Highland Enchantment (Highland Brides) (3 page)

Well, she'd always had that damned angelic face, he thought, jerking his musings to a halt. It was that face that fooled men every time. Even the post-headed Davin probably considered himself her conquering hero, when the truth was, the lady needed no hero at all. She could slice an adversary to shreds with nothing more than the sharp edge of her tongue, and he had the scars to prove it.

"Does your head hurt?" she asked, crouching down beside him.

He scowled at her. "I've been trounced by four drunken brothers, jostled down the road, and tumbled onto the grass like a sack of moldy meal. Do you think my head might hurt?"

"I think if you cannot bear the pain, you shouldn't do the deed," she said.

"They deserved it," he countered, thinking of the coins he'd stolen from the brother's pouch and hidden in his own oversized sporran.

"Deserved what?"

He realized suddenly that he'd spoken too quickly and shrugged, trying to look nonchalant.

"They deserve whatever they get."

"What did you do, Liam?" she asked, her tone suspicious and more than a little weary, as if she were his long-suffering mother.

"Me?" He gestured toward his chest, hoping he looked affronted. "Lest you forget, I am the one injured here. I did nothing but perform a wee bit of simple sleight of hand for their entertainment."

Her expression didn't change a whit.

"I am the one wounded," Liam insisted, and wondered if it were too late for him to make a name for himself on the stage. Surely he had the talent. "How could you of all people think I would do something dishonest?"

She stared at him with tired boredom.

"I no longer steal," he said, then grinned. "Unless someone wrongs me... or someone I know...

or I someone—"

"Lie back," she interrupted irritably. "I'll fetch my things."

He watched her go and told himself that he didn't want her to fetch her things. He didn't want her tending him, didn't want her near him. Through the trunks of the surrounding trees, he could see the flicker of a fire and the bustle of men as they erected tents and saw to the horses.

"You'll need to move."

Liam jerked around at the sound of her voice. The moon had come out. It shone on her face, highlighting the heavenly brilliance of her eyes, shadowing the delicate lawn of her cheeks like the loving stroke of an artist's brush.

"What?" he asked, and slammed a lid on those; foolish poetic words that reared their ugly heads in his mind. The blows to his noggin must have rattled his thinking. He was hardly the poetic type.

"You'll have to move to the fire if I am to tend your wounds."

"You've no need to bother," he said. "I am quite whole."

He could predict her scowl even before it began, even before her brows lowered and her ungodly lips puckered into sassy disapproval. Lifting the lavender skirt of her gown, she knelt down beside him. "Mayhap you think I have dragged you out here for the pleasure of your company. But I assure you, Liam, I have not. I've no time to waste on your foolishness. So let us see this done."

"In a hurry to get somewhere, Rachel?" he asked.

"Aye. I am," she said, offering no more as she touched his brow. "Does that hurt?"

"Of course it hurts," he snapped. "Where are you going in such a rush?"

"Do you feel dizzy? Disoriented?" She moved her fingers upward, skimming them through his hair. A thousand unacceptable feelings shivered through him. He stifled a moan and kept his eyes wide open lest she realize the ecstasy of her touch.

"Shouldn't you have worried about me before?" he asked, managing a grimace.

She scowled, and for a moment he wondered if he saw the edge of guilt in her expression. That mystery aided in his attempt to shove away the raw emotions caused by the touch of her fingertips.

She pulled her hand away. He remembered to breathe.

It was clear by her expression that she thought she should have seen to his wounds earlier, but something had made her push on until nightfall. That wasn't like the Rachel he'd known since adolescence She was a healer first and foremost. All else was secondary.

"Why the rush?" he asked. "Is there a babe somewhere that refuses to be birthed without your assistance?"

"Is your vision impaired?"

"Nay," he answered. "Tis not your cousin's babe that waits to be born is it? Shona's? Sara's?"

"My cousins are fine." Her hand neared again. He caught his breath, and then she was touching him again, skimming her fingers light as moondust along the edge of his jaw and downward. Poetry danced like wicked sirens in his mind. "You're lucky. Your face is mostly unscathed. No broken bones there."

