DevilsHeart (8 page)

But now he was tempted again. Additional land and the
possibility of more power over one of his clan’s enemies was an enticing
excuse. His previous two marriages netted him political clout, allies, and more
money than the Sinclair clan had seen in generations. But land he could do
something with. And power of the MacTavish? That was priceless.

Hell, if Rathe were to marry again, he would want a woman
like Leah anyway. Smart, trusting, bashful, but a wildcat when aroused. It was
a strange combination, but she appealed to him in a way no other woman had. And
if he had his way, he’d take Leah to his bed again now and any chance he got
after she married the Dunlop. Hell, the Dunlop holding was a mere half-day’s
ride from his own—far too close for Rathe to resist the temptation. By this
time next year, the Dunlop would probably be welcoming a son of Sinclair blood
rather than his own. Rathe’s father had done that to his mother and the mistake
had ended up costing her life. Rathe couldn’t do it to Leah. She was too
delicate, too sensitive. Just like his mother. His lust would end up destroying
her.

No. She would be his. “Give her to me.”

David closed his eyes, turning his face heavenward. “I
cannot do that.”

“Why not?”

“Giving her and the land to the Dunlop only makes them
strong enough to hold his own between you and the MacTavish. Giving her to you
tips the balance of power in your favor.”

“MacTavish is dangerous.”

“I know. And the Dunlop is vulnerable.”

Rathe stared at him, his blood boiling. No other man would
ever touch Leah—not as long as he held any breath in his body. “I will not stay
away from Leah should you give her to the Dunlop.”

David’s eyes narrowed. But then an amused ease fell across
his face as his lips curled into a wry grin. “By God, Rathe, you want to marry
this woman, don’t you?”

Rathe’s jaw twitched. Damn it, he hated giving away so much
of his inner thoughts, even to a man he considered to be a friend. This woman
was already trouble and he hadn’t even married her yet.

David smacked him on the back and laughed. Rathe resisted
the urge to shove him into the wall. He was his overlord, after all.

Giving Rathe’s shoulder a squeeze, David turned his back on
him and walked to the door which a servant scrambled to open before him. “I
will think on it, Sinclair.”

* * * * *

Rathe cast a watchful eye up to Leah’s window as he passed
through the courtyard. Damn the woman. She was consuming him. Every thought,
every decision. He almost laughed out loud at the absurdity of his obsession
over a mere woman. Yes, she was beautiful, sweet, and vulnerable, but she was
just a woman.

His name was shouted from some distance away and he turned
just as David descended the stairs from the keep into the courtyard, trailed by
several of his guards who had donned their riding gear and swords. Fury flashed
through David’s dark eyes as he headed straight toward Rathe.

Tiny hairs of alarm rose on the back of Rathe’s neck. He
glanced up at the window to Leah’s room and then back toward David.

David motioned for his men to halt some twenty feet away
before he approached Rathe alone. “Do you have any idea of where Leah is?”

Rathe cocked his head to one side, his eyes narrowing. “You
cannot find her?”

“No.” David’s tone was clipped. “Glenna was to have had her
French lesson after the midday meal, but no one has seen Leah since this
morning. Do you have any idea where she could have gone?”

The glow in Leah’s eyes had been twisted and desperate when
Rathe had caught her attempting to leave the keep last night. He exhaled and
shook his head in disbelief. How could he have not seen this coming?

“I stopped her from running away last night,” Rathe
admitted. “I thought I had been clear about the dangers she would face.”

A deep furrow formed between David’s brows. “What? Why would
she run?”

“She insisted she needed to get back to Graham land. That it
was the only way for her to return home.” Damn her. He should have demanded an
explanation for her cryptic answer, but her soft, willing lips were too
enticing to resist.

“I have told her time and again it simply was not possible.”

Rathe’s blood turned icy. “What do you mean?”

David exhaled and shook his head.

Rathe’s hands clenched into fists at his sides as a strange,
unwelcome anxiety over losing Leah to yet someone else clawed at his chest. “Is
there another who has claim to her?”

