Captured by his Highland Kiss

by Eloise Madigan

  To her mortification, her eyes darted over the young man as if he was a horse she was thinking of asking her father to buy.

  Her usually pin-sharp mind had gone blank. Butterflies seemed to have set up a thriving home inside her stomach and were fluttering madly. A hot blush crept up her cheeks.

  Marcus watched as a flush crept up the neck of the young woman opposite him. He’d swaggered out, full of his usual confidence and good cheer, and found himself struck dumb by the blonde girl facing him.

  She was extraordinarily pretty. Blonde haired—where the majority of lasses in his parts were raven or red-headed—and blue eyed. Her skin was pale and perfect as milk. Her features were delicate, but Marcus got the impression that there was a toughness underneath. It was like seeing an exquisitely crafted flower made of steel. Her eyes seemed to have struck the words from his mouth when she’d looked up at his approach.

  Bonnie is too weak a word to describe this creature, he thought dazedly.

  He held out his hand, his manners taking over, and the girl took it.

  A year or so younger perhaps, he mused.

  “And what might yer name be, me lady?” he asked.

  “Lady Delilah,” the girl replied. “Lady Delilah Jefferson.”

  And Marcus felt the name engrave itself upon his heart.

  “Would ye care to take a walk around the grounds wi’ me, Lady Delilah?” he asked.

  Chapter 2

  Delilah was amazed at how relaxed her parents had become all of a sudden. When it came to walking around with a relatively unknown young man, she’d always been chaperoned—either by one of her own maids, or else by a man from the young man’s household. However, this convention seemed to have been thrown to the bracing Highland winds for, all of a sudden, she found herself hurrying to keep up with the long strides of Marcus Malloch.

  Her mother had looked as if she was going to voice some sort of protest at the two young people going off together, but by that point, her father was deep in conversation with the Laird and had been steered inside. Servants were rushing about, taking care of the Glimouth’s baggage, whilst their armed escort had been directed by one of the Laird’s men to the stables and barracks.

  “So,” Marcus’s pleasant voice spoke, startling her from her thoughts, “where would ye like me to take ye?”

  “I—well—perhaps, it might make sense for your lordship to ponder what a young Englishwoman new to this area might find most engrossing,” she said, trying to hide how flustered she was feeling. She suddenly felt younger than she had in a long time.

  The young Scotsman laughed at this, a rich, full laugh that pulled Delilah’s own mouth up at the corners.

  “Aye, aye, true words and prettily spoken,” he said. “Me apologies for bein’ a lummox and nae thinkin’ that, o’ course, ye wouldnae ken what there is to see in these parts.” He glanced at her, noticing that she was struggling to match the pace he was setting.

  “Man alive, look at me stridin’ out and causin’ ye to run to catch me up!” He gestured at his legs. “It’s these long shanks o’ mine. I apologize.”

  “No apology necessary, sir.”

  “And, please, ye’re free to call me Marcus if it pleases ye. May I call ye Delilah?”

  Delilah blushed again and nodded.

  Marcus looked please at this. He smiled down at her, and she noticed that there was a slight darkening around his jaw where a beard was on the verge of setting in. She thought he would quite likely suit one, even though they were in fashion in English noble society.

  “D’ye ken how to handle a horse, Delilah?” Marcus asked her after they’d walked awhile in silence.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Can ye ride?”

  “Oh, um, yes, yes I can ride,” Delilah said. She plucked at her gown. “Though I fear that I’m ill-attired for horseback.”

  Marcus stopped and turned and cast his eye over her gown. He looked thoughtfully into her face.

  Delilah had never given much thought to romance, being only fifteen, but she couldn’t deny the unfamiliar fluttering that Marcus sent through her stomach when he looked at her.

  “Hm,” he said, holding her bright blue eyes with his dark brown ones and giving her another one of those infectious smiles of his. “I think we’ll be able to work somethin’ out, if ye’re willing.”

