“He is a devil,” Bertram MacNab responded, “who has ruined good women before you, Mistress Maitland.”
“Mistress MacRae,” Isobel corrected him haughtily. “And I quite think this has gone on long enough. Sir,” she turned to Captain MacBain, “we have answered your questions fairly.”
He executed a bow and signaled to his men. “Thank you, Mistress, for your patience.”
“Do not be deceived!” Randal MacNab howled. He turned his glare from MacBain to Isobel. “And you, lass, just wait until your father arrives. I thought to get you away out of here and spare him this distress, but you will answer to him, and he will not be so easily deceived.”
Isobel’s heart sank in dismay, but she kept her head high. “I shall, of course, be pleased to welcome my father into my new home.” Shocking, how well she now lied. Her life had, in fact, become unimaginable, the one consistency her feelings for the man who stood, like a rock, at her side.
And it was to Dougal that MacNab directed his parting words, in a sneer.
“This is no’ over, MacRae. Do not think you have escaped judgment. I will not rest until you hang!”
Chapter Twenty-One
“Tell me MacNab can’t really carry out that threat he made—tell me he cannot assure that you are hanged.”
The whispered plea came suddenly out of the darkness, issuing from the woman who lay, obviously sleepless, beside Dougal. He twitched in response. Since the departure of their unwanted guests, Isobel had barely spoken to him. He had spent a large part of the intervening time riding and tramping his borders and battlements, making sure the guard stood strong. Only in the wee hours had he retreated, ducking the icy wind outside to crawl into her warm bed.
“You should be asleep,” he said softly. He wanted only to lie here and absorb the wondrous heat of her without thought or question. The devil knew he felt unready to contemplate what had happened earlier.
“I know, but my thoughts will not be still.” She stirred restlessly, and the scent of her came to him, subtle and seductive. Despite his bone-deep weariness and his set intentions, his body responded to her nearness involuntarily.
“Husband, where have you been? I had begun to suppose you meant to forsake my bed this night.”
Dougal shook his head. That he would not—could not—do. He had spent every night since his marriage with her, even those when, out of stubbornness, he did not touch her. He could not explain why he should so torture himself, save he felt caught, and never more deeply than now.
“I was busy seeing to our defenses,” he told her. “I do not ken what is coming, but I can sense something. I know MacNab. He will no’ back down. Once your father arrives, he may launch an all-out attack. Tell me, is your father a warlike man?”
“Warlike?” She seemed to muse upon it. “Not at all. He is stern, upright, demanding, and commanding. He believes there is a clear division between right and wrong—”
“Does he believe it strongly enough to accept MacNab’s offer of arms? For you know, he will offer.”
“I am not sure. Nor can I imagine what must be in my father’s mind right now, learning it was I and not Catherine who came north. He will be furious with both of us. He does not take well to deception.”
“Few men do.” Dougal fought the desire to stroke her arm. He knew how she would feel: soft and supple, enough to distract him even from the problems at hand.
“If they do come to your gates seeking battle, my father and MacNab together, what shall you do?”
Dougal answered without hesitation, “Give it to them.”
“Would it not be better and easier for you just to hand me over?”
That did make him turn toward her in the bed. “I have never yet done things the easy way, and you are my wife. You told MacBain you want to stay with me.”
“I did.”
“Is that the truth?”
He heard her breath catch in the darkness. “It is.”
“You are certain? Before this comes to bloodshed—for I declare it to you now, Isobel, if you wish to be with me, I will fight to the death to keep you here.”
“Must we speak of death?” All at once, she was in his arms, burrowing into him strongly and then wrapping her arms around him, tight. “By heaven, you are chilled to the bone.”
“The wind outside is keen as a knife.” Without his permission, his fingers buried themselves in her hair. “And, aye, I fear we must speak of death. For I warn you, it will come if this trouble I sense rushes in upon us.”
“Just so long as you, Husband, remain safe,” she breathed, her lips but a whisper from his.
