by Alisa Adams
Lawrence’s eyes went back to the girl. The chickens had not awakened her. She had not stirred. But then he saw a slight movement. His eyes strayed down her legs to her feminine, delicate feet and the barely perceptible twitch of her foot. She was barefoot, like the rest of them. His boots were laid out, drying in the sun back down the beach near the cave.
He put his hands on his hips as he stared down at her. He did not want this problem. And he knew she was a problem. He would bet all the gold on the ship that this girl meant trouble.
He nudged her with his big toe.
She laughed softly in her sleep and swished her hand lazily at her waist where he had nudged her.
Lawrence frowned and nudged her again, harder this time.
“Tommy, dejar de—stop it,” she murmured sleepily in a thick Castilian accent, refusing to open her eyes.
Lawrence cleared his throat loudly and waited, wondering who Tommy was.
Darling MacRae DeLeon slowly opened her eyes at the rough poking at her waist. She raised a hand to shield her eyes from the sun and looked up to see a man towering over her. She sat up quickly as she eyed the huge man. Startled, she looked down at the weight in her lap to see the calf. She gently moved the sleeping young calf off her lap and set it carefully on the sand with a soft caress of her hand as she kept her eyes on the man. She assessed him quickly.
Not my mother’s murderer, her mind registered. Much too big and brawny.
He wore a large cotton tunic and breeks. The tunic was belted at his narrow hips and fell to mid-thigh. The sleeves were voluminous down to his wrists, where they were gathered tightly in a slight ruffle in contrast to his strong, tanned hands. The neckline was wide and open over his broad chest, with a single loose tie at his neck. Under the tunic, he wore a pair of breeks that came to his knees. They showed his muscular thighs and strong, tanned calves. He had a sword that was carried over his back in a belted leather baldric, with several smaller daggers and sgian dubhs in the wide leather belt he wore low around his hips.
She observed him as the man sighed and ran a large hand through his shoulder-length brown, wavy hair. His hair was not totally brown, for she could see it had a myriad of golden streaks all throughout it, probably from being out on the sea for so many years. He had a faint scar along the edge of his cheekbone and another over his temple, which was visible when the breeze blew his hair about. Something was intriguing about his features and within his eyes. Strong, tired, filled with exhaustion, and maybe a hint of worry. As if he carried the weight of the world on his broad shoulders.
He stared curiously back at her with those eyes. They were the brightest, most piercing blue eyes she had ever seen. They were under golden-brown eyebrows that were like a slash above his eyes, rimmed with dark lashes. She marveled that his eyes were made even bluer by his white teeth as he opened his mouth to speak to her, but then seemed to change his mind on what he wanted to say. Her eyes stayed on his mouth. He had full expressive lips that were now thinned in annoyance. He ran one large hand over his chin and jaw which were covered in a hint of dark stubble. She watched as he sighed again and turned his head away from her. His sharp blue eyes scanned the sea’s horizon, coming to rest on the wreckage of his ship, smashed against the rocks. His eyes narrowed to mere blue slits.
A group of dark clouds raced across the sky, blocking out the sun and bringing the winds up stronger. The man looked up at the clouds, shielding his eyes from the sand spray brought by the winds.
He turned back to pin her with his blue eyes. “Ye were on ma ship,” he stated in a soft burr.
Darling’s eyebrows rose. This is the captain! She knew this voice. He had kept his crew calm throughout the storm.
She slowly rose to her feet. She glanced down at herself, for she was clad only in her shift. She had taken her gown off and set it to dry, but it was at the top of the beach, too far to grab quickly and don. She covered her breasts with her arms as she looked at him.
“Si, Capitan,” she said in a husky voice. She raised her chin and smiled tightly as the sea winds blew her dark hair and whipped it out behind her. Her pale skirt snapped in the breeze and wrapped itself around her hips and thighs and curled between her calves. She tried unsuccessfully to pull her skirt free from between her legs, but the wind was too strong. She gave up with a huff and pushed her hair out of her face in annoyance. “I was on the San Gabriel. But it is not your ship” She took another breath as her mind raced with images of the storm, of her mother being killed, of the screaming horses, and the snapping of the wooden beams on the ship as it fought through the storm. His fault. All of it.
