Free His Rebel Bride (Brothers in Arms Book 3) by Shayla Black, Shelley Bradley

with the men.”
    Smiling, he walked away from a pair of identical stunned expressions and left the great hall. Around the corner and down the stairs, he strode.
    No sooner had he begun down the stairs when he saw Maeve.
    She climbed up in the opposite direction, taper in one hand, balancing a book in the other, with wooden spectacles perched upon her small, round-tipped nose. Her lips moved a bit as she read. She appeared not to see him.
    Watching her, Kieran thought she looked learned—something he had never fancied in a woman. It reeked of deep thought and an aversion to action. Aye, she could kiss sweetly, but he could not imagine her romping in the rain nor enjoying a good hunt. She belonged indoors, a book close to her face, mayhap with a hound at her feet.
    He shuddered, for he could not imagine a life so…settled. His boyhood had been anything but, and today that suited him well.
    “Good morn,” he said an instant before she would have collided with him.
    Maeve tore her gaze from the pages before her to his face. When she caught sight of him, she eyed him warily.
    “Good morn,” she replied, then frowned. “I thought you were to spend the day with Brighid.”
    “Aye.”
    Maeve waited, as if expecting more of an answer. Kieran smiled, happy to let her wait. Vexation crossed her lovely features, giving them more color, more expression.
    “And so where is she now?”
    “In the great hall above.”
    “Breaking her fast?” she asked, closing the book she held.
    “Kissing my squire, I presume.”
    Though he but teased her, Kieran couldn’t stop his grin when ire overtook Maeve’s golden gaze.
    “Kissing?”
    More fresh color lit her luminous skin, and for some reason, Kieran wished her remembrances of their kiss, not her anger, had caused such. After all, had that kiss not kept him awake last night, tempting him? Making him wonder if Maeve would be his best choice of a wife, even though he had not spoken with her and all her sisters?
    “Brighid has no need to be kissing anyone,” protested Maeve, “much less some English fool of a squire. Likely he will trifle with her an-and leave her with child—”
    Kieran erupted in laughter. “’Tis unlikely Colm yet knows how to trifle with himself, much less a female.”
    With a wink, he walked past Maeve as she attempted to sputter a retort. It pleased him to render her near speechless, and he whistled all the way outside.
     
    * * * *
     
    Kieran had scarce worked with the last earl’s soldiers for a quarter hour before he decided they were a pitiful lot.
    Standing on the grassy plain in front of Langmore, he looked over the “army” once more. ’Twas an abysmally small group. Out of the two dozen galloglasses , permanently employed soldiers who had stayed since the last earl left, four men looked as if they spent all their days gorging from dawn to dusk—and beyond—another three looked as if a stiff wind would blow them to their arses. Several others, with their grayed hair, showed they were much closer to the grave than the cradle. Fully a dozen had no real knowledge of wielding a broadsword, an ax, or a mace. Who in Hades had trained them? The rest were Irishmen, the kern , only there for the coin, and such showed in their defiant demeanors.
    ’Twould be a long road before he could make warriors out of this motley lot.
    With a disgusted sigh, he turned away. Clearly, he would need to best the men well and often for most to listen or respect his ability.
    He had not the time for this. Taking a wife and getting her with child so he might leave—that should be his focus. Except the wife hunt had not gone well. Jana was too lost in grief to make a suitable bride. Fiona seemed trapped in some nervous silence that made him want to find the nearest cup of ale. Brighid was fun…but terribly young.
    Damnation! He wanted no wife. But Guilford needed him. And now he had no O’Shea sister to consider but Maeve.
    He felt trapped, as if the walls at Langmore