And for the briefest moment, he considered allowing her to go. To be on her way and remove herself from his protection. All she’d done up to that point was make his life infinitely more difficult. Was it not better to be rid of her?
He could not be blamed for it, either, as she was the one who’d been headstrong and foolish. Sore feelings had led her to this? Well, good riddance, then. He’d done all he could.
This went through his mind in the amount of time it took to blink.
Then, he moved forward. She was not going to get away from him. Not when he’d been through so much for her. Not when he’d come to care whether she lived or died. And whether she was happy while she did so, which was almost entirely beyond his ability to understand.
Indeed, the thought of never seeing her again—and of not being able to apologize for his nasty words—rather pained him.
Which was why the sight of her walking no more than a few minutes upriver lit his world as though she were the sun itself. She walked slowly, taking care to avoid the worst of the mud left behind by heavy rain. Not the stride of a woman in a great hurry.
Instead of clutching her close to him, as he wanted so much to do, he demanded, “Where have ye been? Did ye not think I would wake and notice ye missing?”
She turned quickly enough to nearly topple, only keeping herself from doing so by thrusting an arm out and catching herself on a low-hanging limb. “You startled me,” she gasped, one hand over her heaving chest.
“And ye nearly killed me, by sneaking off while I was sleeping!”
“I did no such thing! I was not sneaking anywhere!”
He made a show of bowing deeply before sheathing his dirk. “Och, then. My mistake. Ye were merely taking the air while I was not awake, and ye didna bother yourself to wake me with a warning.”
“I merely wished to see where the bridge sat, and whether the water had gone down low enough for us to cross.”
This was a lie. He knew her well enough by this time to see the way her eyes lowered whenever she told one. She thought she was clever, and he was willing to grant that she had her moments, but she was not half as clever as she believed at this moment.
Instinct warned him against challenging her, however, no matter how badly he wanted to do so. He’d already broken something between them with his caustic words and would only make things worse if he pressed her to tell him the truth. He’d found her, and that would have to be enough.
He looked upriver, where the nearest bridge was barely visible in the distance. “It seems we ought to be able to cross easily enough,” he observed. “I can see clear space between the underside and the river’s surface. We’ll make it.”
“I’m glad.” Yet she did not look it, and she certainly did not sound as though she was. In fact, had he not known better he would have guessed she’d just received terrible news.
“What is it? Is this not what ye want? To finally reach safety?”
“Safety?” She let out a snort before turning away and drawing the cloak about her shoulders to ward off the chill which left her shivering. “Is that what you believe?”
“What were ye really doing out here?” he asked, as it made no difference. She would hate him either way—her derisive tone told him as much, and they were nearing the end of the journey, so it mattered little now. He was wrong to think it would.
She did not hesitate a moment. “I was going to run away. I was all but decided on the matter.”
His jaw clenched, as did his fists, but he managed somehow to restrain himself. “What stopped ye?”
“I must admit, I do not know. It would have been the wiser course of action to run, would it not have been?”
“Why would ye run away now, when we’re so close to reaching the castle? We’ve come so far. Why throw it away?”
“You do not understand, and you never will.” She turned her head to him, fixing him with a tired, scornful stare. “We are going to your home. Where you have a life, a position. Respect. I have nothing, and I never will. I have no skill. I have no one to speak for me, to recommend me for a position somewhere. I cannot even show my face. How could I make a life anywhere when Jacob Stuart will surely be coming for me?”
“Richard will—”
“Richard will do nothing,” she predicted, sounding even more tired than she did before. As though the weight of the entire world rested upon her shoulders and she wanted nothing more than to release that weight, to be free. “He will do nothing for me. Why should he? I mean nothing to him. And I cannot tell him why the Stuarts had me. I simply cannot.”
He shook his head hard, fast, as though shaking water from his hair—or from his head, which might as well have been underwater for all the sense her words made. “I dinna understand. Why not?”
She scoffed, looking across the river again. In spite of the cloak she’d drawn close around her shoulders and arms, a shiver ran through her. If he could only offer her his warmth…
“If you wish for your laird to know how Jacob Stuart’s men happened to find me, I will not cross the bridge with you. If telling him the truth means so much, I understand. But you cannot expect me to be part of that. Not when I know not whether he will accept me.”
“I know him. I’ve known him all my life. He’s like my brother.”
“Not my brother. Not even my friend. He is nothing to me, and I am nothing to him. Do you understand what I mean? I might be on my way to more of what I left behind.”
“He would never. Dinna even think it. I would leave his guard and his lands if he were the sort who was capable of such a thing.”
She shook her head, eyes rolling. “Even if he would not allow me to live in my own filth for days on end, there is a strong chance he will not take well to knowing what I was part of. I need you to promise you will not tell him—or I will not cross that bridge with you. We shall part ways here.”
He groaned. “Och, ye put me in an impossible position!”
“I would say I’m sorry, but I am not.”
“That comes as no surprise.”
