The Blood of Roses

by Marsha Canham

  No one at the castle, least of all Lauren Cameron, had been forwarned of the existence of the yellow-haired Sassenach who had accompanied him home. And no one had been more pleased or relieved to learn that he had acquired her reluctantly, that the marriage had been forced upon them both, and that he had used her as hostage and camouflage to make his way safely into Scotland. Of course he had bedded her, but out of contempt, not passion. He surely did not love her; any fool could see how perfectly mismatched the two of them were, how disastrous such a union would be.

  Admittedly, Lauren might have presented herself a little too prematurely into his bed that first night at Achnacarry, and admittedly she might have overreacted—just a tad—to his caustic rejection. But arranging to have his troublesome new bride kidnapped by the Campbells seemed to be a logical solution to the problem—ideal, as it turned out, since Alasdair immediately set her on a ship bound for England after the dramatic rescue. Would a man who loved his wife send her out of his life? Would a man who obviously had enormous needs and healthy appetites settle for a bed on the hard, cold ground with only the length of his wool tartan to keep him warm?

  Hadn’t she caught Alasdair staring often and openly at her ripe, hourglass figure these past few weeks? Hadn’t she nearly melted with anticipation on more than one occasion when his dark, probing eyes had visually stripped the layers of clothing from her body one by one, revealing the voluptuous perfection of her breasts, the incredibly tiny span of her waist, the long and lanky stretch of her nubile legs? Melted indeed. She had felt those bottomless eyes on her naked flesh once before and experienced the calloused heat of his hands exploring her flesh. The weeks had not dimmed the memory, nor had the roughness of his initial rejection dulled the ache of her desire.

  She should not have been surprised that he had been watching her wagon or that he had followed her out onto the grassy moor. She had sensed something wondrous and devastating would happen tonight, and it had. It had.

  Sighing, Lauren shifted slightly, and suggestively, and felt the slow brush of long black lashes opening against her throat.

  “I’m glad ye came tae me tonight, Alasdair,” she whispered. “I was beginnin’ tae despair O’ ever seein’ this day, ever feelin’ yer arms around me, or us bein’ togither as it were meant tae be.”

  “We couldna be mair togither than this, lass,” he murmured, nuzzling his lips against her throat.

  Lauren wriggled to acknowledge the virile pressure swelling within her, but the echo of his words struck her and her amber eyes flew open in shock.

  “What … what did ye say?” she gasped.

  He chuckled lustily. “I didna have tae say aught, lassie. Can ye no’ feel what I mean?”

  The broad Scots accent was as thick as dust in a haystack, and, with a cry of horror, Lauren laid her hands flat on his shoulders and pushed upward with all her might. The Highlander had not been prepared for such a swift and perfunctory ejection and cursed angrily as he found himself facedown on the wet grass.

  “What the hell?”

  Lauren scrambled to her knees. This time, when she clawed her fingers into the thick waves of his hair, it was in order to angle his face upward into the dim wash of moonlight. What she saw stopped her heart cold. Like Alasdair’s, his hair was long and shaggy, his eyes dark and deep-set under a slash of jet-black brows. The jaw was even remarkably similar—square and strong, with a hint of a cleft splitting it in two. The body was as well proportioned, evidently as well endowed, although now, as she studied him with a growing fury, she could see his shoulders were not quite as broad, nor the sculpting of the muscles on his chest as well defined.

  “Ye bastard,” she hissed. “Ye bluidy bastard!”

  “Heigh now, halt a blink, wee missy—”

  Snarling, Lauren flung herself at him, raking the sharp points of her nails down his cheeks and throat. She felt some measure of satisfaction as the peeled skin collected beneath the tips and even more when she heard his bellow of pain.

  “Ye bastard! Ye bluidy bastard!” she screamed again, flailing at him with her fists, gouging him with her nails, sinking her teeth around a mouthful of flesh when he tried to catch her wrists and bring her to ground.

