To Love a Highlander (30 page)

“Aye, and Thor shoots thunderbolts at every man who displeases him.” Sorley broke free of her grasp and wrapped his arms around her, drawing her close. He stroked her hair and smoothed his hand down her back, cupping her buttocks. “The Fenris are a legend, love. If I was one, I’d be oath-bound no’ to speak of them.”

“You wear a wolf’s-head belt buckle.” She lifted her chin, met his gaze. “I have never seen it on you before this night. There must be a reason.”

“There is.” He squeezed her bottom, and then slid his
hand beneath her, between her thighs, lightly teasing her intimate curls. “I like the buckle. It was a gift from the King’s brother, Alexander Stewart, the Wolf of Badenoch. Truth is I wore it to impress you. It is a fine piece of workmanship.” He glanced down, his gaze on the wolf’s head. When he looked back up at her, his face was serious. “This, too, I will tell you. Listen hard for I’ll no’ say the like again. I’ll aye protect you as fiercely as a Fenris would guard his lady.”

He took her face between his hands, something in his eyes almost frightening her. “Woe be to any man who’d dare try to harm you. Or when they come, our children. I’d follow such a fiend to the ends of this earth for vengeance, even into the coldest pit of hell.”

“I know you would.” She did, she’d always known.

“If aught should e’er happen to me, send the buckle to the earl.” He released her and strode to the door, where he turned back, fixing her with a level gaze. “Alex will then set guardsmen to watch o’er you for life. That, sweet lass, I promise you. Remember it always, for that truth is the reason I wore the wolf buckle. To make sure you’re aye safe.” He cracked the door, glanced left and right down the corridor before opening it wider. “I will come for you in late morning. By then, I will have made plans for us.”

“Can you not stay…” Mirabelle let the words tail off, for he’d stepped into the passage, closing the door behind him.

She hurried across the room, opening the door again and peering out, but he was already gone. She couldn’t even hear his retreating footsteps, which shouldn’t surprise her. Wouldn’t a Fenris be able to disappear swiftly and silently into the shadows?

She was sure that was so.

Just as she was certain he’d done exactly what he’d sworn never to do. He might not have broken an oath verbally, but he had let her know the truth.

He’d done so because he loved her.

His trust only made her love him more.

Her heart swelling, she returned to her bed, smoothed the rumpled coverlets. As she did so, a hint of sandalwood and pure male musk rose to tease and tantalize her. She closed her eyes for a moment, inhaling deeply. Images of everything they’d done together swirled across her mind, exciting her so much she wondered if she’d catch fire.

Shivers of delight rippled through her.

She just hoped her heart was big enough to hold her happiness.

That she’d be able to wait until he returned for her the next morning. It seemed like ages away, and she already thrummed with anticipation.

S
ometime in the small hours the next morning, Mirabelle sat up in her bed, knowing something was wrong. She just didn’t know what had wakened her, pulling her from a deep slumber. Sorley had been right, she’d needed the rest. Even now, she felt dazed from their lovemaking. Sated and sweetly replete, though a lingering soreness did throb between her legs. But that slight discomfort wasn’t what had disrupted her sleep. It was much less tangible, an inner knowing. The kind of sensation Highlanders thought of as a “stirring in the air,” even when not a breath of wind blew.

She pushed back her hair, glancing about, seeing nothing unusual. Sorley’s sandalwood scent still clung to the bedsheets, as did a trace of heady masculine musk. His powerful physical presence had also left a mark on the chamber, branding it so soundly, she could almost imagine him standing before her now, bold and gloriously naked, ready to pull her into his arms and ravish her awake.

Regrettably, he wasn’t here.

It was much too early for him to come calling for her.

Not the grayest sliver of light crept through the shutter
slats, though across the room, peat ash still glowed in the hearth. All was still and quiet, even the corner brazier no longer burning. The few furnishings in the chamber stood out black against the softer gray of the night shadows.

The room was also bitterly cold.

Settling back onto her side, Mirabelle started to pull the covers over her shoulders, deciding it was the chill that had disturbed her, when she realized the truth.

Little Heart was gone.

He’d slept curled into the crook of her neck, his wee head resting on her shoulder. His soft, sweet warmth, tiny and light as he was, had soothed her, helping her drift into her dreams after Sorley left. She’d felt the steady rise and fall of his breaths, heard his gentle snores. She’d appreciated the comfort of his nearness.

Now he wasn’t there.

Blessedly, he couldn’t have gone far.

Like as not, he’d hopped off the bed to visit the crate and its layer of river sand, thoughtfully recommended by William Wyldes’s aunt, Berengaria, and delivered by Sorley, his kindness to her kitten touching her deeply. She waited for the now-familiar
scratching
to alert her that Little Heart was again ready to join her on the bed.

The sound didn’t come.

Indeed, she didn’t hear him at all. That was strange. He’d taken a fierce liking to her, never leaving her side except when he slept before the brazier. Already feeling at home with her, he purred, trilled, or hopped about like a flea when he wasn’t snuggled against her. There was none of that now.

