Page

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  She wished Cora were here. Born in the Lowlands of Scotia, Cora was the daughter of her father’s new leman. She’d impressed Page with her command of both the Highland and English tongues. She was also the first and only friend Page had ever had. Cora would know what they were saying. As it was, Page could only make out that Malcom “would never do it again.” But what it was he was promising never to do again, she couldn’t begin to decipher.

  She watched them together, the way the MacKinnon swept the hair from his son’s eyes, and found herself growing wistful.

  Forsooth, but it was a glorious sight to behold... father and son.

  Would that her own father had been so gentle after a reprimanding. She’d have given much for him to look at her just so... if only once. She sighed then, for she might have simply wished he’d been so gentle in his rebuking of her as the MacKinnon had been with his son. But he hadn’t been, and she couldn’t turn back time.

  There was no sense in weeping over it now.

  It was only that… now, at last, when her father had revealed some glimmer of affection for her—he’d risked Henry’s wrath in bartering for her freedom and that had to count for something—MacKinnon stole the opportunity from her.

  “Ach, ye could set a mon to flames wi’ that glower, lass.”

  Startled, Page’s gaze shot upward to find the old man, Angus, standing over her, arms akimbo as he watched her. She turned her glower upon him then. “Would that I could,” she remarked. “Do you not have something better to do than to ogle me, sir?”

  He further vexed her by chuckling at her question.

  “Prithee, I see little humor in this,” Page hissed at him.

  His eyes crinkled at the corners. “Aye, but there is humor to be seen, for sure, lass,” he returned cryptically.

  Page considered kicking the old man, but she doubted she could reach him from where she sat bound. “Why can you not set me free?” she asked, jerking at the ties that bound her wrists. “Why must I remain bound to this accursed tree? What have you to fear of me?”

  The old man scratched at his beard and shook his head. “I dunno,” he admitted, and proceeded to sit down beside her. He leaned over to whisper, “Ye see … we’ve been wondering just the same thing ourselves.” He lifted his brows and nodded at her, as though he thought she knew what it was he was speaking of.

  Crazed old fool.

  Page narrowed her eyes at him. “Truly?” she asked, sounding taxed. “And what, perchance, did you come up with?”

  Again he chuckled, and leaned to whisper, “No’ a bloody thing, lass.”

  Page snorted, rolling her eyes. “Try an eye for an eye,” she proposed, mocking his laird’s justification. “And make yourself at home, why do you not?” She eyed the ground where he had plopped himself down, and then turned to smile at him grimly. “In fact, if you would be so kind as to unbind my hands,” she suggested in an acidly sweet tone, “I should be verra pleased to run and fetch you a wee dram like a good little lass.” She batted her lashes at him for effect.

  He didn’t laugh so much this time. Instead, he cocked his head reproachfully. “You dinna see me tryin’ to butcher your tongue, now d’ ye?”

  “Ye dinna have to try,” she returned flippantly, smiling fiercely. “I would venture to say you do it quite well naturally.” She lifted a brow. “At any rate, I thought it a rather a good impersonation.”

  Angus made to rise, shaking his head. “Ye are a pawky wench,” he swore, with a grimace. “’Tis a mystery to me as to why the lad feels so beholden to save—”

  “Ye for myself,” the MacKinnon broke in, scowling down at Angus as the old man rose to his feet.

  “Ach, well, you’re welcome to her, Iain. ’Tis glad I am to be leavin’ her to ye. I swear men have died by duller weapons than that vicious tongue o’ hers.”

  Page blinked over the exchange, her gaze flying upward to meet the MacKinnon’s.

  Iain.

  The old man had called him Iain.

  To save her for himself?

  She opened her mouth to speak, but then closed it again. Surely he hadn’t said what she thought he’d said? Or if he had, he couldn’t possibly have meant what she thought he meant. Her brows drew together. He couldn’t... possibly... want her?

  Nay, she decided. So he must be hiding something. The old man had said he felt beholden to save—what? Her? From what?