  A second voracious curse sent the back of his hand slashing sideways across her cheek. Lauren’s head jerked to one side with the force of the blow, affording him the break he needed to toss her onto her back and pin her under the weight of his body. She continued to fight him like a wildcat, hissing and spitting obscenities, wriggling and squirming to free an arm or a leg to vent her rage. The Highlander merely tightened his grip and guarded his more vulnerable target areas while he waited for her strength to wane.

  With a frustrated curse, her writhings slowed and finally heaved to a halt. Her breasts labored under a fresh sheen of sweat, and her beautifully angry face was all but hidden by her flying hair.

  “Have ye calmed yersel’, then?” he asked matter-of-factly.

  “Get off O’ me, ye great hair-legged lummox!”

  “That wisna what ye were beggin’ me tae dae ten minutes ago.”

  “Ten minutes ago I thought ye were—” Lauren stopped and bit her enraged admission into silence. God, how could she have been so blind? So stupid? How could she have mistaken this … this lout for Alasdair?

  “Ye thought I were someone else.” The Highlander chuckled. “Lucky bastard, this Alasdair O’ yourn.”

  “Ye knew?” She gasped furiously. “Ye knew an’ ye still … ye still—!”

  “By the time ye were bleatin’ his name intae ma ear, I couldna care if ye thought I were the pope himsel’. It would ha’ taken a far better man than me tae be able tae stop, I can tell ye.”

  Lauren gained control of her temper. “Ye must have known afore … afore it went that far, that I’d mistook ye f’ae someone else. Why did ye just stan’ there, gawpin’ like a fool an’ sayin’ nothing?”

  “I thought I were dreamin’,” he murmured honestly. “I saw ye walk out frae them bushes an’ next thing I knew, ye were half out O’ yer claythes an’ tearin’ at mines. What would ye expect a man tae dae? Slap ye on the wrist an’ tell ye tae go hame?”

  Lauren drew a deep breath. Grudgingly she conceded the point. She hadn’t exactly seen the need for words between them; she had just seen him and assumed …

  “Well, I suppose it’s done,” she said bitterly.

  “Aye, that it is, lass,” he agreed, smoothing the web of hair off her face. Seeing the glint of moonlight reflected in the almond-shaped eyes, his gaze strayed lower, to the sensuously full, pouting lips. They were still swollen and bruised-looking from his avid attentions, and at one corner a thin thread of blood trickled onto the whiteness of her chin. His own cheeks stung from the missing ribbons of flesh, as did his buttocks, where her nails had wrought similar damage during the throes of passion.

  Lauren stared up at the shadowed outline of the face poised above her, seeing nothing but the vague impressions of features. The sudden, renewed tension in his body was more readily identifiable, and for some reason it removed the last of her anger and prompted a similarly bold response in her loins.

  When he dipped his head and sent his tongue tracing gently along her lip to capture the blood he had caused to be shed, she did not flinch away or resume her struggle. Nor did she do anything to deter him as his tongue continued down along the arch of her throat, swirling a river of warm sensations into the valley between her breasts.

  “Dae ye think I’ve forgiven ye then?” she asked, conscious of his lower body shifting deftly between her parted thighs.

  “The harm’s done, as ye said. Where’s the use O’ gratin’ at one anither?” His tongue arrived at a nipple and toyed with it a moment before hungry lips closed around the bud and suckled a tender mouthful of flesh.

  No, she thought—squirming for altogether different reasons now—he wasn’t Alasdair. But he was a virile answer for all those long, cold nights when she had lain awake, half mad to feel the vigor
ous thrust of male flesh within her. Struan MacSorley had been her lover at Achnacarry, but even he had seemed to abandon her, whether out of deference for Lochiel or a growing suspicion over the role she had played in Catherine’s kidnapping, she did not know. She did know she had gone too long playing the part of the innocent, wide-eyed virgin, especially when, during those same long cold nights, she could clearly hear the squeaking and creaking of wagon axles all around her.

  Lauren arched sinuously against the greedy lips, her great amber eyes fluttering closed through a shudder of purely avaricious delight. She parted her thighs wider and slid her hands up and around his buttocks, urging the hot stab of flesh to plunge where it was needed most.