Worry niggled at her, dread creeping in as the stillness lengthened.

“Little Heart!” She sat up again, this time flinging back the covers and swinging her legs over the edge of the high mattress. “Little Heart, where are you?”

She looked about, straining to see in the dark as she slid
off the bed, the rushes cold and prickly on the bare soles of her feet.

Naked, for she always slept so, she wrapped her arms around her waist for warmth and hurried about, searching for her precious wee kitten. Her mouth went dry and her heart raced in alarm. She feared he’d slipped out and couldn’t bear if something had happened to him.

It was then, as her eyes grew accustomed to the shadows, that she noticed his new braided wicker travel basket was missing.

She frowned, turning in a circle, searching to see if she’d put it somewhere else, in a place she’d forgotten.

But she hadn’t.

The basket wasn’t in her room, and that meant…

“Oh, Little Heart!” She dashed from corner to corner, hoping she was mistaken. Dropping to her knees beside the bed, she lifted the heavy dressings and peered into the blackness beneath the four-poster. “Where are you, my sweet one?” She didn’t see anything, only gloom. Nothing stirred. “Did Sorley come back and take you away?”

She couldn’t imagine he would, not when he’d promised to fetch her later that morning. For sure, he’d been good to Little Heart, but she also knew he wasn’t overly fond of him.

Yet the kitten and his basket couldn’t have vanished into thin air.

Mirabelle pressed a hand to her cheek and drew a long shuddering breath, terrible heat stinging the backs of her eyes, thickening her throat.

Little Heart couldn’t be missing.

She’d already given her heart to him.

“The bastard doesn’t have him, fair lady.” Sir John’s deep, smooth voice sent chills all through her. “That questionable honor falls to me. If you wish to see your pet again, you won’t scream.”

Mirabelle spun around, fury replacing her fear. “Where is he?” She grabbed her night-robe off the bed, throwing it around herself as she ran at him. She grasped the front of his cloak, fisting her hands in the costly folds. “What have you done with him? Give him back now, at once!”

With ease, Sir John grasped her wrists and lowered her arms. “Are you aware, my lovely spitfire, that you are almost unclothed?”

“Did you know you’re a greater bastard than one whose birth made him that way?” She glared at him, thankful to know her night-robe was thick enough to shield her from his lecherous gaze.

“How dare you enter my room, take what is mine!” She stood straight, her shoulders squared. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of showing fear. “If it’s coin you seek, I have coffers of silver. You can have as much as you wish, just give back my kitten.”

“You know what I desire, Lady Mirabelle.” He didn’t release her arms, keeping them pinned to her sides. “Likewise, you’re surely aware that I am no longer interested in your bride money or lands.”

She raised her chin, narrowed her eyes. “Where is Little Heart?”

“He’s in his basket outside the door, hidden in the shadow of a wall niche. No harm will come to him if you do as I say. Be warned”—he leaned in, his eyes cold and unblinking—“if he brings a single flea to my fair Dunraine, I shall crush him beneath my boot. A worse fate will then befall you.” He straightened, his hooded gaze drifting over her. “But not until I’ve tired of you. Seeing you now, in all your fury, I vow that won’t be for a very long time. I enjoy a spirited woman. The lash of their fire is invigorating, breaking them a welcome challenge. Of course, then I lose interest. Would that displease you?” He curled his lip, mocking her.

Mirabelle let her distaste burn in her eyes.

Her blood was turning to ice. “You wouldn’t dare attempt to take us from here.”

“I dare anything I please.” He glanced at the door she’d forgotten to bar after Sorley left her, his voice smooth as he turned back to her. “Doesn’t my presence here prove that? If you doubt me, you won’t when we reach Dunraine.”

“You’re mad.” Mirabelle’s chest tightened, her breath starting to come in short gasps. She tried to remain calm, to think.

“So some say.” A dark smile spread over his face. His eyes were soulless. “You can decide at Dunraine.”

Mirabelle shivered. She didn’t know of such a holding, but she’d heard whispers that Sir John held a distant keep, half in ruin, where he took women to lock away and use until he wearied of them. Once that happened, they disappeared, never to be heard from again.

He was said to deny the keep’s existence, and its nefarious purpose.

She knew from his tone that Dunraine was this nightmare place. She also knew he wouldn’t mention it unless he saw her as no threat.

That meant…

“You plan to kill me.” She could feel herself paling, the blood draining from her face.

“Not for a while, perhaps never, if you can hold my attention that long.” He jerked his pointy-bearded chin at her clothes. They were draped over the room’s one chair. He also glanced at her cloak, hanging from a peg on the wall. He released her, giving her a shove. “Dress, and quickly, for I have men and horses ready.”

