Highland Redemption

by Lori Ann Bailey

  “What do ye mean?”

  “Why am I no’ at Stirling?” She stood, legs apart, hands fisted on her hips, foot still tapping.

  “I dinnae ken yer question. I pulled ye from the back of Ross’s wagon.”

  “Why was I in the wagon?”

  He shook his head. “I dinnae ken.”

  “Then why were ye there to take me out?” The moon provided just enough light for him to see her eyes narrow on him.

  “I am no’ prepared to explain that. Why did Ross abduct ye?”

  There had been a time when he could tell her everything, but she’d been gone so long he didn’t know her anymore. Her uncle’s clan were Royalists, or at least they were supposed to be; he’d spent years trying to determine if they were loyal to the king and his clan’s religion. Even if he could trust her, though, he and his laird had decided to tell only a small few of his true assignment.

  Hell, she would probably be safer if he took her back to Stirling now. But what if she could finally put to rest the questions he still had about her uncle? If he kept her close, she might reveal the MacDonald’s secrets. And she might be his only link to discovering the truth of Ross’s political sympathies. Either Ross or her uncle must be the traitor he’d been trying to unmask.

  “I have no idea. I dinnae even ken who Ross is.” She started pacing, shaking her arms out again. His gaze followed her, taking in the full curves of a woman—she’d grown without him. He wished he could see if her eyes were still the same shade of emerald, if they sparked as they once had when she’d defended him from his brothers, only now with anger at him.

  Skye continued, “I did hear them say something about trading me to my uncle for something they wanted.” She fisted her hands on hips that had widened only slightly but made her waist look smaller than it had at sixteen summers. “I need to get back. My uncle willnae ken what has happened to me.”

  “We cannae go back. They will be looking for ye.” Aye, she was a complication he didn’t need, but he was well and truly immune to her, so he’d have no trouble spending time with Skye until he got what he needed. And he knew all her weaknesses; surely he could charm the information out of her then return her to her uncle. She was a sore part of his past—and there was no place for her in his future.

  “Well, I cannae stay here with ye.”

  Och, she still had a stubborn streak, but at one time, she’d trusted him. “Ye can and ye will.”

  Skye could be the key to keeping his clan safe.

  “Ye are a treacherous rogue.” She pointed her finger at him. “I wouldnae stay with ye if ye were the last man on earth.” She stepped forward, invading his space, but he stood his ground. “Ye used me and tossed me aside.”

  What the hell was she talking about? The words cut the place inside he’d blocked off and thought long dead. Returning Skye to Stirling and forgetting he’d seen her would be the easiest thing he could do, but if he could pry the answers he needed from her, he could move on to his next mission.

  “Take me back to my uncle.”

  Lacing the words with authority, he brought his gaze to hers. “Ye will stay with me until I ken ye are safe.”

  Aye, he would keep her close until he discovered why the MacLeans were after her and whether her uncle could be trusted. It was now his duty to deliver Skye safely to the MacDonald clan and to keep peace with them, but only if their laird truly was loyal to their cause. If not, he would deposit Skye with the Cameron laird and let him decide what to do with her.

  Chapter Three

  Damn him.

  Steeling her resolve, Skye pulled back her shoulders, “Where are we?”

  “A few hours out from Stirling.”

  “What now?”

  “There is an inn not too much farther ahead. We will stay there for what little is left of the night.” Did his lips just curl up at the edges?

  “Well, let’s go then. ’Tis cold.” If there were another way out, she would take it, even if she had to bargain with the devil himself. She had better odds with Satan than with Brodie Cameron. The fallen angel would only take her soul. Brodie would take everything.

  Telling herself she was not the fool she had once been, that she could keep her distance as long as she kept reminding herself he was a treacherous rogue, she prepared herself for the feel of his chest against her back when they continued on.