He crouched by the water’s edge, splashing some of it on his face to wash away any blood which might have seeped from his wound while he took his ill-advised rest. Really, he wished to turn away from her for a moment, to busy himself while his brain struggled to make sense of what she said.
Lie to Richard. Lie to Richard! He would as soon cut off his hand. He owed Richard everything, and they’d never been anything but honest with one another. How could they behave otherwise when so much of importance rested on their ability to trust?
It would mean leaving her behind, here, on the other side of the river. How could he? “Now that we’ve spent so much time together, I must admit I canna easily let ye go,” he muttered, looking across the water to avoid looking at her. Safety and peace and rest were on the other side, beyond the line of spruce and the hills behind them. It was right there, just beyond his reach.
He ought to have been on horseback by now, crossing the bridge, finishing his journey with the satisfaction of knowing he’d protected her and brought her home.
Whose home? He had not considered it, and more was the pity. He deserved her scorn for not having taken a moment to see things through her eyes.
Or through Richard’s. What would he think if he learned what her people had been engaged in while she was being kidnapped?
“Ricard Munro is a man of great honor,” he explained, thinking aloud more than speaking directly to her. “He would not turn away someone in need. Especially a woman.”
“But…”
He growled. “But I dinna know how he would feel about your… past.”
She snorted. “Well said.”
“How would ye prefer I say it?” He looked back over his shoulder, wondering why he’d been at all concerned when he woke to find her gone. She would have done him a great favor if she’d taken off on her own.
Her eyes widened, most likely at the fury in his voice. “Forgive me. I ought not to be
devil you.”
He turned away again, both surprised that she would apologize and disgusted in general at the tangled mess in which she left him. He could not risk Richard turning her away, leaving her to suffer and most likely die at Jacob Stuart’s hand.
He could not betray his friend.
“Damn it.” He hung his head, at a loss.
“Do you see now?” The question was soft, gentle, without the usual sharp edge. She sounded sad. Beaten.
“See what?” He stood, turning to find her all but slumped against the tree.
“This is why I wanted to leave you.” Her eyes were wide, brimming with tears. “I’m sorry. I do not mean to cry like this, but I… I knew not what to do.”
“What do ye mean?” He stood close to her, straining to touch her but daring not.
“I knew it would be impossible.” A quick skim of her hand over her face caught the tears which had overflowed onto her cheeks. “Your decision. But I cannot bend. I cannot. I will not. He cannot know who I am, what my people did. I will not put myself at risk, nor will I use them as a way to bargain for my freedom.”
“Ye dinna deserve anything but freedom. Ye dinna deserve to be locked away.”
“So you say. Others do not feel as you do. Your friend, the laird, might not feel as you do. He is a laird, he owns lands which his people work for him. What if my kinsmen were to raid Munro land? What would he have to say about them?”
“But they have not—that I’m aware of,” he was quick to add. After all, the thieves might have turned north after her capture. They might well have paid Richard a visit in the weeks since William rode off.
“Even so, he would be more likely to imagine himself in the place of a laird whose lands were raided, would he not? He would not take the part of those who committed the raids. Do you see why I cannot trust him, no matter how you speak on his behalf?”
He did, and his heart ached for her just as his arms ached to hold and comfort her. She was too small, too fragile to bear this on her own. Would that he might grant her a bit of his strength.
He settled for brushing the windblown hair from her face, where tears made it stick. “I cannot lie to him. What I can do is behave as though I knew not who ye were or what ye did. I found ye on the road, aye, and it was clear ye had been mistreated by the Stuarts. He is already aware of the reasons I had for riding out. He does not need to know ye confessed who your people are.”
Her head snapped up, her eyes wider than ever, mouth falling open. “You would do that?”
If it meant bringing life back into her voice as he just had, he would do anything at all. “Aye. I dinna overmuch like the idea, but I will if it means ye will come with me. I canna leave ye here. Who is to say how ye shall haunt my dreams if I do?”
The barest hint of a smile touched the corners of her mouth. “And I would.”
“I’ve no doubt.” He tucked another piece of hair behind her ear when a wind kicked up over the surface of the river, stirring the branches overhead and causing a handful of needles to fall like snow.
She reached up, touched his hand, held it in place. “Thank you. I know how this pains you. I know not what I did to deserve this—your help and protection, but I do not take it lightly. I can assure you of that. I thank the Mother every morning and every night for you.”
He felt himself moving closer to her, as though he no longer had control over his body. As though he merely observed from outside himself. He watched as he tilted her head back, as he leaned down. Watched as she trembled and he hesitated as a result—then as she strained upward, telling him what she wanted without saying a word.
He wrapped an arm about her waist while still holding the side of her face with the other hand and pulled her to him just before his mouth fitted over hers. Now he was no longer observing. Now he was holding, tasting, giving in to what his body and soul had desired for days.
Her deep sigh told him he was not alone in wanting.
She seemed to come alive in his arms, her hands clutching at the front of his tunic and twisting the cloth in her fists as his lips touched hers. Whatever happened once they crossed the bridge would happen. Now, this was all he knew. They were all they had. And it was enough.
