The Guardian

MARGARET MALLORY

NEW YORK BOSTON

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A Preview of The Sinner

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This book is dedicated to the red-haired women in my

family—my sister, daughter, and three nieces—who

were clamoring for a red-haired heroine.

Sìleas (SHEE-las) is for you.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My biggest thanks goes to my long-suffering husband, who—among other trials—gracefully puts up with jokes about where I get the inspiration for my love scenes.

I am grateful to my editor, Alex Logan, and the rest of the crew at Grand Central Publishing for all they do for me. This time, I owe a special thanks to Amy Pierpont and Alex for suggesting I try my hand at writing Scottish historicals. If I’d known how much fun I’d have with my Highlanders, I would have done this sooner. I’m giving a wild cheer for Diane Luger and the art department for the gorgeous cover with a hero who looks exactly as I wrote him.

Many thanks to my agent, Kevan Lyon, for her enthusiastic support and wise counsel. Warm thanks also goes to Anthea, Wanda, and Ginny for their helpful comments on the draft—and for reviewing it in an unreasonably short time. I am grateful to my RWA chapter-mates and the many romance authors who continue to help me along the way.

D. J. Macleod, Honorary Librarian for the Gaelic Society of Inverness, was very kind to send me a copy of the Society’s invaluable but out-of-print article, Marriage, Divorce and Concubinage in Gaelic Scotland, by David Sellar. Finally, thanks to Sharron Gunn, who helped me with Gaelic and other things Scottish.

Is minic a rinne bromach gioblach capall cumasach.

Many a ragged colt becomes a noble horse.

PROLOGUE

ISLE OF SKYE

Scotland

1500

Teàrlag MacDonald, the oldest living member of her clan and a seer of some repute, let her good eye travel slowly from boy to boy. Visitors to her tiny cottage at the edge of the sea were rare.

“What brings ye lads to come see me on this blustery night?”

“We want to know our future, Teàrlag,” young Connor said. “Can ye tell us what ye see for us?”

The boy who spoke was the chieftain’s second son, a strapping lad of twelve with the pitch-black hair of his mother’s side.

“Are ye sure ye want to hear?” she asked. “Most often I foretell death, did ye not know?”

The four lads exchanged glances, but none took a step toward the door. They were braver than most. Still, she wondered what led them to be crowding her cottage and dripping rain on her floor this particular night.

“Ye feared I might die before I foretold somethin’ about ye, is that it?”

She fixed her good eye on the youngest, a lad of ten with black hair like his cousin Connor’s and eyes as blue as the summer sky. The lad blushed, confirming her suspicion.

“Well, I don’t expect to die as soon as ye think, Ian MacDonald.”

Ian raised his eyebrows. “So ye know me, Teàrlag?”

“ ’Course I know ye. The three of ye,” she said, pointing her finger at Ian and his cousins Alex and Connor, “are my blood relations.”

Learning they were related to a woman with one eye and a hunched back did not appear to please them. She chuckled to herself as she turned to toss a handful of herbs on the fire. As it crackled and spit, she leaned forward to breathe in the tangy fumes. She could not call upon the sight at will, but sometimes the herbs made the vision clearer.

As soon as the boys entered her cottage, smelling of dogs, damp wool, and the sea, she had seen the orangey glow about them that signaled a vision was coming. It was unusual for her to see the glow around more than one person at a time. She suspected it was because the lads were close as thieves, but it was not for her to question her gift.

“Ye first,” she said, curling her finger at Ian.

The lad’s eyes grew big, but when one of the other boys gave him a shove, he came around the table to stand beside her.

Quick as a wink, she slipped a small, smooth stone into his gaping mouth. The stone did not help her see, but it added to the mystery and would keep him quiet.

“Don’t swallow the stone, laddie,” she said, “or it’ll kill ye.”

Ian turned wide eyes on his cousin Connor, who gave him a reassuring nod. She rested her hand on Ian’s head and closed her eyes. The vision, already forming from the moment he passed through her door, came quickly.

“Ye shall wed twice,” she said. “Once in anger and once in love.”

“Two wives!” Alex, the one with the fair hair of his Viking ancestors, hooted with laughter. “That will keep ye busy.”

Ian spit out the stone into his hand. “I didn’t want to know that, Teàrlag. Can ye not tell me something interesting… like how many battles I’ll fight in… or if I’ll die at sea?”

“I can’t command the sight, lad. If it chooses to speak of love and women, then so be it.” She looked to the others. “What of the rest of ye?”

The other three made faces as if she had given them one of her bitter-tasting remedies.

She cackled and slapped the table. “No so brave now, are ye, lads?”

“It is no fair for ye to hear about my two wives,” Ian said to the others, “unless I hear about yours.”

Alex gave the other two lads a lopsided grin and exchanged places with Ian.

“I don’t need the sight to know ye were born to give trouble to the lasses.” She shook her head. The boys would all be handsome men, but this one had the devil in his eye. “Shame, but there is nothin’ to be done about it.”

Alex grinned. “Sounds verra good to me.”

“Ach.” She popped a second stone from the dish on the table into Alex’s mouth and put her hand on his head. ’Twas good luck she had gathered pretty stones from the shore that morning.

“Tsk, tsk, this is no good at all. One day, ye’ll come across a woman so beautiful as to hurt your eyes, sittin’ on a rock in the sea.” She opened her eyes and thumped Alex on the chest. “Watch out for her, for she might be a selkie taking on her human form to lure ye to your death.”

“I’d rather have a selkie than two wives,” Ian grumbled from across the table.

For a MacDonald of Sleat to put away one wife to take another was common as grass. It seemed the way of it for them to break the hearts of the women who loved them.

Teàrlag closed her eyes again—and laughed so hard it made her cough. Ach, this was a surprise, for certain.

“Alex, I see ye courtin’ an ugly, pockmarked lass,” she said, wiping her eyes on her shawl. “I fear she is quite stout as well. And I don’t mean pleasing plump, mind ye.”

The other boys doubled over laughing until they were red-faced.

“I think ye are having fun with me,” Alex said, looking sideways at her. “Since I’ve no intention of marrying, I am sure that if I do, the lass would have to be verra, verra pretty.”

“I see what I see.” She gave Alex a push and motioned to Duncan. He was a big, red-haired lad whose mother had served as Connor’s nursemaid.

“This one has the blood of both the MacKinnon Sea Witch and the Celtic warrior queen, Scáthach, so mind ye keep him on your side,” she said, wagging her finger at the other three. To Duncan, she said, “That’s where ye get your fierceness—and your temper.”

Duncan stood still, his expression serious, as she put a stone in his mouth and rested her hand on his head.

Almost at once, a powerful feeling of loss and longing stole over her and weighed down her spirit. She lifted her hand, being too old to bear it for long.

“Are ye sure ye want to hear, laddie?” she asked softly.

Duncan gave her a level look and nodded.

“I fear you’ve sad days before ye,” she said, squeezing his shoulder. “But I will tell ye this. Sometimes, a man can change his future.”

Duncan spit out the stone and gave her a polite “Thank ye.”

The chieftain’s son was last.

“What I want to know is the future of our clan,” Connor said around the stone in his mouth. “Will we be safe and prosper in the years to come?”

His father had come to ask her the same question not long ago. All she had been able to tell him was that one day he would have to send this son away to keep him safe.

When she put her hand on Connor’s head, she heard the moans of the dying and saw men of her clan lying in a field soaked in Scottish blood. Then she saw the four lads as strong, young men, on a ship, crossing the sea. She grew weary as the visions continued, one after the other.

“Teàrlag, are ye well?” Connor asked.

When she opened her eyes, Alex handed her a cup of her own whiskey, saying, “A wee nip will do ye good.”

She narrowed her good eye at him as she drained the cup, wondering how he’d found it.

“I see many perils ahead for all of ye,” she said. “Ye must keep each other close, if ye are to have any hope of survivin’.”

The lads appeared unimpressed. As Highlanders, they knew without foretelling that their future held danger. And as lads, they found the notion more exciting than worrisome.

They were young, and a wise woman did not tell all she knew. After considering what might be of use for them to know, she said to Connor, “Ye want to know what ye must do to help the clan?”

“Aye, Teàrlag, I do.”

“Then I will tell ye,” she said, “the clan’s future will rest on ye choosin’ the right wife.”

“Me? But it’s my brother who will be chieftain.”

She shrugged. He would learn soon enough of the sorrows to come.

“Can ye tell me what woman I must choose, then?” Connor asked, worry furrowing his brow.

“Ach, the lass will choose ye,” she said, and pinched his cheek. “Ye just must be wise enough to know it.”

She looked to the cottage door just before the sound of the knock. Alex, who was closest, opened it and laughed when he saw the little girl with wild, unkempt red hair standing there.

“ ’Tis only Ian’s wee friend Sìleas,” he said, as he pulled her inside and shut the door against the cold.

The girl’s large green eyes took in the room, then settled on Ian.

“What are ye doing wandering alone outside in the dark?” Ian asked her.

“I came to find ye, Ian,” the girl said.

“How many times must I tell ye to be careful?” Ian tightened his mantle and turned to the others. “I’d best take her back to her da.”

The old woman thought the lass’s da should be skinned alive for letting the wee bairn wander about as he did. But he was not the sort of man who had much use for a daughter.

“Were ye no afraid the faeries would snatch ye?” she asked.

Sìleas shook her head. Ach, the poor child knew that the faeries steal only the children who are most precious to their parents.

“Come on, then,” Ian said, taking the wee girl’s hand. “I’ll tell ye a story about a selkie as we walk.”

Sìleas looked up at the lad, and her eyes shone as if God himself had sent the strongest and bravest warrior in all the Highlands to be her protector.

CHAPTER 1

ISLE OF SKYE

Scotland

1508

Sìleas’s outstretched hands bumped and scraped against the rough earthen walls, touch replacing sight, as she raced through the blackness. Small creatures skittered before her, running in fear as she did.

But there was no echo of footsteps behind her. Yet.

A circle of gray light appeared ahead, signaling the end of the tunnel. When she reached it, Sìleas dropped to her hands and knees and crawled through the narrow opening, mud dragging at her skirts.

Brambles scratched her face and hands as she scrambled out the other side. A burst of clean sea air surrounded her, blowing away the dank, new-grave smell of the tunnel. Sìleas sucked in great lungfuls of it, but she had no time to stop.

Startled sheep stared or trotted out of her way as Sìleas clambered up the hill. She prayed that she had not already missed him. When she finally reached the path, she flattened herself behind a boulder to wait. Before she could catch her breath, she heard hoofbeats.

She had to be certain it was Ian. With her heart thudding in her ears, she peeked around the boulder.

As soon as the rider rounded the bend, she shouted his name and jumped out onto the path.

“That was dangerous, Sìl,” Ian said, after pulling his horse up hard. “I nearly rode over ye.”

Ian looked so handsome on his fine horse, with his dark hair flying and the glow of sunset shining all about him, that for a long moment Sìleas forgot the urgency of her trouble.

“What are ye doing out here?” Ian asked. “And how did ye get so filthy?”

“I’m escaping my step-da,” Sìleas said, coming back to herself. “I came out the secret tunnel when I saw them turn ye away at the front gate.”

“I was going to stay the night on my way home,” he said, “but they told me half the castle was ill with some pestilence and sent me away.”

“They lied to ye,” she said, reaching her hand up to him. “We must hurry before they notice I’m gone.”

Ian hoisted her up in front of him. Though her back stung like the devil, she leaned against him and sighed. She was safe.

She’d missed Ian these last months when he was off at the Scottish court and fighting on the border. This felt like old times, when she was a wee girl and Ian was always helping her out of one scrape or another.

But she was in trouble as never before. If she’d had a doubt about how dire her situation was, seeing the Green Lady hover over her bed weeping was a clear warning.

When Ian turned the horse back in the direction of the castle, she jerked upright and spun around to face him. “What are ye doing?”

“I’m taking ye back,” Ian said. “I’m no going to be accused of kidnapping.”

“But ye must get me away! The bastard intends to marry me to the worst of the MacKinnons.”

“Mind your tongue,” Ian said. “Ye shouldn’t call your step-da a bastard.”

“You’re no listening to me. The man is going to make me wed Angus MacKinnon.”

Ian stopped his horse. “Ye must be mistaken. Even your bastard of a step-da wouldn’t do that. All the same, I promise I’ll tell my da and uncle what ye said.”

“I’ll tell them myself when ye take me to them.”

Ian shook his head. “I’m no starting a clan war by stealing ye away. Even if what ye say is true, there will be no wedding soon. You’re a child yet.”

“I’m no child,” Sìleas said, folding her arms. “I’m thirteen.”

“Well, you’ve got no breasts,” Ian said, “and no man is going to want to marry ye until ye do—Oof! No need to jab me with that pointy elbow of yours just for speaking the truth.”

Sìleas fought against the sting in her eyes. After all that had happened to her today, this was hard to bear—especially coming from the man she planned to marry.

“If ye won’t help me, Ian MacDonald, I’ll walk.”

When she tried to slide down off the horse, Ian caught and held her. He took her face in his hand and rubbed his thumb lightly across her cheek—which made it devilishly difficult not to cry.

“I don’t mean to hurt your feelings, little one,” he said. “Ye can’t go off on your own. It’s a long way to the next house, and it’s near dark.”

“I’m no going back to the castle,” she said.

“I suppose if I take ye back, you’ll just sneak out the secret passageway again?”

“I will,” she said.

Ian sighed and turned his horse. “Then we’d best move fast. But if I’m hung for kidnapping, it’ll be on your head.”

Ian stopped to make camp when it grew too dark to see. If he didn’t have Sìleas with him, he’d be tempted to continue. But his family’s home was a fair distance yet, and it was risky to ride in the black of night.

He handed Sìleas half of his oatcakes and cheese, and they ate in silence. There would be hell to pay for this, all because she let that imagination of hers run wild again.

He glanced sideways at her. Poor Sìl. Her beautiful name, pronounced with a soft “Shh,” like a whisper in the ear, mocked her. She was a pathetic, scrawny thing with teeth too big for her and unruly red hair so bright it hurt the eyes. Even once she had breasts, no man was going to wed her for her looks.

At least she’d washed the mud off her face.

Ian rolled out his blanket and gave her a warning look. “Lie down and don’t say a word.”

“ ’Tis no my fault—”

“It is,” he said, “though ye know verra well no one is going to blame you.”

Sìleas scrunched herself into a ball on one side of the blanket and tucked her feet under her cloak.

Ian lay down with his back to her and wrapped his plaid around himself. It had been a long day of travel, and he was tired.

Just as he was drifting off to sleep, Sìleas shook his shoulder. “I hear something.”

Ian grabbed his claymore and sat up to listen.

“I think it’s a wild boar,” she whispered. “Or a verra large bear.”

Ian flopped back down with a groan. “ ’Tis only the wind blowing the trees. Have ye not tortured me enough for one day?”

He couldn’t go back to sleep with the wee lass shivering beside him. She had no meat on her bones to keep her warm.

“Sìl, are ye cold?” he asked.

“I am near death with it,” she said in a weak, mournful voice.

With a sigh, he rolled onto his back and spread his plaid over both of them.

Now he was wide awake. After staring at the tree branches whipping in the wind above him for a long while, he whispered, “Sìl, are ye awake?”

“Aye.”

“I’m going to be married soon,” he said, and couldn’t help grinning to himself. “I met her at court in Stirling. I’ve come home to tell my parents.”

He felt Sìleas stiffen beside him.

“I’m as surprised as you,” he said. “I didn’t plan to wed for a few years yet, but when a man meets the right woman… Ah, Sìl, she is everything I want.”

Sìleas was quiet for a long time, then she asked in that funny, hoarse voice of hers, “What makes ye know she is right for ye?”

“Philippa is a rare beauty, I tell ye. She’s got sparkling eyes and silky, fair hair—and curves to make a man forget to breathe.”

“Hmmph. Is there nothing but her looks ye can say about this Philippa?”

“She’s as graceful as a faerie queen,” he said. “And she has a lovely, tinkling laugh.”

“And that is why ye want to marry her?”

Ian chuckled at Sìleas’s skeptical tone. “I shouldn’t tell ye this, little one. But there are women a man can have without marriage, and women he cannot. This one is of the second kind, and I want her verra, verra badly.”

He dropped an arm across Sìleas’s shoulder and drifted toward sleep with a smile on his face.

He must have slept like the dead, for he remembered nothing until he awoke to the sound of horses. In an instant, he threw off his plaid and stood with his claymore in his hands as three horsemen rode into their camp and began circling them. Though Ian recognized them as his clansmen, he did not lower his sword.

He glanced over his shoulder at Sìleas to be sure she was all right. She was sitting up with his plaid pulled over her head and was peering out at them from a peephole she had made in it.

“Could this be our own young Ian, back from fighting on the border?” one of the horsemen said.

“Why, so it is! We hear you had great success fighting the English,” another said, as the three continued circling. “It must be that the English sleep verra late.”

“I hear they wait politely for ye to choose the time and place to fight,” said the third. “For how else could a man sleep so soundly he doesn’t hear horses before they ride through his camp?”

Ian gritted his teeth as the men continued enjoying themselves at his expense.

“The English fight like women, so what can ye expect?” the first one said, as three more riders crowded into their camp.

“Speaking of women, who is the brave wench who is no afraid to share a bed with our fierce warrior?” another man called out.

“Your mother will murder ye for bringing a whore home,” another said, causing a round of laughter.

“I want to be there when she finds out,” the first one said. “Come, Ian, let us have a look at her.”

“I’ve no woman with me,” Ian said, flipping back the plaid to reveal the girl. “It is only Sìleas.”

Sìleas yanked the plaid back over herself and glared at all of them.

The horsemen went quiet. Following their gazes, Ian looked over his shoulder. His father and his uncle, who was the chieftain of their clan, had drawn their horses up at the edge of the camp.

There was no sound now, except for the horses’ snorting, as his father’s eyes moved from Ian to Sìleas, then back to Ian with a grim fury.

“Return home now, lads,” his uncle ordered the others. “We’ll follow shortly.”

His father dismounted but waited to speak until the other men were out of earshot.

“Explain yourself, Ian MacDonald,” his father said in a tone that used to signal that Ian was in for a rare beating.

“I don’t know how I could sleep through the approach of your horses, da. I—”

“Don’t play the fool with me,” his father shouted. “Ye know verra well I’m asking why ye are traveling alone with Sìleas—and why we find ye sharing a bed with her.”

“But I am not, da. Well, I suppose I am traveling with her, though I didn’t intend to,” Ian fumbled. “But we are no sharing a bed!”

His father’s face went from red to purple. “Don’t tell me I’m no seeing what’s plain as day before my eyes. There can be but one explanation for this. You’d best tell me the two of ye have run off and married in secret.”

“Of course we’ve not married.”

All the way home, Ian had imagined how his father’s eyes would fill with pride when he heard of Ian’s exploits fighting the English on the border. Instead, his father was speaking to him as if he were a lad guilty of a dangerous prank.

“We were no sharing a bed in the sense ye are suggesting, da,” Ian said, trying and failing to stay calm. “That would be disgusting. How could ye think it?”

“So why is the lass here with ye?” his father asked.

“Sìleas got it into her head that her step-da intends to wed her to one of the MacKinnons. I swear, she was going to run off alone if I didn’t bring her with me.”

His father squatted down next to Sìleas. “Are ye all right, lass?”

“I am, thank ye.” She looked pathetic, her skin pale against her tousled red hair and huddling like a small bird under his plaid.

His father gently took her hand between his huge ones. “Can you tell me what happened, lass?”

This was too much. His father was speaking to Sìleas as if she were the innocent in all of this.

“ ’Tis true that Ian didn’t want to help me. But I forced his hand because my step-da means to wed me to his son so they can claim Knock Castle.” She dropped her eyes and said in a shaky voice, “And it wasn’t just that, but I don’t wish to speak of the rest.”

Sìleas was always one to exaggerate. If she didn’t have Ian’s father in her hands before, she surely did now.