  She inched toward the horse as he reached out to offer his hand. Hesitating briefly, she took it and barely managed not to recoil from his touch. She froze as the calluses that marred his palms brushed her fingertips. They were the same ones that had been there when he’d worked the crops and tended to the animals with her father. They were the same hands that had held hers as they’d made plans to build their own home not far from her father’s, and the same ones that had caressed her more than willing naked body as they’d lain together.

  How proud she’d been that he was a hard worker—she’d been so certain he would care for and protect and provide for her and the family they had planned. Once it had been all she desired. Now those dreams were dead. He’d proven to be unreliable, and she needed someone who would be around for her when tragedy struck.

  Visions intruded of the day her world had fallen apart, the fear, the loneliness, and the uncertainty as fate took her father and left her with no one to count on but a family from a faraway island she barely knew. Brodie should have been there.

  “’Twill no’ take long to get to the inn,” he said as he jumped up behind her.

  “We will get some rest, and I’ll find a way to get back to my uncle in the morning,” she said more to reassure herself than him.

  “I’ll get a missive to the MacDonald tomorrow and let him ken ye are safe.”

  “’Tis no’ necessary. I will return tomorrow.” She sat up straighter to put more distance between them, but his arm remained locked firmly around her midsection, preventing her from inching forward.

  “Nae, ye willnae. That was Ross and Neil MacLean who tossed ye into the back of that wagon. They are no’ men to underestimate. Neil recognized me, so they will be on our trail soon. I willnae allow ye to walk right back into their hands.”

  Brodie’s tone was clipped and stern, but one word caught and held her attention. MacLean. Why did she know that name?

  Her thoughts turned to the authority projected in his words. He had always had a playful nature, but his tenor indicated he had hardened over the years. When Brodie set his mind to a task, there was no changing it.

  Something shuffled in the woods and an owl hooted. She studied the unfamiliar dark landscape, her gaze darting from tree to tree, expecting something to fly out at them. Fighting the urge to let go of the horse and take Brodie’s hands, she grabbed the folds of her skirt.

  “Tis long overdue we discuss what happened between us,” he said.

  Her breath seized and she might have toppled off the horse if his grip hadn’t increased with his resolve. She didn’t want to discuss anything with him, especially not their past.

  …

  After arriving at the inn, Brodie dismounted and helped Skye do the same, then he found a tall, thin lad stretched out on a pallet in the stables and woke him. The boy grunted, but grudgingly took the horse and led it into the small space. Brodie took her hand and drew her toward the small inn. He pounded on the door until a bleary eyed man opened it, looked them up and down suspiciously, and stood back to let them enter.

  Warm air washed over her as Brodie released her hand and held the door for her to enter straight into a public area with tables cleared and cleaned in preparation for the morning meal. The inn was small, and despite the pleasant temperature, the hearth on the inside was dark, indicating the fire had been banked or died out long ago. Och, it was almost time to be rising.

  The exhaustion of the evening’s events overwhelmed her.

  “We are in need of a room,” Brodie said.

  “Two rooms,” she clarified.

  The tall, gaunt man looked back and
forth between them then lingered a moment on Brodie. “Sorry, lass, we have guests, and only have one small room available.” His features softened, and he looked apologetic.

  “We will take it,” Brodie said before she could voice the protest that was bubbling up in her throat. “’Twill save us from having to argue.” One eyebrow rose as he dared her to question him.

  “Ye will be sleeping on the floor, then.”

  “We will sort it out,” he said as he took the oil lamp and key that the man offered.

  Brodie passed some coins along to him. More than she thought necessary. She didn’t understand what he was doing until he said, “Someone may come looking for us. He wishes the lass harm. Dinnae alert him to our presence.”

  The innkeeper nodded as the coins jingled in his hands. A satisfied grin passed his lips as the coins disappeared beneath his plaid.

  “Up the stairs. Second door on the left. It’s small, but clean.”

  The innkeeper yawned, and she found herself doing the same, despite thoughts of sharing a room with Brodie.

  “It will do.” He seized her hand and dragged her on numb legs across the room and up the stairs, acting as if she still belonged to him, as if he had the right to touch her whenever he pleased.

