To Love a Highlander Read online

  Still, it couldn’t be helped.

  She had good reason to peer over the walling.

  The very best, to her mind.

  So she straightened with as much dignity as she could, trying not to notice how her entire body tightened with embarrassment.

  Lifting her chin, she turned to face him. “A good morrow to you.”

  “So it is.” He narrowed his eyes, his expression so intense, so dangerous and predatory, that a rush of heat swept her. “As you’re aware, I come up here every morn to enjoy the splendor.”

  “I thought you made your visits at first light.”

  “Aye, well. Your troubles of last night seemed to have become mine. I didn’t sleep well.” He stepped closer, so near his proximity almost seared her. His sandalwood scent surrounded her, teasing her senses and making her heart beat faster. “Now I am glad I wakened so late. Had I been here earlier, I’d have missed such a glorious sight.”

  His cordial tone didn’t match the hardness of his gaze. The firm set of his jaw also bespoke annoyance. So did the way he towered over her with a challenging, anticipatory air as if he sought to provoke a reaction.

  He was angry, definitely.

  In consideration of how they’d parted in the small hours, she was the one who should be vexed.

  His attempt to unsettle her only fired her already simmering agitation. So she stood as tall as she could, squaring her shoulders and hoping he’d credit her flushed cheeks to the wind. She also sent a silent prayer to the gods, thanking them for the height and stature that allowed her to appear courageous when a show of strength was needed.

  In truth, a floodtide of awareness rushed through her, vivid images from their encounter in the Rose Room stirring her blood, making her wish she was still in his arms.

  She shouldn’t desire him.

  Hadn’t he shown her how little the pleasure had meant to him?

  The memory scalded, helped her stand against him now.

  “ ‘A glorious sight?’ ” She lifted a brow. “I am not lacking in wit. I know you don’t mean the hills and the river. There’s too much mist this morning to see them.” She glanced at the scudding clouds, the mist that hid everything but the boulders strewn down the cliff. “What I don’t know is what you meant by ‘and yet.’ ”

  “I believe you do.” He touched her hair, lifting a curl and rubbing it between his fingers. “Why else would you have posed yourself—”

  “I wasn’t posing.” Mirabelle refused to bat his hand away, not wanting him to see how much his touch affected her. “I wouldn’t do—”

  “Lady, I already ken you will do anything.” He didn’t release her hair, the slow rubbings of his thumb doing terrible things to her belly. “You’re a brave and daring lass. And just now, you’re upset because I proposed a plan that differs from yours.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Aye, it is.” He let go of her curl, smoothed his knuckles down her cheek. “You’re intelligent enough to ken that the man hasn’t been born who can resist a comely woman’s bottom waving in the air, beckoning him. After last night, you’re surely aware how dangerous it is for a man to be exposed to your charms. I only wonder how you knew when I’d come out onto the ramparts. Were you lying in wait, listening for my steps on the stair?”

  “I did no such thing!” Mirabelle felt the heat score her face. “You—”

  “I ken women.” Leaning in, he pushed back her hair and placed his lips to her ear, speaking low. “You should ken ne’er to try such a trick again. It won’t work, no’ with me, sweet.”

  That did it.

  Mirabelle’s temper snapped. Whirling away, she set her hands on her hips, her breath coming hard and fast. “Aye, you have the right of it.”

  He cocked a brow, showing he also had the nerve to look pleased.

  Mirabelle frowned at him. “I am annoyed and disappointed. My life, everything in my world, depends on keeping myself from Sir John’s clutches.”

  “He’ll no’ touch you, lass. I promised you that and it’s true.”

  “That doesn’t change that it’s shaming to know you find me of all women not desirable enough to bed.” She couldn’t believe she’d been so blunt.

  But she’d expected him to accept her wishes, executing them in every way she’d requested, including the carnal aspects he supposedly enjoyed so much.

  “To be sure, your refusal frustrates and humiliates me.” She let her tone dare him to say she had no reason to feel as she did.

