by Aileen Adams
“Careful,” he warned. “I might have ye doing it for me. I was never one to do my own washing.”
“I could not be less surprised.” She smirked. “And I’ve spent more than enough of my life doing the washing for men. I’ll be hanged before I do yours.”
“I might be able to arrange it for ye.”
“I am certain ye would like that.” She stood. “And I’m quite hungry. Do ye men not know how to hunt?”
“Why would I waste my efforts on the likes of ye?”
“Because I’m not much use to ye dead,” she snorted, limping toward the other men.
The fact he refused to see and she refused to explain any further was this, she was no use to him in any way at all. Ian simply would not care when he found out. If he ever did, which it was possible he would not. Word might never make it to him.
If it did, he would call it good riddance to bad rubbish and return to whatever happened to have his attention at that particular moment. Drinking, debauching. Brutalizing. Stealing.
Rufus, fool that he was, would not see this.
It was not enough for a man to be good. He must also be capable of seeing the evil in others, especially others who he hoped to defeat. Rufus did not understand how a man could care nothing whatsoever for his own flesh and blood, and that was in his favor.
“If ye wish to destroy an enemy, ye must understand how he thinks and be willing to think as he does,” she murmured, mostly to herself, as Rufus lifted her into the saddle. He did not trust her to ride with her wrists unbound, which did not come as a surprise.
She would gain his trust again, if she ever had it in the first place, and would use that trust when it came time to get away.
This was the first stone in the wall she would climb over to get away.
“What makes ye say that?” Rufus asked, moving behind her. Both the warmth of his body as it drew nearer to hers and his very strong, potent male odor played upon her senses. While he could have used a bath—she was not only teasing or being cruel in order to get under his skin when she’d brought it up—the scent was one to which she’d become accustomed while coming of age in a house full of men.
It was a comforting scent, almost, which she found particularly distressing. She did not wish to find him comforting.
“I was only thinking of family,” she murmured, her eyes moving back and forth as she spoke. Would the rest of them berate her for speaking? Tell her to be silent, as Rufus would have? It did not appear that way, in fact, they appeared too concerned with guiding their horses through the mud left behind after heavy rain to pay much mind to what she said.
“Family. Ye would be thinking along that direction, would ye not?”
“Ye do love the sound of your own voice, do ye not?” she challenged, her rapidly numbing hands curling into fists. Relax. Go easy. Her temper could not get the better of her in this. The fact that he even deigned to speak with her instead of telling her to keep her mouth shut or else risk having it gagged was a mark of progress.
“Go on, then,” he grumbled. The cage of his arms narrowed, tightening, when the horse slipped slightly in the mud and threatened to unbalance her.
She made a point of ignoring this. “I thought of family, as I said. The loyalty ye feel for your brother. And it brought to mind the fact that not everyone feels that same loyalty toward their own.”
“Ye think not?”
“I know not,” she replied instantly, and with complete certainty. “Not every man would take such action.”
“I find that difficult to believe, lass. Why would a man not ride to the ends of the earth if it meant setting things right?” He gestured around them, to the other men on horseback. “And these men. They feel the same, of course, or else they would not be here now. They believe, as I do, that a man ought to pay for such evil. And that payment ought to come at the hand of the man whose family was destroyed by that evil.”
“I do not disagree with ye,” she assured him, and this was not a lie for the sake of being friendly. The truth of it was, she wished someone would finally give her brother everything he deserved.
Though she would never admit it to Rufus MacIntosh. Not for all the gold in the world.
“So ye say these things just to—what? Start a fight, lass?”
“Nay,” she grumbled. “Only to remind ye that others might not think as ye do.” The stubborn, foolish, thoughtless man. He could not, or would not, understand the message she tried to impart.
“Thank ye very much for reminding me, then,” he snorted. One thing she’d never been able to stand was the knowledge that another laughed at her, especially when that person happened to be someone she looked down upon.
She looked down upon many people, and she knew it. Most people. After all, most of the people she knew were her blood, and the MacFarlands were rotten to the core. Many were the times she’d dreamed of what life might have been had she been born a Fraser, a MacDonald.
A MacIntosh.
Were it not for the thick mud, one would never know it had rained so. The sky was clear, blue, as if the clouds had disappeared after emptying themselves, ridding the sky of every drop for good and for all. Fanciful thinking, but there was little else to turn her attention to when riding for hours at a time.
She noticed how the men no longer jested with each other as they had before learning who she was. Their conversation—light, boastful, full of tall tales which were most assuredly untrue—was much missed when the alternative was silence.
There had been too much silence in her life.
“They hate me,” she whispered.
It wasn’t until Rufus clicked his tongue that she knew she’d spoken aloud. “Why should it matter?”
“Why should it not? Have ye ever been hated by everyone around ye?”
“I canna say that I have.”
At least he seemed to have given it thought before offering an answer.
“I find that difficult to believe,” she retorted.
“I have a bad habit of being rather cruel to they who deserve it—be they a man or a woman.”
“Deserve? I deserve it?”