  Her heart beat faster with each step they took. How was she going to spend the remaining hours of the night trapped in a room with him?

  The door swung inward, and he twirled her around to enter first, his large frame blocking any escape she might yet try to mount. She froze and he knocked into her, apparently not expecting her sudden stop.

  The room was smaller than the storage rooms in the kitchens at her uncle’s castle. One bed was pushed up against the outer wall, and an undersize table was the only other piece of furniture. There was barely room to stand, much less for Brodie to lie on the floor. He was a large man.

  Either she would have to take the floor huddled up in a ball, or she would have to share the bed with him. Sighing, she closed her eyes and said a quick prayer for the strength to make it through the next few hours.

  …

  Brodie didn’t even try to stop the corners of his mouth from twisting up when he saw the room and heard her gasp of surprise. Either the innkeeper had been telling the truth, and it was the last room he had, or he’d been very generous. He would have to thank the man when they left; the extra coins he had given the innkeeper weren’t enough. At least in this small space he could be confidant that Skye wouldn’t be able to sneak away without his notice.

  His reason for keeping her so close became selfish, as he wanted answers to more than just questions of clan loyalties.

  She had left him without a word and had gone with her uncle to the Isle of Skye, the island she’d been named for. Brodie had followed after her, but her uncle’s men had kept him away, insisting she refused to see him. Within weeks, Skye was betrothed to another. Her uncle had schemed for a political match for her—of that he was certain. But if she’d still had feelings for him, she was headstrong enough that she would have fought for him and refused to marry another. That she had forgotten him so quickly was proof of her rejection.

  Aye, she was a deceiver, and he had no qualms using her to get all the information he needed, no matter what it took.

  Nudging her into the room, he stepped in behind and held the lamp up to take in the space, then set it on a small table by the bed. The door clicked as it shut behind them, and he turned to bolt it. Ross and Neil were out there somewhere.

  Skye would have to take the side of the bed near the wall so she’d have to climb over him to leave—with her reluctance to stay with him, and her insistence on returning to Stirling, he didn’t trust her to not flee into the night. She’d left him before when she’d claimed to love him. What would stop her now that she carried around such ill feelings toward him?

  “This isnae going to work, Brodie.”

  “’Twill be fine. We just need rest. I promise I willnae touch ye…” He couldn’t resist giving her his best wolfish grin. “Unless ye ask me to.”

  “Ye willnae touch me? I have heard tales of yer prowess in bed.” She kept her heated glare on him as she waited for a response.

  He could see how much the rumors had hurt her, but he’d never give away that his reputation as a wastrel and a rake was merely a cover. If his secrets were exposed, Argyll, the leader of the Covenanter forces, would hunt him down.

  “And ye, have ye been with many, lass?”

  Her cheeks reddened as she pursed her lips. There were flames dancing in her eyes. “When I give myself to someone, it means something. Too bad yer standards are no’ so high.”

  Without really answering his question, she took the one step to drop onto the bed. After removing her shoes, she placed them at the foot of the bed and kept her gaze averted.

  Stretching out, she slid, fully dressed, under the covers and turned away from him to face the wall.

  He looked down at her slight form—she’d been the only thing that had come easy to him as a youth. He had been pitted against his brothers for everything else he’d ever wanted, and other than losing her, he’d done well for himself, even garnering the respect of the former Cameron Laird, the uncle who had recruited him to the Royalist cause so many years ago.

  But the biggest battle was ahead, and it wasn’t with his family or the Covenanters, and it wouldn’t be fighting with stubborn, hard-headed Skye as he attempted to pry her uncle’s secrets from her. Every minute Skye spent with him put her life in danger.

  Chapter Four

  Light streamed in through the window, but Skye couldn’t tell what time it was. Sleep had eluded her. There was so little room on the small cot that she was afraid to move, even though the cold stung her feet and nose. In his sleep, Brodie had slung his arm over her and scooted closer, and she welcomed the warmth, but she couldn’t let him inch his way back to into her life.