“ ’Tis a lucky chance the lass learned of their plan and got away,” Ian’s uncle said. “We can’t let the MacKinnons steal Knock Castle out from under us.”

His father stood and rested his hand on Ian’s shoulder. “I know ye didn’t intend to, but you’ve compromised Sìleas’s virtue.”

Ian’s stomach sank to his feet as he felt disaster coming. “But, da, that can’t be true. I’ve known Sìleas all her life. And she is so young, no one will think anything of my spending the night in the woods with her.”

“The men who found ye already believe the worst,” his father said. “ ’Tis bound to become known to others.”

“But nothing happened,” Ian insisted. “I never even thought of it!”

“That doesn’t matter,” his father said.

“This isn’t about Sìleas’s virtue, is it?” Ian said, leaning toward his father with his fists clenched. “It’s about keeping her lands from the MacKinnons.”

“There is that as well,” his father owned. “But ye have ruined Sìleas’s reputation, and there is only one way to set that aright. The two of you will be wed as soon as we get to the house.”

Ian was aghast. “No. I will not do it.”

“What ye will not do is shame your mother and me,” his father said, his eyes as hard as steel. “I expect honorable behavior from my sons, even when it is hard. Especially when it is hard.”

“But I—”

“Ye have a duty here, to the lass and to your clan,” his father said. “You’re a MacDonald, and ye will do what is required.”

“I’ll gather the men,” his uncle said. “I don’t expect the MacKinnons will be pleased when they hear the news.”

Sìleas was crying soundlessly, holding Ian’s plaid to her face and rocking back and forth.

“Pack up your things, lass,” his father said, giving her an awkward pat. “Ye must be wed before the MacKinnons come looking for ye.”

CHAPTER 2

THE DUNGEON IN DUART CASTLE

Isle of Mull

OCTOBER 1513

“Damnable vermin! The straw is alive with the wee critters.” Ian got to his feet and scratched his arms. “I hate to say it, but the Maclean hospitality is sadly lacking.”

“ ’Tis the Maclean vermin on two legs that concern me,” Duncan said. “Ye know they are upstairs debating what to do with us—and I’ve no faith they’ll chose mercy.”

Connor rubbed his temples. “After five years of fighting in France, to be taken by the Macleans the day we set foot in Scotland…”

Ian felt the humiliation as keenly as his cousin. And they were needed at home. They had left France as soon as the news reached them of the disastrous loss to the English at Flodden.

“ ’Tis time we made our escape,” Ian told the others. “I expect even the Macleans will show us the courtesy of feeding us dinner before they kill us. We must take our chance then.”

“Aye.” Connor came to stand beside him and peered through the iron grate into the darkness beyond. “As soon as the guard opens this door, we’ll—”

“Ach, there’s no need for violence, cousin,” Alex said, speaking for the first time. He lay with his long legs stretched out on the filthy straw, untroubled by what crawled there.

“And why is that?” Ian asked, giving Alex a kick with his boot.

“I’m no saying it is a bad plan,” Alex said, “just that we won’t be needing it.”

Ian crossed his arms, amused in spite of himself. “Will ye be calling on the faeries to open the door for us?”

Alex was a master storyteller and let the silence grow to be sure he had their full attention before he spoke. “When they took me up for my turn at being questioned, they got a bit rough. The chieftain’s wife happened to come in, and she insisted on seeing to my wounds.”

Connor groaned. “Alex, tell me ye didn’t…”

“Well, she stripped me bare and applied a sweet-smelling salve to every scratch from head to toe. The lady was impressed with my battle scars—and ye know how I like that in a woman,” Alex said, lifting one hand, palm up. “It was all rather excitin’ for both of us. To make a long story short—”

“Ye fooked the wife of the man who’s holding us? What is wrong with ye?” Duncan shouted. “We’d best be ready, lads, for I expect the debate on whether to kill us will be a short one.”

“Now there is gratitude, after I sacrificed my virtue to set ye free,” Alex said. “The lady’s no going to tell her husband what we done, and she swore she could get us out.”

“So when’s she going to do it?” Ian didn’t question whether the lady would come; women were always doing unlikely things for Alex.

“Tonight,” Alex said. “And it wasn’t just my pretty face, lads, that persuaded her to help us. The lady is a Campbell. Shaggy Maclean wed her to make peace between their two clans. She hates him, of course, and does her best to thwart him at every turn.”

“Ha!” Ian said, pointing his finger at Connor. “Let that be a lesson to ye, when you go choosing a wife among our enemies.”

Connor rubbed his forehead. As their chieftain’s son, he would be expected to make a marriage alliance with one of the other clans. With so many men dead after Flodden, a number of clans would be looking to negotiate such a match.

“Interesting that ye should be giving advice on wives,” Alex said, raising his eyebrows at Ian. “When it doesn’t appear ye know what to do with yours.”

“I have no wife,” Ian said with a deliberate warning in his voice. “So long as it hasn’t been consummated, it’s no a marriage.”

While in France, Ian had done his best to forget his marriage vows. But now that he was returning home to Skye, he would put an end to his false marriage.

Alex sat up. “Anyone willing to make a wager on it? My money says our lad will no escape this marriage.”

Duncan grabbed Ian before he could beat the smile off Alex’s face.

“That’s enough, Alex,” Connor said.

“Ye are a sorry lot,” Alex said, getting to his feet and stretching. “Ian, married but doesn’t believe it. Duncan, who refused to wed his true love.”

Ah, poor Duncan. Ian glared at Alex—the tale was too sad for jesting.

“And then there’s Connor,” Alex continued in his heedless way, “who must try to guess which of a dozen chieftains with unwed daughters would be the most dangerous to offend.”

“Ach, my da’s brothers will likely kill me first and save me the trouble of choosing,” Connor said.

“Not with us watching your back,” Duncan said.

Connor’s half-uncles would be pleased to have one less obstacle between them and leadership of the clan. Connor’s grandfather, the first chieftain of the MacDonalds of Sleat, had six sons by six different women. The sons had all hated each other from birth, and the ones still alive were always at each other’s throats.

“I hope when my brother is chieftain he’ll save the clan trouble by keeping to one woman,” Connor said, shaking his head.

Alex snorted. “Ragnall?”

That was a false hope if there ever was one, though Ian wouldn’t say it. Connor’s older brother was no different from his father and grandfather when it came to women.

“So who will you wed, Alex?” Duncan asked. “What Highland lass will put up with your philandering without sticking a dirk in your back?”

“None,” Alex said, the humor thin in his voice. “I’ve told ye. I’ll never marry.”

Alex’s parents had been feuding for as long as Ian could remember. Even in the Highlands, where emotions tended to run high, the violence of their animosity was renowned. Of the three sisters who were Ian’s, Alex’s, and Connor’s mothers, only Ian’s had found happiness in marriage.

At the sound of footsteps, Ian and the others reached for their belts where their dirks should have been.

“Time to leave this hellhole, lads,” Ian said in a low voice. He flattened himself against the wall by the door and nodded to the others. Plan or no, they would take the guards.

“Alexander!” A woman’s voice came out of the darkness from the other side of the iron bars, followed by the jangle of keys.

Ian drew in a deep breath of the salty air. It felt good to be sailing again. They had stolen Shaggy’s favorite galley, which went a long way toward restoring their pride. It was sleek and fast, and they were making good time in the brisk October wind. The jug of whiskey they passed kept Ian warm enough. He grew up sailing these waters. Every rock and current was as familiar to him as the mountain peaks in the distance.

Ian fixed his gaze on the darkening outline of the Isle of Skye. Despite all the trouble that awaited him there, the sight of home stirred a deep longing inside him.

And trouble there would be aplenty. They had spoken little during the long hours on the water since the Campbell woman had given them the terrible news that both their chieftain and Connor’s brother Ragnall had been killed at Flodden. It was a staggering loss to the clan.

Duncan was playing sweet, mournful tunes on the small whistle he always carried, his music reflecting both their sadness and yearning. He tucked the whistle away inside his plaid and said to Connor, “Your father was a great chieftain.”

Their chieftain had not been loved, but he was respected as a strong leader and ferocious warrior, which counted for more in the Highlands. Ian found it hard to imagine him dead.

He took a long pull from the jug. “I can’t believe we lost them both,” he said, clasping Connor’s shoulder as he passed him the whiskey. “To tell ye the truth, I didn’t think there was a man alive who could take your brother Ragnall.”

Ian knew that the loss of his brother was the harder blow for Connor. Ragnall had been fierce, hotheaded, and accepted as the successor to the chieftainship. He had also been devoted to his younger brother.

“I suspected something,” Duncan said, “for if either of them was alive Shaggy wouldn’t have risked a clan war by taking us.”

“Even with our chieftain fallen, Shaggy should expect a reprisal from our clan,” Ian said after taking another drink. “So I’m wondering why he didn’t.”

“Ian’s right,” Alex said, nodding at him. “When Shaggy said he was going to drop our lifeless bodies into the sea, he didn’t look like a worried man to me.”

“He had no extra guard posted outside the castle,” Ian said. “Something’s no right there.”

“What are ye suggesting?” Connor said.

“Ye know damn well what they’re suggesting. One of your da’s brothers is behind this,” Duncan said. “They knew we’d return as soon as news of Flodden reached us, so one of them asked Shaggy to keep an eye out for us.”

“They’re all wily, mean bastards,” Alex said. “But which of them would ye say wants the chieftainship most?”

“Hugh Dubh,” Connor said, using Hugh’s nickname, “Black Hugh,” given to him for his black heart. “Hugh never thought he got his rightful share when my grandfather died, and he’s been burning with resentment ever since. The others have made homes for themselves on the nearby islands, but not Hugh.”

“What I want to know,” Ian said, “is what Hugh promised Shaggy to make sure ye never showed your face on Skye again.”

“You’re jumping to conclusions, all of ye,” Connor said. “There’s no affection between my uncle and me, but I won’t believe he would have me murdered.”

“Hmmph,” Alex snorted. “I wouldn’t trust Hugh further than old Teàrlag could toss him.”

“I didn’t say I trusted him,” Connor said. “I wouldn’t trust any of my da’s brothers.”

“I’ll wager Hugh has already set himself up as chieftain and is living in Dunscaith Castle,” Duncan said.

Ian suspected Duncan was right. By tradition, the clan chose their leader from among the men with chieftain’s blood. With Connor’s father and brother both dead and Connor in France, that left only Connor’s uncles. If half the stories told about them were true, they were a pack of murderers, rapists, and thieves. How a man as honorable as Connor could share blood with them was a mystery. Some would say the faeries had done their mischief switching babies.

They were nearing the shore. Without needing to exchange a word, he and Duncan lowered the sail, then took up the oars with the others. They pulled together in a steady rhythm that came as naturally to Ian as breathing.

“I know you’re no ready to discuss it, Connor,” Ian said between pulls. “But sooner or later you’ll have to fight Hugh for the chieftainship.”

“You’re right,” Connor said. “I’m no ready to discuss it.”

“Ach!” Alex said. “Ye can’t mean to let that horse’s arse be our chieftain.”

“What I don’t mean to do is to cause strife within the clan,” Connor said. “After our losses at Flodden, a fight for the chieftainship would weaken us further and make us vulnerable to our enemies.”

“I agree ye need to lay low at first,” Ian said. After an absence of five years, Connor couldn’t simply walk into Dunscaith Castle and claim the chieftainship—especially if Hugh already had control of the castle. “Let the men know you’re home and see they have an alternative to Hugh. Then, when Hugh shows he puts his own interests above the clan’s—as he surely will—we’ll put ye forward as the better man to lead.”

Alex turned to Duncan, who was on the oar opposite his. “You and I are like innocent babes next to my conniving cousins.”

“All great chieftains are conniving,” Ian said with a grin. “ ’Tis a required trait.”

“Connor will need to be conniving just to stay alive,” Duncan said without a trace of humor. “Hugh has been pirating in the Western Isles for years without being caught. That means he’s clever and ruthless—and lucky as well.”

They were quiet again for a time. Connor may not be ready to admit it aloud yet, but Ian agreed with Duncan—Connor’s life was in danger on Skye.

“If you’re going to the castle, I’m going with ye,” Ian said. “Ye don’t know what awaits ye there.”

“Ye don’t know what awaits you either,” Connor said. “Ye must go home and see how your family fares.”

Ian sent up a prayer that his own father had survived the battle. He regretted that their parting had been angry—and regretted still more that he had ignored his father’s letters ordering him home. He should have fought alongside his father and clansman at Flodden. He would carry the guilt of not being there to his grave.

“And ye need to settle matters with the lass,” Connor added. “Five years is long enough to keep her waiting.”

Ian had managed to forget about the problem of Sìleas while they talked of Connor and the chieftainship—and he didn’t want to think about it now. He took another swig from the whiskey jug at his feet while they rested their oars and glided to shore. As soon as the boat scraped bottom, he and the others dropped over the side into the icy water and hauled the boat up onto the shore of Skye.

After five years gone, he was home.

“I’ll wait to go to Dunscaith Castle until I know which way the wind blows,” Connor said, as they dragged the boat above the tide line. “Duncan and I will take Shaggy’s boat to the other side of Sleat and find out the sentiment there.”

“I still think I should go with ye,” Ian said.

Connor shook his head. “We’ll send word or come find ye in two or three days. In the meantime, talk to your father. He’ll know what the men are thinking on this part of the island.”

“I know ye can’t mean to leave your best fighting man out of this,” Alex said. “Should I come with ye or go north to hear what the folks there are saying?”

“Stay with Ian,” Connor said, the white of his teeth bright in the growing darkness. “He faces the greatest danger.”

“Verra funny.” At the thought of Sìleas, he took another swig from the jug—and choked when Alex elbowed him hard in the ribs.

“You’d best give Ian a full week,” Alex said. “Ye don’t want him leaving his poor wife wanting after such a long wait.”

The others laughed for the first time since they had heard the news about Connor’s father.

Ian, however, was not amused.

“I have no wife,” he repeated.

“Sìleas’s lands are important to the clan, especially Knock Castle,” Connor said, draping an arm across Ian’s shoulders. “It protects our lands on the eastern shore. We can’t have it falling into the hands of the MacKinnons.”

“What are ye saying?” Ian asked between clenched teeth.

“Ye know verra well my father did not force ye to wed Sìleas out of concern for the girl’s virtue. He wanted Knock Castle in the hands of his nephew.”

“Ye can’t be trying to tell me to accept Sìleas as my wife.”

Connor squeezed Ian’s shoulder. “All I’m asking is that you consider the needs of the clan.”

Ian shrugged Connor’s hand off him. “I’m telling ye now, I’ll no keep this marriage.”

“Well, if ye don’t,” Connor said, “then ye must find a man we can trust to take your place.”

“Perhaps ye should wait until you’re chieftain before ye start giving orders,” Ian snapped.

CHAPTER 3

ON THE SLEAT PENINSULA OF THE ISLE OF SKYE

The wind whipped at Sìleas’s cloak as she stood with their nearest neighbor, Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald, on a rocky outcrop overlooking the sea. The mountains of the mainland were black against the darkening sky. Despite the damp cold that penetrated her bones and the need to get home to help with supper, something held her.

“How much longer will ye give Ian?” Gòrdan asked.

Sìleas watched a boat crossing the strait, its outline barely visible in the fading light, as she considered his question.

When she didn’t answer, Gòrdan said, “ ’Tis past time you gave up on him.”

Give up on Ian? Could she do that? It was the question she asked herself every day now.

She had loved Ian for as long as she could remember. Almost from the time she could walk, she had planned to marry him. She smiled to herself, remembering how kind he had been to her, despite the teasing he got from the men and other lads for letting a wee lass half his size follow him like a lost puppy.

“Five years he’s kept ye waiting,” Gòrdan pressed. “That’s more time than any man deserves.”

“That’s true enough.” Sìleas brushed back the hair whipping across her face.

Her wedding was the worst memory of her life—and she was a woman with plenty of bad memories to choose from. There had been no time for the usual traditions that made a wedding a celebration and brought luck to a new marriage. No gifts and well-wishes from the neighbors. No washing of the bride’s feet. No ring. No carrying the bride over the threshold.

And certainly no sprinkling of the bed with holy water—not with Ian threatening to toss the priest down the stairs when he attempted to go with them up to the bedchamber.

None of the traditions for luck were kept, save for the one. Ian’s mother insisted Sìleas wear a new gown, though Sìleas didn’t see how a bit more bad luck on top of what she already had could make a difference. Regardless, Ian’s mother wouldn’t hear of her wearing the filthy gown she had arrived in. Unfortunately, the only new gown to be had upon an hour’s notice was one Ian’s mother had made for herself.

Sìleas rushed through her bath, barely washing, so she would be out and dressed before Ian’s mother returned to help her. Quickly, she dabbed at the long gashes across her back so she would leave no telltale blood on the borrowed gown.

When she slipped the gown over her head, it floated about her like a sack. She looked down at where the bodice sagged, exaggerating her lack. If that were not bad enough, she wanted to weep at the color. Such a violent shade of red would look lovely on Ian’s dark-haired mother, but it made Sìleas’s hair look orange and her skin blotchy.

When Ian’s mother burst in the room, her startled expression before she smoothed it confirmed Sìleas’s worst fears.

“ ’Tis a shame we can’t alter it,” his mother said, clucking her tongue. “But ye know that brings a bride bad luck.”

Sìleas was sure the gown’s color canceled out any good luck its unaltered state was likely to bring her. A bride was supposed to wear blue.

Then came the worst part of all. As she descended the stairs, with his mother’s hand at her back pushing her forward, she heard Ian shouting at his father. His words were the last blow that nearly felled her.

Have ye taken a good look at her, da? I tell ye, I will not have her. I’ll no say my vows.

But with his father, his chieftain, and a dozen armed clansman surrounding him, Ian did say them.

Sìleas blinked when Gòrdan stepped in front of her and took hold of her shoulders, bringing her sharply back to the present.

“Don’t try to kiss me again,” she said, turning her head. “Ye know it’s not right.”

“What I know is that ye deserve a husband who will love and honor ye,” Gòrdan said. “I want to be that man.”

“You’re a good man, and I like ye.” Gòrdan was fine looking as well, with rich brown hair and warm hazel eyes. “But I keep thinking that once Ian returns, he’ll…”

He’ll what? Fall on his knees and beg my forgiveness? Tell me he regretted every single day he was away?

Truth be told, she wasn’t ready to be married when they wed. She had needed another year or two before becoming a true wife. But five years! Each day Ian didn’t return deepened the wound. By now, she should have a babe in her arms and another grabbing at their skirts, like most women her age. She wanted children. And a husband.

Sìleas drew in a deep breath of the sharp, salty air. It was one humiliation after another. Ian could pretend they were not wed, because he was living among a thousand French folk who did not know it. But she lived with his family on this island in the midst of their clan.

Where every last person knows Ian has left me here waiting.

“If you cannot ask for an annulment…” Gòrdan let the question hang unfinished.

Though she could ask for an annulment, she could not tell even Gòrdan that—at least, not yet. She had been lectured on that point quite severely by both Ian’s father and the chieftain. If her MacKinnon relatives heard that her marriage was never consummated, they would attempt to steal her away, declare the marriage invalid, and force her to wed one of their own.

Yet her marriage to Ian was not a trial marriage, as most were. Through some miracle, the chieftain had found a priest. The chieftain had wanted them bound—and her castle firmly in the hands of the MacDonalds of Sleat.

For the same reason, it would have been useless to ask her chieftain to support a petition to annul her marriage. A bishop wouldn’t send a petition to Rome on her request alone. Consequently, she had written a letter to King James seeking his help. For six months, the letter lay hidden away in her chest, awaiting her decision to send it.

But now, both King James and her chieftain were dead.

“If you can’t ask for an annulment,” Gòrdan said, “then simply divorce Ian and marry me.”

“Your mother would no be pleased with that,” she said with a dry laugh. “I don’t know if she would faint dead away or take a dirk to ye.”

Although it was common in the Highlands to wed and divorce without the church’s blessing, Gòrdan’s mother had notions about the sort of woman her precious only son should wed. A “used” woman was unlikely to satisfy her.