"I'm an entertainer." It was difficult to speech, more difficult still to act nonchalant. "I must protect my best assets. At least my best
visible
assets." He forced a grin. "Else how will I entice those buxom young maids to perform with me? Ouch! God's balls, Rachel!" he scolded, covering his chest with his hand. "Are you trying to kill me?"

"There's blood seeping through your tunic."

"I noticed," he said irritably.

"I thought perhaps you hadn't. There
was
a buxom maid involved," she said, settling back on her heels.

"I but hope it didn't break her heart that I left so abruptly."

"Last I saw of her, she was hanging on her husband's arm, admiring him for the manly way he trounced you."

"More than probably she's scared of him."

"And you're more than probably a fool!" she countered. They glared at each other for a moment then she exhaled deeply and glanced away. "You'll have to remove your tunic."

"I—" he began, but Rachel interrupted.

"Is my water boiling, Davin?"

"Aye, my lady."

Liam refused to contemplate how she knew the huge soldier was approaching from behind her.

"Help me get the Irishman to the fire," she said. "Then you may find your pallet."

"But..."

She glanced up at the huge warrior. "Liam has long been a friend of my clan. I assure you, I am quite safe."

With a brief nod, Davin bent over Liam. His hands closed like meat hooks around his burden's arms and Liam was wrenched to his feet. The distance to the fire was short. It only
seemed
as grueling as a journey to the Holy Land. But eventually he was dropped in front of the fire like so much ruined millet.

"You are certain—" Davin began.

"I will be safe," Rachel assured him. "And I need you rested. Go. Find your bed."

Liam watched the huge guard turn, watched his blond head duck as he disappeared into a nearby tent.

"So what hole did this Davin crawl from?" he asked.

"You needn't concern yourself," Rachel said, and wrapping her hand in a scrap of woolen cloth, lifted a pot from the fire. "It seems you have enough to worry on."

"Has some fat earl taken ill? Is Davin
his
man?"

She poured the water into a pewter mug, then dipped her hand into a huge leather satchel and brought out a doeskin bag. Pulling out a few crispy leaves, she dropped them into the cup, swirled the contents about and set it aside.

"Has Lord Haldane relapsed?" Liam asked, watching her closely.

"When I left the duke he was on the mend," she said, and poured half the remaining water into a wooden bowl. Adding a dram of oil from a tiny jar, she dunked a folded cloth into the bowl and lifted it toward his face.

So she
had
traveled to London to tend the duke. He had wondered why she was so far from home. "On the mend?" He narrowed his eyes at her. "You traveled all the way to London to see the duke healed, then left before he was completely recovered?"

She said nothing.

"Tis not like you."

She touched the cloth to his lip. It stung, but not unbearably.

"I believe myself far beyond the point where I've a need to explain my actions to you, Liam,"

she said.

So she was hiding something. But why? In truth, the Lady Saint's actions were rarely anything but saintly, except where he was concerned. Why now would she be keeping secrets? he wondered.

But there seemed little point in asking her outright, for it had been a long while since she felt inclined to grant
him
any favors.

"Ahh." He watched her eyes closely in the hopes of intercepting some unspoken thought as he goaded her. "So you go to meet a lover? A private tryst?"

She dunked the cloth into the water, wrung it out then returned it to his face, where she wiped at the dried blood on his chin.

"Does your father know?" he asked.

Smoothing the rag over his cheek once, she returned it to the bowl.

"Remove your tunic, Liam," she ordered dryly.

He gave her his best shocked expression. "What would your beloved say?"

She lifted her peeved expression to him in an instant. "He would say, I should have left you to the fat-chested slut's husband and his mutton-headed brothers."

Liam stared at her for a moment then laughed with almost painful relief, for she was obviously just as naive as ever. The horrid images of her in another man's arms faded slowly. "You still know little of men, Rachel. That's not what a lover would say atall. He would be jealous. He would ask what you saw in the Irishman that made you take him under your wing. Mayhap he would have even heard of my attraction for women and be doubly jealous. Therefore I'll have to assume there is no lover. And too..."—he shrugged—"you're not the sort."

Removing several rolls of bandages from her bag, she set them beside her before returning her gaze to his. "And pray, Liam, in your wise estimation, what sort am I?"

