Page 6 of To Wed a Wild Scot
Logan sighed, a curse leaving his lips as he dismounted. Damned if he knew why he should care what happened to the girl, but he had a weakness for creatures in need. Stray dogs, injured sheep, sick children, and now, apparently, runaway brides.
She hadn’t noticed him the first time he passed, but this time he strode straight toward her. She saw him at once, and her eyes went wider and wider as he drew closer. They looked as if they’d swallow her pale face, the way the tender new grass swallowed the last patches of winter snow.
Green eyes.
Not just any green, he realized with a jolt of awareness, but an unusually bright green, like a spring leaf lit by the sun.
No doubt those eyes are what got her seduced in the first place.
Logan was so distracted by the color of her eyes he didn’t notice at first that her body had gone rigid, and she was gazing at him in shock—far more shock than the situation called for.
He paused a few feet away from her, confused. “Are you all right, lass? Can I help you?”
Her mouth opened, then closed again. Color flooded her cheeks, and Logan saw she was shaking.
What the devil?
She’d been calm enough a moment earlier, but now she seemed to be fighting off a sudden panic. The flush in her cheeks receded as quickly as it had surged, and she was staring up at him as if she’d seen a ghost. Did she think he was going to hurt her? Logan held up his hands, palms out, to show her he didn’t intend to touch her. “Miss? Is your husband nearby?”
She raised stricken eyes to his. She didn’t reply, but managed a quick shake of her head.
No husband? What the devil was she doing in Gretna Green without a husband, or even a servant to attend her? Unless…
Was it possible the blackguard had already abandoned her? “Has he left you behind?”
This time she didn’t appear to hear him. Her gaze was moving frantically over his face, as if she were mesmerized by his features. Logan wasn’t sure what to make of this strange behavior, other than to assume she had indeed been abandoned, and the shock had addled her wits.
He tried a few more questions, but none of them elicited a coherent response. She only gazed up at him as if she couldn’t credit her own eyes, until finally she murmured, “I don’t…this doesn’t make sense.”
Ah! So, those dainty pink lips could form words, after all. He’d begun to wonder if they were merely decorative. Still, dull-wit or not, the lady was confused, and so he took care to speak gently to her. “He told you he loved you to get you to come with him to Gretna Green, didn’t he, lass? Now he’s gone and left you, hasn’t he?”
This caught her wandering attention. Her wide green eyes went even wider, and her brow lowered. “Left me? No! I’m not—” she began, but before Logan could find out what ailed the chit she broke off, biting her lip.
Not what? Sane? Possessed of her wits?
Logan waited with as much patience as he could muster, but he never got an answer. In the next instant she caught sight of something over his shoulder and exclaimed, “There’s my husband now!”
Logan turned, but the man she indicated was at least thirty years her senior, and dressed like a servant. “Him?”
“Yes, indeed. He’s, ah…that is, we’re husband and wife.” Her words came out in a rush, as if she wished to be rid of them.
Rid ofhim, as well.
Logan, who’d begun to regret approaching her in the first place, was more than ready to oblige her. “Beg your pardon then, madam.” He bowed, then strode out of the stable yard. Within minutes he was mounted, and riding away from the King’s Head Inn, still shaking his head.
What an odd encounter.
Then again, Gretna Green was just the place one would expect to find a young lady who’d run off with her much older servant. Logan had seen more than one strange thing at the King’s Head.
He doubted the green-eyed lady would be the last.
Chapter Two
Three days later
The Sassy Lassie, Inverness, Scotland
By the time Logan reined in his horse in front of the Sassy Lassie, the last thing on his mind was the green-eyed lady from the King’s Head Inn. Whatwason his mind was a hot dinner, and a tankard of Fergus’s special dark brown ale.