“ ’Tis no my mother’s decision,” Gòrdan said. “I love ye, Sìleas, and I’m set on having ye for my wife.”

Sìleas sighed. It was a precious gift to have a good man tell her he loved her, even if he was the wrong man. “Ye know I can’t think of leaving Ian’s family now.”

“Then promise ye will give me an answer as soon as ye are able,” Gòrdan said. “There are many men who would want ye, but I’ll be good to ye. I’m a steadfast man. I’d never leave ye as Ian did.”

Though he meant to reassure her, his words pierced her heart.

“ ’Tis time we returned to the house.” She turned and started toward the path. “I’ve been gone too long.”

“Ach, no one will begrudge ye a wee time away after you’ve been working so hard,” Gòrdan said, taking her arm. “And if ye marry me, they’ll have to learn to do without ye.”

As they walked up the path, Sìleas looked over her shoulder at the dark water. Where was Ian now? Even after all this time, she missed the boy who had been her friend and protector. But she didn’t think she still wanted the angry young man who had left her—even if he deigned to return to claim her after all this time.

Five years she had waited for Ian. It was long enough. Tomorrow, she would rewrite her letter and send it to the dead king’s widow.

• • •

“Perhaps ye should ease up on the whiskey,” Alex said.

“Ye can’t expect me to face this sober,” Ian said.

Ian tipped the jug back one more time to be sure it was empty then tossed it aside. When they rounded the next bend, he saw the smoke from the chimneys of his family home curling against the darkened sky and felt a piercing longing for his family. It would be good to be home… if not for having to face the problem of Sìleas.

“Most women don’t appreciate a man who is slobbering drunk, cousin,” Alex said. “I hope ye haven’t had so much you’ll have trouble doing your husbandly duty.”

“Will ye no leave it alone?”

“Ach,” Alex said, rubbing his arm where Ian had punched him, “I only meant to cheer ye up with a wee bit a teasing.”

“ ’Tis good you’re coming home with me,” Ian said. “Since Sìleas will be needing another husband in the clan, it may as well be you.”

“And I thought ye were fond of the lass,” Alex said.

In truth, Ian was fond of Sìleas. He wanted a good husband for her.

He just didn’t want it to be him.

For five years, he had this false marriage hanging over him. Not that he’d let it constrain him, but it was always there in the back of his mind like a sore that wouldn’t heal. Now that he had come home to Skye, it was time to take his place in his clan. He supposed he would have to take a wife—which meant he had to deal with the problem of Sìleas first. He still got angry every time he thought of how he’d been forced to wed her. And whether she’d done it on purpose or not, it was her fault.

Once he was out from under the marriage, he could forgive her.

A dog barked somewhere in the darkness to herald his homecoming. The smell of cows and horses filled his nose as they passed between the familiar black shapes of the byre and the old cottage where his parents had first lived. Just ahead, lamplight filtered through the shutters of the two-story house his father had built before Ian was born.

Swaying just a wee bit, Ian found the latch and lifted it. The earthy smell of the peat fire enveloped him as he eased inside the door.

Ignoring Alex’s nudge from behind, he paused in the dark foyer to survey the people gathered around the hearth. His mother sat on the far side. Her face was still beautiful, but she was too thin, and her thick, black braid had streaks of white.

Across from her, a couple sat on a bench with their backs to the door. Neighbors, most likely. Between them and his mother, a young man with his brother’s chestnut hair was sprawled on the floor, as if he lived here. Could this long-limbed fellow, talking in a deep voice, be his “little” brother Niall?

There was no sign of his father or Sìleas, so he would have the easy greetings first.

“Hello Mam!” he called, as he stepped into the hall.

His mother shrieked his name and ran across the room to leap into his arms. He twirled her around before setting her back down.

“Mam, mam, don’t weep.” Her bones felt sharp under his hands as he patted her back to soothe her. “Ye can see I am well.”

“Ye are a wretched son to stay away so long.” She slapped his arm, but she was smiling at him through her tears.

“Auntie Beitris, I know ye missed me, too,” Alex said, as he held his arms out to Ian’s mother.

“And who is this braw man?” Ian said, turning to his brother.

Their mother had lost three babes, all of them girls, before Niall was born, so there was a nine-year gap between Ian and his brother. When Ian left for France, his brother had barely reached his shoulder. Now, at fifteen, Niall stood eye to eye with him.

“Surely, this cannot be my baby brother.” Ian locked his arm around Niall’s neck and rubbed his head with his knuckles, then passed him to Alex, who did the same.

“Look at ye,” Alex said. “I’d wager all the lasses on the island have been after ye, since I wasn’t here to divert them.”

Niall and Alex exchanged a couple of good-natured punches, then Niall caught Ian’s eye and cocked his head. Ian had forgotten all about the couple on the bench, but at his brother’s signal, he turned around to greet them.

The room fell away as Ian stared at the young woman who now stood in the glow of the firelight with her eyes fixed on the floor and her hands clenched before her. Her hair was the most beautiful shade of red he had ever seen. It fell in gleaming waves over her shoulders and breasts and framed a face so lovely it squeezed his heart to look at her.

When she lifted her gaze and met his, the air went out of him. Her eyes were a bright emerald, and they seemed to be asking a question as if her very life depended upon it.

Whatever this lass’s question was, his answer was aye.

CHAPTER 4

There was something very familiar about this lovely, green-eyed lass, but Ian could not place her.

“Ian.” Alex jabbed him in the ribs.

Ian knew he should stop staring at her, but he couldn’t help himself. And why should he, when the lass was staring right back at him? He wondered vaguely if the man at her side was her husband—and hoped he wasn’t.

“Hmmph,” Alex grunted, as he pushed past Ian. He strode across the room and greeted the young woman with a kiss on her cheek, as if he knew her well.

“Ach, you are a sight to behold,” Alex said, standing back and holding her hands. “If I were your husband, Sìleas, ye can be sure I wouldn’t have kept ye waiting a single day.”

Sìleas? Ian shook his head. Nay, this could not be…

The young woman was nothing like the scrawny thirteen-year-old he remembered. Instead of gawky limbs and pointed elbows, she had graceful lines and rounded curves that made his throat go dry.

And yet… that was Sìleas’s upturned nose. And he supposed that glorious mass of curling red hair could be hers, if it were brushed and combed—a state he’d never seen it in before.

“Welcome home,” the young woman said to Alex in the kind of throaty voice a man wanted to hear in the dark.

Sìleas never had one of those high-pitched little girl voices… but this beauty could not truly be her.

“Ye two must be hungry after your travels. Come, Sìleas, let us get these men fed,” his mother said, taking the lass by the arm. His mother gave him a wide-eyed look over her shoulder, the kind she used to give him when he was a lad and had committed some grievous error in front of company.

When he started to follow the two women to the table, Alex hauled him back. “Are ye an idiot?” Alex hissed in his face. “Ye didn’t even greet Sìleas. What’s the matter with ye?”

“Are ye sure that’s Sìleas?” Ian said, leaning to the side so he could see past Alex to the red-haired lass.

“Of course it is, ye fool,” Alex said. “Did ye no hear your mam just say her name?”

Ian had to tear his gaze away from her when Niall and the other man joined them. Now that he took a good look at the man, he saw it was their neighbor, Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald.

“Ian, Alex,” Gòrdan said, giving them each a curt nod.

Ian met the man’s stubborn hazel eyes. “Gòrdan.”

“You’ve been gone a long time,” Gòrdan said, sounding as though Ian could not be gone long enough to make him happy. “A good deal has changed here in your absence.”

“Has it now?” Ian said, knowing a challenge when he heard one. “Well, ye can expect it all to change again, now that I’m back.”

Gòrdan scowled at him before turning on his heel to join the women, who were busy setting food on the table on the other side of the room.

“Thank ye kindly for supper,” Gòrdan said to them.

“Ye are always welcome to join us. ’Tis small thanks for all you’ve done for us,” his mother said, beaming at Gòrdan. “ ’Twas kind of ye to take Sìleas out for a stroll today.”

What in the name of all the saints was his mother doing, thanking that conniving Gòrdan?

“If ye need me for… for anything at all,” Gòrdan said to Sìleas in a low voice, “ye know where to find me.” Gòrdan touched her arm as he spoke to her, and an unaccountable surge of anger rose in Ian’s chest, choking him.

If Sìleas answered, Ian didn’t hear it over the blood pounding in his ears. Just what was going on between Sìleas and Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald? He was about to help Gòrdan out the door, when the man showed the good sense to leave.

“Ye won’t have far to look to find a man to replace ye,” Alex said in Ian’s ear. “That is what ye wanted, no?”

“That doesn’t mean I’ll let Gòrdan make a cuckold of me,” Ian ground out through his teeth.

Ian didn’t know whether to regret drinking so much whiskey—or to wish he had drunk a good deal more. After traveling half the world, he felt disoriented in his own home. Everyone had changed—his brother, his mother. And most of all, Sìleas. He still could not quite believe it was her.

“Where’s da?” he asked his mother.

“Come have some supper,” his mother said, and disappeared into the kitchen. She returned a moment later with a steaming bowl. “I’ve got your favorite fish stew.”

Ian’s stomach rumbled as the savory smell reached him. He was near starved.

“Where’s da?” he asked again, as he sat down at the table.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the back of Sìleas’s skirt disappearing up the stairs.

He stopped with his spoon halfway to his mouth as it occurred to him he had the right to follow her up and take her to bed. Tonight. Right now. Before supper, if he wanted. And again, after. The part of him between his legs was giving him an emphatic Aye!

His reaction startled him. For five long years, he had planned to end the marriage as soon as he returned. He’d harbored not a single doubt. The only question had been how to do it with the least embarrassment to Sìleas—and the least difficulty for him.

But he made that plan before she turned into this enchanting lass with a voice that was like velvet sliding over his skin—and curves that would have him dreaming of her naked as soon as he closed his eyes.

Aye, he most definitely wanted to take Sìleas to bed. Any man would. The question, however, was whether he wanted her to be the last woman he ever took to his bed. He wasn’t prepared to decide that tonight. Hell, he didn’t even know Sìleas anymore. Was the woman anything like the wild-haired bairn who used to follow him about and always need rescuing?

Ian knew he should say something to her. But what? He couldn’t tell her he was ready to be her husband and bind his life to hers forever. Though he had no idea what he would say, he got up from his chair, stomach rumbling, to follow her upstairs.

Before he had taken two steps, he was stopped by a loud crash in the next room. He turned in time to catch his mother and brother exchanging glances.

At the sound of a second crash, Niall jumped to his feet. “I’ll get him.”

Sìleas ignored the crash of pottery and the bellowing that followed as she ran up the stairs. This once, they would have to manage without her. She slammed the bedchamber door, leaned against it, and gulped in deep breaths. Damn him! She had wept for Ian MacDonald too many times over the last five years, and she was not going to do it again.

Her head pounded, her chest hurt, and she could not get enough air.

The foolish plans she’d held on to since she was a wee girl were shattering like the crockery Ian’s father was hurling against the wall downstairs. She had lied to herself. Lied, when she told herself she had put her childish dreams away. Lied, when she said she’d ceased expecting Ian to want to share a life with her when he finally returned.

If she had given up her dreams, her heart would not be breaking from the loss of them now.

When Ian embraced his mother first, she understood. That was only right. And she hardly resented it at all when he greeted Niall next, for Niall had missed Ian almost as much as she had. But then, it was her turn. She fixed her gaze on the floor and held her breath, waiting. He was the one who left; he should come to her. In any case, her feet would not move.

Then the room went silent, and she felt his gaze on her. Slowly, she lifted her head and looked into the bluest eyes in the Highlands. Her fingers were ice, her palms sweaty, and her bodice felt too tight. For five years, she had waited for this moment.

She had imagined it a thousand times. Ian would give her a wide smile that warmed his eyes and pull her into his arms. He would tell her how much he missed her and how glad he was to be home. Then, in front of God and his family, he would call her wife and give her a kiss—her first real kiss.

In her more realistic moments, she thought it might be awkward between them at first, but that Ian would attempt to make it right and seek her forgiveness. Never did she imagine he would not speak to her.

Not a single word.

With her heart in her throat, she implored him with her eyes to do as he ought. Instead, he stared at her as if she had grown a tail and fins. If he didn’t want to claim her, he could have had the courtesy to greet her as the old friend she was, then told her in private he did not wish to be her husband. His public dismissal was both insulting and heartless.

Sìleas paced up and down her bedchamber, clenching her hands until her nails pierced the skin. The boy she had known would never have been so unkind. The angry young man who had called her repulsive, however, was capable of such cruelty. All this time, she had made excuses for him. Even now, she was tempted—but failing to acknowledge her in some small way was simply unforgiveable.

Ian’s words from their wedding day rang in her ears. Have ye taken a good look at her, da? Ach! She gave the door a good kick—they wouldn’t hear it below over the yelling.

She tilted her head back. “Dear God, did ye have to make him more handsome than ever? Was that truly necessary?”

Ian had been a lovely boy, with kind, sky-blue eyes framed by thick, dark lashes—the sort all the mothers cooed over. But there was nothing left of the sweet lad in the man who strode into the house tonight. True enough, his eyes were as blue as ever and his hair the same shiny black of a selkie. But the man had a rough, dangerous air about him.

It was possible he’d been like this when he returned from fighting on the borders, and she had been too young to recognize it. But the moment he burst into the room tonight, she felt it, recognized it, knew it for the danger it was. And instead of making her wary, a ripple of excitement shivered through her, right down to the tips of her toes. She wanted to be next to him, to feel the power of his presence, to touch the vibrating energy that coursed through him.

She felt it, wanted it… and Ian ignored her.

She needed to be gone from this house. Nay, she would not be married to a man who did not want her. She jerked the cloth sack off the hook on the back of her door, threw it on the bed, and started tossing things into it.

Not all men found her disgusting. She knew several clansmen who would be pleased to have her for a wife—and not just for her lands.

As she looked around the room, deciding what to take with her, her gaze lingered on the quilt his mother had made her… the colored stones Niall had collected with her… the wooden box Ian’s father had carved for her.

She’d lived here for five years, but she’d been wrong to think of this as her home. No matter how much she loved Ian’s family, they were his blood, his family. Not hers.

Sìleas looked down at the gown in her hand and remembered how she and Ian’s mother had talked by the fire as they worked on it together. All her life, she had longed for a family, for a home where people laughed at the table and cared for each other. She had been happy here, despite the waiting.

Ian’s family had welcomed her from the start, and eventually accepted and loved her. His father had taken the longest to win over—but she had. Losing the family she had come to think of as her own would be hard. Very hard, indeed. But she was here as Ian’s wife. If she wasn’t that, she could not stay.

But where could she go?

Sìleas sank to the floor and leaned her head against the side of the bed. She had no family to take her in, no home to go to. Although she was heir to Knock Castle, her step-da, Murdoc MacKinnon, had it now. After he took it, she feared he would come for her too.

She could go to Gòrdan, of course, but she wasn’t ready to make that decision.

Despair weighed down on her as she looked at the moonless black sky outside her window. Traveling in the dark would be foolish—and she had no place to go. Besides, she couldn’t just abandon the family after all they had done for her. There were things she must see to before she could leave.

She was so tired she felt light-headed. The last weeks had been difficult—and tonight, worse. In the morning, she would make a plan for her future.

She pulled the half-filled bag off the bed and let it drop to the floor with a thump. As she crawled into bed, Sìleas tried to forget that this was meant to be her marriage bed.

Ian’s stomach tightened. “Mam, what is it? Has something happened to da?”

“Your father was wounded at Flodden.” His mother gave him a thin, tense smile. “But he’s much better now.”

She flinched at the sound of another crash and broken crockery falling to the floor. This time, it was followed by his father’s voice, bellowing, “Leave me be, damn ye!”

Ian sprinted through the doorway to the small room that used to serve as a servant’s bedchamber. He stopped in his tracks when he saw the man on the bed.

His father lay under a quilt, looking thinner than seemed possible. A bandage covered the top of his head and one eye. Below the bandage, a red gash ran down the side of his face to below his jaw. The part of his face that wasn’t covered by bandages was parchment white, rather than its usual ruddy color.

In all his memories, his father was a tall, powerfully built warrior who could swing a claymore with enough force to cut an enemy in half. He was a man who spent his time outdoors, in the mountains or on the sea. Finding him a bed-ridden invalid shook Ian to his foundations.

“Hello, da,” he said, forcing his voice to be steady.

“It took ye a damned long time to come home.” His father’s voice sounded raspy, as if he had to fight to draw breath to speak. His father’s gaze went past him to Alex, who had come in on his heels. “The same goes for you, Alex Bàn MacDonald. Have Duncan and Connor returned as well?”

“Aye,” Alex said. “They’ve gone to the west to have a look about.”

Ian’s mouth went dry. The quilt covering his father lay flat on the bed where his father’s left leg should have been.

Ian tore his gaze from the missing leg, guilt weighing on his chest like a stone. “You’re right, da. I should have come home sooner. I should have been here to fight with ye at Flodden.”

“Ye think ye could have saved my leg, is that it?” his father said, his face flushing with anger. Then, in a quieter voice, he said, “No, son, I would not have wished ye there. Ye would have been lost like the others, and the family needs ye now that I’m useless.”

Regardless of the outcome, Ian should have fought at his father’s side. His father’s words did not absolve him. Redemption was something a man had to earn.

“But if ye had been at the battle, I know ye would have let me die like a man,” his father said with a vicious look at Niall.

Ian glanced at Niall, realizing for the first time that his young brother must have fought at Flodden. A strong fifteen-year-old who was trained to fight would not be left home with the women and children.

The muscles in Niall’s jaw clenched, before he said, “Come, da, let me help ye sit up.”

When Niall tried to take his arm, his father shook him off. “I said, let me be!”

Something more than losing a leg had changed in his father. Payton MacDonald had been a warrior who sent terror into the hearts of his enemies, but he had also been a man who showed warmth and kindness to his family.

“Give Ian the chair and go,” his father barked without looking at Niall. “Alex, get out of the doorway and come in. I must tell the two of ye of our clan’s misfortunes, for the future of the MacDonalds of Sleat rests with ye.”

CHAPTER 5

“Do ye think we should be leaving so soon?” Alex asked, as they crossed the yard to the byre. “We only just arrived.”

“We need to find Connor and Duncan and make our plan,” Ian said.

His father’s grim news had kept Ian and Alex up talking far into the night. As they had feared, Hugh Dubh and his rough, clanless men had taken control of Dunscaith, the chieftain’s castle, as soon as the men returned from Flodden bearing the body of their dead chieftain. Hugh had proclaimed himself the new chieftain. And then, the new “chieftain” had stood by and done nothing while the MacKinnons attacked Knock Castle.

Ach, it made Ian blind with fury.

“Connor said he’d come for us when he wants us,” Alex said.

“I can’t sit here on my arse doing nothing with so much at stake,” Ian said.

Besides, he needed to escape, if only for a day or two. Nothing at home was as he expected. Finding his father crippled had shaken him badly. And seeing Sìleas had confused him.

“So what are ye going to do about Sìleas?” Alex asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Ye think being away from her will help ye decide?” Alex asked. “Ye must know that’s utter foolishness, cousin.”

Foolish or no, that was what Ian was doing. Because he was forced to say vows when he’d committed no offense, he’d never considered keeping them. But if he took Sìleas as his true wife now, that would be an entirely different matter. It would be his decision, and he would feel honorbound to keep his vows. ’Til death.

“I need time to decide,” Ian said.

“So ye think it’s your choice, do ye?” Alex said. “Are ye so sure Sìleas wants ye?”

Ian turned to look at Alex to see if he was serious. “She’s been living with my family all this time, waiting for me.” With a grin, he added, “The whole clan knows the lass has adored me since she was a child.”

“Ach, but she’s not an ignorant child now,” Alex said over his shoulder as he pulled open the door to the byre.

