Seduced by a Highlander (38 page)

“I did,” his father answered, but Tristan had already turned back to her.

“She loves me.”

“Are ye so surprised, then?” She laughed softly against his lips.

“Aye, I am. Ye hold fast to yer convictions, lass. ’Twas somethin’ that at first excited me but terrified me later. There were days I thought ye would always hate me.”

“But ye did not give up.” She kissed his mouth, so close to hers, loving him more than she ever dreamed possible. “Even when I treated ye poorly.”

“How could I? ’Twould be givin’ up my heart, my life. Fer they are both yers.”

How easily he made her forget. How easily he persuaded her that she was all he needed in his life to truly be happy. She wanted to believe it. Oh, if only he didn’t need to fix what he believed he’d wronged. If only she truly was all he needed to be happy.

Another rider passed them, the force of his presence upon his horse dragging Isobel’s gaze to his intensely blue
one. She smiled at the future leader of the MacGregor clan. “Did ye hear that?”

Rob looked at Tristan first and then back at her. “Aye.” He offered her a smile that was every bit as warm as Tristan’s. “I heard it.” He drew his mount closer and leaned in toward his brother. “The punch is in makin’ certain
they
hear it.”

Isobel knew whom he meant. Callum and Kate MacGregor. Hadn’t Rob recently returned to Camlochlin with a wife the laird did not favor? Suddenly, she saw him in a whole new light. “Did ye proclaim yer love fer yer wife before them?”

“I did, and she did fer me. ’Tis a force nae heart that has known love can withstand.”

“He protects ye,” Isobel said as Rob trotted on ahead without another word.

“He protects everyone he loves. ’Tis his passion.”

“Then”—she smiled, turning forward in his lap and snuggling deep against him—“he is not so different from ye.”

She remained quiet for the rest of the day, forgetting what lay ahead and enjoying the sights and sounds around her; the lilting pitch of the Highlanders’ voices, their boisterous laughter reverberating through the trees, Tristan’s heartbeat against her ear.

Cam seemed to take a liking to Finn, spending much of the day at his side. He listened mostly while the young Mister Grant told him everything there was to know about his family and about the MacGregors of Skye.

By the second day, it was Cam doing most of the talking, and since Finn always rode at Rob’s side, Isobel’s brother had an additional listener.

Judging from the bits and pieces she overheard when
she urged Tristan to ride closer to them, Cam spoke mainly of Patrick.

“He tills the land alone?” she heard Rob ask him.

“He does everything to make certain we are warm and fed.”

“A good trait, that,” Rob said thoughtfully. “Aye, a good one.”

By the end of their third night together, everyone was still in good enough spirits to laugh around the fire about wounds they’d received in one battle or another. Tristan laughed about his many close calls with death with the same gusto as the rest of them, proving to Isobel, at least, that he possessed more warrior blood than he realized.

She looked across the fire to where Tristan’s father sat patiently answering the whirlwind of questions Tamas threw at him. Emboldened by the laird’s indulgent tone, Isobel rose from her place and went to them. She sat close to her brother and stroked his hair.

“How are ye faring?”

He sighed and rolled his eyes to the night sky. “Fine.”

“It is hard fer me…” she lifted her gaze to MacGregor “… to let go of him.”

“What is his age?” the laird surprised her by asking.

“He is one and ten.”

His features were quite striking in the firelight, and easily read. Isobel watched him calculate the years in his mind. When he concluded, he dropped his gaze to the flames. “Ye raised him.”

“My brother and I did.” Her voice shook. Never in her life had she thought she would someday speak to him about what he had taken from her family. “There are seven of us. Patrick is the eldest.” She grew quiet again.
Now that she had the chance to tell him, she found her venom had lost its sting. What could she say? That she hated him for killing her father, when it was her father’s fault that the Earl of Argyll died? How could she tell him that her loss was worse than the loss
his
family had suffered? She couldn’t, not anymore.

“Tristan has told us much about Robert Campbell,” she said quietly, courageously. There were new things she wanted him to know. “Tristan loved him well. He loves him still.”

“I know,” his father said, looking to where his son sat.

“Whatever else is said between us from this night on,” Isobel pressed forward, “I wish ye to know that my brothers and I are deeply sorry fer what happened.”

He didn’t look at her again when he spoke, his voice so raspy and low she wasn’t certain if it was him speaking or the wind. “So am I.”

T
ristan had crossed the narrows into Kylerhea on the eastern coast of the Isle of Skye a dozen times before when he’d visited lasses on the mainland, but he’d never returned with a lass, and never one who would break his mother’s heart. Each moment that brought him closer to Camlochlin set another stone on his chest. He told himself over and over again while they traveled toward the brae pass of Bealach Udal that all would be well. Things always worked out in his favor. What, after all, was so terrible about wanting to end a feud his uncle never would have approved of? As long as his parents never discovered the truth, his mother would come to accept the Fergussons, just as his father did. She had to.

He set his gaze on the laird riding a short distance ahead with wee Tamas still tucked neatly in his arm. He knew why such a sight had brought a smile to his face every time he looked their way over the past five days. Tamas had won his father’s favor. And for Tristan, it was as if he were seeing Callum MacGregor for the very first time. Not as a teacher, though he was one of the best.
His children were testimony to that. Not as a leader, with more responsibilities piled on his sturdy shoulders than any common man could withstand. The MacGregors of Camlochlin, who bore their name proudly during the proscription because of him, could attest to that. But as a father, a shield against any danger that dared come close to his bairn. Tamas wasn’t his, but the child had no father because of him. The Devil MacGregor was no vengeful, unforgiving savage. Savages were not men of honor, and Tristan’s father was that.