  Thus preoccupied, neither one of the lovers heard or saw the three crouched figures moving stealthily toward them through the waves of long, silvery deergrass. All three wore red broadcloth tunics and blue breeches; all three exchanged cautious handsignals as they began to close the circle around the naked, writhing couple.

  The leader of the three grinned lewdly as he heard the unabashed lust in the woman’s groans as she pumped her hips into each grunted pelvic thrust. She was probably not what the captain had had in mind when he dispatched them on this foolhardy expedition, but no doubt he would find some way to make use of her, regardless of whether she provided them with military information or not.

  A final gesture for silence and caution had the corporal withdrawing his knife from its leather sheath. He carefully laid his musket aside, not wanting to risk an accidental misfire that could alert the entire rebel army, then crept the final ten paces before raising the knife and plunging it ruthlessly between the Highlander’s sweat-slicked shoulder blades.

  Alexander heard the shrill scream of a night creature somewhere out over the darkened moorland and paused momentarily to try to pinpoint its source. He had forced himself to take three complete circuits of the sprawling encampment and, thankfully, felt the better for it. His body was no longer behaving as if it were stretched on an invisible rack; his nerves no longer scraped against a jagged edge of steel. He was thinking clearly again and knew that to keep doing so, he must not think of Catherine.

  His third circuit of the camp, therefore, was undertaken with an eye toward the military action due for the morning. He was in full agreement with Lochiel’s assessment of the situation: If Cope had any warning whatsoever of the rebels’ presence in the morass, their hopes for a victory were slim. The crossing had to be made in stealth and darkness and completed before the English general had time to realign his damned artillery. Surprise was the key. Surprise and speed, both of which were the mainstay of the Highlanders’ methods of warfare.

  If only there was some way to unseat the general’s confidence in his position. If only there was some way to shatter the iron-fast discipline of his officers and infantrymen, to bring about a repeat of their startling performance at Colt’s Bridge.

  Recalling the incident, Alexander’s dark eyes narrowed against a gust of smoke-laden breeze. He had been leading a small party of Camerons along the road to Edinburgh, intending only to scout the route and determine where the English would be most likely to stage a defense. His men had been spoiling for action ever since leaving Glenfinnan; apart from one or two minor encounters with government patrols, hardly a sword or pistol had been drawn in anger. His men would have gladly, enthusiastically hurled themselves into a skirmish with the two regiments of dragoons they’d encountered at the bridge, had Alex given the order to do so. But before they had even warmed themselves by hurling insults and jeers first, the dragoons had balked and wheeled their horses away from the opposite riverbank, leaving the Highlanders staring at each other in complete astonishment.

  Knowing they had been vastly outnumbered and outgunned, Alex had shared his men’s surprise. Common sense had forbade him from overextending his distance from the main body of the army, but, as he later found out, the dragoons had maintained their retreat all the way to Leith, several miles beyond the city of Edinburgh, before realizing the Highlanders had not pursued.

  Only one officer had appeared ready to stand his ground at the bridge, and he had been as outraged by the cowardly behavior of his men as he had been when he recognized the tall, black-haired figure who sat in similar stone-cold silence observing him from across the bridge.

  Hamilton Garner.

  There had been no mistaking the lean and arrogant features, the ramrod-stiff posture, the uniform impeccably laid on with every brass button and gold braid arranged in military precision. Jade-green eyes, as frigid as arctic ice, had stared across the river with the same piercing fury they had lashed at Alex months before over the span of crossed sword blades. The hatred they emanated was seething and malevolent, almost a tangible thing as it strove to provoke a similar response in Alex.

  Lord Ashbrooke, Catherine’s father, had said the wound Garner received during the duel had not been fatal. Even so, Alex had not expected to see the haughty lieutenant— now apparently promoted to captain—fully healed and preparing to defend a bridge hundreds of miles from Derby. Damien Ashbrooke had sent word via his couriers that Garner had launched an intensive search for Raefer Montgomery and his new bride. His inability to find any clue as to their whereabouts had rooted an unhealthy obsession in Garner’s mind; he had vowed to find both Montgomery and Catherine and exact revenge for his humiliation if it took his dying breath to do so.