Alex stopped so abruptly that Ian ran into him. When Ian pushed past him, he saw what—or rather, who—had caught Alex by surprise.

Sìleas was dressed in a man’s shirt and old boots, and she was mucking out a stall with a pitchfork. With streaks of dirt on her face and bits of straw tangled in her hair, she looked more like the Sìleas that Ian remembered.

Her pitchfork was half-raised when she saw them. Her eyes widened, and then, very slowly, she rested the wooden end of the pitchfork on the dirt floor.

“Do not tell me ye have it in your head to leave,” she said, looking at Ian.

“Just for a few days,” Ian said, feeling unaccountably guilty. He had every reason to go.

“Ye cannot mean it,” she said, her voice rising. “You’ve seen how it is here. You’ve seen what’s happened to your da.”

“Sìl, a man must do what he must,” Ian said. “The future of the clan is at stake.”

“Hugh Dubh has been sitting in the chieftain’s castle for weeks,” she said, planting one hand on her hip. “I believe we can survive another day or two with him in it.”

“Delay will only make things worse,” Ian said.

“Ye cannot spare your mother more than an evening after the poor woman didn’t lay eyes on ye for five years?” Sìleas said.

Ian felt a twinge of guilt about that, but he had to go. To divert her—and because he was curious—he asked, “What are ye doing dressed like that and mucking out the stalls?”

“Someone has to,” Sìleas said, her eyes sparking green fire. “Your da can’t do it. And your brother can’t do everything himself, try as he might.”

“There are other men who can do this,” Ian said.

“Do ye see any men here to help?” she said, sweeping one arm out to the side. Her other hand gripped the pitchfork so tightly her knuckles were white. “We lost some men in the battle, and Hugh Dubh has forbidden the rest from working our lands.”

Ian’s father had not told him of this insult.

“Give me that, Sìl,” Alex said, using the voice he used to gentle horses. “I understand why you want to use it on him, but Ian won’t be good to anyone if you stick that pitchfork into his heart.”

When she glared at Alex and banged the end of the pitchfork against the ground, Alex lifted his hands palms out and stepped back.

“I can see,” he said in a low voice to Ian, “the lass adores ye still.”

Ian decided to try his luck. When he started toward her, Sìleas braced the pitchfork in front of her.

“Don’t ye try to tell me what a man must do,” she said, so angry that tears filled her eyes, “because the truth is ye are just playing at being a man.”

She was straining his patience now. How dare she mock him? “Protecting the clan is not playing.”

“A true man doesn’t desert his family when they need him,” she said. “And protecting the clan starts with your family.”

This time, the truth of her words burned through him.

“I’ll stay until we hear from Connor,” Ian said, and reached out for the pitchfork. “Go inside, Sìleas. I’ll do this.”

She hurled the pitchfork against the wall with a loud clatter that set the horses snorting, and stormed past him.

At the door, Sìleas spun around to fling one last remark at him. “It’s time ye grew up, Ian MacDonald, because your family needs ye.”

Ian and Alex went to the creek to clean up, rather than dirty his mother’s kitchen washing in the tub there.

“Mucking out the byre was not how I thought we’d be serving the clan,” Alex said, sounding amused.

“It is a waste of our talents. We’re warriors!” Ian said, Alex’s good humor annoying him further. “We should be using our claymores, fighting our way into the castle, and tossing Hugh over the wall for the fish to eat.”

“While Sìleas mucks out the stalls for ye?” Alex said, raising an eyebrow and grinning. “Hugh Dubh has as much right to seek the chieftainship as Connor. We can’t just toss him in the sea, as satisfying as that would be.”

“But he’s claiming it without being chosen, and he’s no right to do that,” Ian said. “He made a mistake by not calling a gathering and forcing the selection before Connor returned.”

“I expect Hugh was waiting until he could share the sad news of Connor’s demise,” Alex said.

“It won’t be easy to convince the men to go against Hugh while he holds Dunscaith Castle,” Ian said. “We must find a way to show them that Connor is the better man.”

“I’m starving,” Alex said, tossing his dirty towel at Ian. “It must be time to eat, aye?”

“Something da said about what happened at the battle troubles me,” Ian said, as they headed toward the house.

“What’s that?” Alex asked.

“He said the English surprised him, striking from behind,” Ian said. “You’ve fought with my father—the man fights like he’s got eyes in the back of his head. How did the English get past him without him knowing it?”

Alex squeezed Ian’s shoulder. “In his prime, your father was a great warrior—but he’s grown old.”

“Aye, he has,” Ian said, his spirits sinking as he recalled his father’s sallow cheeks and graying hair. “I should have been there to protect his back.”

“How are ye feeling today, Payton?” Sìleas asked, as she set the tray on the small table next to the bed.

“I’m missing a leg, so how do ye think I am?” he said.

She stopped herself from helping him sit up, knowing it would annoy him. Though she had a hundred things to do, Sìleas took the chair beside him and forced her hands to be still.

“What are ye all upset about?” Payton asked, slanting his eyes at her as he lifted an oatcake to his mouth.

Sìleas pressed her lips together.

“Come, Sìleas, you’re so furious it’s making your hair curl.”

“Your son is an idiot,” she blurted out—and regretted it as soon as the words were out of her mouth.

“Which of my idiot sons are ye referring to?” Payton asked.

“I’ll not hear ye say another word against Niall, and ye know it,” she said. “It’s time ye stopped blaming him for doing what he had to do.”

“So it’s Ian, is it?” Payton said.

“I fail to see why this is the first thing to amuse ye in weeks,” she snapped. Despite her annoyance, Sìleas was pleased to see a glimmer of his old self.

“What’s Ian done to get on your wrong side so soon?”

She couldn’t tell him that Ian had not seen fit to acknowledge her or their marriage—she had her pride—so she shared Ian’s latest offense.

“He’s no notion of what must be done with the crops and livestock,” she said, folding her arms. It was Ian’s responsibility now, and he would just have to learn.

“I raised Ian to be a warrior, not a farmer, lass. He has more important things to attend to,” Payton said, his expression turning stern. “I told him how that devil took Knock Castle.”

Sìleas said nothing, knowing that the loss of her castle was a festering wound to Payton’s pride—and to the whole clan. Her step-da had bided his time for five years, then struck in the wake of Flodden when the MacDonalds were weak.

Payton set his plate on the tray and sank back on the pillows, looking pale.

“If it’s any comfort to ye, I expect the Knock Castle ghost is haunting my step-da,” she said, giving him a wink. “I doubt the Green Lady has let Murdoc have a single good night’s sleep.”

“ ’Tis a shame your ghost doesn’t carry a dirk,” Payton said in a tired voice.

“Shall I tell ye how she warned me to leave that day?” she asked.

“Aye, lass.” Payton closed his eyes as she began and was asleep before she was halfway through the old story. It hurt her to see the great man so weakened.

The hands resting on the bedcovers were marked by battle scars that told a tale of their own. Yet she remembered how gently those big hands had encompassed hers the morning Payton had found her and Ian sleeping in the wood. Without waking him, Sìleas lifted the hand closest to her and held it.

Payton was getting stronger every day. She could leave soon. With Ian here, he would do just fine without her. They all would.

But she feared that when she left she would be like Payton, always missing a part of her that was gone.

CHAPTER 6

Ian stood in the doorway watching Sìleas. This was the new Sìleas again, all clean and combed in a moss-green gown—and so lovely he had to remind himself to breathe. She must have bathed in the tub in the kitchen, for her cheeks were pink and a damp curl was stuck to the side of her face.

He was surprised his father would let her hold his hand as if he were a child, until he realized his da was asleep. Though he was careful not to make a sound, she sensed his presence and turned. Today her eyes were the same dark mossy green as her gown, but touched with dew from tears that welled in her eyes.

“My mother said to tell ye dinner is ready,” he said in a hushed voice. “Are ye all right?”

Sìleas nodded and picked up the tray as she got up. When Ian stepped aside to let her pass, she said, “He’s not a well man. Ye shouldn’t have kept him up so late.”

Apparently, Sìleas had kindness in her heart for every member of his family but him.

“My father wanted to talk,” Ian said, “and I think it did him good.”

“I suppose you’re right,” she said with a sigh. “But have a care with him.”

Ian followed the provocative sway of her hips until she disappeared into the kitchen.

He continued watching her as they ate their midday meal. With that full bottom lip, her mouth was made for kissing. Every time she puckered and blew on her stew, his heart did an odd little leap in his chest. And his heart was not the only part of him affected. His cock was standing to attention, stiff as an English soldier.

Likely, Sìleas was foul-tempered toward him for not making his intentions clear. He had trouble recalling his reasons for waiting as he watched her take a spoonful into her mouth, smile with pleasure at the taste, and run her pink tongue across her top lip.

Perhaps he should just take her to bed now and have done with it. If the price of following his desire was gaining a wife, well, it was time he had one anyway.

Alex, the devil, was sitting next to Sìleas and plying her with his legendary charm. She threw her head back laughing at something he said. It was a lovely laugh—full-throated and sensual.

“I don’t believe a word you’re saying, Alex Bàn MacDonald!” Sìleas pressed her hand to her bosom as if she couldn’t get her breath. “Five men, ye say? How did ye ever escape?”

“Ye mean, how did they get away?” Alex asked. “ ’Twas nothing, really. I told them they could run, or they could die.”

It irked Ian the way Sìleas leaned forward with her eyes fixed on Alex, as if she were swallowing Alex’s tale whole.

“There were only three of them, not five,” Ian corrected, his words sounding peevish to his own ears.

Sìleas turned to face him, her smile fading. Lord, but she had pretty eyes, even when they were dead serious, as they were now. The scent of summer heather tickled his nose. Did she use dried heather in her bath water? Ah, that meant every inch of her skin would have that lovely smell.

“Now that we’ve mucked out the byre,” Ian said, “Alex and I are going to go speak to some of the men on this side of the island.”

“And why do ye need to do that?” Sìleas asked.

Ian raised his eyebrows. “Not that ye need to know, mind ye, but we intend to find out how the men feel about the prospect of having Hugh as their chieftain.”

“I can tell ye the sentiment toward Hugh, as can Niall,” Sìleas said, slicing her meat with enough vigor to cut through the table. “But if ye must ask the men yourself, they’ll all be at the church tomorrow.”

“A priest is visiting the island,” his mother explained. “Father Brian will be baptizing all the children born since he was here a year ago.”

There was always a shortage of priests in the Highlands. Unlike in France, the church here was poor. Though Highland chieftains might allow God the use of their lands for churches and monasteries, they did not give their lands away. Because the church could provide little to support them, few men joined the priesthood, and a priest who married was not turned out. As with divorce and marriage, the rules of the church were not strictly followed in the Highlands.

“Waiting to see the men at the church seems a good plan,” Alex said, giving Sìleas a bright smile. “Wouldn’t ye agree, Ian?”

Ian nodded, though he would rather go now, if only to feel he was doing something.

“And don’t ignore the womenfolk,” his mother put in. “Ná bac éinne ná bíonn buíochas na mban air.” Pay no heed to anyone that the womenfolk do not respect.

“Sìleas,” Alex said, “what do ye say to you and me going out in the boat this afternoon?”

Alex was trying to taunt him; Ian glared at him to let him know he did not find it amusing.

“That sounds lovely,” Sìleas said with a soft smile for Alex. “But after I clean up the kitchen, I must have a word with Ian here.”

She said his name like she might say pig shite.

Then she turned to level a hard look at him. “When ye have finished your meal, can ye spare a wee bit of time to speak with me?”

Sìleas might not look the same, but she was as direct as when she was a lass running wild. Clearly, she wanted to know where she stood with him. Her sharp words reminded him that he would be wise to give himself time before deciding his fate.

“Do ye have no woman to help in the kitchen?” Ian asked, only partly because he wanted to divert her. They had always had one clanswoman or another who needed a home, living with them and helping his mother.

“Some of the men came to ask your da’s advice regarding the selection of a new chieftain,” his mother said. “He urged them to wait for Connor’s return—and Hugh Dubh has been punishing us ever since.”

“When Hugh threatened everyone who worked here,” Sìleas said, “we told them to leave.”

“Go along now and talk with Ian,” his mother said, taking the bowls from Sìleas. “I’ll clean up.”

As Ian got to his feet, Niall came in through the door. Instead of giving him the sharp edge of her tongue for missing dinner, Sìleas’s expression softened when she saw him.

“Niall, can ye join Ian and me?”

Now, why would she be asking Niall to join them?

“Whatever ye need, I’m there,” Niall said, smiling at her as he hung his cap by the door.

“I appreciate it.” Sìleas’s voice wavered a bit, as if Niall had done something special that touched her—when all she showed Ian was irritation.

As he followed Sìleas up the stairs, the smell of heather filled his nose. He couldn’t help taking in her slim ankles and the sway of her skirts as she climbed the steep steps. Lifting his gaze, he imagined her smooth, rounded bottom beneath the skirts.

She led them into the room that had been his bedchamber growing up. It looked different now, with pretty stones lining the windowsill and dried flowers in a jug on the table. His stomach tightened with the memory of the last time he was in this room—their “wedding” night, when he had spent a long, restless night on the hard floor.

He glanced at his old bed—the bed she slept in now. If he chose, he could sleep here with her every night. He was hard just thinking about it. If he stayed with her, he would build a new bed for them suitable for Knock Castle, with posts and heavy curtains like he had seen in France.

After taking a chair at the table, she gestured for him and Niall to do the same. Niall sat opposite her, as if by habit, leaving Ian to pull up a stool between them, facing the wall.

“I don’t know if ye realize how verra badly injured your da was when we first got him back.” Sìleas spoke in a soft voice and fixed her gaze on the table.

“Da didn’t wake for a fortnight,” Niall put in. “ ’Twas a miracle he lived.”

His father wished to God he hadn’t, crippled as he was. In his place, Ian would feel the same.

“Since ye were not here, Niall and I have been making the decisions that needed to be made these last few weeks,” Sìleas said, her tone becoming clipped again. “I hope you’ll be satisfied with what we’ve done.”

“What sort of decisions?” Ian asked.

Sìleas stood to take down a sheaf of papers from the shelf above the table. “How many cattle to slaughter for the winter, which sheep to sell or trade, that sort of thing.”

What could be more tedious?

Sìleas sat down and pushed the stack of papers across the table to him. “Now that you are here, these are your decisions to make.” She paused, then added, “At least until your da is well.”

Ian glanced down. There were figures all down the first page. “What do ye expect me to do with these?”

“Sìleas will have to explain it to ye,” Niall said, grinning at her. “She’s been helping da manage our lands and tenants for years. Ye should hear him, always bragging about how clever she is.”

His father? Letting a lass help him and boasting about it? Ian didn’t want to accuse his brother of lying, but, truly, this was hard to fathom.

Ian watched Sìleas as she spoke about cattle and crops, listening more to the sound of her voice than her words. He did notice how she repeatedly brought Niall into her recitation. What impressed him as much as her enthusiasm for the tedious details was how she recognized his brother’s need to be relied upon as a man.

His father certainly showed no concern for Niall’s pride. Remembering his father’s harshness toward Niall, Ian felt a rush of warmth toward Sìleas for her kindness to his brother. He would have to ask her why his da was so angry with Niall.

With his mind on Niall and his father, he didn’t realize she was finished going over the accounts until she was on her feet.

“I must go now,” she said, smoothing her skirts, “or the clothes will never be washed and you’ll have no supper.”

Without thinking, Ian said, “Isn’t running the household my mother’s responsibility?” This brought a second question to mind that had been nagging him. Gesturing to the sheaf of papers before him, he said, “Why was she not the one to make these decisions in da’s place?”

“Do ye think I took it from her?” Sìleas asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “Is that what ye think?”

The hurt in Sìleas’s eyes cut him to the quick.

“I did not mean—,” he started to say, but she cut him off.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, though clearly it did. “You’ll be taking over the task now, so I’ll leave ye to it.”

“Wait,” Ian said, catching her arm. “You’ve done a fine job with it, and I’d be happy to have ye continue.”

“ ’Tis no my place to do it now,” she said in a tight voice.

Ach, he felt lower than dirt. But before he could get out a word of apology, she was out the door. No sooner was she gone, than his brother slammed his fist on the table.

“Ye have no notion what it’s been like here, while you’ve been off having your adventures,” Niall said.

Ian met his brother’s angry gaze. “Then you’ll have to tell me.”

“Da was barely alive when I got him home.” Niall worked his jaw as he leaned forward and stared at his hands. “I don’t know what we would have done without Sìleas. She was the one who washed his wounds every day and put on the salve she got from Teàrlag.”

Grief and guilt curled together in Ian’s gut. He would never know if he could have saved his father from injury had he been at his side in the battle. But he was as good as any man with a sword, so he might have made a difference.

“During the time da did not waken,” Niall said, “Sìleas spent hours at his bedside, talking and reading to him as if he could hear every word.”

It struck Ian as odd that Niall spoke only of Sìleas taking care of their father. “What about mam?”

“Mam stopped speaking when she thought da was dying. She was like the walking dead herself.” Niall kept his eyes fixed on his hands and spoke in a low, rough voice. “Sìl and I did our best to make her eat, but she grew so weak we feared we would lose her, too.”

Guilt was bitter in Ian’s throat. Niall was far too young for the burden he’d been carrying—and it was Ian’s burden.

“Mam’s been much better since da woke up a couple of weeks ago. But da…” Niall turned to gaze out the small window. “Well, it’s been almost worse since he awoke and found his leg was gone.”

Ian leaned across the table and squeezed his brother’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here. We came as soon as we heard the news of the battle.”

“Ye should have been here long before then,” Niall said, his voice hard. “For Sìleas, ye should have been here. You’ve shamed her by leaving her for so long.”

Ian had never considered that his absence might shame her. Until he returned, he had thought of her as an awkward girl not ready for marriage.

“One way or another, I will make it right,” Ian said. “I am grateful to ye for taking care of the family in my absence.”

“It’s Sìleas ye should be thanking, not me.” His brother stood abruptly, jostling the table. He was shaking with anger. “Sìleas has worked herself to the bone, keeping the family going these last weeks. Did ye not see the circles under her eyes? I do my best to help her, but it’s no enough.”

“I’ll see to things now,” Ian said, keeping his voice quiet.

“Then you’d best convince her to stay,” Niall said, “for we cannot do without her.”

“Sìleas is not going anywhere soon.” At least not until he made up his mind.

“ ’Tis a wonder she hasn’t left ye yet,” Niall said, his eyes burning into Ian. “If ye don’t know it, there is a line of men just waiting for her to lose patience with ye.”

CHAPTER 7

Ian listened to Alex’s snoring in the next bed and watched the sky grow light through the crack in the shutters of the old cottage as he thought about the day ahead. It was an important day, for him and for the clan. After weighing the advantages and disadvantages over the two days since his return, he had decided to accept Sìleas as his true wife. He would tell her today, after the gathering at the church.

In the end, it was an easy choice. Sìleas had become the peg that held his family together. After not being here when they needed him, he would not take her away from them now. They were all very fond of her. In fact, he was a trifle concerned Niall’s feelings toward her were not entirely brotherly, but the lad was young and would get over it soon enough.

For his mother, Sìleas filled the hole in her heart left by the baby daughters she had lost. What surprised him was the closeness between Sìleas and his father. Busy as Sìleas was, Ian found her at his father’s bedside several times a day. Her presence seemed to soothe him. Although his father had never openly mourned the loss of their daughters as his mother had, perhaps he, too, had carried a wound that Sìleas healed.

If for no other reason, Ian would have kept Sìleas for the sake of his family. Added to that, she was heir to Knock Castle, a good manager, and she made his blood run hot. What more could a man ask for?

Now that he’d come home to take his place in the clan, he needed a wife. There was no good reason to upset the basket when he already had one that suited. The only objection he could claim was that he hadn’t chosen Sìleas in the first place. It would be just pigheaded to let that stop him when everything else weighed in favor of the marriage.

Now that he’d made up his mind, it was only a matter of getting Sìleas alone so he could tell her. Saving the clan from Hugh Dubh came first, of course. He would speak to her after the business at the church today.