Lawrence narrowed his eyes. She had a mass of dark, long hair that the wind was happily playing with. Her large brown eyes flashed irately at him underneath delicately arched brows. Her face was tinged by the sun and her fervent anger. His eyes drifted down to her lips, which looked impossibly fuller now that she was awake. Her whole body was bristling with her fury. He looked down that body, noting how her skirt outlined the length of her long, shapely legs as the breeze blew her skirts about.
She saw where his eyes were and grabbed her skirt, flapping it angrily as she cleared her throat at him, waiting for a response with one eyebrow arched.
Lawrence shook himself. “Nae ma ship? What dae ye mean by that, lass?”
“Es el barco de mi padre!” She spoke in a heated flurry of Castilian as her eyes flashed angrily.
“Speak English, lass!”
She huffed and then took a calming, deep breath of the salty-tinged air. She straightened her spine as the wind came up stronger, whipping her hair out behind her and pushing the clouds faster in the bruised sky above. Sunshine flooded their patch of the beach as she pointed out to sea to the ship’s wreckage that was resting against the rocks just offshore.
She stood tall, looking at Lawrence in the eye.
“That is mi padre’s.” She paused and sighed as she tried to restrain her anger and spoke again, slower, and calmer this time. “The San Gabriel is my father’s ship. It is a Castilian ship. Not yours, Capitan. You are a Scot.”
2
Lawrence gritted his jaw and looked out to the sea’s horizon once again. It was a habit he had developed since he escaped to sea as a boy, eager to become a man and get away from his brutal uncle after his father had deserted him. Here. At this very place where he had been born. Kinlochervie.
He turned back to the young woman as the sea winds tousled his shoulder-length, golden-brown, wavy hair back from his head and pressed his loose shirt against his chest, outlining the corded muscles there. “’Tis nae a ship that belongs tae anyone now.” His voice was low, his Scottish accent deep and melodious.
Darling took a step and looked up into his face. “That is not an answer.” She pointed a finger at him as her breasts rose and fell rapidly with her indignation. “You stole it. From mi padre,” she said rapidly as her accent grew stronger.
Lawrence stared down at her. He took a deliberate step to come up against her finger, which was now pressing against his chest. “Dinnae speak tae me in this way,” he said in a firm, husky burr with one brow raised. “I am the captain, and I am also the laird here.” He looked down at her finger, still pressed against his shirt. He spoke softly, in a warning tone, “Are ye daring tae rile ma temper, lass?”
She pulled her hand away with a scowl up at him.
“You are the laird here?” she said with a soft laugh. “Si, I believe I am trying to rile your temper, mi capitan.” She spread her arms wide as the sea breeze surrounded her and billowed her full sleeves about. “Where is here?” She looked around at the desolate patch of sandy beach, the huge rocks rising out of the sea just offshore, ready to snare any ship, like theirs, and the tall, straight-faced cliffs that dominated the majority of the coastline. She met his eyes once again.
“Here,” he said roughly, “is ma land. This is Kinlochervie. The home of ma father.” He gritted his teeth, knowing his Scottish burr thickened when he was riled. �
�Kinlochervie is the home of my father,” he said, pronouncing his words better. “The MacLeod keep is around here, somewhere,” he said, looking around trying to get his bearings off the different landmarks that were familiar, and yet not.
“You do not remember where your home is?” she asked as she looked up at him with wide, unbelieving eyes. “You lost the San Gabriel and your home as well?”
“’Twas lang ago since I was last in Kinlochervie,” he said in a gruff voice with his brow arched at her. He was taken off guard by her question, or rather, accusation. “The MacLeods’ keep—Kinloch Keep—has been deserted for many years noo, but it is here. We are close,” he said in a clipped voice. “I have come back tae reclaim it. If the Sutherland or MacKenzie Clans have pushed north and taken it, then I plan tae fight for it. But ’tis remote, so I dinnae fear this.” He spoke brusquely as he looked down his nose at her, trying to maintain his distance both mentally and physically from this dark-haired, dark-eyed Castilian woman.
