“There, do you see?” Sister Grizel assured her. “We’ve nothing at all to worry about.”
Tara eased back against the cushion, and closed her eyes, telling herself her companion was right. They would arrive at Burnbryde soon enough, and she would have her answers about Arabel’s death—before leaving.
From the darkness, a man’s voice shouted. No … more like screamed.
Tara sat up straight.
“What was that?” she hissed.
Sister Grizel clenched her arm. “I heard it too.”
The carriage slowed … and rolled to a stop.
The horses snorted and stamped.
“Driver?” she called.
“I see something,” he answered faintly. “Up ahead.”
Horse hooves sounded, rapid at first, then slowing. And again … the dim light of a lantern appeared out of the nothingness.
A man’s face appeared at the window, blood streaking across his nose and cheek. She recognized him as one of the outriders. Tara and Sister Grizel both cried out, alarmed.
“Brigands!” he bellowed. “Flee to the forest. Save y’selves!”
He lifted his sword high, before swinging away.
Terror struck straight through Tara’s heart. Brigands?
In the next moment, the forest around them erupted with shouts.
“Should we do as he says?” she cried, her thoughts immediately moving toward their defense. Curse the earl, who had personally divested her of the dagger she had intended to carry on the journey, as if she would actually commit murder in her attempts to flee.
“No! We will barricade ourselves here. Secure the door!” Sister Grizel commanded, pointing.
Tara wavered for a moment, undecided, then seized the bar—
Only for the door to fly open, yanking her into the night. She slammed to the ground, teeth snapping. Moisture soaked through her cloak and garments, dampening her hands and knees.
The forest echoed with the sound of male voices. Curses. Swords striking. She stared into the face of the carriage driver, who lay on his back, staring up, wide eyed—
In shock … or dead?
“Sir?” she cried, planting her hands against his chest and shaking him.
A gravelly voice chuckled above her. Her head snapped up.
A giant of a man towered above her, and another behind him holding a blazing torch clenched in his hand. Dark hoods concealed their faces and heads. Ominous black holes stared down at her.
“Y’ve dared ta trespass on Kincaid land,” the largest one growled. “By territorial right, we declare yer person under our command—and all yer possessions, forfeit.”
Kincaid land? An unfamiliar name. Certainly not Alwyn. They had strayed off the highland road then.
She scrambled to her feet, heart pounding, and stood with her shoulders straight and head high, trying desperately not to look as frightened as she felt.
“You must release us,” she demanded. “We travel under the protection of Alexander Stewart, the Earl of Buchan. The king’s own son. I am betrothed to the eldest son of the Laird Alwyn. I’m certain you must know of him.”
She suffered no qualms over invoking either man’s name, if it would mean their survival.
The man leaned closer, peering at her. She glimpsed the whites of his eyes.
“All th’ more reason I’ll be havin’ tha’ loovely necklace yer wearin’.”
Tara’s gaze dropped to see the glint of rubies and pearls at her bosom. Her mother’s necklace had slipped free during her fall. She covered the chain with her hands, and backed away, her pulse frantic, realizing these men respected no higher authority and would do whatever they wished.
“There are much finer things in that wagon, over there,” she shouted, pointing.
“I’ll be havin’ the necklace,” he intoned, stepping toward her. “Now, if y’ please.”
A banshee shrieked behind her. Whirling, she saw a shadow that could only be Sister Grizel hurtle from the carriage, her pale veil streaming back, and slam into their attacker.
But it was as if the old woman struck a stone wall. She bounced off his chest and staggered in a sideways direction, only to pivot toward Tara, arms flung wide.
“Run, lass,” she shrieked. “Run.”
Tara couldn’t possibly abandon her companion—a defenseless old woman, no matter how dire the consequence.
But in the next moment, Sister Grizel darted into the night, abandoning her. The man holding the torch ran after her.
Left in darkness, she seized up her skirts she started in the opposite direction, running as fast as she could.
