Seduced by a Highlander (26 page)

Just when she decided to allow herself to fully enjoy this moment, the door to the sitting room opened. She leaped away from Tristan’s embrace, but he snatched her hand and pulled her into the dark kitchen.

They listened, their hearts beating hard against each other’s chest, while Patrick and Cameron spoke softly to each other on their way up the stairs.

“Walk with me ootside.” Tristan’s breath fell over her cheek in the shadows even before her brothers disappeared.

She shook her head, too aware of the thrill he presented every time they were together not to be wary of it.

“I… I am betrothed.” Oh, she hated speaking it aloud. “We should not be alone.”

“We’re alone right now.” The laughter in his voice as he pulled her toward the front door tempted her to follow wherever he led her. “Ye have my vow to be a perfect gentleman.”

Did she dare trust him, even in this small thing? She smiled and followed him out of the house.

T
hey walked together beneath the gentle radiance of the full moon. Neither of them spoke for a little while, stilled by the beauty of the earth and the heavens bathed in silver, and the awkward comfort of their entwined fingers.

Tristan’s gaze slid to Isobel beside him. He missed arguing with her, smiling at her and seeing her smile back. She had put him through hell these last few days, and he understood why, but that hadn’t made her disregard any easier to bear. She wasn’t angry with him anymore though, about Tamas, or about his kissing her again. Hell, she’d kissed him back this time, and he would be damned if her mouth wasn’t just as hungry for him as his was for her. Looking at her, he wondered if he would be damned anyway for touching her, for pulling those delightful little groans from her mouth that gave him hope of finally winning her favor. He didn’t intend to remain here with her. He was fond of her, more so than any lass before her. He wanted to prove to her that he was not the barbarian she had called him and his kin in
England. He wanted to repair the damage he’d caused in her life and mayhap regain some honor in his. He didn’t want to love her. He didn’t know if he even could. What purpose would it serve to love a lass who belonged to another? If he loved her, losing her would tear away what remained of his heart.

But how was he going to keep his word and not touch her when the sight of her, the taste of her drove him mad with desire for more?

“Ye never told me if the uncle who taught ye his favored tales was Robert Campbell.”

Tristan blinked his gaze away from her when she looked at him, unprepared for the topic she presented. “Aye, ’twas him.”

“I ask ye,” she went on softly, “because ye said ye would show me who ye are and I want to know. I need to know. Was it his stories ye loved so much, or him?”

He’d asked her to trust him. First, he knew he must trust her.

“He was the men in his stories, Isobel. He lived his life the way every man should.”

She closed her eyes, shielding him from the pain and regret he saw there. “Then I am sorry he is gone from this world.”

He smiled at her moonlit face. “As am I.”

“I do not wish to bring him up and cause ye sorrow.”

He stopped and, turning to her, he lifted his fingers to a bronze tendril sweeping across her cheek in the cool night air. She opened her eyes again and looked into his.

“His memory doesna’ cause me sorrow. I have hardly spoken of him to anyone in many years, and that has caused me greater pain.”

Her gaze on him softened and suspended his breath. “I
would like to hear of him, then,” she told him, covering his hand with hers.

“Verra well,” he replied, turning his hand around hers and bringing it to his lips. “I shall tell ye.” Curling his fingers through hers, he let their hands drop between them as they began walking again. “I dinna’ know why he favored me. My brother Rob carries his name, not I. Mayhap ’twas because he wanted me to live up to the name I had been given.” He smiled softly to himself, surprised at how easily the words spilled off his tongue. “He invited me to spend my summer months with him and his wife at Campbell Keep, and there he trained me to be like him. That became my home.”

“He became a father to ye,” she said, recalling the words he’d first used to describe the earl to her. “Was yer true father so terrible, then?”

Tristan knew she probably didn’t want to hear anything good about the man who had killed her father, but he wanted her to understand that he was not spawned from some bloodthirsty monster who killed without provocation. “My faither was no’ terrible at all. He never treated any of his bairns poorly. He is simply cut from another mold. He, along with the rest of my kin, had to fight in order to protect what was rightfully theirs. My faither became what was necessary to keep his name alive.”

She was quiet for a time while they walked together toward the hills and the tree line beyond, and then, as if she knew exactly who he was, she turned to him and asked, “How did a gallant little boy fit in with men who knew only battle and bloodshed?”

“I never belonged in Camlochlin,” Tristan admitted quietly. “And after my uncle died it felt like there was nae
more place fer me in the world. After he died, I stopped carin’ if I ever found my place again.”

“But why?”

“Because I loved him and what he taught me more than anything I have ever loved in my life…”

… There are many moments in a man’s life when the choices he makes will decide his destiny.

“… And in a moment of anger, an instant of allowin’ my prideful MacGregor blood to rule me, I destroyed it all. So I turned my back on my uncle’s code and on my faither’s.”

When they came to the trees, she stopped and turned to him. “How did ye destroy it?”

He studied the shape of her, lithe and very feminine against a backdrop of stars. His body trembled for an instant, racked with desire to sweep her into his arms, tell her everything she wanted to know, and then kiss her until she believed him. He didn’t want to fall in love with her, but any man who didn’t was a fool.

“I fought with Alex.”