Darling looked all around her again. “You meant to come here? You meant to crash the San Gabriel here?” she said with surprise and the hint of a grin.
Lawrence gritted his teeth and pushed his hand through his hair. His eyes narrowed as he stared at the outspoken young woman in front of him who had dared to speak to him without any of the respect he was used to.
“’Twas a vera bad storm,” he said through his teeth. “It took the ship from me. I was trying tae sail into the auld harbor of Kinlochervie, but the storm swept us past the harbor.” His words were stilted, angry. Bitter.
He would not meet her eyes. He suddenly remembered the years before his sweet and gentle mother had died. She had loved to tease him, saying he was always so serious. She would take any bad situation and make it seem funny. But she had never fully recovered from his birth. When she died, she took her light and laughter with her. And then his father had left without a word, deserting his son. When he did not return, Lawrence had been sent to his uncle in the far reaches of the Caithness Highlands. His uncle had proven to be a brutal, cruel man, telling him that his father had left because he had never loved his mother or cared about his son. Lawrence had no reason to think otherwise. He left his uncle as soon as he was barely old enough to join the crew of a merchant ship in the local harbor. The sea had been his home ever since, and he had risen rapidly through the ranks.
Darling stared at him, studying his angry face, his bitter expression, and tightly clamped jaw with the hint of stubble on his face’s hard lines. His hands were clenched into tight fists. She looked up and stared deeply into his eyes. They are sad, she thought with surprise. Her anger lessened for a moment, and her instinct was to soothe and console him.
She stepped even closer and patted his arm as she looked up at him. “You are not a very good sailing man, Capitan. Put your terrible sailing skills away in a box in your mind; do not waste your concern on that. But there is good, for I have to think you were a successful pirate from all the gold you had on the ship.” She smiled as she continued to pat his arm. “Did you wreck your own ship, and then you had to steal my father’s?” She nodded as if confirming her own question and continued on, oblivious to his look of shock as he stared down at her. She spoke rapidly and dramatically, her husky voice tinged with her passion. “Si, you were trying to sail home after all these years of being away, giving up your terrible ways of pirating, and then you wrecked your own ship and had no way to get home. You had no choice but to steal a ship to get to the home you loved mucho, mucho dearly and left so long ago, to reclaim your lairdship.”
Lawrence looked down at the woman’s hand on his arm with his brows raised in stunned surprise. He was not giving up sailing! And he was a good sailor! A good captain. He was an admiral, in fact, with letters of marque on behalf of the Scottish Crown to go after pirates. Many men fought to prove their worthiness to be part of his crew. They are not pirates. Not really. He and his men were known to be the best of Scotland’s privateers! He just needed a home base, and the old deserted Kinloch Keep built by his father was perfect. He looked down at her hand again. She was petting his arm. He looked at her eyes. She was not trying to irritate him. It seemed she was trying to console him. He growled deep in his chest.
“Why were ye on ma ship?” he asked her brutally as he pulled his arm away from her gentle touch.
She pulled back as if he had struck her. Her hands slammed down on her hips as her anger flooded back, and she remembered why she was so irate with this man. He may not be the murderer, but one of his men was. That is why she had ended up here.
“Si, why should I feel any concern for you, for how could I forget?” she whispered in a harsh voice as angry tears came to her eyes. “One of your men, el asesino mi madre,” she declared in a choked voice, warring between sadness and fury and injustice. “And robo mi caballo,” she added as a tear coursed down her cheek.
Lawrence’s eyes widened. “Did ye just say that one of ma men murdered yer mither? To steal yer horse?” He stopped himself from shouting, but his voice was loud, incredulous. His eyes narrowed. His fists came to rest on his hips as he leaned down towards her face. He spoke softly from between gritted teeth, “We arenae murderers!”
His men would have recognized that the tone of his voice was a warning to his enemies. This woman did not seem to care, however.
