Highland Lover (34 page)

they didnae mind, we would be taking the mon they had tossed in the oubliette with us as weel, for

we believed that they had played that game long enough. Then we headed here, for young Simon

was certain this would be where this mon would take ye.”

Alana stared at her brother as she fought the urge to hit him over the head with her heavy tankard—

repeatedly. She knew he could speak well when he chose to and could weave a tale that left one

spellbound. He was being so terse in the telling of this tale that she knew he was doing it on purpose.

“That was not a proper tale, Artan; it was lacking a great deal of information, for one thing.”

Lucas grinned. “Aye, it was short. Near as short as the wren here.” He winked at her.

“I am nay short. The two of ye are just far too tall,” she replied nearly word for word as she had for years.

“Aye, we did keep on growing long after we should have stopped.”

“How did ye get the Gowans to give ye the horses and Simon without having to pay their ransom or

join Simon in that dreadful hole in the ground?”

“Artan met the laird’s wife.”

“Oh dear,” Alana murmured, having a dreadful suspicion as to where this part of the tale was

headed. Women did seem to be drawn to her brothers, and she suspected some of the fascination

was that there were two of them and they were nearly exactly alike.

“Aye, that fine woman took a liking to our Artan and told him all about the Gowans, the ransoming,

and the keep. She isnae a happy wife.”

“I cannae accept the laurels for the information about the keep, Lucas,” said Artan. “She told ye

about that.”

“Only because she thought I was you, brother.”

Alana exchanged a wide-eyed look with Fiona and then took a long drink of cider to calm herself.

She was torn between an urge to laugh and one that would have her sliding beneath the table and

hiding in embarrassment. It was a common problem when dealing with her brothers. Ewan and

Gregor were doing a very poor job of hiding their amusement. Alana suddenly wondered if Lady

Gowan truly had been confused about which twin she was with or had simply let her brothers think

she was so that she could enjoy both of them. She then scolded herself for having such an unkind

thought about the woman, only to realize that she had betrayed her husband with two men.

“To continue,” said Lucas, much to her relief, “we got inside the keep late one night and quickly

convinced the laird that it would be a fine gesture on his part if he returned your horses and let us take Simon home. I told him that would probably be enough to soothe my ire and sense of grave

insult o’er the way he had treated my sister.”

Artan nodded. “The laird decided he didnae want to be nailed to the floor and,” he glanced at Fiona,

“other such playful diversions and let us take the horses and Simon.”

Lucas suddenly grinned. “The laird’s wife wanted us to take her with us, too, but Artan told her he

didnae think the two wives he already had would ken what to do with a third.” He chuckled when

Alana groaned softly.

“Several Gowans tried to come after us, but we made them understand that we didnae want the

company.”

“Ye didnae leave dead Gowans scattered about, did ye?” asked Alana, feeling a little sorry for the

inept Gowans, for she knew with what deadly swiftness her brothers would react to any perceived

threat.

“Wheesht, we would ne’er be so untidy.”

“Lucas,” she said warningly, although she knew they would ignore her threats as easily as she

ignored theirs.

“Nay,” replied Lucas. “We remembered what Maman taught us.” He winked at Alana.

“Which lesson was that?”

“The one in which she said that although the world might be the better for it, ye cannae kill a mon

just because he is an idiot.” He smiled sweetly at Fiona when she laughed and smiled even more

widely when Ewan scowled at him.

“Ah, that one.” Alana began to think that there might be a lot more of her mother in the twins than

she had realized. “I thank ye for getting our horses back and bringing Simon home. It was kind of

ye.” She hid a smile at the way they both winced at being called kind. “Actually, ye might be able

to do us a favor when ye leave. We had to borrow Brother Peter’s horse when we left the monastery

and—”

“’Tis your horse now,” said Lucas as he peeled and cored an apple with an awe-inspiring speed and

skill.

“Nay, ’tis Brother Peter’s. Cousin Matthew said so.”

“Aye, so he told us when we stopped at the monastery on our way back here. ’Tis yours now.”

“Oh, dear. Ye didnae threaten the mon again, did ye?”

“Nay, we just convinced him that it would be a fine gesture if he gave us the horse so that none of

us would be troubled with bringing the beast back. Told him we would see it as a gracious mea

culpa for what he tried to do to our sister. He agreed.”

“Then ’tis Keira’s horse. She was the one he wronged.”

“Aye, but one thing Ardgleann has a lot of now is horses, and she doesnae need another. So, ’tis

yours.”

Alana decided not to argue the matter. One thing was certain. It was not Brother Peter’s horse any

longer. Alana idly wondered if she would give it to Gregor, perhaps as a wedding gift if he ever got

around to speaking of marriage. She then realized that there would be few chances for some private

conversation or kisses with her brothers here and turned her mind to thinking of a way to get them

to leave without insisting she go with them.

“And we willnae be leaving until after the wedding,” said Artan, and Lucas grunted in agreement.

“Wedding? What wedding?” she asked, startled out of making plans to hurry them on their way

home to Donncoill.

“Yours and this laddie’s.”

She heard Ewan choke on a laugh and suspected it was because very few people called Gregor a

laddie. The way her brothers were eyeing her told her they were prepared for an argument and she

decided there was no need to disappoint them. It was true that she wanted nothing more than to be

Gregor’s wife, but she wanted him to go to the altar willingly, not dragged there by her brothers.

There were enough missteps between them without adding a forced marriage and all the anger and

resentment that could stir up.

“Nay, there is no reason for ye to be demanding marriage between Gregor and me.”

“That isnae what Cousin Matthew said.”

