Page 22 of The Dragon Laird’s Obsession

Gordon’s face did not change. “Aye.”

Only that.

Aye. Nay apology or amusement. Nay proper appreciation for her wit.

The man was impossible.

Ailis folded her hands before her. “How lovely.”

Gordon’s gaze lingered on her face for half a heartbeat, and his eyes pinned hers again with an awareness, mayhap. The sort that made the air between them tighten, as though even the horses had the sense to fall quiet.

“Ye’ll need yer strength from this day onward,” he said.

Ailis frowned. “For what?”

Gordon turned toward her again. This time, there was something perilously close to amusement at the edge of his mouth. It was small, nearly hidden beneath the grimness he wore like armor, but Ailis saw it.

“For work,” he said.

She blinked. “Work?”

“Aye.”

The word dropped between them like a stone into a well.

Ailis stared at him, and he began walking.

Apparently, he thought she would follow. She paused for two breaths, refusing to move out of principle. When she noticed Malcolm watching with an unrestrained interest, pride urged her feet to move forward.

She hurried after Gordon, skirts gathered in one hand. “What sort of work?”

“The sort that keeps a household standin’.”

“I had nay realized yer castle was in danger of fallin’ without me.”

“Every castle is.”

Ailis narrowed her eyes at his back. The man had a truly remarkable back. Broad, unyielding, annoyingly well-made. She wished his shoulders were less fine. It would make despising him simpler.

Do nae stare at his shoulders like a foolish milkmaid.

She lifted her gaze to the back of his head instead.

Gordon led her across the courtyard toward the kitchen yard. “Aunt Marion worked. I worked.”

“Ye?” Ailis asked before she could stop herself. She rolled her eyes, her tone deliberately sharp. “I had assumed all ye did was bark orders.”

He glanced back over his shoulder. “I spent most of me childhood scrubbin’ floors, stackin’ wood, muckin’ stalls, and earnin’ every meal in this hall.”

For a moment, she saw him younger. Not this towering, hard-faced laird who filled every doorway and every silence. A boy with dirt under his nails, shoulders too broad too soon, hands already rough from labor. A boy made to earn his food beneath a roof that should have sheltered him freely.

Softness stirred in her chest. She hated how quickly it came.

Gordon turned forward again, his voice hardening as if he regretted letting even that little truth escape. “If ye intend to become a lady of our lands, ye’ll be expected to ken the difference between commandin’ a household and livin’ in one.”

The softness she felt a moment earlier vanished.

Ailis’ chin lifted. “I ken hard work.”