Darling impatiently swiped her tears off her face with both hands. She put her hands back on her hips, mimicking his stance. The wind continued to whip around her as if sensing the stirring of her impassioned anger.
“Why should I believe you are not murderers?” she said firmly as she stepped up to him, suddenly slamming both hands against his broad chest, forcing him to take a step back in surprise. “You stole mi padre’s ship!” She slammed her hands against his chest again as he took another step back. “And it looks like you stole horses. My horse,” she said as she curled her fingers tightly and slammed her fists against his chest. Then she flung an arm wide, pointing up the beach to the herd of horses guarded by the big, black mare. “And you stole jewelry and gold too! I saw it. I heard you!” She slammed her fists fiercely against his chest again, but this time he did not move; his chest felt like an iron wall. She lifted her hands and hit him again, with every bit of strength she could muster.
Lawrence grabbed her fists in his big hands to stop her from striking him. She had not hurt him, of course. She had continued to press his temper to its edge, however.
He stepped up to her while she stood fast, glaring back at him. He leaned down into her heated face and looked into her flashing, dark eyes. “We are nae murderers,” he hissed, maintaining his calm with the sheer force of his will. He pulled her closer and watched as her eyes widened as he leaned in even closer to say, “And the gold and jewels were a’ready on the ship when I took it, lass.”
Her eyes widened as she struggled to pull her hands free. “Let me go!” she said forcefully as she tried to pull away. She could not free her hands, and although his hold did not hurt her, his strength frightened her. She glanced up at his face as she writhed and pulled in a panic. “You...you...pirate!” she said with a cry. “You evil, villainous, murderous pirate! You are all the lowest creatures on this earth! I know what you want! Mi madre warned me of men like you. You will not take my innocence! I will not let you! I will die fighting you!” she said furiously. “Let go of me!” She kicked out at him as she pulled this way and that in his hold.
Lawrence was so startled he let go of her hands so quickly she fell backward into the sand. She looked up at him with wide eyes as her breasts heaved under her stays with her angry breathing. He stood there, looking down at her as he worked to control his own temper.
“I would never do such a thing, lass,” he said in a gruff, soft burr. He looked away from her breasts as he helped her to her feet. He stood up straight, looking down into her eyes with all the calmness he could muster. How she had managed to shake his normally serene military countenance, he did not know. “Neither m
y men nor I are murderers, nor are we ravagers of young maidens,” he said stiffly as his Highland burr thickened. He took a step back, nodding his head civilly to her as he kept both hands at his sides. He was giving her space. “Your overwhelming emotions seemed tae have affected me.”
Darling looked up at him with her long lashes batting furiously as she tried to calm her breathing. She was relieved that he had stepped back. She had to acknowledge that he had not hurt her. Somehow deep within her, she had known that this captain—this calm leader of men throughout the journey and in that frightening storm—would not have harmed her when she struck him repeatedly, no matter how feeble her strikes. Still, something about this captain made her lose control over her emotions.
Darling had always fought the wild, dramatic emotions that she had seen all too frequently in her mother. Her mother often became frequently and suddenly out of control and began sobbing. It always had something to do with her father’s visits. She was obsessed with seeing him and demanding they talk in private away from Darling. When he left, it was always the same. There would be days of her mother weeping, inconsolable, her body wracked with her sobs, unable to do anything.
Darling had tried her whole life to keep her emotions hidden. To put them away in a secret box in her mind. To always be calm, collected, serene, and not reactive like her hot-blooded mother.
She was failing hugely now, however, for she could not be calm. Not after watching her mother be killed and her horse taken. Not after watching her mother’s locket be ripped from her throat. But she would not tell the captain that part. She would find the locket. She would find out what was so important that it was her mother’s dying words—to look inside the locket—before anyone else did. It was her mother’s wish.
She swallowed tightly, trying in vain to control her seething anger. “And my horse? And the other horses?” She pulled her stays needlessly up over her breasts and flicked the pale skirt of her shift back into place with an annoyed snap of the fabric.
