Highland Jewel (Highland Brides) (13 page)

"Ye blame the action of brigands on me?" snapped Leith, his face only inches from hers.

"I speak not of the brigands, you braying ass. I speak of
your
maulings." She swung the branch again, but was too close to do any real harm.

"Maulings!" he snorted. "Ye play the prancing mare in heat. Only hiding behind yer robes when ye have na the nerve to admit yer needs!"

"Mare in..." She gasped in outrage. "Mare in..."

"Save yer sputtering pride for another," Leith warned, nostrils flared, eyes hard. "I know ye for what ye are."

"Mare in ..." she gasped again and just when he reached for her arm, she kicked.

The sandals she wore were simple and soft-soled, yet the thud of her heel against his fresh wound made him suck in breath through his clenched teeth.

Even Rose's face blanched at the suffering she'd caused, but when his gaze lifted to her, she did not wait to inquire about his health.

Raw, erupting rage shone in his face. She scrambled backward, finding her feet in a rush and fleeing with all the strength in her legs.

She made it a good fifty feet before he tackled her. They hit the ground hard with Leith taking most of the impact on his right hip and side.

Still the fall crushed the breath from Rose's lungs and she lay motionless and stunned just long enough for Leith to turn her over and struggle on top of her.

Fresh blood had seeped through his bandages but his hands were like steel bonds as he pinned her wrists to the ground above her head. She fought like a badger in a trap, writhing wildly against his heavy weight.

"Hold still, ye little she-devil," he grunted as her knees pummeled his backside, "or I'll forget meself and teach ye a lesson ye shan't soon forget."

"Teach me..." She bucked violently, nearly spilling him from his perch. "You couldn't teach a skunk to stink."

Leith's brows rose slightly as he considered her words. "Ye mean to insult me?" he asked with casual interest.

"You're damned right I mean to insult you, you lying son of—"

"I would help," called Colin from a safe distance, "but I canna decide who needs me assistance the more. And too…" He grinned. "I..."

His words stopped, his hand dropping cautiously to the dirk in his belt. "I think we have company."

All eyes turned to the tawny shadow at the edge of the woods.

Silken had returned, his sleek, powerful body pressed to the earth, his ears flattened as he waited.

It took a moment for Rose to realize the circumstances and even then the situation seemed incredible. Could it be that the wildcat had indeed followed her trail to protect her?

Her eyes turned to Leith's. "You may enjoy browbeating a poor postulate of the Lord," she said, her tone low and smug. "But would you care to try your luck with Silken?"

It was the biggest cat Leith had ever seen. Beneath the tawny coat each sinewy muscle was taut and ready. The golden eyes did not blink but watched him with breath-stopping intensity.

Leith remained as he was. He'd been wounded and battered and pummeled. He could not battle the cat. But neither could he allow Rose to leave, for her
own
safety as well as the safety of his clan. Many lives were at stake. Many precious lives.

"I may die, lass," he said softly, his eyes not leaving those of the golden beast's. "Or the cat may die. But I willna let ye free until ye've fulfilled yer promise."

Rose's breath came hard, for he was sitting on her abdomen and he was not a small man. But it was his eyes that held her attention. They were hard, flat, and deadly sober. He would die, torn to shreds by the razor-sharp claws of Silken before he would turn her loose.

"If ye care for the animal," he continued softly, "send him away."

"Get off me." Her tone held the same matter-of-fact flatness as his, and Leith loosened his grip on her wrists, slipping from her body without a glance at her face.

Rose drew a single deep breath and bent to a sitting position. "Silken." She said the name softly, holding the cat's gaze with her own. "Go play. Go," she wheedled gently, her tone much different now.

The cat remained flattened only a moment, then rose, his eerie eyes slamming to Leith and Colin before returning to Rose's face.

"Go," she urged again, and he left, slipping like a silent shadow into the darkness.

Colin drew a deep breath, his hand dropping from his dirk.

Against her thigh Rose could feel Leith's tense muscles relax slightly.

"Now," said Colin, settling back with a grin. "Ye two can continue where ye left off."