Then he could join Sìleas in the bed upstairs.

He smiled to himself. That particular advantage had weighed heavily in favor of keeping the marriage. No more sleeping in the old cottage with Alex. And once he told Sìleas of his decision, she would stop giving him the sharp edge of her tongue.

He could think of other uses for that tongue…

“Are ye going to lie abed all morning?” Alex said, and Ian turned to find his cousin dressed and strapping on his claymore.

Ian grinned at him, feeling better than he had since returning home. He could hardly wait to see Sìl’s face when he told her. He remembered how she used to look up to him, with that glow in her eyes, as if he was the strongest and bravest person she could ever hope to meet.

When he told her, she would look at him that way again—but with a woman’s eyes. And a woman’s desire. Then he’d pull her into his arms and kiss her as he’d been wanting to. Ah, it had been years since he’d given a lass her first kiss.

And then there would be all the other firsts…

God’s blood, he’d never bedded a virgin before. He had done his best to avoid innocents up until now. It surprised him that he found the prospect of bedding a virgin… exciting. At least, this particular virgin. Sìleas would be his alone, now and forever.

“Ian,” Alex said, jarring him back to the present.

As he got out of bed, Ian grabbed his plaid to cover his throbbing erection. God’s beard, he was in pain. Tonight. Tonight, he would get to take Sìleas to bed.

But first, there was the gathering. Work before pleasure.

“I see you’re going to church prepared,” Ian said to Alex, as he strapped on his own claymore.

“I don’t wish to count on Hugh respecting the house of God without encouragement.”

Word of Ian and Alex’s arrival would have reached Hugh’s ears, and their presence was bound to make Hugh nervous. Hugh was no one’s fool. He’d know that if they were here, Connor and Duncan could not be far behind.

“How many blades are ye taking?” Ian asked, as he slipped a dirk into the side of his boot.

“I only have two dirks,” Alex said, pulling a face.

“Here,” Ian said, tossing him another. “I got extra from the house last night.”

“You’re a good man,” Alex said, catching it.

Sìleas wasn’t downstairs when they had their breakfast, but she was waiting at the gate with Ian’s mother when Ian, Alex, and Niall brought the horses to the front of the house.

“You’re sure you’ll be fine without me?” Sìleas asked his mother.

“Ye worry too much,” his mother said, patting her hand. “I’m feeling my old self again. Payton and I will manage just fine.”

Sìleas kissed his mother on the cheek and turned to where the three of them were waiting on their horses. “It’s such a fine day,” she said. “We could walk.”

“We’re riding,” Ian said.

It was true that the rain was no more than a light mist, which made it a fine day for mid-October in the Highlands. But he wanted the horses in case they needed to make a quick departure.

When Sìleas started toward Niall’s horse, Ian nudged his forward to block her way. He held out his hand. “Ride with me.”

For a moment, she looked as if she would refuse, which annoyed him. He reminded himself that she didn’t know yet of his decision. When she finally gave him her hand, he swung her up in front of him. He pulled her tight against him as he kicked his horse into a trot. When he turned to wave good-bye to his mother, she gave him an approving nod.

He’d make two women happy by his decision to make a true marriage with Sìleas.

It was hard to think with the smell of her hair in his nose and her bottom snug between his thighs. But the ride was short, so he forced his thoughts to what he would say to the men when they got there.

As they neared the church, they had to pass Dunscaith Castle, the seat of their clan chieftain. The castle was made famous by two women, both of whom—if Teàrlag was to be believed—were Duncan’s ancestors. According to the old stories, Dunscaith was built in a single night by a sea witch. It was here, too, that the great Celtic warrior queen, Scáthach, ran her legendary School for Heroes.

Ian had seen Dunscaith a thousand times before, but today he looked at it for the first time as an attacker. The castle stood on a rock island just offshore, with a gap of twenty feet between it and the main island. If the sheer rock was not enough to deter an attack by sea, the five-foot-thick curtain wall on top of it surely would.

To get into the castle, an attacker either had to come in by the sea gate on the far side, which was easily blocked, or cross the walled bridge that spanned the gap. If you made it across the bridge, the castle’s defenders could raise the drawbridge at their end of it to stop you. And if you made it past the drawbridge, you still had to fight your way up a walled flight of stairs that was too narrow for two men to go abreast swinging their swords.

“An easy castle to defend and a hard one to take,” Alex said, echoing Ian’s thoughts.

“Aye.” As they rode past, Ian narrowed his eyes at the castle’s tower. Was Hugh there now, watching them from his perch?

It was hard to bear that a greedy, honorless man held the castle where Scáthach had trained her celebrated warriors of old.

Ian could see that there was already a large gathering of people outside the church, which was no more than a stone’s throw past the bridge to the castle. The church was a humble, whitewashed building, a poor relation to the cathedrals he had seen in France.

With his thoughts on Hugh and the tasks ahead, Ian realized that he hadn’t spoken a word to Sìleas—but he didn’t have time now.

“Watch after her,” Ian said to his brother, as he helped her dismount. “I need to talk to the men.”

As planned, he and Alex moved separately through the gathered men to discover what they thought of Hugh proclaiming himself chieftain. After welcoming him home, a few spoke quietly to Ian about Hugh’s mistreatment of them or their family. One who was not so quiet was Tait MacDonald, a wiry man of thirty.

“Hugh violated my sister and left her carrying a babe,” Tait said, his eyes burning with hate.

“I suspect ye don’t wish to wait for Judgment Day to see him punished,” Ian said. “I know I wouldn’t.”

“Hugh had best watch his back.” Tait sidled closer and added, “A lot of men would support ye if ye put yourself forward for the chieftainship.”

“I am not of the chieftain’s blood.” Ian was as skilled a warrior as any, and he could lead men in battle. But the best of chieftains needed to be patient schemers as well, and patience was one trait he did not share with his cousin.

“No, it has to be Connor,” he told Tait. “He’s back, and he’ll be a great chieftain, even better than his father.”

“Tell Connor I’m with him,” Tait said.

Ian looked the man over and surmised that Tait’s quickness would more than make up for his short stature in a fight. “He’ll be glad to have ye on his side.”

It was a start, and others would follow. As the saying went, one cow breaks the fence, and a dozen leap it.

“The problem is that Connor is still a lad in the men’s memory,” Tait said. “He’s been gone a long time.”

Tait was right. The men needed to see Connor to judge his mettle as a man. Showing himself openly too soon, however, could get him killed.

“On the other hand,” Tait said, “the men are outraged that after calling himself chieftain, Hugh sat by while the MacKinnons attacked Knock Castle. And they don’t understand why he hasn’t tried to take it back.”

The loss of Knock Castle was one more weight in the chain of guilt around Ian’s neck. Even though he hadn’t wanted it, holding Knock Castle had been his duty.

The morning after his “wedding,” Ian and his chieftain surprised Sìleas’s stepfather with the news of the marriage—and an overwhelming force. As soon as the MacKinnons surrendered the castle, Ian sailed for France, not caring who his chieftain chose to hold the castle in his name. But fury, tinged with shame, burned in his belly now. The clansman who stood in his place as defender of the castle had been killed in the MacKinnon attack.

As Ian moved through the crowd, he heard again and again the complaint about the loss of Knock Castle.

“What are ye going to do about your wife’s castle?” more than one man asked him. “We’re ready to fight for it, but we need a chieftain to lead us.”

Speak of the devil.

When the men around Ian shifted their gazes and stepped back, he turned to see Hugh Dubh emerge from the castle’s bridge followed by a score of men. Ian exchanged a glance with Alex over the heads of the other men to be sure Alex had seen Hugh. Alex nodded and headed his way.

Ian caught the priest by the arm. “Father, get the women and children inside the church.”

The priest turned and saw Hugh and his men. “I’ll get them inside, but I’m warning ye, I’ll have no violence here in the churchyard.”

“That’s up to Hugh,” Ian said. “All I can promise is that I won’t be starting it.”

Ian found Sìleas and Niall next. “Go inside now,” he said, putting his hand to the curve of her back to push her along.

Sìleas glared at the approaching men over her shoulder. “I’m not afraid of Hugh.”

“Ye should be,” Ian said, gripping her arm hard so she would know he meant it. “Niall, see that she gets inside, then help the priest with the others.”

Niall and Sìleas both scowled at him, but he didn’t have time to argue.

“Go now, both of ye.”

He moved to stand next to Alex just as Hugh and his men entered the churchyard. Hugh’s gaze was fixed on him, which was fine with Ian.

I am ready to cut your ballocks off, Hugh Dubh.

Hugh halted a yard in front of him and stood with his legs apart in a wide stance. For a long moment, they took each other’s measure. Hugh was a big, square-faced man who bore a strong resemblance to Connor’s father and Ragnall. As the youngest of his father’s six sons, he couldn’t be much over thirty, though his years at sea made him look older.

When Connor’s father was made chieftain, Hugh took up pirating. Judging from the colorful stories told about him, Hugh was successful at his trade. Some believed he could call up a sea mist at will, because of the way his boats disappeared after an attack. Others said Hugh had a large stash of gold hidden on the Isle of Uist—and that he fed captured children to the sea dragon that guarded it.

“I heard the two of ye were back,” Hugh said, resting his hand on the hilt of the long dirk in his belt. “Ye should have come to the castle to pay your respects.”

“If the men who used to work our land still did,” Ian said, “perhaps I could have spared the time for a wee visit.”

“The rest of ye stand back,” Hugh said, and lifted his hand. “I need a private word with the prodigal sons here.”

He waited to speak until the others backed away a few paces.

“I was merely encouraging your da to pledge his loyalty,” Hugh said, his eyes glinting with amusement. “But now that you’re here, I’ll accept your pledge in his place.”

Anger pulsed through Ian; his hand itched to reach for the claymore strapped to his back. One good swing and he could rid the clan of this vermin.

Ian made no effort to keep his voice down. “While my father lives, I’ll no be making decisions for him.” Ye slimy bastard.

“I hear he’s lost his mind, as well as his leg,” Hugh said. “It’s your duty to step up and take his place as head of your family.”

“As all the men here know,” Ian said in a loud voice, as he swept his arm out to encompass the men gathered around them in the churchyard, “my father fought in many battles with the Lord of the Isles to protect our clan. He merits the respect of his son and his clan.”

The men responded with nods and grunts of approval.

“I will not take my father’s place nor give his pledge,” Ian said, glaring at Hugh.

“And where does your father stand, Alexander Bàn MacDonald?” Hugh asked.

“If ye have to ask, my guess is he hasn’t given ye his support,” Alex said with a smile that suggested he knew very well his father wouldn’t favor Hugh. “Ye don’t suppose he has reservations about your ability to lead, do ye?”

The vein in Hugh’s neck pulsed as he flicked his gaze between Alex and Ian.

“In the end, he’ll bend his knee with all the rest of ye,” Hugh snapped. “Ye can tell Connor the same when ye see him.”

Ian turned to speak to the men behind him, leaving Alex to cover his back.

“As the son of Payton, a nephew to our dead chieftain, and a man of this clan,” Ian shouted, “I call for a gathering of the clan to choose our next chieftain, as is our custom.”

When Ian turned back, Hugh looked as if he would have liked to plant his claymore in his chest, but another round of approving grunts had him thinking better of it.

“That’s a fine idea,” Hugh said through his teeth. “We can all go into the hall of the castle and do it right now.”

Hugh’s men, a rough lot from his pirating days, raised their fists and shouted their agreement. For a moment, Ian feared he had lost control of the crowd, but it was soon evident from the silence of the other men that they did not agree with Hugh’s suggestion.

“Every man is entitled to a voice in the selection of our chieftain,” Tait called out. “Word must be sent to every member of the clan, with a date certain.”

There was a loud murmur of agreement.

Hugh could read the crowd as well as Ian. “We’ll confirm my place as chieftain at the Samhain gathering,” he said. “I’ll send word out that I expect every man to come to the castle and make his pledge.”

Alex raised an eyebrow at Ian. At least they wouldn’t have to fight their way into Dunscaith, since Hugh had agreed to a formal gathering to select a chieftain.

“Now, let’s see those babes christened.” Hugh signaled to his men, and the crowd parted for them as they headed for the church door.

“You’ve got ballocks,” Ian said to Alex, as they waited for the other men to go inside the church. “ Do ye suppose my father has reservations about your ability to lead? ”

“Me? I was just trying to make Hugh’s eyes bulge as much as you did.”

They shared a dry laugh, then started for the church.

“Samhain is less than three weeks away,” Alex said, worry tugging at his voice.

“It might be easier to take the castle by force,” Ian said, “than to persuade so many hard-headed MacDonalds of anything in so short a time.”

“Pity Hugh’s mother didn’t drown him at birth,” Alex said.

“Aye, ’tis a damn shame.”

The priest, who had a warrior’s build to go with his manner, stood at the doorway, making every man leave his weapons outside. “Now lads, ye can put your claymores in this pile and your dirks in that one. They’ll be no weapons in my church.”

“Did ye make Hugh Dubh and his men leave theirs?” Ian asked when it was his turn.

“I did,” the priest said. “And ye will leave yours as well.”

“You’re a brave man,” Ian said in a low voice. “If you’re a good one, too, then ye know that Hugh is the devil’s tool.”

The priest’s dark eyes flashed, and he gave Ian a slight nod.

“Ye can be sure that Hugh and his men kept a few dirks hidden from ye,” Ian said. “I mean no disrespect, but that means my cousin and I must keep ours as well.”

“Keep them well hidden,” the priest said in a low voice.

Ian leaned close to speak in the priest’s ear. “When the time comes, we’ll need every good man, including you, Father.”

“God will reward the righteous,” the priest said. “Now ye are holding up God’s work, so get inside.”

One look from Ian, and the boys who were sitting in the back pew got up to find other seats. He and Alex needed to sit closest to the door—and the piles of weapons outside. After they sat down, Ian searched the crowded church for Sìleas. It didn’t take long to find her near the front. Hair as bright as hers stood out, even among this many redheads.

“Who is that beside her?” he hissed at Alex.

“Beside who?”

“Ach, ye know damned well I meant Sìleas.”

Alex didn’t try to hide his smile. “I believe that’s your neighbor, Gòrdan.” After a pause, he added, “Gòrdan is a fine man. I’d wager the lasses find him handsome as well.”

Ian stewed as a dozen squalling babes were sprinkled and prayed over.

“By the saints, how many babes were born this year?” he complained.

“I’d say the men had a verra good winter,” Alex said.

Ian and Alex were the first ones out the door after the last babe was baptized. The drops of holy water didn’t have time to dry on the babe’s wee head before they had their weapons in their hands.

“ ’Tis good to have her again,” Alex said, kissing the blade of his claymore.

He and Alex stood side by side with their blades unsheathed as Hugh and his entourage filed out of the church.

Hugh stopped in front of them. “Mark my words, unless you’re dead by Samhain,” he hissed in a low voice, “you’ll be on your knees before me at the gathering.”

“One of us will be dead before that happens,” Ian said.

Ian met the gaze of each man as they came out of the church and passed him. He recognized most of them. Every man understood that the return of the Highlanders from France had shifted the balance of power here on Skye. Each man would have to choose sides.

When the last of Hugh’s men was on the bridge to the castle, Ian caught sight of Ilysa, Duncan’s sister. She was such a slight thing, it was hard to believe she and Duncan came from the same mother. In a shapeless gown and with her hair covered in a drab kerchief like a grandmother, Ilysa blended in with the married women. He only noticed her when she looked up and gave him a razor-sharp glance. Then she tilted her head, signaling she wanted to talk with him.

When he approached the group of women, they crowded around him asking about his travels. It took him some time to ease Ilysa away.

“I am sorry to hear you lost your husband at Flodden,” he said once they were out of the hearing of the others.

An emotion he couldn’t read crossed Ilysa’s face before she dropped her gaze and nodded to acknowledge his condolence.

“Where are ye living?” he asked.

“I’m back at the castle.”

Ian stared at her. “That can’t be safe. Hugh and his men are a rough lot.”

Ilysa and Duncan had grown up in the castle, but Ian had assumed she was living with her husband’s family.

“Ach, no one notices me,” Ilysa said with a small smile. “And just to be sure they keep their distance, I let it be known that I’m learning magic from Teàrlag.”

“I can’t believe Duncan is letting ye stay there,” Ian said.

“As if I’d let Duncan tell me what to do,” she said, rolling her eyes. “I managed without his instruction while the four of ye were gone. He did try, but I’m twice as stubborn as he is.”

That was saying something.

“But why stay at the castle?” Ian said. “If ye don’t want to go to your husband’s family, you’re welcome to stay at our house.”

“Connor needs eyes and ears in the castle, and none of ye can do that for him,” she said. “Hugh thinks so little of women, he has no notion I’m spying on him.”

If Duncan hadn’t been able to convince her, Ian wouldn’t be able to. “Ye be careful now. Don’t take any chances.”

“I have a message from Connor and Duncan,” Ilysa said in a low voice. “Ye are to meet them in the cave below Teàrlag’s cottage day after tomorrow.”

Alex came up behind them and put his arm around Ilysa’s narrow shoulders. “So how is Duncan’s baby sister?”

“I am just fine, and ye can take your hands off me, Alexander Bàn,” Ilysa said good-naturedly as she pushed Alex’s arm off. “What trouble are ye up to?”

“Trouble, me? No, I’ve been doing a good deed,” Alex said, with a devilish grin. Turning to Ian, he said, “I found a woman to help your mother and Sìleas in the kitchen.”

“Did ye now?” Ian scratched his neck. “Let me guess. Does the woman ye found happen to be an attractive lass with loose morals?”

“Here I am, trying to help out a poor kinswoman whose been thrown out by her husband,” Alex said, shaking his head, “and all ye want to do is criticize.”

“Ye don’t mean Dina, do ye?” Ilysa asked.

Dina? Ian had a vague memory of a dark-eyed, curvy lass who was a couple of years older than he was. He’d been between her thighs once or twice when he was barely old enough to know what to do.

“Good luck with that,” Ilysa said. “I must get back now. I’ve got Hugh believing no one else can make sure there’s plenty of food and ale on the table.”

When she had gone, Ian said, “Perhaps ye should have asked me before inviting someone to live in my house.”

“I didn’t see you finding anyone to help your poor mother and wife.” Alex shrugged. “But if ye don’t care that they are working their fingers to the bone, well…”

At the mention of Sìleas, Ian swept his gaze over the few women still in the churchyard.

“Have ye seen Sìleas?” he asked, thinking she must have gone back into the church.

“She left with Gòrdan”—Alex cleared his throat—“for their usual Sunday stroll.”

“Their what?”

“Don’t fret—she said they’ll meet us at the house,” Alex said. “Ye see, Gòrdan’s joining the family for Sunday dinner. As usual.”

“What does Sìleas think she’s doing?” Ian felt as if his head was exploding.

“Strolling, I suppose,” Alex said.

Ian wanted to smash his fist into the middle of Alex’s grinning face.

That sneaking Gòrdan. Ian found his brother by their horses and grabbed him by the arm. “Tell me what’s been going on with Sìleas and Gòrdan.”

Niall jerked his arm away. “Gòrdan’s been protecting her, just as we all have, in your absence.”

With that, Niall swung up onto his horse, slapped the reins, and galloped off. Ian blew out his breath and wondered what had happened to the young lad who used to look up to him. He would have to have a talk with his brother. But first, he would deal with Sìleas.

On the ride back to the house, he ignored Alex’s attempts at conversation. He was in no mood for it. He kept his eyes out for Gòrdan and Sìleas, but he did not catch a glimpse of the wandering pair all the way back.

If they were not on the path, where in the hell were they?

CHAPTER 8

When they reached the house, Alex went to the byre, saying he preferred the beasts’ company to Ian’s. Niall must have taken himself off somewhere as well, for there was no sign of him. Ian found his mother alone, stitching by the fire.

“How’s da?” he asked.

“Sleeping.”

Ian sat with his arms folded, waiting for Sìleas and Gòrdan.