“Ye must speak with him about it.”

He looked down at Isobel to find her staring back at him. “Aboot what?”

“About whatever it is that created this rift between the two of ye. Ye conceal it well beneath yer blithe demeanor, but it was there when ye spoke of him. It is there when ye look at him, just beyond the glimmer in yer eyes, shaping yer smiles with a trace of something unguarded and raw, like a wound that will not be healed.”

He had wanted Isobel to know who he was, but she had looked even deeper. “I dinna’ know if it can be,” he admitted to her.

“Of course it can, my love.” Her smile was tender, as was her touch. “Whatever he did—”

“Nae, my wound is self-inflicted, Isobel. I didna’ try to fit in. I didna’ try to be his son. How could I be his when I thought we were so different? I didna’ know who he wanted me to be because I couldna’ see who
he
was. I wanted my uncle and he was gone because of me.”

“No, not because of ye.”

“I believed it to be so,” he told her softly. “And that belief was the dagger that first made me bleed.”

She traced his lips with her fingers and he kissed them
in return. “Then, my handsome, most noble knight, begin there.”

The treacherous cliffs of Elgol were no match for Tamas Fergusson. He found so much delight in the roar of the waves below the narrow precipice that he roared back. It was jarring enough to hear him screeching at the top of his lungs, but when he leaned over the side of the laird’s horse as far as he could to have a look down, everyone behind them let out a shout. Either he had complete trust in the man securing him by the wrist, or his fearlessness went beyond anything the rest of them knew—especially Will, who nearly passed out just peeking over the edge.

Topping the cliffs, they came to a high ridge overlooking a vast, heather-lined glen and a wide bay to the west. Quaint, thatch-roofed bothies littered the landscape while snowcapped mountain ranges cut across the northern sky. In the center of it all, Camlochlin Castle rose out of the dark curtain wall behind it, the Devil’s fortress cupped in God’s glorious hand.

Isobel took a deep breath and found the air moist and refreshing to her lungs. Now, if she could just get her heart to slow down.

There were already a number of people spilling out of the bothies, as well as the wide castle doors, eager to see the approaching riders. Rob took off into the glen first, his horse’s hooves trampling the heather as he raced toward a woman breaking from the small crowd to meet him. He bounded from his horse before it came to a complete stop and swept her off her feet and into his arms.

There were other women waiting, two in particular who watched in silence as the remaining riders trotted toward them. One woman, the taller of the two, fixed
her dark eyes on the laird and Tamas first and then on Isobel.

“Fergusson prisoners?” The smaller woman, standing a bit hunched beside the first, quirked a raven brow at Cameron.

“Just Fergussons, Maggie.” Coiling his arm around Tamas’s waist, the laird dismounted and deposited the boy at her feet. Maggie and Tamas gave each other a level stare before Maggie huffed and watched him run off.

“Tamas!” MacGregor called out after planting a kiss on the taller woman’s mouth. “Stay oot of trouble!”

“Yes, Callum!” Tamas called back.

After a brief but frigid glare at her husband, the woman turned her eyes on Tristan. “It is good to see you alive, my son.” She didn’t wait for his response, or for introductions, while Tristan helped Isobel dismount, but turned on her heel and strode back to the castle without another word.

Watching her, Tristan’s father ran his hand over his bristly jaw. “I will speak to her,” he murmured, more to himself than to anyone else, and promptly followed her inside.

“What will yer father speak to her about?” Left alone with them, Maggie MacGregor fisted her small hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at Isobel and Cameron. “What have ye done this time, Tristan?”

Isobel hadn’t been around so many people inside one structure since Whitehall Palace. Camlochlin was not as grand as the king’s place of residence, but it was big enough to house more MacGregors than she was comfortable with. The halls were cavernous, with thick iron candle stands and bracketed wall torches lighting the maze of corridors.

Isobel did not smile at the faces staring back at her but reached for Cam’s hand instead. She should not have allowed him to come. Her fear about her error in judgment was validated when three enormous Highlanders sauntered toward her and halted in their tracks when Maggie spoke the word, “Fergussons.”

“Hell,” one of them growled deeply with disgust.

“Are we havin’ them fer supper, then?” Another, with red bushy hair peppered with gray and a long scar running from ear to chin, snarled.

“Easy, Angus,” Tristan warned him with a wry smile. “This bonnie lass will bite ye back.”

Isobel wanted to smile at him for crediting her with more courage than she probably had, and for coming to her rescue nonetheless. No matter what they thought of him here, the man she knew would have made Arthur Pendragon proud.

“Angus! Brodie!” The laird called out brusquely from the top of the stairs. “See that Camlochlin’s guests are treated well.”

The threat in his command did not need to be spoken aloud. The two burly Highlanders stepped away without another word or glance in her direction.

“Jamie,” he called to the third. “Bring Cameron oot to Finn and keep an eye on the wee one called Tamas. See that no harm comes to him.”

“Aye, Laird.”

For the first time since she stepped into the castle, Isobel breathed a sigh of relief. And she had him to thank. She looked up at Tristan’s father with appreciation in her eyes instead of hatred. The images she had of him, created from the horror of her childhood, were slowly being replaced by merciful glances and the tenderness
in his large, scarred hands as he closed his plaid around her smallest brother. Somehow, Tamas had won his favor. That alone said much about him.