Every inch of Leith's body ached with an individual pain, with the whole of his form throbbing in synchronized agony. His eyes caught Rose's. They were wide and bright. Her face was pale and smeared with his blood. And her expression—pitifully guilty.

"Me," he said quietly, resisting the urge to touch her, "I would rather fight the cat."

Rose felt as if she'd been punched in the gut. Was it her imagination or had she just been beating the man with a tree limb? And the blood that seeped from his bandage and was smudged along his heavy forearm—had she caused that?

She crossed herself without thinking, then lowered her gaze to shakily draw up the fabric the brigands had torn at the front of her robes.

Though the humor of the situation was not lost on Leith, he did not smile, for he doubted if he could withstand more of the lass' temper without kissing her again. And truly, it would not look good for the laird of the Forbes to be killed by a mere girl for the sake of a kiss.

He cleared his throat and tried to do the same with his thoughts. "We will need to find ye a new garment, lass," he said softly.

Rose blinked before raising her eyes to his. "Got any sackcloth?"

He chuckled quietly, unable to resist her wit, though her expression was painfully woebegone.

"Colin," he called, not taking his gaze from her sweet, pale face, "fetch the woman's clothing from me pack."

Colin rose with a frown, but paused before leaving. "Ye willna start battling again afore I return?"

"Colin," Leith warned darkly, and the younger man laughed.

"Clothing it is, me liege," he acquiesced meekly, and strode off toward his brother's pack.

Silence settled over the camp, but despite herself, Rose found she could not raise her eyes to Leith's.

"I fear I have behaved..." She curled her fingers, scrunching the torn wool of her humble gown and clearing her throat. "... in a rather ... unholy manner."

She looked like a forsaken puppy, aching to be held. But beneath that soft flesh lay the body of an enchanted fairy and the spirit of a wildcat, Leith knew. "Ye think ye acted in less than a saintly manner?" he asked with careful sobriety.

Rose scowled, seeming distrustful of his somber words. "Well, it's your fault!" she declared.

Despite everything, Leith threw back his head and laughed. Never in all his life had he met such an entertaining woman. Contrite one moment. Enraged the next.

Bringing his amusement under control, he eyed the girl's angry expression and found she watched him as if wondering where to punch him to obtain the most beneficial results.

"What has happened since I left?" questioned Colin, hurrying back to the scene.

"The lass apologized," Leith said, choking on the chuckle he confined in his throat.

Rose's left brow rose with her ire and Leith lifted his hands in panicked appeal.

"Please," he said, doing his pitiful best to stop the laughter. "Forgive me, wee Rose. It is just that ye have such a ..." He shook his head helplessly. "Such a ... winning way about ye."

"That she does," agreed Colin. "But I like her best when she's flailing ye with a tree limb. Have ye plans to do so again this night, lass?"

Rose shifted her eyes downward in abject guilt and Colin sighed.

"It seems na," he deduced with some disappointment. "So I will see to the widow, who sleeps like the dead." He turned, then paused to add, "Have a care what she mixes in yer drink, brother, or ye may sleep till the Christ's next coming." From the darkness his laughter drifted back to them as he strode away.

Rose cleared her throat, then sucked in her lip. Her scowl was solemn. She cleared her throat again. "You might be surprised to know that I... " She paused, still holding her poor mistreated robe together at its top. "I used to be quite a nice person."

Leith didn't dare challenge her words.

"It's true." She nodded, as if he must surely be doubting her. "There were people who actually liked me. My father called me his sweet, gentle babe."

"Sweet, gentle babe?"

"Don't you laugh," she warned, her expression as dark as a storm. "Or I shall do something I'll regret."

"And I shall regret more, no doubt," Leith added, keeping his expression sober as he covered his wounded chest with a hand.

She lifted her eyes to his, then dropped them morosely. "I'm a horrid failure," she whispered hoarsely.

"At being a nun?" he asked, watching her small face.

She nodded, her bottom lip trembling, and against his will, Leith reached for her.

To his utter astonishment she did not resist, but drooped against him—like a parched flower too long in the sun.

God! The touch of her fine, young body against his bare flesh torched Leith's senses, but he closed his eyes above her head and steeled his will. "There now, lass," he soothed gently. "Ye take this too much to heart."