Did she truly care? Could she care? Or were these just woman’s words, meant to cajole and manipulate? She did not want to return to her father, that was clear, nor did she wish to go to MacNab. Perhaps she just found him, the Devil Black, a less horrific alternative—which, in itself, held a ludicrous irony. She hoped he would defend her, when he had failed to protect the only woman he had ever loved.
He understood what he was—and was not—even if his bonny wife had not yet discovered it. Yet she was here, so close and warm, and his body thrummed in a way he found hard to deny.
“Tell me, Husband—Dougal,” she appealed, “how did you know what story to give MacBain, what tale to spin him—the very same I had chosen: that you rescued me from the road after the coach had wrecked?”
Dougal shook his head in the darkness. He could not quite explain how he had known what to say. He had looked at her and the words just came to him. The fey Scot in him made him ask, “Did you will me to know?”
He expected her to deny it, perhaps scoff at the idea, half Englishwoman that she was. But she whispered, “Yes. Yet, I will many things where you are concerned. Why should that particular wish prove effective?”
“I do no’ ken.” Dougal thought hard about it. A practical man, he nevertheless believed in Second Sight, messages from beyond the grave, and even visits from departed spirits. Was the transference of thought really so much more absurd? Yet the ability to pass a message from her mind to his argued some deep and fast shared connection, and that he was reluctant to warrant. After all, he had shared no such connection with Aisla, whom he had loved better than his own life.
“’Twill be a fluke,” he whispered, “a chance or coincidence.”
“You think so? Perhaps, Husband, we should test it. Can you tell what I am thinking now?”
He need not read her mind for that. Her warm body said it all, wriggling against his and conveying her desire far better than words. He slid his hands from her hair down her back, then further to cup her buttocks, drawing her closer. She opened herself to him like a flower. He longed so to plunge himself into her, it fairly unhinged his mind. Yet certain things must be said.
“Thank you for championing me this day, Wife. I confess, such defense half surprised me, given your past anger with me for—as you have repeatedly accused—making a weapon of you.”
She sighed deep in her throat and twined her arms around his neck, curling her fingers into his hair. “I no longer feel angry. Hurt, perhaps, and wishing things could be different between us, that you were not still in love with someone else—Aisla.”
At the sound of the name, pain clenched at Dougal’s heart, nearly crippling him. “I will never—never love anyone else,” he admitted, the confession torn from him.
“I know. And no woman wishes to learn she will always come second, even in her husband’s bed.”
“I desire you,” he told her—impossible to deny it in the present circumstance. “Is that not enough?”
“At some moments it is.” She brushed her lips across his lightly. “At some moments, I find it is not.”
“Which moment is this?”
“Let me warm you, Husband. Let me warm you to your heart.”
She warmed him three times before dawn. Even then, when he rose to leave her, his desire remained unspent. He eyed her where she lay in the bed, lit by the dull morning light, stark naked and drowsy, her rounded breasts and slightly parted legs a rampant temptation. What was this madness he felt for her, that refused to calm? Aye, so, he found her beautiful. But no matter how many times he accommodated her physically, he could never satisfy the longings he now suspected of occupying her heart.
“I am sorry,” he whispered, and she widened her sleepy eyes at him.
“For what?”
He shook his head. He did not want her to care for him, for his heart was a wounded and blackened thing. The devil knew, he did not deserve a woman like this.
“For continuing to use you, I suppose,” he told her wryly, “despite your forgiving heart.”
“Do you hear me complaining?” she asked. “Come back to bed, Husband, and use me sorely again.”
He smiled despite himself. “Wicked!”
“Am I not? As befits, perhaps, the wife of an infamous devil.”
“Aye.” Despite himself, his fingers tarried in the act of fastening his clothing. The tightness beneath his kilt told him he would be well able to take her again.
She sat up in the bed and her red hair swung across her breasts. “Where do you go?”
“Out to check the fortifications, one more time.”
“Would you not rather stay here? It sounds to be sleeting again.”
“I would rather stay here—temptress!” Yet he turned away, wondering whether she could possibly come to terms with what he was, and was not, able to give her.
She flopped back into the bed. “I suppose I shall just have to wait until later, then.”