  It was an ambiguous statement, but Delilah couldn’t help trusting the self-possessed Highlander. Something about the young Scotsman inspired courage, made her want to show him that she wasn’t the helpless little daughter of an English noble that he doubtless thought her.

  She tilted her chin and set her jaw.

  “I’m willing,” she said.

  A short time later Marcus was leading the daughter of the English Earl into the warm fustiness of the MacConnair stables. He led her along the rows of stalls, looking for a mare that he thought would suit her best.

  She’s got fire in her, this lass.

  He walked down towards the back of the quiet building.

  She has fire, but that doesnae mean that she kens one end of a horse from another necessarily.

  He stopped outside of a stall and clicked his tongue at the beautiful gray mare standing inside and champing contentedly at some hay that’d been strung up for her to nibble on. The horse looked up and stepped over to nuzzle at his outstretched hand.

  “This here’s Fannan,” he said to Delilah. “She’s a fine old nag. I’ve known her ever since she was foaled when I was a little lad.”

  Delilah came forward and held her hand out. Marcus was impressed that she waited for the horse to come to her, rather than force her touch on the beast.

  “What a lovely name you have,” the girl said to the horse, stroking the velvet nose.

  “Aye, it means ‘gentle breeze’ in Gaelic. Never has a horse suited her name more than this one.”

  Marcus and Delilah stood quietly, their eyes flicking up now and again over Fannan’s muzzle when they thought the other wasn’t looking.

  “She does seem a fine animal,” Delilah said to Marcus after a little while. “But as sweet a temperament as she may have, doesn’t change the fact that these long skirts aren’t really conducive to riding.”

  Marcus wrinkled his brow. “Conducive?” he asked.

  “I mean, they’re not really helpful for horse-riding. They’re too long.”

  “I’ve nae heard that word before,” Marcus admitted. “Ye must have some mighty clever tutors to teach ye such words.”

  Not only fair as a harebell in spring, but a sharp mind, too.

  “Ye dinnae have to worry about skirts and what nae,” he said, trying to instill his voice with a confidence that was fast fading. “We’ll tie yer skirts into breeches with this here twine and ye’ll be able to ride without a care.”

  The young woman blinked at him, and for a moment he feared he’d said something inappropriate.

  “But, you’ll, you’ll be able to see my ankles,” she said to him.

  Now it was Marcus’s turn to look puzzled. “Aye,” he said slowly.

  “Well, is that appropriate?”

  “Appropriate?”

  “Yes. Will people not think I’m rude?”

  Light finally dawned for Marcus. He snorted with relief more than mirth. “Ah, lass,” he said. “I forgot what me faither told us about yer English ways. I’ll tell ye this, it’s not the showin’ of a wee bit o’ ankle that excites comment in the Highlands, it’s more a bared arse that’ll get folk talkin’!”

  To his delight, Delilah burst out laughing, covering her mouth almost instantly with her hand.

  Marcus thought that seeing her shake with suppressed mirth might just have been the finest sight he’d ever seen.

  “Come on, Delilah,” he said. “Let’s saddle the nags and get ye on the back of Fannan here.”

  Delilah could not believe what she had allowed herself to be talked into wearing.

  Marcus had fashioned her long billowing skirts into the
loosest approximation of a pair of breeches that had probably ever been devised. It wasn’t just her ankles on show for the whole world, but practically both calves—in all their pale glory!

  The strapping young Highlander looked completely unabashed when he’d finished his rudimentary tailoring. He’d simply nodded to himself, tightened one of the pieces of twine, and then helped Delilah onto the back of Fannan. Then he had taken the reins of her horse, and the chestnut gelding that he’d selected to ride, and walked the two animals out into sporadic sunshine.

  “Afore I take ye on a tour of the country,” he said, squinting up at her, “I think it’d be wise o’ me to see how ye ride.”

