse, now that she had singed the stew.
‘Brunsons don’t whine about food.’ He took her arm and pushed her ahead of him. ‘I should not have let you out at all.’
She looked towards the gate. He must not lock her in the tower again.
‘There ought to be salmon now,’ she said, dragging her feet. Liddel Water was just beyond the gate. Air without walls, a chance to explore, even to escape …
He had retreated to silence and did not glance at her.
She tried again. ‘Are you not a fishing man, then?’
Now he looked insulted.
‘Ah,