“Ye know ye do. And I’m now tired of hearing your voice.” With that, there was no further chance of building any trust. At least, not then.
10
The late afternoon sun shone pleasantly warm over the River Tay, making the rippling water sparkle like jewels against a blue sky. Spring had started early that year, with the afternoons much warmer than the still-cool morning and evening, and this normally meant a long, hot summer.
If luck was on his side, he would settle his mission and be free to do as he pleased. Perhaps he would stay close to home for a while, helping Kenneth put things to right. MacFarland had more than likely destroyed much of what Elliot MacIntosh and his ancestors had built.
Had the water around him begun to boil at the thought of the likely destruction, Rufus would not have been surprised.
“I have been thinking quite a bit.”
Rufus turned to Alec with a snort, the two of them in waist-deep water. He raised his arms, lifting the sodden kilt to eye-level before plunging it into the slow-moving current once again. The lass had been correct. It needed washing, badly, along with his tunic which was already drying on a rock.
“I didna know ye spent a great deal of time thinking.” He chuckled.
“I’m serious. I have been thinking about this. What do ye think I’ve done, riding in silence all through the day?”
“Riding,” Rufus muttered. “I didna imagine ye had so much on your mind.”
“I did, and I do. And I believe the lass is trying to tell ye something when she reminds ye that some dinna think as ye do.”
Rufus ceased washing and turned to Alec, brows lifting in curiosity. “What do ye mean? I dinna recall her saying anything of the sort.”
“Just this morning. When we first rode away from our camp.”
Rufus frowned as he went back through his memories of the m
orning. He did remember the lass talking quite a bit before he’d put a stop to it, but he could not recall that which Alec described.
Alec read his expression and laughed in disbelief. “Ye were not listening?”
He did not know why it bothered him so, being found out this way. He returned his attention to the tunic, plunging it harder than ever. “I was thinking about my brother at the time, if ye must know.”
“Kenneth?”
“The only brother I have. Who else?”
Alec sighed. “Where would he have gone? You’re certain he was not in hiding closer to home?”
“He would not linger close to home if Ian MacFarland was anywhere near there. He would not risk it.” He scoffed quietly. “Kenneth was never the fighter of the family.”
“I’m certain he defended himself as best he could,” Alec offered.
“Ye dinna need to make me feel better, ye ken. I know my brother better than any man alive, and I know there was nothing he could have done to defend himself against the likes of Ian MacFarland and the rest.” Or even Ian on his own.
Kenneth had always been more the thoughtful type, the one who read, reasoned, and did whatever he could to solve problems with words and compromise. In other words, there was little place for him in their world.
Yet birthright was birthright, and someone had to get it back for him. Kenneth certainly never would.
“I’ll make a point of asking after him the next village we come to,” Alec offered. “Someone must have heard something of him.”
“I fear him dead,” Rufus admitted. “He succumbed to the wounds Ian gave him that night and died in the woods, alone. No one there with him. I’m more certain of it every day that I hear nothing from him.”
“Dinna allow yourself to think overmuch on it,” Alec advised. “Ye canna believe that to be true. We’ll hear of him when we reach the next village.”
Would that he could be as confident as his friend, even if Rufus suspected a great deal of that confidence was purely put on for his benefit, that none of the men believed any more than he did that Kenneth survived the events of that terrible night.
Why would MacFarland have left him alive, when he’d taken pains to kill their parents? Like as not the man had been certain there would be no retribution from the likes of Kenneth and so had chosen to leave him alive, that he might wallow in his failure and punish himself far worse than any other man could.
For the sword, when plunged into the correct place, could end a man’s suffering in an instant. It was only possible to die once by the sword. Guilt, however, could kill a man again and again.
Yes, Ian MacFarland would despise a man such as Kenneth, who did not defend his parents or his land.
There were moments when Rufus himself was not certain how he felt about his brother when he viewed the situation through the eyes of an outsider. A disloyal thought, to be sure, but one he could not help.
He would have died before allowing another man to take what was his.
Rufus did not share this with the others. Not even with Drew, who he believed would be the one to best understand, being of MacIntosh blood. None of them could suspect he resented his brother’s lack of effectiveness.
He wrung what he could from his kilt and snapped it in the air several times before setting it to rest beside his other garments. He was the last to finish bathing, the others already having returned to camp to help in snaring and skinning hares to roast for supper.
A thick bramble stretched along the river’s bank, shielding him from view, which gave him freedom to swim, away from the lass’s gaze. It was different, traveling with a woman, and something he was sorely unaccustomed to. He could not say he enjoyed it.
Now, however, he could be at peace for at least a moment. Long, sure strokes took him further across the wide river, until he was roughly halfway between banks. The current was strong, perhaps too strong for him to have gone so far out, but he knew well how to manage it.
So long as one did not panic and instead allowed himself to swim along with the current until it released him, there was no trouble. Struggling against it only lead to exhaustion and cramping, which led to drowning.