  For a heartbeat the night before, in the corridor on her way back to her room, she’d half believed he’d stride after her, catching her to him, swinging her about, and kissing her hotly. Ravishing her then and there, until her very toes curled with wanting him.

  But he hadn’t budged.

  He’d let her go.

  She shouldn’t care, but she couldn’t keep her scowl from darkening. She knew her eyes blazed, felt the heat of annoyance coloring her cheeks.

  “My suggested plan to address your difficulties should make you happy.” His answer wasn’t the one she’d wanted. “I regret it drives you to such silliness as I just witnessed.”

  Mirabelle’s jaw slipped. She could only stare at him.

  He still believed she’d posed at the rampart wall.

  She took a deep, shuddery breath, not caring if he saw her vexation. Tremors of agitation rippled through her. He was only half the reason. Though, indirectly, he was completely responsible.

  “I was not leaning over the crenel to entice you.” She held out her hand, warding him off when he started toward her. Furious, she threw a glance at the ramparts’ notched wall, her heart thundering. “I saw—”

  “Dinnae tell me you were looking for the pink lady, down on the rocks?” He followed her gaze, shaking his head. “Thon slope is too steep for even a ghost to flit down. If one dared, she’d stub her gauzy toes on the rocks. There’s stone piled on stone from this wall”—he thumped a merlon—“all the way to the bottom, where the haint would find an even greater sea of boulders. Aye,”—he hooked his thumbs in his sword-belt and rocked back on his heels—“you’ll no’ be seeing a bogle by peering over the battlement wall.”

  Mirabelle bristled. “You are insufferable.”

  “So many say.” He had the audacity to smile.

  Mirabelle began tapping her foot. “You’re also unable to think of aught but coupling with jaded court women and taunting me about ghosts.”

  He lifted his hands, palms outward. “You have me there, sweeting.”

  “I am not your—”

  “Indeed.” He inclined his head, his smile gone. “You are no’ mine and that is good so, my lady. That shall remain the way of it no matter how much you tempt me, how luscious I find your lips, how pert your nipples, or how many times you wriggle your delectable bottom in my face.”

  “I wasn’t ‘wriggling my bottom’ at you.” Mirabelle would think about his other observations later. She didn’t trust herself to do so now.

  She did turn back to the crenel notch, peering through it as best she could without leaning into its opening as she’d done before. This time, much to her sorrow, she saw only broken rocks and a few threads of thin, blowing mist.

  Nothing else stirred.

  And that made her heart squeeze.

  Straightening, she took a deep breath and turned back to Sorley. “I was watching a wee kitten. I saw him from my room’s window when I opened the shutters. He was down on the rocks, beneath the battlements. I’ve never seen a tinier kitten, so thin he couldn’t weigh more than air. He looked injured, was favoring his back leg. I worried about him, so I nipped out here to see him better.” Mirabelle swallowed the sudden thickness in her throat, not wanting him to see how much the kitten meant to her. “I wanted to know where he was heading so I could circle around the base of the curtain wall and find him. He’s why I leaned into the crenel. Now he’s gone.” She didn’t hide the accusation.

  “A kitten?” Sorley arched a bro
w. “Are you sure he wasn’t a bird, small as you say he was?”

  “I can tell the difference between a bird and a kitten.” Mirabelle wasn’t surprised he didn’t believe her. “Or have you ever seen a gray-striped bird with big pointy ears, huge round eyes, and a furred tail?”

  “So it was a kitten.” He didn’t sound concerned. “His mother will have been about somewhere.”

  “He was alone.” Mirabelle’s heart began to hurt again. “He was lost and hungry. Frightened—”

  “Sweet lass, do you ken how many cats and kittens roam Stirling?” He strolled over to her, cupping her face in his hands. “There are plenty, and they take good care of themselves, I promise you.”

  “Not this one.” Mirabelle could tell.

  She’d also named him already, thinking of him as Little Heart.

  “So you weren’t wagging your bottom in the air to tempt me?” Sorley released her and stepped back, a note of humor in his voice. “I am disappointed, fair lady, for I was sure that was so.”