His mother looked up from her sewing. “What’s troubling ye, son?”

“I am trying to understand why my family appears to have encouraged Sìleas to go off alone with Gòrdan every chance she gets,” he said, grinding out the words. “Ye know how that looks, mam. Sìl didn’t have a mother who taught her that sort of behavior could earn her a reputation, but ye know better. Why did ye not tell her?”

His mother arched her eyebrows. “If ye were concerned about your wife’s behavior, perhaps ye should have come home sooner.”

“I didn’t know she was traipsing all over the Isle of Skye with Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald.” And traipsing had damned well better be all she was doing with Gòrdan.

“Ach, men,” his mother murmured and went back to her stitching. “What ye should be doing is thanking Gòrdan for looking after her.”

“I should be thanking him?” Ian said, working hard not to shout at his mother.

“Ye can’t expect her to stay cooped up in the house all the time,” his mother said. “Your da never let her go out alone for fear her MacKinnon relations would try to snatch her. Since he was injured and the other men quit working our lands, Gòrdan has been kind enough to accompany Sìleas when your brother can’t.”

“Hmmph,” Ian snorted. “Gòrdan has something in mind other than protecting her.”

“Gòrdan is an honorable man,” his mother said. “If ye don’t want Sìleas for a wife, I’d be glad for her to have Gòrdan as her husband.”

Ian sat up straight. “As her husband, ye say?”

“Keep your voice down. You’ll wake your da.”

Before Ian came home, his plan had been to see Sìleas settled with a good man. But Gòrdan? He would never do for her.

“It would be a good match for our Sìleas—except for Gòrdan’s mother, of course.” She clucked her tongue. “That woman will be a trial to any daughter-in-law.”

“It would be a good match—except for his mother?” Ian bit out. He couldn’t believe he was hearing this.

“Aye, it would,” his mother, breaking the thread with her teeth. “Losing Sìleas would be like losing my baby daughters all over again. If she isn’t going to remain part of our family, then it would please me to have her close by.”

“What makes ye think I’ll let Gòrdan have her?”

His mother set her sewing aside and gave him a soft smile. “If ye want Sìleas as your wife, don’t ye think it’s time ye told her?”

At the sound of the door opening, Ian jumped to his feet. Sìleas came in, looking over her shoulder and laughing. She was a vision, with her cheeks rosy from the cold and loose tendrils of hair curling about her face.

Her laughter died when she turned and saw him.

“Where have ye been?” Ian stood in front of her waiting for an explanation.

“With Gòrdan,” she said, as she slipped off her cloak and handed it to Gòrdan to hang by the door.

“I did not see ye on the path,” Ian said.

“We weren’t on the path,” she said, then turned to speak to his mother. “Such a lovely afternoon for this time of year. No, don’t get up, Beitris. I’ll see to supper.”

She brushed past Ian and headed for the kitchen without so much as a glance at him. He was about to follow her when Alex stuck his head through the front door.

“Niall and I could use your help with one of the horses,” Alex called, then shut the door again.

Ian stormed outside and found Alex waiting for him by the byre. “What do ye need me for? You’re the best man with horses.”

“I didn’t call ye out for help with the damned horses,” Alex said in a low voice. “Your brother is in the byre, and he’s in such a fury he’s like to put the cows off their milk.”

“I don’t have time now,” Ian said, clenching his fists. “I need to talk with Sìleas.”

“Just now, I think ye need to speak with your brother more. I’ve tried telling Niall that ye are not the horse’s ass ye seem to be, but I fear I wasn’t too convincing.” Alex slapped Ian on the back. “Go talk to the lad.”

“Ach!” Ian banged into the byre and found Niall brushing his horse down.

When Niall looked up and saw him, he threw the brush against the wall.

Ian grabbed Niall as he stormed past him. “Niall, what is—”

“Go back to France!” Niall shouted in his face.

Ian blocked Niall’s arm when he tried to drive his fist into Ian’s face. Before Niall could punch him with his other hand, Ian spun him around and held him by the neck. His own temper was flaming now.

“You’re a long way from taking your big brother, so I suggest ye not try that again,” Ian hissed in Naill’s ear.

There was no point in talking when they were both so angry, so he let his brother go.

Ian watched Niall’s stiff back as he stalked out of the byre with his fists clenched. So much for following Alex’s advice. Ian finished brushing the horse to calm himself before going back to the house.

By the time he got to the table, his brother and Gòrdan were sitting on either side of Sìleas, and Alex had taken the seat across from her. He sat down and glared at Alex as he started shoveling his food down.

His mother was speaking to him, but Ian couldn’t follow what she was saying when it was plain as day that Gòrdan was set on stealing Sìleas away—right under his own roof. God’s bones, the man’s gaze never left her face.

And what was Alex up to? He was putting on a full show of his dazzling charm. And from the way Sìl laughed at Alex’s foolish remarks, his charm was working.

Ian could hardly choke down his food.

Sìleas was determined to be cheerful. Damn Ian MacDonald anyway. First, he demands she ride with him, leading her to believe he was going to play the part of her husband before half the clan at the church. Then, as soon as they arrive, he sends her off as if she were still a child.

She threw her head back and laughed at Alex’s joke, though she had missed the first half of it entirely.

Was it too much to ask Ian to sit beside her? For five years, she’d had to listen to the women’s remarks about her missing husband. If one more matron had given her a look of sympathy today, she would have screamed right there in the church. And then the women would have even more to talk about.

She should be used to the humiliation by now. But it had been harder than she expected to watch mother after mother bring her babe forward to be baptized, while her own arms were empty.

Ian wasn’t even waiting for her at the church door. Fortunately, Gòrdan had been kind enough to take her home as soon as the ordeal was over. Of course, that meant she had to suffer Gòrdan’s pleading looks, but at least he had the good sense not to press her today.

“We need to tell them about the men we saw,” Gòrdan said in a low voice while the others were talking.

“No,” she mouthed.

Gòrdan didn’t look happy about it, but he’d do as she asked. She didn’t want to worry Beitris and Payton over nothing, just when they were both getting so much better. When she and Gòrdan saw the three strangers coming toward them on the path, she panicked, thinking they could be MacKinnons coming after her.

It was foolish. Why would they come for her after all this time? All the same, she and Gòrdan slipped off the path. They took the shortcut to his house, where he gave her a nip of whiskey while his mother scowled at her.

“What’s that you’re saying?” Ian asked, glaring at Gòrdan from the far end of the table.

She kicked Gòrdan to remind him of his promise to say nothing.

“That I’d best be getting home,” Gòrdan said and stood up. “My mother will be waiting.”

She tilted her head back and gave Gòrdan a grateful smile for not telling. “Thanks for seeing me home safe.”

No sooner had Gòrdan gone than there was a knocking at the door.

“I’ll get it,” Alex said.

When he opened the door, in came Dina, a woman men followed around as if she had some dark secret to share with them. Sìleas heard at the church today that Dina’s husband caught her in their bed with another man—which was no surprise to anyone but him—and tossed her out.

Unease settled in Sìleas’s stomach when Dina dropped a heavy cloth bag inside the door.

“Thank ye for taking me in,” Dina said, dipping her head to Ian’s mother. “I’m a good cook, and I’ll do my best to lend a hand wherever ye need it.”

From the startled look on Beitris’s face, the invitation to join their household had not come from her.

“Ian and I told Dina ye would be happy for her help,” Alex said.

Sìleas shot a look at Ian, who was glaring at Alex, as if he was not pleased with Alex for mentioning his role in this. How could Ian do this to her, on top of everything else? It was one humiliation too many.

The awful memory flooded her vision. She must have been nine years old. Ian had told her—repeatedly—that he was “a man now” and couldn’t have her following him everywhere anymore. Of course, she had paid no heed.

Until the day she came upon him behind a shepherd’s hut with Dina’s legs wrapped around his waist.

Ach, he’d forgotten all about Dina. He should have warned his mother. Why did Alex have to go and invite her? Wasn’t there enough trouble in the house?

“I’ll take Payton’s supper to him,” Sìleas said, getting up without so much as a glance Ian’s way. “Ye must be hungry, Dina. Take my seat.”

Ian noticed Sìleas had not touched her own supper.

After they finished their meal, he and Alex went in to talk with Payton. When Ian attempted to catch Sìleas’s eye, she abruptly left the room, leaving a cold frost in her wake.

Ian wanted to go after her, but his father was waiting to hear what happened at the church. He showed some of his old spirit as they discussed what needed to be done next. Since his father had taken a long nap, he didn’t tire for a good long while.

By the time Ian and Alex returned to the hall, it was empty.

“Damn it,” Ian said. “I wanted to talk to Sìleas tonight.”

“Talk?” Alex said, elbowing him. “I thought your plan was to take that lass to bed and make a proper wife of her today.”

“She doesn’t make it easy,” Ian said, taking down the jug of whiskey and two cups from the shelf. “The looks she gives me could fry eggs.”

“Ach, Sìleas is just upset because you’ve kept her waiting.” Alex patted his chest. “Ye can be sure I wouldn’t have.”

“Oh, aye, for certain ye would be ready to jump into marriage,” Ian said, then tossed back his first drink.

“Not me, but we both know ye are the sort to marry.” Alex drank his own cup down and signaled for more. “Ye will do no better than Sìleas. That lass has fire in her.”

Before drinking down their second round, they clinked their cups together and chanted, “It’s no health if the glass is not emptied.”

“What can I do?” Ian said, wiping his mouth. “She acts as if she hates me. And she’s always running off with that Gòrdan Graumach.”

“Ye can’t let Gòrdan have her—he’s too dull for a lass with her spark.” Alex waggled his eyebrows. “I’d know what to do with that spark.”

“This is no time for your joking,” Ian said, his irritation rising. “And I’m more than a wee bit tired of hearing what ye would do in my place.”

“Who says I’m joking?” Alex lifted one shoulder. “Wouldn’t ye rather see her with me than with Gòrdan? Ach, she’d be wasted on a man with so little imagination.”

“I don’t appreciate ye speaking about my wife that way,” Ian said, clenching his fists.

“If ye are so foolish as to let Sìleas go without fighting for her, ye don’t deserve her.” Alex leaned forward, his expression serious. “And if ye don’t make her your true wife soon, ye are going to lose her.”

“She is my wife,” Ian said through his teeth. “And I intend to keep her.”

“Then you’d best do something about it,” Alex said. “I grew up with a bitter woman, so I can tell ye—a woman will only forgive so much before she comes to hate ye.”

That was a depressing thought; they both took another drink.

“Speaking of your folks,” Ian said, “when are ye going to go see them?”

“No matter which I see first, I’ll never hear the end of it from the other.” Alex blew out a long breath. “I’ll wait until the Samhain gathering, so I can see them both at once.”

“How many times has your mother tried to poison your da?” Ian asked, without expecting an answer. “Doesn’t it strike ye as odd that neither of them married again?”

“Praise God they haven’t undertaken to torture anyone else. The only thing the two of them can agree upon is that I should make the same mistake. They want me to marry and produce an heir.” Alex shook his head. “Perhaps I should rescue Sìleas from Gòrdan. It would be no hardship to set to work on getting an heir with her.”

Ian reached across the table and grabbed Alex by the front of his shirt. “I warned ye not to speak of her that way.”

He was stopped from punching his cousin in the face by a light laugh behind him. He turned to see Dina saunter in from the kitchen.

“Fighting over me already, are ye?” she said.

“Don’t hurry to the cottage,” Alex said to Ian before he pushed himself up from the table. He put his arm around Dina’s shoulders and walked with her toward the door.

Ian tipped more whiskey into his cup and swirled the golden liquid. He’d take good Scottish whiskey over French wine any day. He felt the pleasant burn as it slid down his throat. Hell, he’d take bad Scottish whiskey over the best French wine.

What was he doing sleeping in a cold bed every night—next to Alex, for God’s sake. Sìleas was his wife, wasn’t she? She was sleeping in his room—in his bed, no less.

They’d said vows before a priest. Surely that meant something? True, he’d been ready to give Sìleas up, but that was before he’d returned to find her all grown up.

Lord help him, Sìleas had grown up fine.

He thought of her full breasts, the mesmerizing swish of her skirts as she climbed the stairs, the sparkle in her green eyes, the creamy skin that showed at her throat above her gown.

His cup was empty, so he took a long pull straight from the jug.

He wanted to see more of that creamy skin. To smell it. To run his tongue over every inch of it. And there was no reason he shouldn’t. Sìleas belonged to him. The church had joined them.

Damn it, he shouldn’t have hesitated. That was where the problem lay. All he needed to do now was show her he wanted to be a husband to her.

But was he ready to give up other women? Was he ready to say she would be the last woman he bedded? He thought about it for a moment.

Hell, yes.

He would show her just how much he wanted her. Sìl was a fiery thing, always was. She’d be everything he wanted in bed, he knew it without a doubt. And he’d be everything she wanted. She damned well wouldn’t look twice at that Gòrdan Graumach again.

He slammed his cup down on the table. It was time. His decision was made. By God, he was ready to commit himself.

It was going to be a night to remember.

CHAPTER 9

Ian took off his boots and stepped quietly up the stairs. No need to let the entire household know his intentions. He lifted the latch to Sìleas’s bedchamber door—their bedchamber door—and slipped inside. Blackness enveloped him as he eased the door shut behind him.

He felt for the bar and slid it across. He wanted no early-morning interruptions. Someone else would have to do the morning chores; he intended to keep Sìleas in bed late. Perhaps they wouldn’t get up at all tomorrow.

He stood near the door, every muscle taunt with anticipation, and waited for his eyes to adjust. His cock was painfully hard already. In the stillness, he heard her breathing, soft as sighs.

Gradually, he could make out her form on the bed. She lay on her back, with one arm flung up, framing her head on the pillow. He swallowed. He would carry this image of her from their first night together with him for the rest of his life. A wave of tenderness swelled in his chest. This woman was his to protect. His wife.

He was ready for the responsibility.

His throbbing cock reminded him he was more than ready for the pleasure. His breathing came in short, shallow breaths as he stepped to the edge of the bed.

Lying with her would not be like lying with other women. This was his wife. This was Sìleas.

The muscles of his stomach were tight, and his throat dry. He couldn’t wait to touch her. To remove her nightshift and run his hands over that creamy white skin for the first time. To sink his fingers into her mass of red hair as he kissed and caressed her.

They would be naked. Aye, definitely naked. Skin to skin, with the smell of heather in his nose.

He unwound his plaid and pulled his shirt over his head, letting them both drop to the floor at his feet. She gave a sigh as he lifted the covers and slipped beneath the blankets. With his heart thundering in his ears, he reached for her.

He caught the edge of her nightshift, the cloth stiff beneath his fingertips, as she rolled away from him with another sigh. He moved closer and rested his hand on the curve of her waist.

Lust roared through him like a wild beast. For God’s sake, she was a virgin. He told himself he must go slowly, but it was not going to be easy.

He pulled her against him and bit his lip against the surge of desire that swamped his senses and tested his will. He made himself take in slow, deep breaths. He meant to savor every part of this first time: holding his wife in bed, the smell of her hair in his face, the warmth of her body next to his.

He pushed her heavy hair to the side and kissed her neck.

“Mmmmm.” The sound came from deep in her throat.

He smiled against her skin as he breathed her in. He thought he might have to persuade her, but she had been waiting for him to come to her.

“Sìl,” he whispered in her ear, “I’m going to take your nightshift off now.”

When he nuzzled her neck, she made that low “Mmmmm” sound again, which set a fire deep in his belly. Then the breath went out of him in a rush as she pressed against him, making his cock throb against the crevice between her buttocks.

He worked her nightshift up, anticipating the feel of bare skin. Slowly, he eased it over her hip—ahhhh. Her skin was even softer than he imagined. One more tug on the shift and his shaft rested against her bare buttocks.

“Ye can’t know how good that feels,” he said in a choked whisper. So good, he nearly bit her shoulder. But this was going better than he expected, and he didn’t want to frighten her. So he kissed her shoulder softly, instead, and forced himself not to move against her. She drew in a deep breath that sounded so contented he wondered if he was worrying too much.

He wished he had lit a candle. He wanted to see her, but nothing could get him out of this bed now. It was pleasurable torture to run his hand slowly up and down the curve of her hip. Of its own volition, his hand moved to cup her breast.

Oh Jesu! The heavy softness of her full breast felt glorious in his hand. The nipple hardened and pressed against his palm—and he was a lost man. Blood pounded in his ears. His hunger was urgent, demanding. Now. He needed her under him now.

His resolution to go slow was a lost ship in the raging storm of his lust. All he wanted in this world was to be buried inside her. In an instant, he had her on her back. His hands were on her breasts under her nightgown, and his cock pressed against the inside of her thigh while he kissed her throat.

“Ian! What are ye doing?”

Ach, what was he doing? He dragged himself back from the edge. A virgin. She’s a virgin.

A virgin shouldn’t feel this good beneath him. He took her face in his hands and lowered his mouth to hers. Her kiss was so innocent, it shook him.

“Aw, Sìl, ye are a wonder to me,” he said.

He ran his tongue across her bottom lip and heard her draw in her breath. At first she seemed to resist his kisses, but gradually she softened. When he urged her mouth open, she jerked back, startled, but in another moment she softened for him again. When her tongue moved against his he saw a glimpse of the heaven to come. Soon he was drowning in her kisses.

It was all perfect. She was perfect.

He clutched his hands in her hair.

“Don’t be afraid. I’ll be careful. It won’t hurt much,” he whispered in her ear as he inched forward. He gasped when the head of his cock found its goal and touched her sweet center.

“Get off me!” Sìleas shouted, and started pounding her fists against his shoulders and chest.

“What? What’s wrong?” She didn’t answer, but she was clawing at him and squirming like a fish, so he rolled off her. “Sìl, what did I do?”

She threw off the covers and leaped out of the bed. He caught a glimpse of long legs in the moonlight from the window before she jerked her shift down.

She lit the candle and turned furious eyes on him. “What are ye doing in my bed, Ian MacDonald?”

“It’s my bed, too,” he said, trying to get his brain to work. His cock was so hard it hurt him. He had been so close…

“How dare ye come in here when I’m fast asleep and think ye can have your way with me.”

“You’re my wife,” Ian said. “That means I can have my way with ye.”

“So I’m your wife now, am I? Ye didn’t think so before.” She folded her arms beneath her breasts, and his throat went dry.

“I… I’ve decided to accept the situation,” he said, his eyes and thoughts on her breasts. The skin of his palms tingled with the memory of the feel of them in his hands. “I’m ready to take ye for my wife now. Quite ready.”

“Are ye now? And what has made ye come to this decision after all this time?”

She was tapping her foot, not a good sign. Ach, Sìl even had pretty ankles…

“Ian!” she said to get his attention. “I asked what made ye decide ye wanted to be married to me. I thought I ‘disgusted’ ye.”

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and gave her a slow look up and down.

“Ye don’t disgust me now,” he said, his voice thick. “And I don’t disgust you either, judging from the way ye were kissing me.” He couldn’t help grinning when he said it, which was probably a mistake.

“I was asleep!” She had her hands on her hips now, and her foot was tapping furiously.

“Maybe ye were at first,” he said, finding he was enjoying teasing her, “but I don’t believe ye were sleeping when ye kissed me back.”

“I thought I was dreaming,” she snapped. “I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“For not knowing, ye were doing fine,” he said, grinning at her. “Verra fine indeed.”

Her cheeks flushed, and she looked prettier still. He grabbed a handful of her voluminous nightshift and pulled her closer.

“I know ye heard me say some unfortunate words about ye before I left, and I’m sorry I hurt your feelings. But I find ye appealing now.” He dropped his gaze to the lovely, rounded breasts just inches from his face. “Verra appealing.”

When he looked up, her eyes were boring holes into him. He couldn’t think for the life of him what he was saying wrong now. What woman didn’t like to hear a compliment?

“What you’re saying is that ye want to take me to bed,” she said.

“Absolutely,” he said.

“And that’s the reason ye want to be my husband.”