  Delilah suddenly felt embarrassed and a little nervous. This Highland youth was clearly at home in the saddle. She rode fairly often, but it was practically always side-saddle. The fluttering feeling in her stomach seemed to grow, as she looked at the back of Marcus’s head as he led her to a fenced area that she recognized as the corral in which horses were broken.

  Marcus tied his own reins around a post, opened the gate, let go of her reins and let her trot the gray mare inside.

  “Right, Lady Delilah,” he said, “let’s take a wee look at how ye get on.”

  She trotted four times around the large pen, her back stiff and her eyes flicking periodically towards where Marcus stood leaning against the fence. His handsome face—and she realized that she most definitely thought that it was handsome—was inscrutable. She could feel Fannan between her legs. Despite what Marcus had told her about the mare, the animal felt skittish, nervous.

  Eventually, Marcus walked out into the corral. Fannan came to a halt in front of him without him saying a word.

  “I don’t know why, but I have the feeling that Fannan hasn’t taken to me quite like you thought she might,” she said.

  Marcus extended his hand to her.

  “Hop down, and I’ll show ye why she’s a wee bit skittish,” he said to her.

  Delilah dismounted and Marcus stood directly in front of her.

  “Now,” he said, looking straight into her eyes, “I’m going tae touch ye, with yer permission.”

  Delilah nodded, not looking away from the kind brown eyes.

  Marcus put his large hands around her waist.

  “This feels fine, does it not?” he said gently.

  “Um, yes,” Delilah said. As Marcus had touched her, a thrill had passed through her. If she was honest, it felt better than fine.

  “What about this?” Marcus asked, still looking right into her eyes. His grip tightened somewhat. Delilah’s lips parted.

  “Uncomfortable,” she said.

  “Aye. And this?”

  The grip in the strong hands tightened further, the muscles in his forearms—visible due to Marcus having rolled his shirt sleeves up—standing out slightly. Delilah gasped.

  “It feels like, if you wanted, you could hurt me.”

  The grip relaxed and Marcus grinned. “Aye, that’s right. Now, think o’ your legs doin’ that next time yer ridin’. Relax. Breathe. Trust Fannan. The lass can feel a single drop o’ rain on her back, so there’s no need to try and squeeze her in two! Trust her, let her ken ye trust her, and she’ll nae let ye fall.”

  Marcus led Delilah across the moorland, on a lap of the loch, that had acted as a backdrop to the castle when she had viewed it from the road, and up into the rugged country on the other side.

  He showed her the crystal-clear creek that flowed out of the hills, leaping down rocky escarpments and wending its way down through the meadows of wildflowers until it fed the loch below. They even stopped so that she could taste an icy draught from the stream, as Marcus was adamant that it was the purest water to be found anywhere in the Highlands.

  They stumbled across a flock of hardy sheep being tailed by an old shepherd. Marcus exchanged a few words with the old fellow in Gaelic and the man doffed his shapeless bonnet from his head in a mark of respect to Delilah.

  The two of them talked of inconsequential things, laughing and teasing one another, listening with rapt attention to stories from each other’s childhoods. Eventually, as the sun sank towards the westward horizon and dusk started to diffuse the sky, they made their way slowly back to the castle.

  “I really can’t believe how pretty it is out here,” Delilah said. “Even though we’re only a two-day ride from my home, it feels like a whole different world.”

  “Aye, tis a bonnie land, right enough,” Marcus replied. “Though as fair as it looks, things are a wee bit unsettled at the moment.”

  “They are?”

  “Aye.”

  “But, it all seems so calm.”

  “That’s as may be, but there’re rumors startin’ to swirl again that war is comin’. There have been skirmishes all along the border between our folk and yers—not MacConnair land, ye understand, but it won’t be long afore the fightin’ spreads.”

  As mature as Delilah was in many ways, when it came to matters of the Crown and politics, the world still seemed to her like a very large place with plenty of space in it for the sharing.

  “I don’t understand why we must fight so,” she said. “Why the King will not just let the Scots govern themselves if they like. Surely, we are not so different.”