As soon as she was able, Alana intended to write her cousin a scolding letter about having a big

mouth. “Weel, Cousin Matthew doesnae ken what he is talking about.”

“He had his tongue down your throat,” Artan said and watched her closely over the rim of his

tankard as he had a deep drink of ale.

Alana felt herself blush fiercely. “That doesnae mean he must marry me. I am certain ye have had

your tongues down the throats of many women and ye havenae married them.” She could not

believe the things she was saying and decided it was all her brothers’ fault.

“Of course we havenae. Most of them arenae the sort of women a mon marries. Ye are.”

“A mon shouldnae be forced to marry a lass just because he kissed her in the garden!” Arguing with

her brothers was akin to banging her head against a wall and Alana decided she had had enough. “I

believe this discussion is over and nay more of any use or sense will be said,” she said, quite proud of how dignified she sounded as she started to stand up.

“Ye run along then, lass,” said Lucas. “We dinnae mind having this talk with Gregor. The mon

cannae seem to decide what his name is, but I suspicion we can talk some sense into him.”

Alana quickly sat down again. Her brothers’ discussions with other men could swiftly become

brawls, and she had the feeling the MacFingals were ones to join in such a thing wholeheartedly.

“They are the kind of brothers that make ye always find yourself looking for something to hit them

o’er the head with, arenae they,” murmured Fiona.

“Most certainly. Something verra heavy, but nay so heavy that ye cannae hit them o’er the head

again and again without getting tired.” She ignored the way her brothers just grinned.

“There is no need for ye to insist upon a marriage. I dinnae care what Brother Matthew has told ye.

He wasnae with us in that cottage, was he? And just because two people share a cottage, it doesnae

mean that they share anything else. Wheesht, for the first week Gregor and I were together, he

thought I was a child. And he rescued me from the Gowans and got me all the way here safely, most

of it on foot. In fact, there were several times he saved my life. Ye ought to be ashamed of

yourselves for impugning his honor in this way.”

“Weel said, lass,” murmured Gregor, his voice shaking with laughter.

As soon as she was done beating her brothers, she would beat Gregor, Alana decided. “This isnae

the way Maman taught us to behave when guests in a mon’s home.” For a brief moment her

brothers looked uneasy, but then Lucas’s eyes narrowed, and she knew that ploy to get them to be

quiet had failed.

“A mon’s honor demands that he wed the wellborn lass he has been frolicking with,” said Lucas.

“Oh! And now ye impugn my honor!”

Gregor could not help it, he grinned as he listened to the ensuing argument. Alana never lied to her

brothers, never denied what had happened between them, but never admitted it, either. When she

had first refused to be married to him, he had felt a sharp pain, seeing it as the rejection of him he realized he had been half expecting all along. Then he started to understand what she was doing.

She did not wish to have them both forced to the altar, and he could only agree with that. Until they had talked and he had found the courage to tell her all he felt, it would not be good for them to be

forced into marriage. There was also the fact that he simply did not like these men telling him what

he must do.

For a brief moment he considered the possibility of letting them have their way. It would get him

what he wanted without his having to spit out words that seemed to be stuck in his throat. Alana

would be his, which was exactly what he needed, and he would be free of the burden of having to

expose all that was in his heart.

He inwardly shook his head, forcing that idea out of his mind. His first thought had been the wiser

one. He and Alana needed to talk openly about all they felt for each other and all they wanted and

expected from each other. Despite how he had hurt her, she had given him a second chance. Gregor

knew he owed it to her to give her the full truth about how he felt. If they were forced to marry,

Gregor suspected he would let his cowardice rule him, for, after all, he would have what he wanted

already.

There was another reason he wished to have a serious talk with Alana—an exchange of all the

truths they had kept hidden from each other or from themselves. He had no real idea of what she felt

for him. He could guess, and Gregor admitted that he did a lot of that, but she had said no more

about what lay in her heart than he had. Although he could still hear her call what they shared

beautiful and precious to her, those were not really words of love, but of passion. What he needed

from her was the deeper, the more binding emotions such as love.

Never had he been so concerned about what a woman felt and he supposed he ought to be ashamed

of that. It was his past, however, and now he looked to his future. Alana was his future, and he

wanted her to come to him willingly. He hoped she could convince her brothers that there was no

need for them to be dragged before a priest.

“And have ye thought about our father and what he may be doing right now?” Alana asked, hoping

her father had not selected a man for her but more than willing to use the possibility to stop her

brothers from forcing Gregor to marry her.

She thought it a little odd that Gregor just sat there, apparently lost in his own thoughts. He

occasionally grinned at some exchange between her and her pigheaded brothers but made no

attempt to defend himself or protest the plans her brothers had for him. Alana did not want him to

loudly declare that he had no intention of marrying her no matter what he was threatened with, or

something of that ilk, but she did think he might say something. Most men would be raging at her

brothers simply because they did not like to be ordered to do anything.

Her brothers had their heads together and were whispering, and Alana scowled. That was always a

bad sign. Either they knew something about what her father was doing, which they were soon to use

to counter her argument, or they were planning some attack, verbal or physical. It was not that

unusual for her brothers to decide that there had been enough talking and start to use their fists to settle a dispute. Since they would never hurt her, they would go after Gregor. An attack on him

could bring forth the whole family. Good as they were in all the arts of battle, she doubted her

brothers could hold off Gregor and his army of brothers. Nor did she wish a fight between members

of her blood family and those of the family she wished to join.

She took a sip of cider and tried to act as if she had just struck them a telling blow and won the

dispute. There was a faint humming in her ears and she feared she had allowed herself to become

too warm. The way Lucas raised his head and looked at her told her there would be some further

argument, however, and she sighed before bracing herself to face it.