The mormaer stared up at Leah’s chamber window, his lips
drawn together in a tight solemnity.

“David,” Rathe barked. “To whom does she belong?”

David turned back to him, holding Rathe’s gaze. When he
finally spoke, his voice was low, almost a whisper. “You know about the wife of
your friend, the MacAirth?”

Rathe’s brows drew together in confusion over the odd
question. “Anna?”

“You know where she comes from, right?”

Rathe hesitated to answer. He did know of Anna MacAirth’s
origins. Well, a little anyway. It never was something he fully understood, but
his friend, Galen, was adamant Rathe keep all knowledge of it to himself. Had
the mormaer been privy to the secret too?

David’s brows rose in obvious expectation and Rathe nodded.

“I only know because her father, Alec, told me. The king was
breathing down their necks for an explanation of Anna’s sudden appearance in
the Highlands and the reason for the death of the Gowrie laird. Alec and I have
been friends for a long time, as you know, and he enlisted my help.”

“What does this have to do with Leah?” This explanation was
taking too long. Leah could be hurt or worse in the time it would take to find
her. Every moment was precious.

“She is from the same place as Anna and was transported here
against her will. Graham land, the fall equinox, an amber stone. It is all the
same as it was with Anna.”

Rathe shook his head, struggling to piece the puzzle
together. “But Anna was in Graham Castle when it happened. Was Leah?”

“No, but she had had a run-in with the old Graham witch not
long before she rescued Alexander. The woman had given her a pendant that
matches Alec Campbell’s description of the one Anna had. After John brought
Leah to the castle later that night, the necklace the witch had given to her
was missing. She must have dropped it.”

Understanding relaxed Rathe’s brows. “And that is why she is
trying to get back there.”

“Exactly. I do not remember all of the details Alec told me,
but I do not think Leah can go back anytime soon. She is stuck here with us.”

Rathe gave him a curt nod. “I will round up my men and we
will search for her.”

“Good. Do you still want her?”

An intense possessiveness flared within Rathe’s chest.
“Yes.”

“Can you draw first blood on the MacTavish in a hand-to-hand
fight?”

Rathe’s pulse thudded in his temples in immediate
understanding. “Hell, yes.”

“You find her and bring her back,” David instructed in a low
tone. “Tonight, I will announce her hand and the land as a prize. That land is
so far northwest as to be worthless to most men here except for you, MacTavish,
and Dunlop.”

“Dunlop will not fight,” Rathe stated.

“No, he will not,” David agreed. “But MacTavish will. You
draw first blood and Leah becomes your wife right then. I will have the priest
waiting. You will allow the Dunlop clan use of the land Leah was granted and
you will assist them whenever it is needed. You will be his ally and together
you will keep the MacTavish in check. Agreed?”

Rathe nodded and turned to round up his men. The task took
little time. Most were eager to get out of the mormaer’s holding for a bit and
away from the other clans. The Sinclairs were used to the isolation along the
rocky, western coast of Scotland. Not many outsiders ventured up their way
except to make trouble. With plenty of room to roam and a tight-knit clan at
home, the more crowded lands closer to Edinburgh filled with ever-changing
political alliances suffocated them.

They would leave on the morrow. David would understand his
reluctance to tarry while the MacTavish roamed the mormaer’s holding after
losing Leah to Rathe.

A footprint in the soft ground near the stream outside the
castle walls caught Rathe’s attention. He called for his men to halt and then
dismounted his horse. He crouched down beside the print, running his finger
through the middle of it. It was a feminine print, lighter than what would have
been made by a man, with a trajectory pointing north toward the main road.

He straightened up to full height, glancing toward the
castle and back north. Yes, it was the road the mormaer would have used to
bring Leah and his family home from Graham land. If Leah had been paying any
attention on the journey then she would know the road would take her at least
part of the way back.

It was time to retrieve his new wife.

Ugh.

