The Taming of the Wolf Read Free Page A

is of the utmost concern. Watch the roads, will you?”
    ***
     
    Caitrin absently rubbed her shoulder as she tugged the blue Macleod plaid closer about her legs. Even though her gift of sight had allowed her to see many things she shouldn’t, including many intimate scenes, she only hovered at the edge of those images. She never saw what actually went on between men and women behind closed doors. Of that, she was very glad. Until now.
    She wanted more than anything to ask if it was normal for a man in the throes of passion to gnaw on one’s collarbone. But that would be terribly improper. Who in the world could she even ask? All her coven sisters in Scotland were maidens, just as she was. Aside from Elspeth, of course, whom she’d just left behind in Hampshire. Cait sighed deeply.
    “Are ye all right, Miss?” her maid, Jeannie, asked from where she rested on the other side of the coach.
    The question drew Cait from her reverie. But just barely. “What did ye say?” she mumbled as she pulled the collar of her traveling dress over to cover the mark.
    “I asked if ye’re all right,” Jeannie repeated, her eyebrows scrunching together.
    “I’m fine. I canna imagine why ye would think otherwise.” Cait closed her eyes and laid her head back against the leather squabs.
    “I’m worried about ye, is all. First we leave Westfield Hall in the dead of night like thieves. Ye dinna even say good-bye ta Lady Elspeth. And now ye’re so fretful ye canna even sleep.”
    Cait raised her head and stared at her maid. Jeannie was years older than Cait, a decade or so. Perhaps she could ask her. Caitrin shook that thought away as quickly as it arose.
    “Does it have something ta do with that love bite on yer neck?”
    Cait reached to tug her collar over farther. “I doona ken what ye mean,” she gasped.
    “Aye, ye do.” Jeannie smiled and nodded her head, making her dark curls bob up and down. “Ye canna lie ta me, Miss. I’m the one who does yer hair, and I’ve kent ye since ye were a wee bairn. And ye definitely have a little love bite under yer ear, there. It wasna there yesterday.”
    “Under my ear?” Caitrin echoed in surprise, trailing her fingers up her neck. Jeannie wasn’t talking about the bite. Did the blasted man leave another mark?
    “Aye,” the maid confirmed. “Who was he? And what made ye want ta run back ta Edinburgh when ye obviously enjoyed him so much?”
    “Enjoyed?” Caitrin gasped. Then she muttered under her breath, “I wouldna go that far.” But she had enjoyed it, right until the moment he mistook her for a piece of meat.
    “Ye canna lie ta me, Miss. I ken ye as well as yer own papa, maybe even better.” She shook her finger at Caitrin playfully. “So, doona even attempt it.”
    This was much too embarrassing to discuss after all. She’d known it would be.
    “Who was he?” Jeannie persisted.
    “I doona ken who he was,” Caitrin finally admitted.
    “Oh, a handsome stranger?” Jeannie let her voice trail off as her eyebrows arched. “Where did ye meet him?”
    “In the Duke of Blackmoor’s study.” Caitrin finally sighed. “I was lookin’ for a book.”
    “And?” the maid prompted.
    “And he just… kissed me.” Cait shrugged her shoulders, unsure what else to say.
    Jeannie sat back against the squabs and eyed her mistress warily. “Without even bein’ properly introduced? Yer father wouldna approve.”
    “Ye canna tell Papa, Jeannie. Promise me.”
    The maid frowned.
    “Please, Jeannie,” Caitrin pleaded. Her father wouldn’t be at all happy about the situation, and nothing could be done about it now, anyway.
    “Did this man just grab ye, Miss?”
    “Well,” Cait hesitated, suddenly feeling protective of the man, although that was a ludicrous thought. “He grabbed me,” she admitted. “But I dinna mind,” she quickly added. Then she drew in a deep breath and steeled herself before finally asking, “So, the ‘love bites’ as ye call them. They’re what