  Mirabelle glanced again at the wall, the now-empty crenel. She thought she heard the kitten crying, but then realized the sound was only the wind whistling round the tower. She also knew Sorley was trying to lift her spirits, make her forget Little Heart. Although she knew she wouldn’t—she’d felt an immediate and powerful bond with the kitten—she was warmed by his effort.

  “Sorley…” She started to thank him, but the words slipped away when he gave her a smile that curled her toes.

  “Aye?” He angled his head, waiting. “Are you ready to admit it was the pink lady you were staring after, down on the rocks?”

  “No, there really was a kitten.”

  “You can tell me true, Mirabelle.” He spoke her name in a way she’d never heard before, his voice stroking her like an intimate caress.

  “I did. Tell you true, I mean.” She shivered and drew her cloak tighter against the wind, protecting herself from him. The excitement he stirred inside her, a thrill of expectancy that made her breath catch and her skin hot.

  “I wished to tell you…” She broke off again, barely able to string words together.

  “Aye?” He was looking at her with his dark, intense eyes, his gaze both unnerving and causing her pulse to skitter. It was difficult not to squirm.

  If she didn’t know better, she’d believe he’d cast a spell over her. That he wasn’t who he appeared to be at all, but a dark sorcerer who’d conjured the most potent love elixir in the world. That he’d somehow administered it to her, rendering her helpless against his will.

  He surely knew her thoughts. Was aware that she couldn’t stop remembering his kiss and how the urgent, open-mouthed plundering of her lips, the madly-arousing thrusts of his tongue, had fuelled her own passion. She’d been ravenous for him, and she wanted more.

  Here on the battlements in the cold morning air and with the mist blowing all around them.

  In truth, she desired it fiercely. She ached to feel his hands on her, to be held in his arms, and have him initiate her in all the pleasures of the flesh that would follow. Her yearning made clear how foolish she’d been to approach him with her proposal. She might as well have stepped into the flames of a balefire. Their kiss in the chapel had scorched her, awakening her to passion. What happened in the Rose Room had branded her, irrevocably. Should anything else occur between them, she’d be haunted by the memories for all her days, never again whole.

  The longing would eat her alive, making her miserable.

  She knew that.

  Which brought her guard back, praise the heavens.

  “I’m sure you have much to do, so I won’t keep you.” She held his gaze, wondering how he would fill his day. She hoped it wouldn’t be with a woman. “Perhaps you hope to meet the man who asked for you at the Red Lion?” The possibility sat better with her than imagining him in some wanton’s bed. “He did seem eager to speak with you. The Highlander named Grim—”

  “Aye, Grim Mackintosh, from the Glen of Many Legends.” He surprised her with his openness. “I am on my way to seek him.”

  Mirabelle blinked. “You didn’t seem concerned about him last night.”

  “I’m no’ that now either.” He gave her a slow smile. “I’d just hear what he wants. By all accounts, he’s different from the usual sort who come round, asking for me.”

  “By whose account?” The question slipped off Mirabelle’s tongue before she could catch herself.

  Sorley’s smile deepened. Winking, he reached to tweak her cheek. “Sweet lass, did you no’ ken that a wise man ne’er reveals his sources?”

  It was then that everything was clear.

  “Maili told you. She came back with me.”

  He shrugged, his smile still in place. “Maili is aye full of blether.”

  His answer-that-wasn’t and the way his eyes warmed as he said the girl’s name sent a stab of hot green jealousy straight to her heart.

  He clearly cared for Maili.

  He also had no wish to discuss the stranger with her.

  “I’ve no idea who the man is or what he wants.” His words proved her wrong. “As you said as well, he’s a warring sort. Like as no’, he’s an old enemy I’ve forgotten. Or a paid fighter employed by someone I’ve grieved. Either way, I’m expecting a scuffle with him. So”—he stepped close again, once more placing his hands on her shoulders—if you hear of aught happening to me, stay near to your father and his guards. At the worst, if Sinclair plagues you after you leave here, send word to Alex Stewart, the King’s brother, up in Badenoch. He has a fierce reputation, but is great of heart and loves women. He’d no’ hesitate to rid you of any problems Sinclair might give you. Indeed, he’d make sure the bastard would ne’er trouble anyone ever again, male or female. Remember that, if I dinnae return.”