Heavy boots thudded on the earth behind her, as she’s known they would.
“Y’ can’t run. Y’ can’t hide.” He laughed wickedly. “I’ll find ye.”
The words sent a chill down her spine. She quickly changed direction, hoping he wouldn’t realize and follow. She scoured the ground for a branch. A weighty stone. Anything she might use as a weapon to defend, but darkness obscured everything—including a tree root—thunk—which struck her shin. Pain! She gritted down a cry of agony and raced on. Entering a small clearing, she ran faster—
Only to have the toe of her boot sink deep into the earth. She stumbled. Fell. Into a wide puddle. Water … and mud, splashed up to strike her full in the face, cold and shocking.
Gasping with dread, she pushed up to stand and heard footfalls squishing heavily behind her. She whirled, backing away, skirts heavy now, and tangling at her ankles as he advanced.
“Stop runnin’, lass,” he growled, breathing heavily. “It willna do y’ any good.”
He drew his sword—
Panic rippled through her. Her lips went numb, and the hairs along the back of her neck stood on end.
Did he … did he intend to kill her?
Again, she turned and ran—
But something tugged hard at her neck—then released, leaving her skin stinging.
Touching her chest, she found the necklace missing. She spun round to find the man holding her mother’s necklace in his hand.
“No,” she bellowed, outraged. Forgetting her fear and his size, she lunged, reaching with both hands, determined to take back her one treasure, her only means of freedom.
Thud.
Suddenly, her attacker slumped to the side—along with the other man who had struck him.
“Aagghh.”
From the darkness, she heard the sounds of splashing, thrashing, and groaning.
She turned, squinting into the darkness, and could just make out the sight of a man, on top of the first attacker—the glint of a blade—a short sword, and a shimmer of pale hair.
But he was thrown off.
Both men cursed … rolled … leapt to their feet—
Her attacker lunged sideways, as if to flee. The other man—the blond one—lunged sideways as well, meeting him face-to-face, and with a commanding upward strike of his sword—
The air sang with the clash of metal.
Again, and again.
“So you wear a mask,” taunted the blond man, in a smooth, deep voice. “Very courageous of you.”
They splashed near, their arms swinging their swords with terrifying power. Tara crouched, fearing her head would be cut off.
“Would I recognize you?” he added, still teasing. “I suspect so. So let’s see who you are.”
More clashing, until there came a loud, long scraping—their blades sliding heavily against the other—and a whooshing through the air …
Followed by two distinct thuds, some distance away.
The sound of their swords falling.
More cursing, grappling, growling and swinging fists.
Her rescuer, if that’s what he was, was younger, leaner, more agile, and now—without a weapon.
She ran to the place she thought they’d landed and searched the ground, bending to touch the grass and tapping about with her toe. Her shoe struck the hard metal of a hilt. There! And yes, not far away,
the other. She removed her thick mittens and quickly judged one more finely crafted and evenly weighted than the other. She returned to where the men fought, carrying the one aloft and dragging the other by its hilt, behind her, and dropping it into the muck.
“You there,” she cried, attempting to edge nearer to his side, desperate to help him—because she did not wish to be left alone with the other man again. “You there. I have your sword!”
But with a roar, the hooded man seized hold of the blond man’s tunic. The blond man bent at the waist, and in one quick movement, freed himself from the garment, causing the hooded man to stumble back. In the next second, the now-shirtless man lunged at the other’s torso, tackling him to the ground.
Scrambling atop him, his arm—his fist—rose and fell with terrifying swiftness, a blur in the night.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
He stopped. Breathing hard, he reached for something—his tunic, she surmised, and stood. His opponent did not move.
Had he just killed the man? With his hands?
Tara stood frozen, staring at his back, he only a shadow in the night. An immense, imposing shadow.
He turned to her.
Dangerous, her instincts warned.
She stepped back, lifting the sword.