Though it would soon not be. His arms tightened, his body pressing against hers with growing need, and he knew it had to end before they went too far. They might already have gone too far. He pulled away and caught sight of her flushed face, lips parted and swollen from the roughness of his kiss, brows lifting over closed eyes in a sort of lost, dazed expression.
She leaned against him, her head on his chest, her heart pounding over his ribs. It matched the beat of his own. He stroked her hair, her back, wishing there could be more even as he knew it was for the best there wasn’t more.
He might already have gone too far.
“Come,” he murmured once it seemed they had both calmed themselves. Though gray clouds still covered the sun, he assumed they were already well past midday. “We should be on our way if we hope to reach the castle by nightfall, and with the rain having ended, I suppose anyone looking for ye might be on the road by now.”
And so it was, the two of them riding as they had from the start, with her nestled against him and watching for signs from the surrounding wood while he walked the horse through puddles and thick mud before they reached the bridge.
Only once they had crossed—the longest ride of his life, that—did he feel comfortable enough to heave a relieved sigh. It was only a matter of crossing through Munro land now, and anyone they happened to come across would be a friend, not foe.
She lifted her hood, as though she did not much like the notion of anyone noticing her astride his horse. She was still afraid, even in spite of the rapid approach of darkness which would hide the shade of her skin.
He told himself not to be afraid for her, that there was no cause to be. No one on this side of the river would know of her, as her people raided too far south for word to have spread. They rode into the woods, now using the main road and making better time than they ever had before.
Only when the lass sat bolt upright, her body rigid, did he have a sense that anything was amiss.
“William.” Her whisper was tight, throbbing with urgency. “There are two men watching us from the right, just ahead. On horseback.”
He did not have time to look for them before they appeared on the road, no more than two shadowy figures in the deep wood.
“Halt!” one of them barked. “Who are ye, and what brings ye here?”
20
She trembled so, William feared she might die of fright unless he spoke. “These are my men,” he murmured in her ear. “There is nothing to fear. We’re safe now.”
“They are?” she whimpered.
“Aye, I trained both of them myself.”
She slumped. “Och. Thank the Mother.”
“Indeed.” He nodded to the two guards nearest them. “’Tis a relief to be home.”
“Och, so it’s yourself! ‘Tis a relief to have ye back.” One of the men, who William recognized in the darkness as Fergus, signaled to one of the others. “Ride ahead and tell the laird the captain has returned.”
“There is no need to disturb him,” William protested, but they were hearing none of it.
“He’ll wish to know you’re safe, Captain Blackheath. He’s been keeping watch for ye, though he would not wish for ye to know it,” Fergus added with a soft chuckle.
William snickered. “Aye, I’ll not breathe a word of it.”
They rode the rest of the way to the castle in such a manner, speaking of the guard and how training had progressed in his absence. It seemed all was well, which came as both a relief and something of a disappointment. He reminded himself this was a sign of how well he’d trained his men; they could carry on without him.
Though his pride would not have minded if they’d been just the slightest bit lost.
The sight of the familiar walls, as they loomed nearer, was in
deed a welcome one. The weight he’d been carrying on his shoulders—a weight he had lost awareness of, one which had become part of him somewhere along the journey—lightened with each step the horse took.
They came to the tall, thick wooden door which opened thanks to the efforts of two pairs of men standing atop the wall. They worked in teams at a pair of massive cranks which raised and lowered the door on a series of heavy chains.
“An entire army of men could try for a week straight, never stopping, and they could still not break through a door of that thickness,” he assured her. “You shall be safe here.”
She kept her thoughts to herself, choosing to look around instead. Now that they were inside the courtyard, lit torches provided her a better view.
And they provided a better view to the men who’d ridden along with them. Now, they saw her better, and judging by the way they frowned, sharing troubled glances, William knew they were surprised. Perhaps a bit concerned.
“There is the keep,” he explained, ignoring them for the moment in favor of making her feel comfortable. “That will be where ye stay, I would imagine. ‘Tis where much of the household lives, the servants and what have ye.”
“Servants?”
“Do ye believe a house of this size runs itself?” William chuckled as he dismounted, then he reached for her.
She did not move. “Is that what I shall do, then? To earn my way?”
“What do ye mean?”
“Have you brought me here to be a servant?”
“Why must ye always think the worst? Come, please. I’m all but exhausted and would like very much to speak with Laird Richard before sleeping in my own bed for the first time in weeks.” Just the thought was nearly enough to make his eyes want to close. He would sleep now. His dreams would be untroubled. He’d delivered her to safety, against all of the challenges which had stood against him.
She accepted his assistance in dismounting, her wide eyes still examining everything around her. “I’ve never seen anything so grand in my life,” she whispered.
“You’ve never seen a castle?”
“Only from the other side of the walls. Or of the dungeon, from the inside of a cell. Never from this side.”
Highland Temptations: Boxed Set: Books 1-3 Page 31