  He took his hands from her shoulders, stepping back. “Though I fully expect to, ne’er you worry.”

  “I wasn’t.” She knew he’d be back.

  She also had the strongest feeling the Highland warrior’s wish to speak with him had nothing to do with fighting.

  She didn’t feel it was her place to say so.

  But she did wonder about one thing. “How will I know when you’ve returned?”

  “Och, you’ll know. Everything will unfold as you desire.” He took her hand, lifting it to his lips. “Leave it to me.”

  Before she could ask what he meant, he squeezed her fingers and then strode off into the mist, leaving her to stare after him.

  Much later, but in a distant place, far from Stirling and many other places as well, hard rain lashed at the stout stone walls of a clifftop stronghold. The wind also rose, howling past the towers and rattling window shutters. Somewhere near, thunder rumbled, deep and bold, as if the floor-shaking booms came not just from the dark, angry heavens but also the bowels of the earth. Such days of wild wind and icy, spitting rain were common in these parts.

  Some claimed the sheer, soaring peaks that held the stronghold needed fierce weather as sustenance. That such cold majesty could thrive only on gray, bleak days and nights of impenetrable blackness.

  That the gloom even stole the light out of Scotland’s shimmering summer skies, daring the sun to shine.

  Others whispered the darkness was a curse. Punishment rained down on the laird for his many transgressions and sins.

  The truth would likely never be known.

  Few visitors made the treacherous journey, so not many men had opportunity to ponder the possibility.

  Regrettably, the clan who dwelt here had a long history of being at odds with their neighbors, far off as most of them were. That sorrow was slowly changing. Leastways some erstwhile foes had visited at the last Yuletide.

  Otherwise, those who called this place home mostly walked alone.

  For the stronghold was Duncreag, “fortress of rock,” though its aging chief, Archibald—Archie—MacNab thought of it as a castle of sorrow.

  The most charitable description of Duncreag was a massive, wi
nd-lashed eyrie, daunting and formidable. It was perched high atop a sheer, rocky crag, and clouds and mist often hid the stronghold from view. Unlike other, similarly situated holdings, Duncreag lacked a stone stair leading to its lofty door. Anyone wishing to visit had to climb a threadlike goat track that wound its way up the treacherous bluff.

  That being so, not many would-be guests bothered.

  And that suited Archie fine.

  For he knew he was cursed. With the wisdom that comes with age, he regretted his sins and had no wish to burden others with his ill fortune.

  It didn’t matter that he was lonely, a shadow of the lusty, life-loving, always-smiling man he’d once been.

  He’d reaped what he sowed, after all.

  And he had only himself to blame that he now sat alone at his high table, Duncreag’s vast great hall empty save for the ever-smoking torches and the scores of hounds who, remarkably, loved him despite his damnable past.

  Firming his jaw, for it shamed him too much to show his sorrows, even when no one saw, he sat straighter in his high-backed laird’s chair and continued feeding tidbits of fine, roasted beef to his dogs.

  Slipping his meals to his much-loved and trusted four-legged companions made the beasts happy. Besides, who would care if lack of food shriveled him to bone?

  He was fine with turning into one of the ghosts he was sure haunted his cold and stony stronghold, so full of darkness and gloom.

  Of course, there were a few exceptions…

  A small number of garrison men, Mackintoshes mostly, were currently gathered in one of Duncreag’s solars, drinking ale and casting dice. Duncreag men for the now, the Mackintosh warriors were good-hearted souls from Nought in the neighboring Glen of Many Legends.

  Led by Grim Mackintosh, a battle-hardened warrior if ever there was one, the Nought men were generously helping Archie rebuild his lost garrison. Some of the Mackintoshes had agreed to stay on at Duncreag indefinitely, claiming an affinity to the territory’s rocky bleakness. Others were here only until Archie’s few remaining kinsmen, young lads mostly, had been trained as stout enough fighters to adequately defend the formidable stronghold.