  “Busy makin’ friends, are ye, lass?” the MacKinnon asked rudely.

  Page blinked, trying to recall every word of the exchange between the two, and nodded her head. “Aye...”

  He lifted a brow, and his beautiful lips turned faintly at the corners. “Wool-gathering now, are ye?”

  Page’s brow furrowed. “I—”

  But she couldn’t remember the question. She peered up at him, frowning, because she wasn’t about to ask the arrogant wretch what it was he’d said.

  He grinned down at her, flashing those white teeth. “’Tis said,” he apprised, “that the mind is oft the first to leave us. Shall we begin the funeral preparations so soon?” He lifted both brows in unison.

  Page’s cheeks flared. “You are the one with silver hair,” she pointed out, averting her gaze, unable to bear his scrutiny an instant longer. He was far too handsome for her own peace of mind.

  “So I am, lass.” She glanced up to spy the gleam of good humor in his gold-flecked eyes, and longed to know how it felt to match wits with him in a friendly manner—as he sometimes did with some of his men. “So I am.”

  “How old are you anyway?” Page flung back at him, curiosity getting the better of her. “Two score years?” She cocked her head, and added sweetly, “More?”

  He merely chuckled at her impudence, and her ire intensified. How dare he be so impervious.

  “No’ so auld as that, lass,” he said, winking. “But auld enough to discern a virgin’s blush—and, I warrant, auld enough to know desire when I see it.”

  He had the audacity to wink at her.

  Page’s gasp was audible, and when she could find her tongue to speak again, her words were strangled with fury. “How dare you!”

  But her cheeks bloomed with heat.

  His grin turned more crooked still. “Well, now, perhaps ’tis because I’m just a barbarous Scotsman. Have ye no’ heard, lass? We’re a randy lot, we Scots.”

  “You’re a crude lot,” she returned. “Feckless, too.”

  “Dinna forget lusty,” he added, and winked again.

  If it was his intent to thoroughly distract her, he was surely succeeding in the endeavor, for she was flustered to her very toes. Page scowled at him. “Foul Scot! Is that all you can think of at a time like this?”

  “Aye.” His smile turned wicked, and his voice softened. “When I’m looking at a bonny lass, ’tis all I can think of.”

  Page was momentarily dumbstruck by his brashness. She averted her gaze, her heartbeat quickening at his shameless cajolery. He was naught more than a smooth-tongued knave to speak such lies.

  And yet...

  “Y-you cannot,” she stammered, and shook her head. “Y-you cannot possibly think me...” She could scarce even speak the word.

  “Bonny?” he supplied.

  Page’s gaze lifted to his.

  He was scowling now, it seemed, staring as though he would see into her very soul, but he said nothing.

  He didn’t answer.

  It was just as she supposed—they were false words from a man who cared naught for her feelings. ’Twas simply his way to be so glib and he couldn’t possibly mean a word that he said... and yet...

  The look in his eyes... the way that he stared...

  Could he think her bonny, in truth?

  Chapter 9

  Iain was staggered by the anguish so apparent in her liquid dark eyes.

  Did she not realize?

  Could she truly not know?

  In truth, he’d meant the words as a ploy, a simple flirtation to distract her, and yet it was the trut
h he’d spoken. Faced with her pain and her sorrow, he forgot where they stood for the moment, forgot that his men were likely to be watching them, forgot that they were supposed to be enemies—he the accursed foe, who’d dared steal her away from her father, she the daughter of the man who’d kidnapped his son.

  Squatting upon his haunches, he reached out to take into his callused hand the disheveled plait of her hair. “Aye, lass,” he whispered. His fingers skimmed the length of the braid. “Ye are bonny. Ye’ve eyes so dark a mon could lose himself in them. And hair...” He came forward, falling upon one knee, reaching out with his other hand to tug free the ribbon that kept her plait bound. He nudged his thumb into the weave of her hair, working the soft strands loose with his fingers. “’Tis lovely,” he murmured as he stroked the unbound locks. “Fine silk against skin that’s ne’er felt the like.”