Leah leaned one palm against a nearby oak and lifted her
foot out of the squishy mud to inspect her shoe. Caked was an understatement.
Damn these long skirts twisting around her ankles all the time. Who knew she’d
ever miss asphalt so much?

She attempted to scrape the mud off the soles of her shoes
on a nearby rock before picking up her skirts again and trudging forward,
ignoring the thudding of the dull pain in her head thanks to the previous
night’s whisky. Judging by the emptiness of her stomach, a few hours must have
already passed since she left the mormaer’s keep.

The mist hanging in the air and cold wind moving down the
mountains had been a stroke of luck for her as she left the safety of the
castle walls. Pulling the oversized hood of the black cloak she’d taken from
the stables up over her head and securing a small basket with several small
buns, apples, and hard cheeses covered with a cloth, she had appeared as any
other woman coming and going from the village outside the castle walls. No one
had taken the slightest notice of her.

A twig cracked and she jumped before she realized the noise
had come from her own feet. She breathed long and slow to calm her pounding
heart, scanning the forest around her just in case. Rathe’s warnings of bandits
and wild animals played over and over again in her mind, causing her stomach to
churn.

Rathe.

She sighed, touching her lips with her fingers. That man
could kiss. Confident and more experienced than she could ever hope to be, he
knew how to use his mouth to get what he wanted. If only she’d had the chance
to find out if his lips were just as talented elsewhere.

A strange longing in the pit of her stomach nagged at her,
intensifying each time Rathe’s face faded in and out of her memory. Irritated,
she shoved it aside. Being with him, as amazing as it was, was a one-time deal.
With any luck, she was going home and would never see him again. Besides, he
was the type of man who could break her heart. The type of man she had always stayed
away from. Charming, handsome, a natural-born flirt with a dark reputation.
Yeah, the opposite of the type of man she needed.

But she couldn’t stop the replay in her head of the previous
evening, no matter how hard she tried. A fathomless ache formed between her
thighs as she walked, his deep voice echoing within her brain and her skin
tingling as though he were running his rough palms over her.

What she wouldn’t give to have one more night with that man.

Ugh.
No. It was over.

A strange pounding of the earth echoed through the forest
and she turned, pushing her hood up away from her eyes. A horse? Maybe even
multiple horses? She attempted to peer around the bend she had just cleared.
The pounding reverberated through the ground and up into the soles of her feet.

Definitely horses. Her heart leaped into her throat and she
dashed off the road into the forest, catching a glimpse of brown snouts and
hooves out of the corner of her eye as the animals and their riders rounded the
bend.

The branches of dense underbrush clawed at her clothing as
she hurried deeper into the woods, cursing the snaps of dead branches beneath
her feet. Men’s voices almost pulled her gaze back around, but she didn’t dare
look over her shoulder for fear of stumbling.

The rumbling of water rushing through rocks soon drowned out
the voices. She headed toward it. Maybe she could wade to the other side and
throw the men off her trail if they were indeed after her.

She slowed her gait, pushing her hood back off her head as
she searched for the stream. After a few false starts in which she altered her
course several times, she caught the gray color of water peeking between the
trees.

A massive hand clamped over her mouth and an arm encircled
her waist, drawing her backward. She screamed, but her voice was muffled by the
man’s hand. On instinct, she threw an elbow back into his abdomen and a heel
into his shin just as she clamped down on his fingers with her teeth.

A dark Gaelic phrase that couldn’t be mistaken for anything
other than the equivalent of a four-letter word in English escaped from the
person’s throat just as he released her.

Leah stumbled forward, catching herself on a nearby tree,
and bolted. Dodging bushes and rocks, her blood pounding through her veins, she
headed toward the water.

Breaking through the foliage, she approached the rocky shore
of the stream. Except it was no stream. A wide, restless river lay before her
with clear rushing water in the shallows that gave way to a dark, opaqueness
halfway across, not hinting to its possible depth.