Tears spilled down her face, and through the haze of milky moonlight her eyes shone like twin seas. He wanted to plunge deep inside them, cleanse himself in the cool spring of renewal only she could offer. “Ye blame yerself fer his death then? Tristan, tell me please if ye have come here to avenge it. I understand now what he meant to ye…”

His heart wrenched at the fear in her voice. He lifted his hand to cleanse her of her tears. When she pulled away, he moved toward her, unable to keep away another instant.

“Isobel, ’tis because of what he meant to me that I didna’ avenge him.”

“I am sorry my father took him from ye. He… he had been drinking that night. I did not know what he meant to do. I was a child. We all were.”

She didn’t want him to blame himself, and for now, he would do as she asked. “Aye, we were innocent children.” He cupped her face in his hands and dipped his mouth to hers.

“Yes,” she breathed across his lips.

She closed her eyes and parted her lips, smashing to bits his resolve to remain gallant. Slipping one hand behind her thick tresses and the other down her back, he gathered her in and captured her sweet breath with a kiss.

They met at the tree line, beneath the stars and the slow-waning moon, every night for a full week. They spoke about their pasts and the dreams that had pushed them to go on during their most difficult days. Isobel told him her worst fears and her deepest hopes for her brothers’ futures—things she had never shared with a single soul before him, not even Patrick. Of course, she did not tell him everything, but during their nightly visits she began to trust that his coming to her home had nothing to do with his uncle. At least not in the way she had feared.

After their first walk together had ended in Tamas’s room, she had even completely forgiven Tristan for his treatment of the youngest Fergusson.

He’d taken her to the edge of Tamas’s bed, where they sat together waiting for the dawn. She listened in silence while he admitted to her brother that he had taken Tamas’s missing sling, and that in order for Tamas to regain it, he would have to earn it. She remained as still as Tristan when her brother began to wail at her, and then
when he flung his small feet over the side of the bed. Tristan had reached him first when he stumbled on his weakened legs, and she watched, her wary heart softening, while he took his time helping Tamas walk around the room.

She was certain that at least some of her brothers were aware of her and Tristan’s secret meetings, but none of them objected, despite her being betrothed. Like her, they seemed to have forgotten all about Andrew Kennedy.

Until, as unexpectedly as a summer rain, he and Annie arrived at their door.

Isobel could have smashed her heaviest pot over Patrick’s head when she saw them stepping into her dining room. The moment Andrew’s eyes met hers, she knew she could never marry him. He smiled at her, glad enough to see her there in the kitchen doorway, but his eyes lacked the luster and the spark that Tristan’s possessed when he entered a room and saw her in it.

“I hope we are not imposing,” Andrew said, more to Patrick than to her.

“Do not fret, Andrew,” Isobel said, wiping her hands on her apron. “We will all simply eat less so that ye can dine with us.”

“Ye see?” Annie slapped her brother’s shoulder. “I told ye it was poor manners to arrive uninvited and unannounced.”

“The reason we did,” Andrew hastily explained, “is that auld Edward the Tanner came by our land two days ago and told us that he met a man on the road a while back who asked him where to find the Fergussons. I grew concerned. Tanner said he was a Highlander.”

“Yes, he”—Patrick began, but then stopped again when Tristan appeared in the doorway—“is most certainly a
Highlander. Tristan, this is Andrew Kennedy, Isobel’s betrothed, and his sister, Annie.”

“Isobel’s betrothed!” The resounding crunch of Tristan’s teeth biting into his apple behind her made Isobel cringe. “How fortunate fer ye.”

Andrew nodded and reached out his hand as if she were in some terrible danger from which he meant to deliver her. Annie said nothing. She simply gaped at Tristan until Isobel wanted to slap her.

“Andrew.” Isobel narrowed her eyes on him. “Ye were concerned fer our safety, so ye brought yer sister along?”

“Och, but she’s a clever, intuitive wee wife to be, is she no’, Kennedy?” Tristan said proudly and then stepped around her when he spotted Tamas making his slow way down the stairs from his room. “God smiles doun upon ye.”

Annie’s large, dreamy eyes followed him, dipping to his clingy breeches as he passed her. “He does not look like a Highlander,” she said with a little sigh. Isobel cursed his plaid and the fact that he rarely wore it, preferring to don his more English attire.

Andrew’s cool gaze lingered on him as well. “Should I have brought a troop of my kinsmen for one man?”

“If he meant to harm us,” John pointed out, already seated in the chair at the table. “It would not have been enough.”

“Oh?” Andrew arched a doubtful brow while he studied Tristan helping Tamas down the last step. “And exactly what kind of threat would he pose without a sword at his belt?”

Oh, Lord. Isobel shook her head at the ceiling and smacked her thigh. It was going to be a difficult evening. Andrew was clearly riled by Tristan’s presence. Then
again, what man wouldn’t feel inferior in the same room with him? And while Tristan’s amicable smile never wavered, she knew him enough to know that it was not genuine. Before another challenge was offered that Tristan might be tempted to answer, she shooed Andrew to the table.

“Now that ye are here, why do ye not have a seat and share a word with Patrick.” Isobel turned to Annie next. “Annie, would ye go outside and see if Cameron and Lachlan have returned from hunting?”

“Who?” Annie smiled at Tristan when he lifted Tamas over his seat and set him down gently.

“What happened to him?” Andrew asked, pointing to Tamas.

“Nothing,” Isobel snapped, glaring at Annie. “He is perfectly capable of gaining his own chair.

“My feet are still sore, Bel.” Her youngest brother scowled at her, then turned to their guests. “Tristan put thistles in my boots.”