  With the rest of his regiment, officers and dragoons alike, scrambling for the safety of the forest, Hamilton Garner had drawn his sword and kicked his horse forward toward the stone arch of the bridge. Had the self-righteous fool been about to cross the river and challenge Alexander to a rematch? Cameron had no way of knowing, for within moments of Garner’s men interpreting his intentions, they had surrounded him and literally dragged him into the retreat.

  Alex frowned over the memory and looked down at the smooth pebble he had been rolling between his fingers. His fist clenched around it as he remembered his own disturbing pang of disappointment that day. He would have welcomed the chance to test his steel against Hamilton Garner again, if only to rectify the mistake he had made in not delivering the coup de grâce the first time. And why hadn’t he? God only knew, it was not out of respect or admiration for the man. Perhaps it had been because of the flash of pale blonde hair he had seen on the fringe of the crowd of horrified spectators.

  Alex tensed and let the pebble slip through his fingers and fall to the ground, forgotten. With a slight, almost imperceptible move of his arm, he closed his hand around the steel-clawed butt of the pistol he wore tucked into his belt. He let the shiver of cool anticipation clear his mind of all thoughts as he concentrated his instincts on the nearby rustle of a carefully placed footfall.

  Whoever was walking up behind him was no more than ten feet away, his approach too furtive to be a friendly clansman. Alex was quite alone on the dark rim of the encampment, a situation he was not permitted to enjoy too often these days. Lochiel had detached Struan MacSorley as captain of his own personal guard and ordered him to watch Alexander’s back instead. Word had reached the chief of the Camerons that the Duke of Argyle, Alexander’s mortal enemy, had not received the news of the Camshroinaich Dubh’s safe arrival at Achnacarry with any humor, nor had he accepted the subsequent death of his nephew, Malcolm Campbell, at Alexander’s hands with peals of delight. The failure of Argyle’s elaborate plan to capture Alexander and see him hang from a noose at Inverary Castle had prompted the duke to double the long-standing reward of ten thousand pounds for his capture. Aluinn MacKail had also learned the duke had hired an assassin, a man known in such specialized circles as The Frenchman, who boasted a success rate of one hundred percent. Alex had shrugged aside the threat with his customary indifference—after all, he had spent most of his fifteen-year exile dodging Argyle’s bloodhounds. But Lochiel had not welcomed the reports so blandly, nor had Aluinn MacKail or Struan MacSorley, either of whom usually were with Alex at all times.

  N
either of them would exhibit the poor sense to creep up on him in the dark of night, however.

  “Beggin’ yer pardon, laird—”

  Alex dropped into a crouch and whirled around, pivoting on the balls of his feet and drawing his pistol at the same time. The old, poorly clad clansman threw his hands up before his face and stumbled back several paces, squawking pleas and petitions in Gaelic when he saw the fully cocked pistol leveled at his chest.

  Cursing with equal fluency, Alex sprang to his feet and in a single long stride, grasped the visibly shaken clansman by a fistful of tartan and lifted him onto the tips of his toes.

  “You goddamned blithering fool! What were you thinking, stalking a man in the dead of night?”

  “I … I wisna stalkin’, laird,” the man stammered, clawing at the vise that gripped his throat. “I didna mean tae stalk, laird. I walkit normal, but quietlike so as nae tae distairb ye. I could see ye were thinkin’ rare hard an’ I didna want tae distairb ye till ye were through!”

  Still suffering the effects of an adrenaline rush, Alex lowered the weight of the man slowly, then released his grip on the bunched folds of tartan.

  The clansman scrabbled cautiously back out of range of the long, powerful arms and watched frog-eyed as the flintlock on the pistol was stepped down and the gun resheathed in the leather belt.

  “What the devil is so important you risked getting your head blown off?” Alex demanded harshly.

  The old man swallowed noisily and lowered his hands, a signal for the rest of his scrawny body to relax out of its cringed stance, uncrumpling like a folded piece of parchment.

  “Ma name is Anderson, laird. Robert Anderson, an’ I ken the night is short an’ ye’ve a mout O’ work tae dae—”