“It does not,” she said with a dark scowl. “I don’t know this woman, nor do I care about her, and I don’t want anyone whispering that you do.”
“Coira, if we are to be married, ye best heed me now. I will nae ever allow ye to order me about, and I will always do what I can to help others, bonny lass or nae.”
“Bonny lass!” she gasped, indignation sweeping over her face. “Have your fight,” she snarled, drawing the eyes of the people around them, “and free that whore”—she was raising her voice and his temper—“but you will set her from your home immediately, or I will consider that you are breaking your sacred promise to wed me and be true to me. Then you will have yet another enemy, for my enemies are my father’s enemies,” she threatened.
Callum didn’t doubt that. Though her father had used her in marriage once already and was about to use her again, the man demanded she was treated with respect, though he clearly did not care that she did not want to marry Callum. He suspected that the earl felt that disrespecting his daughter or son was disrespecting him, and it would make him appear weak.
As Callum intended to free Marsaili immediately anyway, and he would never do anything further to put his family and clan in harm’s way, he said, “I will set the lass free because that is what I was planning to do already,naebecause ye are threatening me.”
“I’m going to tell my father of your treatment!” she cried out, then turned and stomped away.
Callum did not even bother to watch her depart as his brother’s fight was starting. She’d likely go to her father, and there’d be trouble to contend with later—or at the very least, apologies to be given—but he’d deal with it then. Right now, the only thing that mattered was freeing Marsaili. Then he would have Brice see her home, or wherever she would be safest. But before that, he had to talk to her. He had to know what had happened, why he’d been told she was dead. It changed nothing, of course, yet somehow it mattered whether it had been her or her father who had sent word of her death. He was a fool either way, for if it had been her father’s doing, it would only make parting with her again that much harder. If it had been her doing, and she had decided those years ago that she did not wish to be with him, then he had cost his father his life and caused his clan years of strife for a woman who had not felt what he had: an attachment so strong and true that he had forsaken his honor and his family for Marsaili’s heart.
