Page 46 of Kidnapped by a Rogue
He glanced at Alex, who wasshamelessly attempting to overhear them, and drew her farther away. “Tell me, what is this about?”
“Ella isn’t really mine,” Margaret said, twisting her hands in her gown. “I mean, she’s mine now. But she wasn’t always.”
Wasn’t always?By the saints, had Margaret stolen the bairn? Something had seemed off from the very start. It had been too easy to persuade her to come with him, but he had put that down to her cool head and calm facade. And she had not seemed to know her own daughter very well, but he dismissed that when she told him Ella had been in the care of a village woman.
“Explain this to me,leannain.” Finn rested his hands on her slender shoulders and spoke in a soft voice. “How can Ella be yours, but not yours?”
“I didn’t give birth to her,” Margaret said in a tight voice. “She was…a…a gift.”
“A gift?” People did not give away children. He cupped Margaret’s cheek with his hand. “Oh, lass, what have ye done?”
She proceeded to tell him a wild tale of a murdered mother and a desperate lad who brought Ella to her on the very night Finn kidnapped her. His head was spinning.
“Do you believe me?” she asked, looking at him with those big brown eyes that appeared to hold no guile.
Finn would be a damned fool to believe her. And yet he did.
“Ye cannot take me back,” she pleaded. “My brothers will use me to forge an alliance. They’ll force me to marry again!”
Jealousy rammed him like a raging bull as Finn imagined another man touching her velvety skin…sliding his hands over her soft curves…tasting her lips…
“No nobleman my brothers would choose for my husband will accept the child of poor villagers as my adopted daughter.”
She was talking about Ella, but his mind was still stuck on the notion of a husband who would wake to see Margaret’s face every day and lie with her each night.
“Do ye understand?” She gripped the front of his tunic in her fists, forcing him to hear what she was telling him. “If I return, my brothers will take Ella away from me! I’ll never see her again.”
“I’ll not let that happen.” He pulled her into his arms and kissed her hair. “I promise.”
He gave her his word without thought because he could not bear to see her so distressed and because it would be wrong to part her and Ella. But what in the hell was he going to do with them?
He’d never wanted to be responsible for a woman or a bairn—and he’d never been in a worse position to do so. He would protect them with his life, but he had little else to offer them. He had no home he could take them to and no certain means of providing for them.
With a deep sigh, he rested his chin on her head. How did he get himself into this mess? Their lives had become entangled like his fingers in her hair. There was nothing he could do now but bring them with him to Dunrobin and pray his uncle would take him into his guard.
He felt a tug on his tunic and looked down to see Ella with her arms raised, wanting him to pick her up. He tossed her into the air, which earned him a rare laugh from the bairn. When he turned to Margaret and saw her face glowing with happiness and relief, his doubts fell away.
No matter what it took, he would find a way to take care of them until Margaret decided what she wanted to do next.
###
Margaret was overjoyed that Finn would not abandon them or try to return her to her brothers. But the smile froze on her face as she recalled their wild moment of passion no more than an hour ago. If she had known she and Finn were not parting today, she never would have asked him to kiss her. Her cheeks grew hot as she recalled how quickly that kiss led to having her back against a tree, her skirts around her waist, and Finn staring at her bare breasts.
Her hand flew to her chest. She had not even considered the consequence of Moray’s change in plans to Finn.
“Forgive me for only thinking of myself,” she said. “This must mean ye won’t receive the lands ye were promised for kidnapping me.”
“Ach, I’m no worse off than I was before,” Finn said with a shrug.
She was not fooled. This was a hard loss for him.
“I’m sorry,” she said, resting her hand on his arm. “I know how much ye wanted that land.”
If he had no home, where he would take them? She did not care where so long as she could keep Ella. From the tale Finn told of how he came to kidnap her, however, he might not be welcome with either his father’s or his mother’s clan.
Though Finn surely wanted to be rid of them, it would be a lot to ask him to take her and Ella across the Highlands and through mountainous terrain to Eilean Donan Castle. And what if Sybil and her husband had changed their plans and were not there when they arrived? Still, she was about to suggest it when Finn spoke.
“I’m glad I don’t have to choose between taking you all the way back to the Lowlands and taking Alex north to Sutherland.”