Her face, ivory pale and princess perfect, seemed little changed from the moment he had first met her in her father's castle.

"You're the marrying sort," he murmured.

Her gaze, sharp as cut amethyst, remained on his for a fraction of an instant then flitted downward as her fingers mixed some evil concoction. "So I am told repeatedly."

The tension that had just eased in his gut, knotted up a hundredfold as the image of her naked appeared again. Naked and ecstatic, writhing in another man's arms, her wicked lips parted as she crooned an unknown name. "By whom?" he asked, forcing the question.

"The man I am to marry," she said.

"You are promised to be wed?" Liam asked. His tone, he was happy to note, was casual, but his gut had twisted into something akin to a cruel sailor's knot.

She said nothing, her expression unreadable, her fingers quick.

"Rachel," he said, forcing out the word a little too sharply.

"I am no blushing maid." She glanced quickly up. "I am five and twenty years old. Tis well past time I am wed."

Liam clenched his teeth and considered trying a smile, but he was a man who well knew his limitations, and a smile was, just now, far beyond those boundaries. The knot tightened.

"Who?" he asked, his voice quiet.

"Tis none of your affair."

Nay. It was not. It was
not.
But... God's balls! His gut hurt. He jerked to his feet, and reveled momentarily in the bracing pain.

"Someone I know?" he asked.

"Tis difficult to say."

"So that is where you go in such haste," he said, watching her face. "And the hulk? This Davin.

He is your... betrothed's man?"

She raised her chin. "I suppose you would not believe me if I said Davin is the one I am to wed."

She had always had a biting sense of humor when the mood suited her. But making him believe she would settle for someone whose station was little above his own was cruel beyond words.

Though he hoped with all his misguided soul that she did not know it.

"I always imagined you with someone different," he said with forced civility.

"Oh?"

"Aye. Someone who could breathe and talk at the same time," he said.

"And this from a thief who would wear a plaid in Rainich."

"And why should I not?" he asked.

"Because twill give them only one more reason to trounce you, and you very well know it," she snapped.

Ah, yes. Maybe that was the third reason to wear a plaid in England. But there were decided advantages to remembering one's place in life. He pulled his gaze from her face.

"And that sporran," she added, scowling at the pouch strapped to his waist. Made of fine hide and decorated with long tassels of black horsehair, it was an ostentatious Gaelic display that hung nearly to his knees. "Must you always make a spectacle of yourself, Liam? Must you always wear the brightest plaid, the biggest sporran? Have you stolen so much coin that you need more space to tote it about?"

"You being Scots yourself and you don't know the true purpose of the sporran? Tis not the wealth it is there to hide, tis the wick." She had the tendency to bring out the devil in him, though her cousin, Shona, had always said it was not necessarily a difficult task. "And hence..."—he swept his hand downward to display his sporran's unusual proportions and grinned—"its ponderous size."

She stared at him, her eyes expressionless. "Take off your tunic," she ordered.

Wasn't she even shocked by his language? She was a lady! Naive, soft, delicate. And experienced? The possibility sent tiny shards of pain ripping through him. "I know you are tempted, lass," he said, scowling at her. "But I assure you, I do not need..." he began.

She stepped forward, her lips pursed, her movements quick as they touched the strip of leather that laced up his tunic at the neck. Her fingers brushed his throat. Liam gritted his teeth against the slash of feelings that sliced him from neck to groin. "I'll do it," he said and swept her hands aside.

She stepped slowly back. Forcing his fingers to do his bidding, Liam unfastened his pewter brooch and pulled the ends of the shirt from beneath his plaid. Shards of pain splintering off in every direction.

"Lift your arms." It was an order, given from a lady to a subject.

If he had the wits of a turnip, he would refuse, but she was too close for him to muster any manly fortitude.

He lifted his arms with an effort. Grasping the hem of his tunic, she eased it upward. Her knuckles skimmed his ribs, his chest then paused. Her gaze, bright as liquid fire, caught his. Memories of forbidden dreams leapt in Liam's mind. Dreams of creamy skin, shivery caresses, the sigh of his name from her sweet lips.