  Marcus chuckled softly. It was a nice sound, deep and reassuring. “I’m nae so sure that the people—‘specially the Scottish people—come up too much in the King’s thinkin’.”

  “What do you mean?” Delilah asked.

  “Gold,” Marcus said simply. “Always, it boils down to gold in the end. It’s his coffers that the King cares most about, no’ the people. More land means more taxes for him.”

  The footfalls of the horses were silent on the springy turf. In the gathering gloaming, a shrill, happy barking sounded from somewhere out in the quiet of the hills. Delilah recognized the sound as young foxes playing.

  “I know that yer still here for a few days more, after me faither’s birthday celebrations, Delilah,” Marcus said, abruptly breaking a comfortable silence that had fallen between them. “But, I was wonderin’—if ye find the thought agreeable—whether I might write to ye after yer have returned to England?”

  It was only the fading light and the fact that she was following behind Marcus that stopped Delilah from betraying yet another blush. Inside her chest, her heart flickered against her ribs like a trapped bird. With some effort to keep her voice from betraying too obviously her joy, she said, “I would like that very much, Marcus.”

  A new silence opened up between them, a silence that seemed to fill with the myriad things that Delilah wanted suddenly to say to the tall, attractive Scotsman. Her eyes lingered on the wide, strong shoulders, on the dark hair that flew free and untamed, like shreds of shadow, in the breeze blowing across the heath.

  For the very first time in her young life, the word ‘marriage’ started drifting around the edges of her thoughts.

  “Yes,” she said. “I would like that very much indeed.”

  They made it back to the MacConnair’s castle just in time to change and make their way down to the great banquet hall.

  The hall itself was festooned with heather and other wild flowers—vetch, gorse, and marsh marigold, to name but a few—and in pride of place, sitting in the middle of the table on which the platters and bowls of food sat, was the doe that Marcus had brought down with his bow and arrow that morning, roasted to perfection on a spit.

  Marcus sat on his father’s left side, whilst his mother sat on the Laird’s right. At the head table—reserved for family, close friends and guests of honor—the Glimouth family also sat.

  Marcus smiled and exchanged pleasantries with all the guests that made their way past the head table to convey their best wishes to Laird MacConnair on his birthday, shaking hands with many of the MacConnair family’s old friends and allies.

  However, whenever he wasn’t chatting animatedly with this person or that, he found that his eyes were drawn to his right, down the table,
to where young Delilah sat.

  Is it wishful thinkin’, he caught himself pondering, more than once, or dae her eyes keep flittin’ this way, as mine stray to her?

  His gaze darted with the speed of a swallow once more to the blonde young woman at the other end of the table.

  And, a couple chairs along, Griselda smiled knowingly at her venison.

  Chapter 3

  The rest of the Glimouth family’s extended trip to the Highlands seemed to pass in a haze of happiness for Delilah. She spent the week or so after the Laird’s birthday celebrations either walking the countryside with her father, exploring the gardens, watching the dramatic sunsets with her mother, or, ideally, being taken riding further and further afield by Marcus.

  Often, she thought about the host of other young men that she’d been introduced to over the past year or so—some of them very rich and from extremely notable English families—and how they compared to the loud, sure Marcus. She sometimes saw the Scotsman from her bedchamber window, galloping across the meadowland with the dew and mud flying from his horse’s hooves. His long hair trailed behind him and that infectious smile would be wide on his striking face.

  She really could not recall, now, what she had used to find so glamorous and impressive about those other young men wrapped in silks and finery.

  It is the difference between something that is pretty and shiny and useless, and something that is plain and practical.

  As all good things must, the Earl of Glimouth’s holiday eventually came to an end. As the carriage, and its armed party of riders, moved slowly away from the castle, Delilah felt a longing starting to rise in her chest. She cast one last look out of the carriage window and saw the figures of Callum and Griselda waving as the Earl’s procession began their journey back across the border to England.