She said nothing, but sniffled again and he shifted his hand to the bright mass of her glorious auburn tresses.

"What made ye think to become a nun, lass?" he questioned absently. "Surely there is nothing in this world ye fear, that ye would lock yerself behind those sacred walls."

Still she did not speak and he raised his brows and continued. "Was it a man, then? Someone already wed, mayhap, who hungered for ye, causing ye to choose such a course?" He glanced at her face. A pair of fat tears had squeezed from her eyes, wetting her downy lashes. "Or ..."

" 'Twas my mother," she said quietly.

"Yer mother?" he asked in surprise, then nodded and sighed. "Ah, I ken. The good woman always wished for ye to become a nun—in atonement for her own sins."

"No." Rose shook her head. His chest felt firm and lovely against her cheek. "She never mentioned such a course until..."

"Until," he prompted.

"Until her illness," Rose finished brokenly. "She took the fever, shortly after Father died. She said ..." Rose scowled at his chest, trying to stem the tears as she smoothed a wrinkle from the bandage where it crossed near his nipple.

The shock of her fingers brushing his flesh sent excitement rippling through Leith's body, but he hardened his jaw and remained still. "Go on, lass."

"She said that it was Father's wish too." Rose raised her eyes to his.

Leith didn't breathe. Her eyes were as deep and mysterious as the loch near Inverness. A man could become lost in those eyes—never to return. Never to wish to.

"But why?" she asked softly.

Why? Leith had completely lost her line of thought and he exhaled, longing with every inch of his being to lay her down and stoke her desire. But common sense held him still. Let the lass speak, he thought, for her soul ached.

"Why would they wish for me to become a nun?" she questioned. "They were not the religious sort. Oh ..." she hurried to explain, her wide eyes on his face, "they were good people. So good, so kind." She smiled. "But they were..." She shrugged. "They were not afraid to laugh."

He stroked her hair and kept himself from touching her lips where they curved up at the memory of her parents.

"Ye miss the laughter, wee lass?" he whispered gently.

"Yes. I mean, no!" Her body became immediately stiff as she tried to pull from his arms. "I am to be a nun. And a nun is what I shall be," she assured him quickly.

He loosened his grip only slightly. "Whether God wills it or na?"

She nodded, then scowled and shook her head violently, realizing her mistake. "Let me up."

"We were discussing yer parents," Leith reminded her, trying to soothe her with his tone. "They gave na reason for their request?"

She settled back against his chest with a sigh, realizing somewhere in the hidden recesses of her mind that there was nowhere she'd rather be. "Mother said—just before she passed on, that I was too... odd to trust..." Rose sucked in her lip and wondered for the hundredth time at her mother's words.

"To trust with what?" Leith scowled and Rose's eyes fell shut.

“To trust to this world," she finished hollowly.

Leith urged her head gently against his chest.

"Me sweet, gentle babe," he murmured. "And ye thought her words a rebuke?"

Rose could hear the strong beat of his heart and above that thrum was the endearment her father had used.
"Gentle babe,"
he had said, but the words sounded different from Leith's lips, like a forbidden fruit, sweet and dangerous.

"What else but a rebuke?" she asked, raising her gaze.

He shook his head. "Ye dunna see yer gifts, wee lass, for it seems ye have long denied them. And ye are too young to know the punishment for being special."

She scowled at him.

"The English still hang witches, lass," he said quietly, seeing her confusion.

"Do you call me a witch?" she breathed. Did he believe the very thing she feared herself? Did he believe her to be evil? The devil's tool? Could it be so? Or was there some other explanation for the shadowy images that appeared with more and more frequency in her mind?

"There is a great difference betwixt what ye
be
and what people
deem
ye to be, wee Rose," Leith murmured gently.

A hundred thoughts scrambled through Rose's mind, but she lifted a hand to cover her eyes and shook her head. "I do not know what I am, but this I know—I have promised myself to the abbey. And I shall keep my word."

"Rose—"

"No." She uncovered her eyes, placing both hands against his hard form. "I cannot deny that you move me," she whispered hoarsely. "But I must do what I must do."

Their gazes held, and neither one breathed.