Yes, he had saved her, but for what purpose? Ah, she was a fool. Why had she not run while they fought?
He came nearer, his boots crunching over the earth, slowing to a stop just beyond the point of the blade. The night concealed his features. There was only the faint, silvery gleam of his hair.
“Let me understand this,” he said quietly. “I have valiantly saved your life, and now you think to kill me, with my own sword?”
She heard amusement in his tone, genial and teasing—so unlike the cruel taunts the first man had employed. Nonetheless, she continued to point the blade at his chest. His bare chest, though she could see nothing of it, save it being a lighter shade of shadow in the night.
“How do you know it is your sword—and not his?” she asked inanely, believing as long as they were conversing, then things would remain civilized between them.
“Because the blade speaks to me, even from your hands,” he answered.
What a ridiculous thing to say.
“That’s not true,” she retorted.
“Of course it’s not true. I’m only guessing it’s mine,” he replied, chuckling low in his throat. “It’s very dark, if you hadn’t noticed. Now give me the sword so that I can decide for myself,” he said in a brisker tone. “And then we’ll go back and see who’s still alive back there at the carriage.”
He stepped toward her. Again she stepped back.
He paused … and shifted his stance. He stood easy and relaxed, but remembering the way he had moved in the darkness, she knew she must not let her guard down.
“We’re still not friends, I see,” he observed.
“Of course not,” she replied. “I don’t even know who you are. You could be just as dangerous as that Kincaid over there.”
She pointed the tip toward the man on the ground. He still had her necklace, and she must retrieve it, but she didn’t want this man to know about the existence of her valuable jewels, because he might thieve them as well.
*
“Kincaid, you say?” he answered, his voice deepening.
Och, the sword grew heavy, and her arms shook from the strain of holding it extended.
“Are you familiar with the Kincaids, then? Did you recognize him?”
“Unfortunately this dark is too dark for even my astoundingly keen eyes,” he answered. “I shall have to return with a torch, if one can be found, and look at his face. Now back to this I-don’t-know-you-and-therefore-can’t-trust-you-nonsense.”
“It isn’t nonsense,” she replied. “I’m a woman traveling through unfamiliar lands. For all I know, you could be a brigand, just like him.”
“Well, I’m not.” He chuckled, emitting a raspy sound from deep in his throat. “At least not tonight.”
“I’m not reassured.”
“In all fairness, I don’t know who you are either,” he countered. “Perhaps it is I who should not trust you. Especially since you so unkindly refuse to return my sword. A female brigand, that’s what you are. Thieving swords from innocent young men in the night.”
She smiled. A foolish reaction, which she quickly corrected.
“Perhaps the sword on the ground … there … is yours,” she said, pointing in the opposite direction of the sword behind her, thinking that once he turned to search the darkness, she would flee.
“I’m not interested in that sword,” he answered softly. Almost … seductively. “The one you dropped on the ground behind you.”
A shiver went through her—one, she attributed to the cold and her damp clothes, though she knew full well it hadn’t been that sort of shiver.
“Why not?” she said, putting another step’s distance between them, and shifting her position sideways, just a bit.
He rotated on the heel of his boot, keeping his gaze fixed on her so pointedly she wondered if he could see in the dark.
“Because you aren’t holding it.”
Heat rose into her cheeks.
This dangerous man was trifling with her, and as much as she knew she shouldn’t, she liked it, just a little.
She ought to be scared of him, but she wasn’t. Not really.
Instead, he intrigued her, an unwise reaction, being that she couldn’t even see his face, and faces revealed so much about a person’s intentions. It was time to end their verbal flirtation, or whatever this was going on between them and distinguish whether he was friend or foe.
She straightened, still wielding the sword, and peered as best she could at him, out from the depths of her cowl. “I am Tara Iverach, ward of the Earl of Buchan. I have come at the invitation of the Laird Alwyn, as I am betrothed to his eldest son.”
He remained quiet for a long moment.