  As of yesterday, she was promised to another.

  The events of the evening before kept replaying in her head. Those memories had taken her back to the wedding celebration last night as she stood on the edge of the dance floor and watched the happy couple. Recognizing the emotions swirling in the bride’s eyes as her new husband held her close and twirled her around the floor—devotion, trust, and love—she’d turned away.

  Utter foolishness.

  Fighting the urge to rush to the lass’s side and shake reason into the girl, she’d studied the tapestry that hung on the castle wall depicting the victory of Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn and thought of her own triumph against the demons that had held her captive for years. Sure, she would wed, but the best she could hope for in a marriage was casual indifference or maybe friendship. She’d given up on a union born of silly childish dreams and hope for the kind of love she’d seen shimmer in the depths of her parents’ gazes. Her mother had been the daughter of a laird and her father a simple Cameron farmer, but they hadn’t let those differences come between them. They had been each other’s worlds.

  Now, she was resigned to a marriage built on a foundation of Royalist unity and the blood of her kin, who were massacred by Covenanter soldiers at the orders of Sir Duncan Campbell of Auchinbreck. Alliances with other Royalist clans were becoming more important as tensions rose between those who were loyal to King Charles, and the men, like the Duke of Argyll, who supported the Presbyterian Covenants as the sole religion of Scotland.

  Often, she awakened, covered in sweat, when her dreams took her to the horrors she’d heard tales of—hundreds of Catholic MacDonald women of Rathlin Island begging for their lives, and the piercing screams that must have spilled from their lips as the Covenanter soldiers of Argyll’s Foot pushed them over the cliffs to the rocks and surf below.

  If she could save others by forming an alliance with another clan, so be it. Despite living with the Cameron clan as a child, she owed her uncle, the MacDonald laird, and their people a debt because they had taken her in and given her a new life. At least her uncle had given her a c
hoice of men.

  Skye’s gaze caught on a colorful celebratory tapestry depicting the coronation of Mary, Queen of Scots. The crowning of the ill-fated queen had taken place in this very castle. The Catholic monarch had been imprisoned and forced to give up her throne because of her religion and then hunted down by her son’s own men. Skye understood betrayal, but, unlike the queen, she knew when something she wanted was not worth the fight.

  “And here she is.” Her uncle’s voice broke into her reverie as he dipped his head to place a kiss on her cheek. “This is Collin MacPherson. Collin, ’tis my niece, the bonniest lass in all of Scotland and a mirror image of her mother.”

  Turning toward Collin, she tipped her chin slightly and peeked up at his intense hazel eyes. They didn’t make her heart skip a beat and weren’t the eyes of the man she’d once given her love to.

  This man was safe. Discovering he lived in his family’s castle with multiple cousins and other family members, she agreed right away to the marriage. Even if she didn’t grow to care for the man, it wouldn’t matter because she would never be alone again.

  “Collin, dance with my bonny niece. She’s quite graceful.” Her uncle smacked the man, who was a good three inches shorter than him, on the back. Unprepared, the blow pushed him forward and nearly toppled him over.

  Despite his reserved nature, Collin was light on his feet. “What do ye think of Stirling Castle?” she asked.

  “It isnae like home. We arrived early to make preparations for the upcoming meeting in Edinburgh.”

  “I heard the meeting will take place in June. Will ye be going?”

  “Nae, my father and oldest brother will be. My other brother will keep watch over the clan while they are gone, and I’ll probably be left to settle disputes.” He winked lightheartedly.

  “Do ye think the Royalists and Covenanters will find a way we can live in peace?”

  “Nae, but there is always hope.”

  They danced by the newly married couple and delighted chatter reached her ears. Nae, she would never have the bride’s infatuated look in her gaze, but she would be well cared for, safe, and content to live her life with the cordial third son of a laird who wouldn’t be required to produce heirs.