Free Seduced by a Rogue by Amanda Scott

ladyship was unlikely to visit soon, that chamber might even serve another purpose or person first. He would have to
     consider the notion more thoroughly, to see if it had merit.
    Dismissing Gibby to help set up in the hall for the midday meal, Rob said, “I want to think a bit before we dine, Gib. But
     we’ll go upstairs afterward and take stock of what we might do there.”

    “I told you so,” Fiona said with a grimace the following Thursday morning as she and Mairi aired bedclothes on the hillside
     below Annan House’s gateway. “At least we’re outside, but only because Mam wants to keep us busy whilst she rests.”
    “She is tired,” Mairi said.
    The grassy hill sloped away more or less on all sides of the house. They could see the river below and the strip of narrow
     but dense woodland edging it. Across the river lay western Annandale and hills separating it from Nithsdale.
    The woodland edging the river continued south and then east above the breeze-rippled waters of Solway Firth, sparkling now
     in the sunlight. From the woods upward, freshly tilled fields covered most of the hillside.
    “I vow, Mam
must
be pregnant again,” Fiona said abruptly. “She behaves as if she were. In troth, she has been with child more than she has
     been with
out
child for most of my life. And to what purpose? She has miscarried so many that she does not even seem sad anymore when she
     loses one. But then, before a person can turn around, she declares she is pregnant again and Father hovers over her, fretting
     about her health, just as he has been doing of late.”
    “It is natural that he should concern himself,” Mairi said fairly. Her thoughts shifted abruptly to Robert Maxwell, as had
     happened far too often of late. This time it was to wonder if
he
might fret over a pregnant wife as her father did.
    But, in truth, Phaeline was the fretful one, always talking of how she felt, and Mairi had a notion that a wife of Robert
     Maxwell’s might have no cause to do that.
    It occurred to her only then that she did not
know
he was unwed. Unlike Will Jardine, who lived in Annandale and was Old Jardine’s heir, and would therefore occasion much remark
     when he took a wife, Robert Maxwell was an outsider.
    Mairi had assumed he was unwed from the way he had gazed at her when they met. But he was certainly old enough to have a wife
     and
many
children.
    “Why do you frown?” Fiona asked, startling her from her reverie.
    With a self-deprecating smile, Mairi said, “I just happened to realize that although we can be nearly sure that Will Jardine
     does not yet have a wife, it is a different matter with Robert Maxwell.”
    Fiona’s eyebrows shot upward. “So you were thinking of
him
again, were you? How you can let your thoughts dwell on that man for even a minute when you believe he and his wretched brother
     want to seize our estates, I do not know.”
    “No one can control the way thoughts form, Fee. They just do. For that matter, we don’t know that
Robert
Maxwell wants to seize the estates. I believe he was just warning Father that the sheriff has the power to do so.”
    “Aye, well, I won’t deny that
I
think about Will Jardine because I want to,” Fiona said. “Even if we did not know he is unmarried, one could never doubt
     that he is. He would surely not flirt as he does if he
were
married.”
    “Do you think he would not? Men often flirt who should not, I think, even married men. In troth, if you stop to consider,
     our father’s friends often flirt with us, and nearly every one of them is married.”
    “Aye, but they ken fine that we do not believe they mean it,” Fiona said as she moved to help Mairi shake out their featherbed.
    “Nor
do
they mean it,” Mairi said, wondering at the odd ways of men, even gentlemen and noblemen. “If a married woman flirted the
     way married men do, her husband would soon sort her out.”
    After they had vigorously shaken the featherbed to settle its contents more