  For an instant she seemed unable to respond, hanging on his every word like a woman starved, and then she blinked, as though regaining her senses, and wrenched her head back, tugging the lock free from his hand.

  She glared up at him. ’Twill take more than pretty words to move me, Scot.” She lifted a brow in challenge. “If you mean to woo me, you might better begin by unbinding my wrists. They hurt.”

  Iain considered her request, thinking it a well founded grievance. And yet... he didn’t intend to stay awake all night long guarding the troublesome lass. Her chin lifted and she held his gaze, her eyes burning with indignation and ire.

  “I am no animal to be kept fettered!” she persisted.

  “Nay,” Iain agreed, “ye are not, lass.” He sighed. “Verra well.” He leaned forward, reaching about her, stretching his body across hers as he groped blindly around the tree for the ropes at her wrists.

  It was a mistake, he realized. He should have gone around her. Certainly it would have been the sensible thing to do.

  As it was, he found himself embracing her, his chin resting upon her shoulder and his lips far too near the warmth of her neck. Her gasp was almost inaudible. He felt it more than heard it, and then she went wholly still beneath him.

  Iain, too, froze, utterly aware of the woman within his arms.

  It had been much too long since he’d been this close to any female... He could feel her chest rise with her every breath. It was all he could do not to lean into her, inhale the essence of her—that glorious scent that was purely female and wholly intoxicating.

  He had to remind himself who she was—who he was—that they were not alone.

  And still he couldn’t help himself; he lowered his body in an effort to reach the bindings and leaned into her. Trying for a lighthearted tone, he whispered, “You’re no’ busy planning your escape, are ye, lass?”

  She said nothing, and he persisted, although he hadn’t the least notion why he should care. “Promise me you’ll no’ try to escape.” His hands arrested at her back, awaiting her response.

  For an instant longer, she said naught, and then she proposed, “If I cannot promise? Will you still release me?”

  So she was a woman of her word, was she?

  Iain smiled.

  He didn’t know why he felt so driven to protect her, but he knew with a certainty that he’d not let her go. “Nay, lass,” he said against her hair, nudging it away from his face with his chin. A few strands stuck to his lips, and he tasted them, closing his eyes as he imagined the silky curtain unbound and cascading into his face as she kissed him. The scent of her taunted him, aroused in him feelings he’d nearly forgotten. The image made him shudder. Could she be such an innocent not to know how she could affect a man... how she affected him? “I’ll will not,” he murmured, clearing his throat. “Not if you canna promise.”

  Although he knew it was impossible, she seemed to shrink away from him, into the ground beneath him. “In such case,” she answered, somewhat breathlessly, and more than a little flippantly, “I promise not to try.”

  He smiled at her cunning. “You promise not to try?” he repeated, disbelieving her audacity.

  “I believe ’tis what I said, Scot.”

  He couldn’t see her face, but imagined her saucy expression, and Iain chuckled. He nudged aside her hair with his lips, and whispered against her ear, “Verra well, swear you will not escape.”

  She made some keening sound as he brushed her neck with his mouth and wrenched herself away. “Very well! I’ll not escape. Untie me now.”

  Iain chuckled.

  “Get yourself off me!” she demanded. “I cannot bear for you to touch me.”

  His smile faded, and he faltered momentarily. There was a pang in his chest, nearly taking his breath away, as memories of Malcom’s birth flooded his mind. Surely, it wasn’t happening again. Could he have been so wrong in what he spied there beneath her brazen veneer? The feeling of her there before him, warm and briefly uninhibited, served to bring him back from that emotional precipice. Iain’s smile returned at her shiver, for it gave lie to her avowal. She was no less affected by him than he was by her. He’d wager his eyeteeth over it.

  Still she sounded quite desperate, and he didn’t wish to upset her any more than she was already. “And you’ll keep your word?” he persisted.