He would never forget witnessing the drowning of a distant cousin when he was little more than a wee bairn. The sight of a handsome, strapping young man who had only hours earlier been telling jokes and showing off his strength and prowess was dragged from the water, his face already turning blue, a look of horror on his face, eyes open and staring blankly up at the summer sky while all who’d happened to be nearby wept. Even grown men, reduced to tears at the sight of youth cut short for no reason other than the misfortune of swimming too far and struggling against the undertow.
The memory had inspired Rufus’s desire to become a strong swimmer. That, and his cousin’s panicked cries as the current pulled him further from the bank.
The brambles stirred and shook as one of their party approached the water’s edge.
Auburn curls.
Rufus was not certain whether this was a welcome event or no. While he had no desire to speak to the lass or even look upon her—God above forbid he have a moment’s peace and quiet—there was the pesky matter of the way her appearance caused his pulse to pick up speed.
It was not her. It was the exertion of swimming. So he told himself.
She looked up and down the bank, clearly believing herself to be alone. He saw it in the way her shoulders loosened, in the deep breath she took. She tilted her head back, eyes closed, as though she soaked in the sunshine. A smile touched the corners of her mouth.
He held his breath, watching her. But she was bonny. Lying, traitorous, but bonny just the same. Now, without her knowing he watched, he could admire her as he had before finding out who she was. The shape of her face, the soft curves of her cheeks and nose, the long column of her neck and the way he held her head in such a proud, strong fashion.
Only when she began opening the leather belt cinched around the waist of her muddied, blue dress did he stir from the stupor she put him under and call out. “Och, lassie, ye might want to allow a man to turn his back!”
She gasped, head moving back and forth as she looked for him. He lifted an arm and waved. “Here!” It was difficult not to laugh when she crossed her arms over her chest. The lass had not removed a single garment, yet covered herself as though she had.
“What are ye doing, that far out?” she demanded.
“Swimming. What do ye think?”
“Well… come back.” She waved her arms in a beckoning motion.
“Why?”
“I wish to bathe.”
He shrugged, still treading water. “The river is not wide enough for the two of us, then?”
“I have no desire to bathe in front of ye,” she growled. Her face nearly glowed red. Even at a distance, he saw the impotent fury, the way her fists clenched tight. “Return, if ye please.”
“I dinna please,” he smiled. “I happen to be enjoying myself quite a lot and rarely have the chance to swim. But if ye wish, ye might bathe. I will not place myself in your way. Look!” He turned around, then called out over his shoulder. “I will not watch ye undress. Ye have my word.”
She let out a groan. “Do not turn about.”
“I will not.” He chuckled at the sound of her muttered curses. The lass had quite a knowledge of language, for certain. She spoke as though she’d spent her life surrounded by the roughest, filthiest of men.
His smile faded when he remembered that she, in fact, had done just that. The MacFarlands. He no longer saw the humor in the situation.
Only when he heard splashing behind him did he dare look over his shoulder. She had not waded in very far but was likely crouching, as the water reached her shoulders. Her back was to him as she plunged her faded plaid skirt into the water again and again. Her hair was now wet and slicked down, darker than before.
Yes, she was bonny. Creamy skin. Long, firm arms, strong shoulders. Healthy, fresh, like a pea
rl gleaming in the sun. Truly a thing of beauty.
He supposed even a flower could bloom from time to time amongst the ugliest of weeds.
His strokes were slow, deliberate, bringing him back to the riverbank a bit at a time. “Take care ye dinna come out too far,” he warned as he approached. “The current is quite strong. Ye might not be able to fight it.”
“I would not venture far,” she replied, careful to keep her back to him and everything below her shoulders below the water line. “I do not swim.”
“You canna swim?”
“I do not,” she spat, glaring over her shoulder. “I choose not to.”
“Because ye never learned.”
“What of it?”
“It seems something a person ought to know, I suppose.”
“I’m certain there are many things ye do not know how to do. Have ye ever baked a loaf of bread?”
“Has a person ever drowned while baking bread?”
“Has a person ever starved because they did not know how to swim?”
He might have offered a sharp retort, but the sense of what she said halted him. He merely shook his head, swimming nearer. “Fair enough. Promise me ye will not go further out, then, as I dinna take kindly to the notion of saving ye from drowning.”
“I would rather drown than ask ye for your help.”
“I believe ye.” He snickered. “Ye might wish to turn your back now, lassie, unless ye would like the thrill of watching me walk from the water and dress myself. I canna blame ye, if ye wish to watch.”
She merely scoffed and kept her back to him as he stepped out, onto the bank, the sun heating his skin and drying the water which ran in thin streams until it puddled at his feet. “I’ll be standing here for a bit, until I’ve dried enough to dress. I thought it only fair to warn ye.”
“I’m certain I do not care,” she called over her shoulder.
“I would not wish for ye to die of excitement, is all,” he jested. “If ye were to look upon me, ye might not be able to control yourself.”
She plunged her dress into the water with a splash, grunting. “If there is a man in the world more impressed with himself with less of a reason to be so, I do not wish to know.”
