Page 118 of The Laird's Masked Passion

“After all yer threats?”

“I reserve the right tae revise me opinion when presented with new evidence.”

“And was the evidence convincing?”

“Skye!”

Her maid laughed, but the sound held no mockery. She reached across the space between them and took Elspeth’s hand.

“Were ye happy?”

Elspeth meant to answer at once. Instead, she thought of Colin bending to kiss the wound at her ribs. She remembered his fierce promise that no one would hurt her again, and the still more dangerous gentleness with which he had held her afterward.

She remembered how afraid he had been that she might see a monster when she looked at him, and how impossible it had seemed to see anything but a man who had spent his whole life protecting others from the darkness he feared within himself.

“Aye,” she whispered. “I was.”

The truth settled quietly inside her. It was no longer merely desire, though desire remained. It was not curiosity, gratitude, or the confusion of a woman whose husband had proved different from every warning she had received.

She cared whether Colin slept, whether his wounds healed, whether he stood alone before his father’s memory and believed himself condemned by it.

His pain hurt her. His rare laughter warmed her. His life had become necessary to the shape of her own.

Elspeth drew in a startled breath. “Oh.”

Skye watched her carefully. “What is it?”

Elspeth looked toward the door, as though Colin might enter and discover the truth upon her face.

“I… dinnae ken how tae say it,” she smiled, feeling her cheeks warm up.

Skye returned the smile. “I think I ken what ye mean tae say, so ye decide whether ye wish tae keep it a secret, even from yerself.”

“I couldnae even if I wanted tae,” Elspeth pressed her hand to her heart. “Skye, I… I think I love him.”

The words frightened her more than the dungeon had.

Skye’s hand tightened around hers. Elspeth stared at the closed door, her heart beating with the dreadful certainty of a woman who had finally understood herself.

She loved Colin MacKenzie.

And she had not the faintest idea what she was meant to do about it.

The attackers had entered through the northern ridge. Colin knew it before Murdoch dismounted. The ground there fell sharply between two walls of dark rock, forming a narrow passage hidden by heather, thorn, and low pine. From the main road, it appeared impassable. From within the hills, it offered a clear descent toward the village without forcing a rider into open ground.

Breac crouched beside a patch of churned earth and pressed two fingers into the mud.

“Six horses,” he pointed out. “Perhaps more. The rain has spoiled part of the trail.”

Murdoch led his horse farther beneath the trees, following broken stems and the faint scars left by hooves upon exposed roots.

“They waited here,” he called out. “Long enough fer the horses tae trample the ground.”

Colin remained in the saddle and studied the ridge.

The morning wind carried the smell of wet soil, pine resin, and heather bruised beneath careless boots. Below them, his lands stretched beneath a grey sky: scattered cottages, fields divided by stone walls, cattle moving slowly through pale grass, and the distant dark shape of the castle upon its rise.

It was everything Robert wished to take from him, everything Colin had promised to protect.