“It’s one of the reasons,” he said, speaking carefully now. “I’ve also seen all you’ve done for my family, and how attached they are to ye. My mother is very fond of ye.”

“So ye want to keep me because your mother is fond of me,” she said. “That would be a rare comfort to any woman.”

The conversation had somehow gone awry. The problem was that there was too much conversation altogether. If he could just get her into bed again, he could make her forget whatever nonsense she was fussing about.

He stood up and pulled her against him.

“I am sorry if I can’t find the right words, but ye feel so good,” he murmured against her hair, “and ye smell so good, I cannot think.”

She gasped when he cupped her breast. Finally, she seemed at a loss for words.

“We are going to bed eventually, Sìl,” he said against her ear. “Don’t make me wait. I want ye badly.”

She shoved him away. “There’s nothing special about wanting to take me to bed, Ian MacDonald.” Flinging her arm to the side, she said, “Half the men in the clan could say that. At least, I don’t think many would refuse if I made the offer.”

Blood pounded in his ears. “If ye offered? If ye offered!”

“Ye wanting me in bed is not a good enough reason for me.” She stomped across the room. At the door, she turned and shouted over her shoulder, “You’re not good enough for me.”

She slammed the door so hard her pretty rocks on the windowsill bounced.

He was more than a wee bit annoyed himself. If she offered. How could she say such a thing?

He grabbed his shirt from the floor, pulled it over his head as he crossed the room in three long strides, and took off after her down the stairs. “You are the one who wanted to be married to me in the first place. Ye can’t deny it.”

“Just stay away from me,” she shouted back. “Or I swear, I’ll stick a dirk in ye.”

“You planned the whole thing because ye wanted to be away from your step-da,” he bellowed, as he followed her through the hall and into the kitchen. “And I wasn’t supposed to have any say over it, was I? Everyone would get what they wanted—but me.”

They were in the kitchen now, with the worktable between them. When he reached around the side to get a hold of her nightshift, she grabbed a skillet from the table and swung it at his head.

“Now that I want ye to be a true wife, ye change your mind,” he shouted. “Just what did ye think you were getting into? Did ye no expect a husband to want ye in his bed?”

“Perhaps I did expect it—a year ago. Or a month ago,” she shouted back. “Or a few days ago, when ye finally decided to bless us with your presence.”

“I am prepared to be your husband now,” Ian said, gritting his teeth.

“Oh, thank ye.” She rolled her eyes and patted her chest. “My heart is all aflutter over it.”

“You picked me, and like it or no, I am your husband,” he said. “And I don’t want to ever again hear my wife talking about other men and what they’d do if ye offered.”

That was when she caught him on the side of the head with the skillet.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, ye hit me!” He doubled over holding his head. It hurt like hell.

Sìleas looked as shocked by what she’d done as he was. He decided that if she were in a forgiving mood, so was he.

“Come, lass, this is no way to start our married life.”

“No, it isn’t,” she said in a shaky voice.

He noticed that she had a kitchen knife in her other hand now and reached for it. “Put the blade down, Sìl, and come to bed.”

That was when she hit him the second time.

He woke up on the floor with Sìleas standing over him, the kitchen blade still in her hand. Judging from the fire in her eyes, she was debating just where to stick it into him.

“I think you’re safe from the beast without having to use my best kitchen knife on him.”

At the sound of his mother’s voice, Ian risked taking his eyes off Sìleas long enough to see his mother standing in the doorway in her nightshift and cap. Her long, black and gray braid hung over her shoulder, and her hands were planted on her hips.

Ian rolled out of the way as the knife fell from Sìleas’s hand, and it clattered to the floor where he had been lying. Sìleas opened her mouth as if she were trying to form a reply to his mother, then she clamped her hand over her mouth and ran from the room.

“Thanks, mam,” Ian said as he got to his feet. He shook his head, trying to get his bearings and make sense of what just happened. One minute, he was kissing Sìleas in bed, and the next she was trying to kill him.

“And just what did ye think ye were doing?” his mother asked.

“Me?” he asked, thumping his chest. “Sìleas was the one attempting to murder me in your kitchen.”

“Ach, even half drunk as ye are, I expect ye could get away from a wee lass like Sìleas.” His mother waved a dismissive hand. “Now, are ye going to tell me how it is that sweet lass was chasing ye around the kitchen with a knife?”

“This is no something I’m going to discuss with my mother.” He picked the knife and skillet up from the floor and banged them on the table.

Niall appeared in the doorway behind his mother. “What’s he done to Sìleas? If he’s hurt her, I’ll kill him.”

Ian sighed and picked up the skillet again, in case he needed to defend himself.

“This is none of your business,” his mother said in a sharp voice. “Go back to bed. I’ll deal with Ian.”

Niall stood clenching his fists and glaring at Ian for a long moment before he obeyed his mother. When the door finally closed behind Niall, Ian set the skillet down. It was all so ridiculous, that a smile tugged at his lips. “Ye will deal with me, will ye, mam? Aren’t I a wee bit big for that?”

“I have some advice to give ye,” she said, “and you’d best listen if ye don’t want to lose your wife.”

Heaving a sigh, Ian followed his mother into the hall and took a seat by the hearth. His head still pounded from the skillet. The lass had a good arm.

“You’ve hardly spoken to Sìleas since ye came home, and then ye go to her room demanding rights as a husband,” his mother said, shaking her head.

“Mam, can you no respect my privacy? This is between Sìleas and me.”

His mother waved her hand again. “What did ye do, jump on the poor lass?”

“No, mam. I didn’t jump on her,” Ian said, keeping his voice calm with effort. “But she is my wife.”

“What kind of fool did I raise?” his mother said, tilting her head up as if beseeching Heaven.

“Ye made me marry her, and now ye are telling me I cannot act like a husband?”

“Ye know verra well that there are all kinds of marriages,” his mother said, pointing her finger at him. “If ye want a happy one, you’ll take my advice.”

He thought of Alex’s parents, who had been warring for as long as he’d known them. “All right, mam. Tell me what ye think I ought to do.”

“Ye broke her heart and hurt her pride,” his mother said. “So now ye must seek her forgiveness and earn her trust.”

“And how am I to do that?”

“Talk with her, spend time with her,” his mother said. “Make her see that ye value her.”

“I do value her,” he said.

“I’m no sure she understood that when ye burst into her bedchamber in the middle of the night demanding your rights.”

“I told ye, it wasn’t like that.”

“Sìleas knows ye were forced to wed her,” his mother said, leaning forward. “So what ye must do is convince her that if ye could have any woman in the world, she is the one you’d choose.”

He still wanted Sìl after she hit him in the head with a skillet—twice. Surely, that counted for something.

But would he choose Sìleas above any other woman? A week ago, he would not have believed it possible. Now, he wasn’t so sure.

“Sìleas had a father who thought more of his dogs than he did of his daughter, and then she got a step-da who was worse,” his mother said. “The lass needs a man who sees her worth and loves her. She deserves that. If you can’t give her that, then perhaps ye should step aside.”

Ian had always been fond of Sìleas. But he knew his mother was talking about something more than fondness. She was talking about what she and his father had.

His mother stood up and took his face in her hands. “I planned on the two of ye marrying long before that day your da and uncle caught ye sleeping in the woods with her.”

Ian raised his eyebrows. “Perhaps ye should have told me.”

“It would have done no good,” she said, and kissed his forehead. “Ye and Sìleas were made for each other. Just don’t ruin it by doing something else foolish.”

CHAPTER 10

As soon as Ian sat down at the table to join his brother and Alex for breakfast, Niall jumped to his feet, sending his spoon clattering to the floor. After giving Ian a murderous look, he stormed across the room and out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

“Nothing quiet about this family,” Alex said, his mouth twitching. He stretched his arms in a dramatic yawn. “A fearful noise woke me last night.”

“I’m warning ye, Alex, not another word,” Ian said.

“I take it that the wedding night did not go as well as ye hoped,” Alex said. “Do ye need me to give ye pointers, cuz?”

Ian started to lunge across the table, but he checked himself when Alex shot him a warning glance.

“Good morning, Sìleas,” Alex called out.

“Is it?” Sìleas said in a clipped tone. Ignoring the empty place beside Ian, she walked around to the far side of the table and sat next to Alex.

Alex raised an eyebrow at Ian and commenced to shovel porridge into his mouth.

Ian cleared his throat. “Morning, Sìl.”

She pressed her lips into a tight line and set to stirring her porridge with a good deal of vigor. For the next several minutes, the only sound in the room was the scrape of spoons in bowls. For all the attention Sìleas gave her porridge, she didn’t appear to be eating much.

Finally, she set down her spoon. Looking past Ian as if he weren’t there, she said, “Where is Niall?”

Ian cleared his throat again. “I believe he went out for some fresh air.” He tried desperately to think of something else to say to her.

“Some fresh air would do ye good as well,” Alex said to her. “You’re looking peaked. How about I take ye out fishing today and let the sea breeze put the color back in your cheeks?”

When Ian kicked him, Alex lifted the finger resting against his cheek to signal that Ian should be patient.

Sìleas narrowed her eyes, considering. Then she said, “I’d like that verra much. I haven’t been fishing in years.”

“Meet me on the beach in an hour, and I’ll show ye how it’s done,” Alex said.

What the hell was Alex up to?

The door to the kitchen swung open, and Dina came in, wiping her hands on her apron. “Are ye finished?” With a sly smile for Alex, she added, “Or will ye be wanting more?”

“Can ye see to Payton’s breakfast, Dina?” Sìleas said, as she got to her feet. “I have some things to attend to. And then I’m going fishing.”

Without waiting for Dina to respond—or sparing a glance for Ian—Sìleas left them and disappeared up the stairs.

• • •

The icy wind froze Sìleas’s cheeks and made her eyes water. Despite Alex’s smooth, sure strokes with the oars, their little boat bobbed in the choppy water.

Sìleas’s emotions were as wild as the sea today. She was furious with Ian for sneaking into her bed without even asking her. After keeping her waiting for five long years, he had expected her to be grateful—grateful!—that he had decided to “accept the situation.”

She was not a “situation.”

Ian’s kisses had sent an unfamiliar storm of emotions raging inside her. She was so hungry for Ian’s affection, and the desire he stirred in her was so overwhelming, that she had almost lost herself to it. But she knew that for him it was only a physical need. Ian wanted her, but for the wrong reason—or at least not for the reasons she needed.

“You’re not afraid of a wee bit of weather, are ye?” Alex called out, grinning.

Sìleas shook her head. Like him, she was an islander and as comfortable on the sea as on land. “All the same, I’d say it’s a poor day for fishing.”

“Well, ye don’t believe I brought ye out here for the fishing, do ye?” Alex said.

She shook her head again and watched as he skillfully maneuvered the boat around some rocks to a sheltered cove, where the sea was quieter.

“ ’Tis time we had ourselves a talk.” He rested his oars and leaned forward. “You and I have some scheming to do.”

She pushed back the hair whipping across her face. “Scheming?”

“Aye, scheming,” Alex said, and waggled his eyebrows. “Now, you and I both know that ye love Ian and always have.”

“Ye don’t know my feelings.”

“I am on your side, lass,” Alex said. “So let’s not waste time lying to each other.”

She folded her arms and looked out to sea. “I’ll no spend my life hoping Ian will care for me.”

“I’m no saying ye should accept less than your due,” Alex said. “But I suspect Ian cares for ye more than he knows.”

“Seems to me,” she said between her teeth, “that not knowing that he cares is the same as not caring.”

“Sometimes a man needs to be pushed a wee bit,” Alex said. “Hitting him over the head with the skillet a couple of times was a good start.”

Sìleas felt her cheeks grow warm. “Ian deserved it.”

“I haven’t a doubt that he did,” Alex said. “But ye can’t blame him for trying to get ye under the blankets.”

“Hmmph.”

A seal popped his head up and looked at her with its black eyes for a long moment before disappearing again below the waves.

“Do ye remember how the four of us lads used to sail to Knock Castle to take ye out fishing with us?” Alex said. “It was always Ian who talked us into it. Not that the rest of us didn’t like ye, mind, but we were lads off having adventures. We wouldn’t have brought ye along if Ian hadn’t insisted.”

“He just felt sorry for me,” she said.

“Aye, Ian always did have a soft heart,” Alex said. “But he liked having ye around. He was always talking about the funny things ye said or how quick ye were to learn something.”

“I was a wee girl,” she said. “He doesn’t know me now.”

“So give him time to get to know ye again,” Alex said. “That’s all I’m saying. Don’t decide against him so quick.”

“Why are ye trying to convince me?”

“Because I know ye will make Ian happy,” Alex said, his expression serious for once. “He’s a good man, Sìleas. That’s why ye waited for him so long.”

“Hmmph.” She was more confused than ever.

Alex narrowed his eyes at the clouds on the horizon. “We’d best head back. A storm is coming.”

The waves grew wild on the way back, bouncing them like an egg in a kettle at full boil. Sìleas held tight to the sides of the boat, enjoying the rush of the water and the sting of the sea on her skin.

“ ’Tis grand, isn’t it?” Alex shouted, and they grinned at each other.

The rain was pelting the sea not far behind them as Alex rowed hard for the beach.

“Is that Ian?” Sìleas shouted over the wind, though she knew that was him pacing up and down the beach.

“Ahh, perfect,” Alex said. “Even from here, I can see he’s in a state.”

Ian had seen them now and was standing with his hands on his hips, glaring out to sea in their direction.

“Shall we stay out a bit longer?” Alex said. “The man deserves to suffer, wouldn’t ye say?”

“What are ye about, Alex?”

“ ’Tis all part of my plan to make Ian appreciate ye.”

“Appreciate me? Ian looks as if he’d like to murder us both.”

“What fills the eye fills the heart,” Alex said. “Trust me, ’tis a good sign.”

She crawled closer to Alex so she could hear him better over the wind. “Ye said ye had a scheme, but ye never told me what it was.”

“Well, one part is to make him jealous,” Alex said.

“Jealous? Of you?”

Alex laughed. “Believe it or not, most women find me irresistible.”

Though Alex wasn’t for her, it was easy to see the appeal of the sea-green eyes and Viking warrior looks combined with all that charm.

She turned to see Ian striding through the surf to meet them. He had that dangerous look about him that made her heart beat fast.

“Are ye sure this is a wise idea, Alex?” she asked.

“I’ll make a wager with ye,” Alex said. “If I’m right and ye have Ian groveling at your feet within a fortnight, ye must give me a big kiss on the mouth in front of him.”

“Ye are a devil,” she said, unable to keep from laughing, despite the tension she felt with Ian bearing down on them. “And if ye are wrong?”

A slow smile spread across Alex’s face. “Why, the same, lass. The very same.”

Ian must have been bewitched by faeries to let his cousin take Sìleas out in the boat alone.

You’re no doing so well on your own, Alex had said to him. Let me see if I can help her to see things your way. Ye know how persuasive I can be.

Ian knew precisely how persuasive his handsome cousin could be. Women fell over each other to make fools of themselves with Alex.

The sea was rough, and heavy, black rain clouds were rolling in as Ian paced the beach. Where in the hell were they? What was Alex doing keeping her out with this storm coming? The weather was getting worse by the moment.

He reminded himself that Alex had a second sense on the water, as if a Viking ancestor was whispering guidance in his ear. All the same, Alex shouldn’t be taking chances with Sìleas in the boat.

Ian glanced again at the old, leaky boat resting high on the shore. He was almost desperate enough to take it out to look for them, when he caught sight of their boat as it appeared and disappeared between the troughs. By the saints, he was going to kill Alex.

As they neared shore, Ian waded out into the rough surf to help haul the boat in. Neither the icy water nor the cold, wet wind on his face cooled his temper. It burned hotter still when Sìleas moved to Alex’s end of the boat and her laugh traveled across the water.

He caught hold of the side and steadied it as Alex dropped into the water. Instead of taking his side of the boat, Alex lifted Sìleas out. Alex headed for the shore, carrying her in his arms above the reach of the waves—and leaving Ian to drag the boat alone as if he were a damned servant.

“Mind the boat!” Alex shouted over his shoulder. “We don’t want to lose her.”

When Alex reached the sandy beach, he turned with Sìleas still in his arms to watch Ian do his work for him. For God’s sake, why did the man not set her on her own two feet now? And there she was, smiling up at Alex, as if she were enjoying herself.

As soon as he had secured the boat, Ian stomped across the beach to join them. “Is my wife injured?”

“I wouldn’t let harm come to my favorite lass, now would I?” Alex said with a broad wink at Sìleas. “But I couldn’t risk letting her get tossed about in the surf. ’Tis a stormy day, if ye hadn’t noticed.”

“I suggest ye set her down before I break your arms,” Ian said. “Better yet, I’ll take her.”

“I can stand,” Sìleas said. “Put me down.”

“Whatever ye say, lass,” Alex said, and set her down.

Ian itched to give his cousin a clout across his smiling face, but he wanted some answers first. “What in the hell were ye doing, having her out on the water with that storm coming? And don’t tell me ye didn’t see it.”

“ ’Course I saw it coming,” Alex said, easy as could be. “I may have cut it a wee bit close, because we were having such a grand time, ye see. But we made it in all right.”

Ian glared down at Sìleas and did not feel at all badly when she trembled. With her color high from the wind and her hair wild about her, she looked like a sea nymph come to shore hoping to be ravished.

“What were the two of ye doing out there so long?” he said to her. “I didn’t see any fish in the damned boat.”

“It was a poor day for fishing,” she said.

Now that he thought of it, there wasn’t even a net in the boat.

“Then just what were ye doing all this time?” he yelled, with the image of her arms around Alex’s neck as he carried her to shore vivid in his mind. “Is it not enough that ye have Gòrdan Graumach eating out of your hand?”

“Ye may find it strange, but I enjoy being with a man who doesn’t shout at me,” she said, shouting herself.

“Enjoying Alex, were ye?”

With her green eyes flashing and her hair whipping about her face, she looked like the magnificent Celtic warrior queen, Scáthach, herself.

“Ye have no call to accuse me of what ye are,” she said, poking her finger into his chest.

Her statement calmed him a bit. Sìleas wouldn’t lie to him.

“Ye should mind how it looks when ye go about with other men,” he said. “I won’t be made a fool of.”

Sìleas sputtered what might have been curses but was lost in the wind. When he reached for her hand, she kicked him in the shin. He stood dumbfounded as she turned and ran up the beach to the path above.

Ian looked to his cousin, expecting commiseration—and the apology he was owed.

“What in the name of heaven is wrong with ye?” Alex said, raising his hands in the air. “Did ye have to yell at her?”

“Me? You’re blaming me for this?”

“Accuse me of anything ye like,” Alex said, with a hard edge to his voice. “But there’s no excuse for insulting Sìleas.”

“I hope you’re telling me that nothing happened between ye out there,” Ian said, clenching his fists.

“I was out there doing my best to persuade her that ye are not the idget that ye are. You’ve somehow managed, in spite of yourself, to get the perfect wife, and now ye seem to be doing all ye can to lose her.”

Alex, who was usually hard to rile, was pacing back and forth and gesturing with his hands as he ranted.

“Sìleas is not just lovely, but she’s sensible and kind as well,” Alex said. “Adding to this miracle, your family adores the lass.”

“I’ve told her I want her,” Ian said. “What more does she want from me?”

“Why have ye done nothing to make amends to her?” Alex said, spreading his arms wide. “Would it be so hard to show her that ye admire her, that ye care for her? I tell ye, I’m disgusted with ye.”

With that, Alex turned and left Ian alone on the beach staring after him. He was still standing there when the heavens opened up and drenched him.

CHAPTER 11

Sìleas sat at the small table in her bedchamber with her letter to the now-dead King James and a clean sheet of parchment before her. How did one address a letter to a widowed queen who was also Regent? She brushed the feather of her quill against her cheek as she considered the question.

To Her Highness,

That should suffice. She bit her lip as she copied the rest of her original letter. It annoyed her that she had Ian to thank for the skill. Did she have no pleasant memories from her childhood that did not involve him?