****
Curse her, it proved all Dougal could think about that whole day long: the warmth of her in the bed, the promise in her eyes, and what he meant to do about it. Even as he rode his boundaries with a party of his men, enduring the stinging sleet, even as he conferred with Lachlan concerning likelihoods and possibilities, and when he weighed the odds for battle, Isobel occupied his mind.
Not even the view from his battlements, one that usually filled him with a feeling of deep possessiveness, served to distract him. Late in the afternoon, when he and Lachlan stood on the walkway of the highest tower braving the wind, his eyes caressed each fold of land, outlined in light and shadow, but his mind dreamed of caressing his wife.
“I mean to ask your sister to marry me,” Lachlan said.
“Eh?” Dougal turned and directed a stare at his friend. “Have you lost your mind entirely?”
“You know,” Lachlan looked thoughtful, “I believe I have. ’Tis the only explanation for what has come over me these last weeks, since she returned home—unless, of course, you allow for the possibility of love.”
“I do not believe in love,” Dougal said harshly.
“And I say to you again—you did, once.”
“That was a long time gone.”
“So,” Lachlan tossed his head, “you mean to tell me you will never love again?”
“Never!”
“Never is a great span of time. I should think you might find yourself tempted by that bonny wife of yours, spirited as well as beautiful.”
“Oh, aye, I am tempted by her, all right.” Dougal laughed harshly. “But not into the trap of love. I know my own mind, Lachy, and ’tis made up.”
“Ah. I hope your sister is not equally stubborn. I have been trying to get her in my bed, but,” he added frankly, “though she will kiss and cuddle and tease, she will no’ commit to the act.”
“My sister, cuddle?” Dougal echoed incredulously. “Impossible!”
Lachlan grinned. “Grope and fondle, then. She has had her hands up my kilt more than once.”
“Spare my ears!” Dougal cried in agony.
“I thought if I offered her marriage—a better marriage than she last endured—with a man sincere in his affections—”
“You?” Dougal howled. “Sincere? The world must be ending.”
“I am desperate here, man. She has fair enchanted me. I would say or do anything!”
“The cry of man since the beginning of time. But, Lachy, that does no’ make you sincere.”
“I ken that, fine. Do you suppose Meg can tell?”
“I think it likely, since my sister is no fool.”
“Perhaps you are right,” Lachy admitted ruefully, “and wise to keep yourself free of all ties and so save yourself. ’Tis no fun, this, finding yourself at the mercy of—”
“Wait.” Dougal laid a hand on his friend’s arm, silencing him, and narrowed his eyes in an attempt to peer through the gathered gloom. “What is that?”
“Where?”
“There, in amongst the trees, and in the folds of the land. They are out there, Lachlan.”
“Who—?”
“But why did my guards fail to come and warn me?” Dougal felt a chill race up his spine, closely followed by a surge of anger. “Come on!”
“By the devil’s horns, Dougal, I do not—”
“MacNab has us surrounded,” Dougal shouted. “’Tis war now, and certain!”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“How many of your men are dead?” Isobel asked her husband, trying to sound calmer than she felt. Dougal and Lachlan had come in just at dark and she had gleaned the details of their situation in pieces: MacNab haunting their borders, lurking not quite beyond sight, attacking when he could and withdrawing again when Dougal himself rode out. The guard Dougal had assigned to patrol the perimeter had been slaughtered, the message clear.
She had never seen anyone wear the look now on her husband’s face, grim, stark, and blank with anger, enough to justify his name. He had not expected an attack so swift or stealthy. Unable to sit still, he paced before the fire in the great hall while Lachlan sat silent with his head in his hands, and Isobel, with Meg at her side, stood by.
“Four,” he answered in a voice rough with emotion. “Every man I sent out on this last patrol—their horses, as well.”
Meg swore bitterly, and her brother glanced at her. “Aye,” Dougal said, “he needs to pay. He
will
pay.”
Lachlan raised his head. “Aye,” he agreed in turn. “But MacNab has made his position evident, has he no’? Not a man comes or goes until your wife’s father arrives and this matter is settled. You do not ride out, I do not go home. You cannot even send a message to the King.”