Margo Maguire - Bride Of The Isle

Adam could not recall seeing anything quite as grand as Cristiane MacDhiubh

enjoying her first sunrise on Bitterlee. Her eyes were wide, framed by gold-tipped lashes. Her lips were full and moist, and entirely too alluring.

His heart began to pound. The rushing surf was naught compared to the roaring in his own ears.

In the growing light he saw that she was covered from neck to toe by a thin linen kirtle, yet her enticing form would never be hidden from him again, no matter how well covered it might be. Burned into his memory was the way she’d looked in the firelight the morning he’d seen her undressed.

’Twould take only the slightest movement of his hand to pull her close, a trifling tip of his head to bring his lips into contact with hers.

And every fiber of his being demanded that he do so…!

Acclaim for Margo Maguire’s latest titles

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—Rendezvous

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“Packed with action…fast, humorous, and familiar…THE BRIDE OF WINDERMERE will fit into your weekend just right.”

—Romantic Times

#607 HER DEAREST SIN

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Bride of the Isle

Margo Maguire

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Available from Harlequin Historicals and

MARGO MAGUIRE

The Bride of Windermere #453

Dryden’s Bride #529

Celtic Bride #572

His Lady Fair #596

Bride of the Isle #609

This book is dedicated to Amy Ho, enthusiastic backpacker, avid reader, daring volunteer and student extraordinaire. May all your dreams and wishes come true.

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Epilogue

Isle of Bitterlee, in the North Sea

Autumn, 1299

“Nay, Penyngton,” said Adam Sutton as he restlessly paced the length of the tower room. “I’ll not marry again. And certainly not a Scot.”

“But, my lord,” Sir Charles Penyngton protested. He had license to speak to his lord in this manner, only because of his long term as seneschal here at Bitterlee. “You are still a young man. Merely one and thirty. And you have no heir. As Earl of Bitterlee, ’tis your duty to provide…”

Distractedly, Adam stopped at one of the long arrow loops in the wall of his solar and gazed out at the sea beyond. Bitterlee was a bleak, isolated place. According to legend, it had been named the “Isle of Bitter Life” by one of his ancient ancestors after his wife had ended her life here. ’Twas said that the name had changed over the years—been corrupted—to Bitterlee.

“This Scotswoman is perfect,” Charles said. “Cristiane of St. Oln. She is accustomed to a harsh climate such as ours, and is said to be a hearty lass.”

“Unlike Rosamund,” Adam said starkly. He knew what Charles and the others assumed. That he still mourned the death of his wife, Rosamund. And that was true, to a point.

What they did not understand was that he had never cared for Rosamund the way he should have, nor did he mourn her loss. Oh, true enough, he mourned her death, as he would have mourned anyone in his household.

But Rosamund had never been part of his heart or his being. Adam did not care to think how he would feel if she had been more to him than she was.

Even now he did not understand how Rosamund’s father could have given her to him in marriage. Surely the man had known Bitterlee’s characteristics, its isolation, its harsh winters…its fierce beauty. Rosamund had been a delicate young lady who should have married a southern lord. She’d have fared so much better wed to a man with connections in London, a man with aspirations at court.

Instead, she’d come to this godforsaken isle. And languished here for nearly five years. She had despised it.

“My lord,” Charles began again, but his words were cut off by a spate of coughing. When Adam would have seen to him, the seneschal waved him off, insisting he needed no help. “There are other considerations,” he said, once he’d caught his breath. “Your daughter, my lord…she is in need of…”

Adam frowned and speared Charles with his steely gray gaze.

“Er…that is, Margaret needs…I mean to say Lady Margaret does not seem to—to adjust, my lord.”

Adam had to admit that much was true. Though everyone at Bitterlee had kept secret Rosamund’s cause of death, Margaret was clearly traumatized by the loss of her mother. The child was a wraith. She looked nothing at all like a Sutton, and was as frail and wispy as her mother had been. Since Rosamund’s death, Margaret had closed herself off. She never spoke, and she showed little interest in anything that would normally hold a child’s attention.

And if Adam did not do something about Margaret’s impassivity, she would not survive the year.

But marry a Scotswoman?

“Tell me more of this…Cristiane of St. Oln,” he said, his words and attitude without hope. He’d recently suffered bitter losses at the hands of the Scots, and could not imagine bringing one of their kind to the isle. “But do not assume that I will go along with your plan.”

The Village of St. Oln, Scotland

1300

Cristiane inghean Domhnall, the half-English daughter of Domhnall Mac Dhiubh, sat on a rocky promontory overlooking the crashing black waves of the North Sea. The wind had kicked up, and the clouds overhead were thick with moisture. Cristiane knew there would soon be a downpour.

’Twas no matter. There was a cave nearby if she needed to find shelter. She would not return to the village by choice. Lord knew she was barely tolerated in St. Oln since the death of her parents.

Cristiane stretched one arm out and opened her hand, letting it rest quietly beside her. Soon enough, a pair of soft gray kittiwakes approached, one more shyly than the other. The bold one stood looking at Cristiane, then hopped closer, eyeing the outstretched hand, tilting his head this way and that, viewing from all angles the bit of bread she held.

Cristiane smiled wistfully. ’Twas a game she’d played for years, with the guillemots, the shags and the puffins that inhabited this place. The birds were unafraid of her. Wary, of course. She expected nothing less of them.

But soon she would see them no more. For her mother had arranged for her to be escorted to York, to the estate of her uncle. Elizabeth of York had known that Cristiane had no future here in St. Oln. When the lass’s father, the Mac Dhiubh, had been killed in a skirmish with a neighboring clan, Elizabeth had begun to seek a new home for Cristiane.