Her mother had never been well long enough to teach her to write, and it wouldn’t have crossed her father’s mind to hire a tutor for her. When it was apparent that no one else would teach her, Ian did. For a boy who never liked to sit, he had been diligent, spending hours with her. The result was that while she did not have an elegant, feminine hand, she was a slow but competent writer.

She smudged the ink and had to start over on a clean sheet of parchment. When she finished, she blew on the letter and read it over again. It would do.

The problem now was how to get it delivered to the queen at Stirling Castle.

She started at the sound of a rap on her door and shoved the letters under the sheaf of accounts stacked on the table. “Who is it?” she called out.

Ian stuck his head through the door.

He gave her a smile that raised her heartbeat. Why did he have this effect on her? She had avoided him since yesterday—no small task when they were living under the same roof—because she feared seeing him would weaken her resolve.

“May I come in?”

When she failed to summon an answer, he stepped inside and closed the door behind him. Her cheeks flamed hot as she remembered her letter. She felt a pang of guilt for not telling him she was seeking royal assistance to annul their marriage—and stifled it.

“I promise, I won’t shout at ye. And I won’t touch ye…” Ian’s voice trailed off as his gaze slid over her, as if he were remembering every part of her he’d had his hands on two nights before. “… unless ye want me to.”

She could not get enough air. With his dark hair falling over one eye and the shadow of beard over his strong jaw, Ian looked rough and dangerously handsome.

He drew his brows together. “I wouldn’t hurt ye. Surely ye know that?”

He would. He already had.

Ian’s gaze drifted around the room. “You’ve made it nice in here.” He sniffed and the corners of his mouth tipped up. “Smells much better than when I slept here as a lad. It used to smell of dogs and horses—and me, I suppose.”

She remembered waking to the smell of him when he crawled into bed with her. The scent had lingered faintly in her bed, giving her a restless night.

She swallowed as Ian’s gaze fell on the bed and remained there for a long moment.

“I came to ask ye about the accounts ye showed me,” he said, bringing his gaze back to her.

How did a man get such blue eyes?

“I’m sure my da didn’t record such things, though perhaps one of the men working for him did,” Ian said. “So, you’ll have to teach me.”

She raised her eyebrows, since he had paid no attention the first time she tried to show him.

He lifted the stool that was against the wall with one hand, set it next to her, and sat down in one easy motion. The man moved as she imagined a lion would, all grace and rippling muscle.

She jumped when he scooted his stool closer.

As he reached across her for the pile of parchments, his arm and shoulder pressed against hers, sending heat radiating through her body. “Now let’s have a look at these.”

She awoke from her daze and grabbed the stack away from him.

“These are in order!” she said, her voice coming out high and squeaky.

He gave her an amused look, blue eyes sparkling, and raised an eyebrow.

To cover her embarrassment, she began explaining her method of keeping track of the farm’s livestock. “Ye see, I mark all the new calves here—”

He touched her hand, and the words dried in her mouth.

“Ye were always better at figures than me, Sìl.”

“Only because ye lack patience.” She attempted a severe look, though, despite herself, her heart swelled with the compliment.

“Impatience is a failing of mine.” Ian gave her a slow smile as he dragged his finger up her forearm. “A failing I’m trying verra hard to cure.”

She swallowed. “I know what ye are trying to do.”

“Do ye now?” He brushed a stray curl from her cheek, sending a shiver all the way to her fingertips and toes.

“You’re trying to seduce me.”

“We should each do what we’re good at,” he said, his eyes glimmering. Without shifting his gaze from her face, he waved his hand toward the parchments. “You’re good with figures, so ye should keep doing that.”

She opened her mouth to tell him she would not be here to do it, but stopped herself. Ian was set on doing his duty to his family and clan, and he had decided that duty included making her his true wife. It was best, then, that he not know she was making other plans.

“And what are you good at?” she asked instead.

“Just as ye say,” he said, leaning closer, his even white teeth gleaming. “Seducing my wife.”

She felt herself blush to her roots. “I’m no your wife.”

“But ye are,” he said.

“Ye did not claim me for five years.”

He slid a hand beneath her hair and cupped the back of her neck as he leaned toward her. “Well, I’m claiming ye now.”

The saints protect her, Ian was going to kiss her. The memory of waking to his kisses sent an unfamiliar rush of desire through her. His lids were half lowered over eyes that held a molten heat like the blue in a hot fire. She felt herself leaning toward him, like a moth flying into the flame.

His kiss was soft and sensuous, caressing her lips with a tantalizing suggestion of all that a kiss could be. When he drew away, she followed him. He smiled against her lips, then ran his tongue lightly over her bottom lip. How could that small movement fill her with such a powerful yearning? She gripped the front of his linen shirt in her fists to steady herself.

He made a sound deep in his throat that she felt more than heard. When he pressed his mouth to hers this time, it wasn’t a teasing brush of lips but a kiss that sent the blood pounding through her veins. She felt his heart beating beneath her hands as he pulled her against him.

Her own heart pounded in her ears as he deepened the kiss. She didn’t remember opening her mouth to him, but their tongues were moving together in a rhythm that resonated deep inside her. She felt a growing urgency in him that was both frightening and exhilarating.

His fingers were buried in her hair, and his body was taut with the same tension that ran through hers. As he ran hot, wet kisses beneath her ear and down the side of her throat, she cupped his jaw with her hand. The rough day’s growth of beard tickled the sensitive skin of her palm and sent shivers of pleasure up her arm.

She loved his face. Touching it now made her realize that she had been longing to hold it in her hands since the first night he returned.

She sucked in a shaky breath as he worked his way along the top of her bodice with his mouth. Now. She should stop him now.

But she was hungry for a man’s touch. For this man’s touch. For Ian.

She stopped breathing as he slowly slid his tongue over the curve of her breast. It was as if Ian read her body, for no sooner was she aware of a low ache between her legs than he made it worse by resting a warm, heavy hand on her thigh. When she made a sound at the back of her throat, he lifted his head to capture her mouth again.

She was light-headed, drowning in his kisses. How long they kissed she could never have said. When he pulled away, she became aware of his hand moving up her thigh and his breath hot in her ear.

“We need to move to the bed,” he said, his voice rough with longing, and she wanted to go wherever he was taking her. “I don’t want to make love to ye the first time in a chair.”

Putting to words where this was headed finally brought her to her senses.

“No,” she said, pushing him away.

He dropped his forehead on her shoulder. “Sìl, don’t say no,” he said, sounding as if he were in pain. “Please.”

The room had become sweltering, and the only sound was their harsh breathing.

“I want ye something fierce.” Though he didn’t touch her except where his forehead rested on her shoulder, the air vibrated with the tension between them.

“I said no.” She didn’t try to push him away again, for fear that if she touched him she could not make herself let go again.

He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Whatever ye say,” he whispered, then he leaned back on his stool. “But will ye tell me why?”

The heat in his gaze burned her skin. She bit her lip but wouldn’t answer.

“Ye can’t tell me ye don’t like it when I kiss ye,” he said, his voice rich like honey on her tongue. “Or that ye don’t like the way I touch ye, because I can tell ye do.”

His words sent another wave of heat through her.

“I believe ye would enjoy… the rest.”

Oh, aye. She used to wonder if she would enjoy marital relations, but now she was quite certain she would—at least, she would if it were with Ian. Her heart was still pounding as if she’d run a race.

He ran a finger lightly up her arm, sending another bolt of heat low in her belly. “Is there something that worries ye? Something you’re afraid of?”

There was, but she wasn’t telling him.

“Ye might fear it will hurt the first time I bed ye,” he said, “but I’m thinking it’s something else that is holding ye back.”

She swallowed, wondering how he had guessed.

“I can’t fix it if I don’t know what’s wrong.”

Ian sounded sincere, as best she could tell through the pounding in her ears. But she wasn’t going to tell him. She had decided that she needed more from him than desire. Yet that wasn’t what stopped her tonight. In truth, when he was kissing her like that, his lack of love and devotion couldn’t have been further from her mind.

No, it was a different fear that had brought her back to her senses and given her the strength to bring a halt to what they both wanted.

“Ye used to trust me,” he said, taking her hand and rubbing his thumb across the heel of her palm.

There was a time she would have told him anything. But not now.

Nothing could make her admit that what she feared was seeing the fire in his eyes cool when he saw her naked. In her ignorance, she used to think it would be possible to keep her clothes on when her husband took her to bed. But from the determined way Ian set about trying to get them off her, that seemed unlikely.

Most unlikely.

If he loved her, she might not be afraid to let him see her. If she didn’t love him so much, it might not matter to her.

“Ye were fearless as a child,” he said, his eyes softening with his smile. “Truth be told, ye used to scare me sometimes. It almost seemed as if ye got yourself into trouble just so I would have to save ye.”

“It’s true, I did.” She choked on the words; it was a hard thing to admit. “I trusted ye utterly. But I don’t trust ye now.”

She saw the flash of hurt in his eyes before he pressed his lips together and nodded. Her mouth grew dry as the tense silence between them lengthened.

“I failed my family and my clan by not being home when I was needed. I want to make amends, to make things right, if I can,” Ian said. “I want to be your husband—not just to have ye in my bed, though I’d be lying if I said that wasn’t part of it. But I promise I’ll try to be the kind of husband ye deserve.”

Sìleas felt herself weakening, but one pretty speech should not be enough to make her forgive the years of neglect nor the hurt he’d caused her since coming home.

“What about what I want?” she asked with a quaver in her voice.

“I thought this was what ye wanted. You’ve been happy living here with my family.” He leaned forward and gave her a soft smile. “And ye used to like me quite a lot.”

What he didn’t say, but they both knew, was that Ian had been the person she loved best in the world. And damn it, judging by how much her heart hurt, it was still true.

“I don’t want ye to be my husband because ye were forced to do it.” She swallowed and fixed her gaze on her hands in her lap. “Or because the clan needs my lands. Or because your mother is verra fond of me.”

“I’m fond of ye as well.” He reached out to tuck a loose strand of her hair behind her ear, but she pulled away.

“I don’t want ye to be my husband because ye think I need protecting or because ye feel sorry for me,” she continued. “Or because ye don’t like to do figures yourself.”

“I can promise ye, I’d want ye even if ye couldn’t do figures,” he said, brushing his knuckles against her cheek. When she looked up, he gave her a sizzling look that made her stomach tighten. “I do want ye, Sìl.”

She took her hand from his and got to her feet.

All the reasons he wanted her might be enough if he were any other man. But they were not enough from Ian. She would not spend her life with a man, pining for her love to be returned.

She made herself walk out the door and close it behind her.

CHAPTER 12

Ian heard his father’s raised voice as he opened the front door to the house.

“Look at what ye done to me!” Payton was shouting at Niall, who was trying to help him across the room. “Ye should have let me die like a man.”

Sìleas stood on his father’s other side, coaxing him forward. “It will be lovely to have ye take your meals with the family again.”

“Will ye no come sit at the table, da?” Niall said.

The instant his father began to raise his cane to strike Niall, Ian started across the room, but Sìleas was closer. His heart stopped when she stepped between the two men.

“Don’t ye dare touch him!” Sìleas shouted.

When his father checked the blow in time, Ian breathed again. His father still had the arms and shoulders of a powerful man. God in Heaven, he could have killed her.

Niall walked past Ian and out the front door without even seeing him. Sìleas locked gazes with his father, going nose to nose with him—or she would have, if she were taller. Neither appeared to take any notice of Ian’s presence or the slamming door.

“If ye speak that way to Niall again, I swear I’ll not forgive ye,” Sìleas said. Her chest rose and fell in deep breaths as she and his father glared at each other.

“He should have let me die on the battlefield,” his father said. “He took away my manhood, bringing me home like this.”

She spoke in a slow, deliberate voice, and there was steel in her eyes. “Ye ought to be grateful to have such a son, after what he did for ye.”

“Grateful? Look at me!” his father shouted, pointing at his missing leg.

“Shame on ye, Payton MacDonald, for wishing you could desert your family,” she said. “ ’Tis long past time ye stopped feeling sorry for yourself.”

She turned on her heel, her hair swinging out like a shooting flame, and stormed out of the house.

His father hobbled to the nearest chair, dropped onto it with a thump, and rubbed his hands over his face. Ian got the whiskey down from the cupboard and filled a cup.

“Here ye go, da,” he said, as he set the cup on the table next to his father. He started to put the bottle back, then set it on the table as well.

His father clenched the cup as if holding a lifeline and stared at the wall.

“I’d best see to Niall,” Ian said.

His father nodded without turning to look at him. “Do that, son.”

It was raining buckets, so Ian hoped Niall hadn’t gone far. He tried the old cottage first—and found Alex and Dina in the midst of enjoying the ways of the flesh. They didn’t notice him. From there, he splashed through puddles to the byre.

The smell of cows and damp straw filled his nostrils as he peered into the dim, musty interior. He paused and listened. Behind the sound of the pounding rain, he heard the murmur of voices and followed it to the back of the byre, where he found Niall and Sìleas sitting side by side on a pile of straw between two cows. They didn’t hear him approach.

“It’s your father’s pain speaking,” Sìleas said. “He doesn’t mean it like it sounds.”

“He means precisely what he says.” Niall slammed the side of his fist against the byre wall beside him. “He couldn’t be plainer.”

“Well, I am proud of ye, if that matters at all to ye.” Sìleas put her hand to Niall’s cheek. “I am so proud of what ye did that my chest fairly bursts with it every time I think of it.”

“Ye mean it, Sìl?” Neill said, blushing bright red.

“Ach, of course I do!” she said with a wave of her hand. “I’ve watched you grow into a man we can all rely on. To tell the truth, I’m sick with jealousy over the woman who is going to have ye, because you’re going to make the finest husband in all of Scotland.”

Ian felt the bite of criticism in her words. A man we can all rely on. The finest husband in all of Scotland. He felt his shortcomings on both counts.

“But don’t forget that it was your father who taught ye to be the man ye are,” she added in a softer voice. “I’m spitting mad at Payton just now, but I’m also praying he’ll get back to himself again. When he does, I know he’ll regret every word he said to ye.”

“So here ye are,” Ian said, pretending he had just come into the byre.

They both turned as he stepped into view.

“I’m sorry da was so harsh with ye,” Ian said.

“Do ye think I did the right thing, bringing da back?” Niall was looking up at him with earnest eyes, seeking his approval as he used to years ago.

Ian suspected he would feel the same way his father did. A man who couldn’t fight was not really a man anymore. Still, in Niall’s place, he would have done the same.

“I don’t know if it was the right thing,” Ian said. “But ye had no choice.”

When Sìleas started to follow Niall out of the byre, Ian held her arm. He felt guilty when she turned to face him and he saw wariness replace the kindness that had been in her eyes when she spoke with his brother.

“Thank ye for speaking to Niall as ye did,” he said. “Ye restored his pride.”

Her expression softened at the praise, and he felt another wave of guilt. If paying her a well-deserved compliment was all it took to please her, he should have managed it before.

“The weather should clear soon,” he said. “Will ye take a stroll with me later?”

“I’ve too much work to—”

“Ye have time to go with Gòrdan and Alex, but not with me?” he said, failing to keep the sharpness from his tone.

“I have a pleasant time with them,” she said, her eyes snapping. “I see no cause to get behind with my chores to have an argument with you.”

She tried to pull away, but he held her arm fast. “Ach, I don’t mean to argue with ye,” he said. “Will ye go with me to Teàrlag’s cottage? Ye could take her a basket.”

He knew from his mother that Sìleas and Duncan’s sister took turns bringing the old seer food. Without it, Teàrlag wouldn’t make it through the winter.

“I do need to visit her.” Sìleas pressed her lips together, considering.

“So come along and keep me company,” Ian said.

“I will,” she said. “But what is taking ye to Teàrlag’s cottage?”

“I’m meeting Connor and Duncan there,” Ian said. “Can ye be ready in an hour or two? I have something to do first.”

Sìleas bit back her irritation as she showed Dina where things were kept in the kitchen. In truth, irritation was far too mild a word for what she felt.

It wasn’t that Dina was doing anything in particular to aggravate her—at the moment. Every time she looked at Dina, however, she saw her with her legs wrapped around Ian’s bare backside as the pair rocked against the shepherd’s hut.

Sìleas banged a pot onto the worktable—and then was doubly annoyed when she could not recall what she meant to do with it.

The fornicating pair had been too absorbed in what they were doing to notice the nine-year-old girl who was watching from a few yards away. At first, Sìleas had been too stunned to cover her eyes—which probably explained why her memory of it was crystal clear. Even when she finally covered them, she could hear Dina’s odd gasps and her shouts of Aye! Aye!

“Aye?”

The sound of Dina’s voice right next to her made Sìleas jump a foot.

Dina gave her a puzzled look. “Is this where Beitris hides the salt?”

Sìleas nodded without looking to see where Dina was pointing. She hated having this woman in the house. How dare Ian bring his former lover into their home? But then, this wasn’t truly her home, was it?

And perhaps Dina wasn’t Ian’s former lover, either.

Sìleas started chopping turnips with a large knife. Whack, whack, whack.

She was angry with Ian for giving her that ugly memory of him and Dina. Ach, it was annoying that it upset her as much now as it had when she was a child. But everything changed between her and Ian after that. She paused in her chopping. No, the change had begun earlier.

As Ian left boyhood behind, he came to Knock Castle less and less often to take her for a ride on his horse or out in his boat. Then he was away at the university in the Lowlands for months at a time. And when he was home, he seemed to spend all his time practicing his battle skills with the men—or flirting with the lasses old enough to have breasts.

Or more than flirting.

“You’re not getting much chopping done,” Dina said, drawing her attention to the single chopped turnip on the table.

“Do ye think ye can get supper on alone?” Sìleas said, as she lifted her apron over her head. “I have an errand to run.”

She fled the kitchen without waiting for Dina to answer and went looking for Ian, intent on telling him she had changed her mind about going to Teàrlag’s with him. She stopped in her tracks when she found him behind the byre with his father.

Her throat felt tight and tears stung the back of her eyes as she took in the scene. Damn Ian. Just when she was ready to accept that he had nothing left in him of the lad she had loved, he would go and do something like this.

Ian had carved a piece of wood and fitted it with leather straps to his father’s half-missing leg. With one arm over Ian’s shoulder, Payton was learning to walk with it.

The rest of them had treated Payton like the invalid they saw him to be. They fetched and carried for him and—until today—put up with his rage at finding himself less than the man he used to be. Ian was a warrior and understood his father better than they had.

She felt guilty as she realized this was the first Payton had been outside the house since Niall carried him home—and this was a man who was used to spending most of his waking hours outdoors.

She watched as Ian walked with his father at an excruciatingly slow pace, up and down the length of the byre, and then up and down again.

“Ye got it, da,” Ian said.

Payton snorted. “Soon I will be dancing, aye?”

“Ye were always a terrible dancer, da.”

At the sound of Payton’s laugh, she felt her determination to resist Ian weaken another notch. This was so like the Ian she remembered. He had seen just the right thing to do to help his father and done it.

“Ye will be walking on your own in no time,” Ian said. “As soon as ye do, we’ll get a sword in your hand.”

“Good. I’m a much better fighter than dancer,” Payton said.

Ian was still laughing when he looked up and saw her. She managed to wipe her tears away before Payton noticed her as well.

“Ah, Sìleas,” Payton said, with a smile that shone in his eyes. “ ’Tis a fine day to be out, is it not?”

It was bone-cold and damp.

“A very fine day, indeed, Payton,” she said, her eyes blurring. “The best in a long, long while.”

CHAPTER 13

Sìleas’s emotions felt raw, whipsawed between her anger with Ian and the warmth she felt toward him for what he’d done for Payton. She realized this walk to Teàrlag’s was the first she had been alone with him since his return—except for the two times in her bedchamber, which hadn’t been good for conversation.

“What will ye do to see that Connor is made chieftain?” she asked, for something to say.

“I’ll do whatever it takes, for the sake of the clan,” Ian said. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for Connor. He’s like a brother to me.”

If Ian had a plan, he wasn’t sharing it with her.