  He imagined that she rolled her eyes as she said more than a little acerbically, “To the man who broke faith with my father? Certainly. Now get off!”

  Iain chuckled at her wit. “Ye’ve a point,” he ceded, and began at once to untie the bindings at her wrists. “Never mind, I believe I know the perfect solution.”

  Curiosity tinged her words. “You do?”

  She sounded so ill at ease with the prospect. “Somethin’ that should please the both o’ us,” he revealed mischievously. He was looking forward to it himself.

  Page stiffened at his reassurance.

  Something that would please them both?

  She certainly didn’t think so.

  She tried not to panic as she considered every conceivable solution—tried not to consider his thoughts at all. But it was all she could do not to think of the man poised so intimately above her. Nay, he wasn’t lying, precisely, on top of her, though he might as well have been. He shielded her from his weight, but she could feel every inch of his body as though it were melded to her own. And forsooth, never in her life had she been more acutely aware of her own body.

  A lump rose in her throat.

  He’d said she was bonny.

  Could he truly have meant it?

  The possibility made her tremble with... something she shouldn’t be feeling for her enemy. Her brows drew together.

  How could she possibly allow herself to be distracted so easily? Aye, it was his intent to distract her, of a certainty, but did she have to be so blessed accommodating? Nay, he couldn’t possibly have meant a word he’d said, she convinced herself.

  She knew what she looked like—had seen her reflection oft enough to know that she was no enchanting faerie creature, able to steal a man’s heart and soul with a single glance. She was rather unremarkable. Her hair was not the spun gold of the troubadour’s favor, it was the color of dirt; her face was not fair and unblemished, but darkened by the sun and freckled across her nose. Her eyes were not the lucid blue of a summer sky, or the green of a new leaf in spring, just common brown.

  Page felt her heart squeeze at the cruelty of his glib words, and then berated herself for her foolishness. What more could she have expected from a devious, faithless, oath-breaking Scot?

  She bucked beneath him.

  He groaned. “I’d not do that were I you,” he advised.

  “What is taking you so long?” she demanded. “Have you not even the sense to untie a simple knot?”

  “Ach, lass, I’m trying! I dinna tie the accursed thing—and indeed, ’tis no simple knot.” He muttered an unintelligible oath beneath his breath.

  Feeling a little desperate, Page lifted her knee, jabbing him in the thigh. “You’ll need do more than try,” she hissed.

  He made a strangled sound and fel
l atop her as the binds were undone at last. Page twisted beneath him, eager to be free. With hardly any effort and before she could stop him, he had her pinned, her arms spread at her sides and clasped to the ground.

  “That wasna verra nice,” he said, his jaw set firm, and his eyes burning with fury.

  “I did not mean to be nice,” Page said angrily, her eyes stinging with tears she refused to shed. Her nerves were near to shattering. She could not bear another moment of his presence. His eyes continued to bore into her, demanding—what?

  “How could you expect me to be nice?” she asked. “You’ve abducted me from my home, kept me bound to a tree like an animal—and you think I should tender thanks? Please!” she appealed. “Can you not simply set me free?” She couldn’t help herself; tears welled. They spilled from her eyes, down the side of her face, onto the ground. She felt the wetness creep across her neck, and blinked. Could he not see how very much it meant to her to return to her father? “You have your son,” she beseeched him. Another tear slipped past her guard, and she shook her head, losing composure entirely. “I could find my way still,” she pleaded. “Let me go... please?”

  He shook his head, lowering his eyes. “I canna, lass,” he said softly, regretfully. He met her gaze once more, and she spied the determination in his eyes. “I am sorry, but I canna.”

  “You mean you will not?” Page snarled at him.

  He nodded once. “If you will, then, aye, I willna.”

  She swallowed her pride. “But my father,” she entreated, her voice breaking. “He—”

  “Your father is a blackguard,” he said impassionedly, though the blaze in his eyes had extinguished somewhat.

  “He bargained with you in good faith.”