“Is that so?” he answered quietly.
“Yes.”
He let out a sound—a laugh, she thought. “Indeed.”
“Well, then…” His voice went husky. “How fortuitous that we should meet.”
Lifting his hand, he touched the tip of the sword, and commandingly pushed it down, moving closer. She—finding herself unwilling to wrench the hilt higher and stab the blade through his chest—could only allow him to do so.
“Being that I am the Alwyn’s … eldest … son.”
Tara’s breath caught in her throat.
She inhaled softly. “You?”
This was the man from whom she intended to escape? With whom she intended to break her troth?
What would it mean to have a man like him as a husband?
Despite all her caution, something like pleasure speared up from her stomach, warming her neck and her cheeks, and her breasts. Gently, he took possession of the sword—his hand closing over hers for a moment as he claimed the hilt, and closed the space between them, peering down at her. Her heart raced.
She did not step away this time—she felt anchored there, caught up in his power and presence.
“Indeed,” he answered in a quiet voice of command. “Which I believe … entitles me to a kiss for saving you.”
A kiss.
She had never been kissed before but … perhaps she did want to be kissed by him.
She didn’t even know what he looked like, but somehow his face didn’t matter. His voice. His manner. His skill as a warrior. The way she felt now, deep in her soul. It was all she needed to open her mind to the possibility of him.
“May I, then?” he murmured.
She did not answer.
She listened, instead, to a soft whisper that seemed to come straight from her soul—
Reminding her that he had been Arabel’s betrothed first. Though dead, Arabel was not gone from her memory and most certainly not her heart. She still deserved a sister’s loyalty and respect. Even
a sister’s guilt, for being alive … for being here in her stead.
That whisper faded when his arm came around her suddenly, pulling her close against his body.
He was hard—everywhere—constructed of muscle and strength. She took a step, but not away—just to steady herself, her hands coming up flat against his chest—his bare chest, cool, firm skin, underscored with heat. Her betrothed … if she so wished.
The sensation of him shocked her senses. Dizzied her.
He stepped too, aligning his body to hers—still clenching the sword low and ready—a warrior’s stance.
It was like a dance. A wonderful, mesmerizing dance. An intimacy not forbidden, because by the law of the land, they were already bound to one another, just as surely as if they were married.
Unless she fled, as she had planned to do all along.
“Come here,” he said huskily, lowering his head, his face into her cowl—
His voice … the words he spoke, sent a flush over her skin, a sensation of heat.
To accept or deny him? Her pulse surged high with excitement and uncertainty, for she knew not what to do. Instead, because it was easier than making that choice … she did nothing. She closed her eyes … and waited.
She felt pressure against her lips—but the sensation of cloth, not his lips.
Her eyes flew open. Her veil! Even she, lost to the thrill of the moment, had forgotten its presence.
“Thwarted.” He chuckled deeply—a distinctly masculine sound. She felt the rumble of his chest, under her palm. “And cruelly so.”
He gently tugged the swath of linen lower and she felt cold air on her lips and her chin.
“But I wilnae be denied again.” He dipped, lowering his face—
As right as the moment felt, something still felt wrong. She went stiff in his arms and turned her face away.
“What is it?” he asked in an intimate tone.
“Arabel,” she whispered. “She was my sister.”
“I never kissed her,” he murmured. “But I will kiss you.”
The sudden brush of his lips against hers sent a shock rippling through her. She exhaled, unsteadied by the rapid beating of her heart. And yet the kiss did not end. Before she could take another breath, his mouth closed on hers with deliberate passion.
He gathered her nearer, so that their hips … legs … stomachs … hearts … aligned, their bodies standing, but entwined. His kiss deepened, his mouth and tongue coaxing her response. Gasping, she inhaled his scent: rain … peat smoke … and male skin. Even as her instincts insisted she be wary, his power consumed her, and laid siege to her thickly bastioned soul.
The Rebel of Clan Kincaid Page 5