She stopped, her lungs burning. She shoved her hand into her
basket, searching for the knife she had stolen from the castle kitchens. She
wrapped her fingers around the worn wooden handle and pulled it free from the
basket just as a dark figure emerged from the trees to her left. Gasping, she
whipped around to face him, holding the knife out in front of her.

It was Rathe.

He held up his hands to either side as he approached her.
But he didn’t seem like himself. The jovial sparkle she had come to adore was
missing from his eyes. His gait was tense but smooth like a lion cornering his
prey.

“Just, just stop where you are!” she sputtered in a daze.

He shook his head, continuing his advance. “I hate to admit
it, lass, but you caught me off-guard back there. Impressive.”

Her hand convulsed at his chilled tone. She shook her head,
unable to reconcile the memories of his warm smile and easy manner with the
ruthless determination in his now-emotionless eyes. “Stop. Please, Rathe.”

He lowered his hands to his sides. She took a tentative step
backward, resisting the urge to look over her shoulder for an escape route if
she needed to run. But why was he here? Did the mormaer send him?

“No, just stop. I am not going back there. I need to get
home. My mother and sister will be worried sick.”

Her words didn’t seem to register on his face. He continued
his advance.

Tears stung Leah’s eyes. How could this even be the same man
who had held her while she fell into an uneasy sleep last night? The same man
who had promised to rescue her if her future husband proved to be violent?

“Drop the knife, Leah.”

She shook her head, continuing to back away from him as he
approached. “Stay where you are!”

Rathe lunged for her, grabbing her wrist. She gasped and
attempted to wrench away from him, but he used his full weight to shove her
backward until she smashed into a tree. The basket hanging from her other
forearm tumbled to the ground.

He forced one of his legs between her knees, pinning her
with his hips to the tree as he squeezed her wrist with the hand holding the
knife. “Drop it.”

Leah grabbed his wrist with her other hand, attempting to
pull it away. He pried her fingers loose and secured her arm against her side
as he dug his fingers into her other wrist.

His eyes nearly blackened as he glared at her. “Drop it.”

A whimper of frustration and pain vibrated in her throat.
With her heart almost bursting from her chest, she forced her fingers open,
allowing the knife to tumble to the ground.

Shaking his head as he eased his grip, he glanced down at
the knife and then back up to her face. “You could not skin a rabbit with that
dull blade, let alone fend off an attacker. What were you thinking?”

His arrogant, reproachful tone pricked her pride. She shrank
back against the tree, centering her gaze on his chin so she wouldn’t have to
witness the fury emanating from his eyes.

She swallowed hard, her voice small and shaky as she spoke.
“After last night, I realized if I wanted to go home, I had no choice but to
get there on my own.”

Rathe’s jaw tensed. “After all of my warnings, you still
thought this was a good idea? God’s blood, woman!”

“I have been just fine up to now, thank you,” she muttered,
half under her breath.

He threw back his head, his chest shaking with laughter.
“You think the mormaer would tolerate bandits on his land? You have no idea
what lies outside his borders!”

His criticism stirred a deep irritation within her, but she
remained silent. Perhaps it wasn’t her most brilliant plan in the world, but at
least she was doing something now instead of waiting for someone to come to her
rescue.

Tears welled up in her eyes and one dropped onto her cheek.
“You don’t understand. There is something I need to find. Something that will
take me home.”

“The pendant only works at certain times. It will not help
you now.”

Her lashes flew up in surprise. “How—how do you know about
the pendant? What else do you know about it?”

“The mormaer told me.” His tone was laced with impatience.
“I know very little, but I do know it will not take you home. It is too late
now.”

“No, that’s not possible. My mother and sister—”

“What of them?” he demanded in an exasperated tone. “Do they
depend upon you to take care of them? For food? Shelter? Protection?”

“Well, no, of course not. But they will be worried.”

“Then let them worry! It is better for them to wonder than
for you to risk your neck on a fool’s errand!”

She squeezed her eyes shut, her stomach heavy with remorse
and confusion. “No, I must go home.”

