Page 50 of Auctioned to the Cruel Highlander
At least, with her being busy with her duties, she would have some kind of structure, and he wouldn’t have time to let himself wonder if the walls he had built could perhaps be allowed to tumble down.
The next day proved how badly that logic failed.
Ciaran came upon the lesson by accident. At least that was what he told himself when he passed the half-open door and stopped at the sound of the housekeeper’s patient voice repeating the same instruction for what sounded like the third time.
He looked inside.
Ava sat at a small table by the window with an embroidery hoop in her lap and a look of intense determination on her face that would have been more convincing if the cloth in her hands had not already been so thoroughly mistreated.
What in God’s name?
Thread had gone where thread had no business going, and the stitches wandered. Whatever shape the housekeeper had first intended now resembled nothing that looked like anything.
Good God.
He decided that whatever was in Ava’s hands deserved nothing more than a merciful flame at the end of the day.
The housekeeper, to her credit, remained calm.
“Nay, me Lady,” she said, leaning closer. “Ye must keep the spacing even.”
“I am trying.”
“I can see that.”
Ava looked down at the cloth with open suspicion, as though it had betrayed her. “It looked much simpler when ye did it.”
“That is because I have been doing it forfortyyears.”
“Oh well,” Ava groaned, her voice laced with despair. “That does seem an unfair advantage.”
For a minute, there was just silence. Then she and the housekeeper burst into loud laughter that seemed to almost roll through the passageways.
Ciaran stayed where he was, one hand still resting against the doorframe. He should have moved on. The lesson was none of his business. He had wanted her introduced to the household and its expectations. The housekeeper was doing exactly that. There was no reason for him to linger there.
Yet he did.
Because the scene was funny.
Ava was plainly terrible at embroidery, but she was terrible in such a determined way that amusement came before judgment. She was trying, failing, and trying again with the same look she wore when arguing a point she refused to surrender.
The housekeeper reached over and corrected the angle of her hand. “There. Gently.”
Ava obeyed. The next stitch went in crooked anyway.
The housekeeper closed her eyes for one brief second.
“I saw that,” Ava drawled.
“I made nay sound, me Lady.”
“Well, yer face did, Mrs. Patmore.”
Ciaran bit his lip to stifle a laugh, because if he did not, he would likely reveal his presence.
He had expected something useful from this. If Ava sat with the staff, learned about stores, linens, keys, accounts, and the duties expected of a laird’s wife, then perhaps some steadier shape would settle over her place in the castle.
Instead, he found this.
