Free Love Wild and Fair by Bertrice Small Page B

Year brought greetings from Glenkirk. Adam shook his head. “He’s not yet found her. It’s as if the wench had disappeared off the face of the earth.” He looked at his wife. “Would ye ever do that to me, love?”
    “Nay,” said Fiona, glancing quickly away.
    Adam looked at her more closely. “My God!” he shouted.
“Ye
know where she is! Ye do! Don’t ye?” The look in his eyes was terrible, and Fiona panicked.
    “She’s in our house in Edinburgh! She made me promise not to tell! I thought she would be home, and safely wed wi him by now!” Then Fiona laughed. “She’s got courage, has Cat! Good for her!”
    “Ye know,” said Adam ominously, “how I’m going to punish you, Fiona, don’t ye?”
    Fiona’s temper snapped. If Patrick could be brought to heel, then so could Adam. It wouldn’t hurt to try. “Ye do, Leslie,” she shouted back at him, “and I’ll spread my legs for the first man that comes through that door! I’ll nae be treated like a naughty child any longer!”
    For a moment they glowered at each other, and then Adam laughed. “I dinna think ye and Cat were friends.”
    “We weren’t, but we are now. We must both contend with Leslie arrogance. Your ass-eared brother called her a ‘thing on which to breed his sons.’ Do ye blame her for fleeing him? I don’t!”
    “I’ve got to tell him, Fiona, else the innocent bairn will be born on the wrong side of the blanket.”
    “I know,” she agreed. “The Glenkirk courier is still here. Send your message back wi him And Adam—tell Patrick to use Cat gently. She does love him, you know, but she wants him to love her for herself and not just for the children she can gie him. He must treat her wi
respect.
This was all his own fault.”
    “I think,” he said teasingly, “that being married to me is good for ye, sweetheart Yer gaining in wisdom.” He ducked as a pillow flew by his head.
    “Write yer letter, Leslie, and come to bed,” she answered him. “Cousin Louise showed me some fascinating pictures today, and I’m dying to see if we can do the same things.” She looked provocatively over her shoulder at him.
    Adam Leslie gazed back at his lovely wife. “I shall be your most willing and eager pupil, madame,” he said, raising a rakish eyebrow.

Chapter 9

    T HE Leslie courier had no difficulty in reaching the French coast from Paris, but once there he was forced to cool his heels. A nasty winter storm was brewing, and no captain was willing to set off across the North Sea. It wasn’t that the fellow minded holing up in the cozy little French inn. He enjoyed the hearty food and excellent wine. But he knew the news he carried was of great importance to the earl. Lord Adam had given him a gold piece, and told him the earl would give him another.
    Finally one windy but sunny morning, the courier stood in the center of the taproom, holding the gold piece high. He announced, “This to the man who gets me safely to Aberdeen! And another from my master, the Earl of Glenkirk, when we get there!”
    The coin was plucked from his hand by a black-bearded man. “If this wind holds, laddie,” he said, “I’ll hae ye there in no time!”
    The courier reached Glenkirk on the morning of February 2. Not only did the earl replace the gold piece he’d been forced to spend, he gave his messenger two more. The seacaptain was rewarded as had been promised.
    Patrick Leslie left Glenkirk on the afternoon of February 2. He stopped at the abbey and asked Cat’s uncle, Abbot Charles Leslie, to accompany him to Edinburgh.
    “We’ll have to ride hard, uncle. Ellen says she’s nae due for at least two more weeks, but ye canna tell wi a first bairn.”
    Charles Leslie nodded, went to his apartments and returned a few minutes later. The monk’s robe was gone. Abbot Charles had become a tall, hard man of forty-five, booted and ready to ride. “TU do better in Edinburgh,” he said, “if I dinna look like a priest in that heretic