He grabbed her chin, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Look at
me.”

With reluctance, she forced her eyes open. The unexpected
tenderness now in his gaze caused her breath to catch in her throat.

“This is your home now. Here. In Scotland.”

“But—”

An intense flash of determination glowed in his eyes as he tightened
his fingers on her jaw. “If you dare to run again, I will hunt you down. Make
no mistake about it, lass. I will find you. There is no going home. Not ever.
This is your home now.”

The desperation in the pit of her stomach subsided as they
stared at one another in silence. A strange, undefinable emotion passed between
them, but when Leah attempted to hold on to it so she could understand it, it
slipped away and was replaced by an acute awareness of Rathe’s hard, lean body
pressed up against hers. His eyes dropped to her lips as though he could read
her thoughts and she licked them, her breathing quickening.

Oh God. Not again…

His lips swooped down upon hers, claiming them in a searing,
hungry kiss that weakened her knees. She grabbed fistfuls of his tunic to
steady herself, parting her lips beneath his as her abdomen swirled with
renewed desire. He thrust his hardening cock against her stomach and she
groaned. Releasing her chin, he plunged his tongue between her parted lips as
he grabbed at her skirts, raking them up her legs.

She quivered, torn between the desire ripping through her
and the intelligence of allowing this near stranger such unfettered access to
her body. Pulling her head back and pushing against his chest, she broke the
kiss just as the cool early autumn air swirled around her now-bare knees.

“Wait, what are you doing?”

His voice was sharp, seductive. “What I should have done
before leaving you this morning. What I should have done after I saw you in the
mormaer’s chamber.”

Startled, she stared at his lips, tongue-tied.

“What? You thought last night would be all there was between
us?” He released a low, throaty chuckle and shook his head, his eyes traveling
down her neck to her breasts. “This is only the beginning.”

He dropped his lips to her neck, growling as he slid his
teeth over her sensitive flesh. She gasped for air, her aching nipples grazing
against his chest with each inhalation.

“But the mormaer is forcing me to marry,” she protested as
he hiked her skirts up to the tops of her thighs, exposing her to the forest
around them.

He nipped her earlobe. “So?”

“My husband…it wouldn’t be right. It—”

His palm chafed the delicate skin of her inner thighs. “I
will have you before you are married and after you are married. Whenever I
desire.”

He drew two fingers up her moistening slit to her clit. She
jumped at the sudden bolt of pleasure, grabbing his shoulders to steady
herself. Slow, heavy circles around the sensitive nub, quickening with the
rhythm of her breathing. Faster and harder. He licked and sucked the sensitive
flesh of her neck, his hot breath scorching her skin. Sharp, exquisite waves of
desire rippled through her pussy.

She whimpered as the pressure within her core mounted,
sending rhythmic, pulsating waves through her. But then his touch was gone,
driving the breath from her lungs. Her vision blurred, her head buzzing as his
hands fumbled against her. Chilled air seared her lungs as she fought to
breathe and her vision sharpened just as he shoved her skirts up to her waist.
Her eyes were drawn down, landing on the thick, throbbing veins of his cock.
Her lips parted, her mouth drying in anticipation.

His fingers slipped around her neck as he pushed her chin up
with his thumb. Her face heated. She tried to avoid his gaze but he forced her
chin to the side so his eyes caught hers. But then his grip eased as the dark
determination faded from his lips only to be replaced by the slight upturn of
arrogant, male satisfaction over her obvious admiration and desire. He brushed
his thumb over her lips, his brow crinkling for a moment.

But then he dropped his hand and grabbed her thighs. “Hold
on to me,” he ordered, lifting her off her feet.

She threw her arms around his neck and he impaled her in one
smooth movement. Crying out, she clawed at his back. The sudden full sensation
as she stretched to accommodate him triggered thrilling, rhythmic pulsations
through her core. Her pussy contracted hard around his cock as he slammed into
her and ground against her clit.