“Men, or snakes?” Mirabelle used her iciest tone as she hurried into her gown, pulling it on while keeping her night-robe wrapped about her. She also struggled to pin Sorley’s MacKenzie brooch on the inside of her gown, which wasn’t
an easy task. She wasn’t going anywhere without it and he’d surely snatch it if he saw.

“They are guards, my lady.” He went to the door, leaning against the jamb, his arms crossed as he waited for her to dress. “Even one such as I has stalwarts. Trusted men and skilled fighters, they will circle back and cut down your hawkish bastard should he be smitten enough to follow us, hoping to rescue you.”

“He wouldn’t bother. He doesn’t care that much for any woman, all know it.” She gave him her haughtiest look. “It won’t matter to him what you do with me. You err.” She hoped he’d believe her.

He laughed, proving he didn’t.

“He would eat you with a spoon, and all of you.” He strolled over to her and gripped her arm as soon as she swirled her cloak around her shoulders. Then he pulled her to the door. “He would slay his own King if Robert glanced sideways at you. I saw how he looked at you in the hall. He was all over you, kissing you, pulling you onto his lap.” His gaze swept her, disdainfully this time. “Everyone present saw him take you abovestairs, knew what then happened.”

“You’re obsessed.” Mirabelle forced down her fear. She didn’t like the glint in his eye, was becoming sure he was mad, completely crazed.

“Nae, I am doing you a service.” He inclined his head slightly, as if he expected thanks. “You shan’t be soiled by a lesser man, but honored by the skilled and vaunted touch of a noble. I shall keep you not as my wife, but as one of my Dunraine mistresses. It’s a much more fitting role, wouldn’t you say?”

Mirabelle felt bile rising to choke her.

Before it could, she drew herself up to her full height. “I’d sooner lie with a toad.”

“So you did.” He looked at her squarely. “I have spared you further soiling.”

“Pah!” Mirabelle’s temper was swelling. “You are soured because you’ve been hounding my father, pressing him to agree—”

“Ahhh… That was then, Lady Mirabelle, and is no more. I’m no longer desirous of your hand.” He shook his head in seeming regret. “Even so, you’re too fetching to suffer the taint of a nameless bastard whose ambitions and pride are greater than his station.”

“Do you speak of yourself, my lord?”

“See you? Even your wit amuses me.”

“A dagger passed between your ribs won’t.” Mirabelle stood as straight as she could and put back her shoulders. “Surely you haven’t forgotten my warning?”

“You are not wearing a lady’s dirk now.” The corner of his mouth twisted up again. “I watched you dress, or have you already forgotten?”

She glared at him. “There will be knives at Dunraine. I will find one. You will never know when it’s hidden in the folds of my skirts.”

He shrugged. “Then I shall observe you all the more closely. It will be an especial pleasure.”

“My pleasure,”
Mirabelle muttered as he opened her door.

“It could be once you adjust to life at Dunraine. There are other ladies to keep you company. Although…” He shrugged again, looking amused. “Some of the Dunraine women are quite witless, poor creatures. I can’t imagine what drove them to such a state.”

His grip on her elbow like iron, he peered left and right down the dimly lit corridor.

“Come now,” he hissed, pulling her from the room. “We’ll fetch your kitten and be on our way. Just remember what I told you. One cry or an attempt to run, and Little Heart will meet the sole of my boot.”

He jerked her to a stop beside a shadowed niche in the
wall, reaching in to retrieve Little Heart’s basket. He thrust it at her, then dusted his hands as if the braided wicker had soiled his skin.

“Little Heart…” Mirabelle hugged the basket to her chest, relief sluicing her when she felt the kitten shifting about inside. Hearing her voice, he yowled and thrust a paw through a gap in the weaving.

“Be still. Keep him quiet.” Sir John gave her a warning look. “I meant what I said, especially about him. Doubt me at your peril.”

She didn’t.

She believed every word.

Before the first glimmer of sunrise even touched the eastern hills, Sorley stood at his favorite spot on the battlements. The morning air was cold and wet, smelling of damp stone and the rich, black earth of the vales and woodland stretching away from the castle. The view he most loved. The rolling hills and distant Highlands couldn’t be seen, everything in that direction lost in heavy mist.

Still, he braced his hands on a merlon and stared hard into the whirling gray, imagining himself riding north to meet the father he’d never known.

A man he didn’t wish to know now.

So why could he so easily see himself on such a journey?

He did, the notion even making his throat constrict with emotion, not because somewhere in that distant land of cloud and mist, Archibald MacNab waited, his father by blood if nothing else. Nor were his thoughts born of knowing that even farther north than MacNab’s Duncreag Castle stretched the wilds of Clan MacKenzie’s Kintail, home of his late mother and where, likewise, his forebears had walked, breathed, loved, and died amongst the hills and heather.

His heart beat strongly at thinking of such a journey, because Mirabelle would ride beside him. They’d go
together, as man and wife. And even though he was chilled by the damp wind, that knowledge warmed him to his soul, filling him with such gladness he could feel the strength of that wonder beating all through him.