Page 17 of Highlander’s Torn Bride

He had seen the opportunity to infiltrate Margaret’s heart, and he had taken it, forcing his way through with false promises and half-truths. Gavin had taken advantage of Margaret when she was most vulnerable, and, for that, Ann would never forgive him.

“He is not a good man,” Ann told her brother.

“Aye, maybe not, but he is one of Laird Gunn’s finest outriders.”

“Tis an awfully fancy term for cattle rustler,” Ann replied. “A criminal and a thief will always be a criminal and a thief once ye strip back the labels.”

“Perhaps, but Lady Margaret hadn’t seemed to mind what he was at his base.”

“That is because she didna ken what it was that he was doing when he left,” Ann grumbled.

Ann wished she hadn’t known what it was that Gavin did for Laird Gunn. She had found out on accident years ago, when she had overheard Gavin describing his latest adventure to Alan. She had been so surprised that she had dropped the tray she had been carrying, and the pair of boys had immediately found her and forced her into a pact of secrecy. She couldn’t tell anyone about his job, especially Margaret.

Ann now considered the pact to have been forced upon her, but, at the time, it had been nothing quite so dramatic. Ann had agreed because she had never seen a reason to talk about Gavin to anybody, let alone Margaret.

If she had ever imagined him to be capable of weaseling his way to her side, she never would have accepted. When Ann began hearing them throw about words such as love and marriage, Ann’s first reaction had been to hold in a wretch, and the second had been the realization that she simply had to reveal Gavin’s job to Margaret, promise or not. She tried on numerous occasions but, whenever Ann so much as spoke his name aloud, her friend would brighten so much that all of her nerves fled, the thought of bringing reckless hurt down upon her friend paralyzing.

John arched one brow. “She doesn’t ken?”

“Nah,” Ann replied, “and, at this point, there is no reason for her to ken.”

Ann thought about Margaret that evening, at her constant flushing and skittish nerves whenever Alexander so much as brushed her hand when reaching for his goblet. And Alexander, though Ann hadn’t noticed, had been deeply aware of Margaret, too. That had become apparent to Ann when she had looked over to see her friend on the edge of sickness and, before she could even rise from her seat, Alexander was at her side and rescuing her before anyone else could notice.

He may have been a Mackay, and he may have had some learning to do when it came to caring for Margaret’s unusually independent personality, but, if those were his only faults, then Ann would place her support behind him wholeheartedly.

And she would be damned if she let Gavin get in the way.

5

“Listen here, Alexander Mackay,” Rob said, pulling a bright red iron from the fire and holding it before Alexander’s face, so close that the heat of it made his nose run. “I expect you to be a good husband to that lass over there, or it shall be the queen you answer to.”

“What is wrong with you?” Alexander said, smiling and kicking Rob back.

“Queen Mary asked for me to make sure that the threat of her displeasure was clearly felt. And I,” he twirled the iron bravely in his hand, “happen to ken that she enjoys this method of torture.”

Alexander didn’t want to know how Rob knew that, so he just shook his head while his friend returned the iron to the fire. “Thank you for your assistance through this.”

“Aye, I am glad that I was able to help see you wed, as well as help you with other matters,” Rob replied, patting one of the bags slung over his arm, where a bloodied sheet was folded up for transport to the queen. That morning, when Rob had come to collect it, he had caught Alexander waving the sheet in an effort to dry the blood he had just dabbed onto it from a small cut in the tip of his finger.

Surprisingly, Rob hadn’t teased him for it at all. Instead, he had just helped Alexander dry the sheet and vowed to keep it a secret between them.

“Well, Alexander, I expect to see you again soon,” Rob said.

“Aye, one would hope.”

“Make her beg for you,” he said with a wink, nudging Alexander’s arm once in finality before going to join his wife and child for their journey home to Dounie Castle.

“What a strange thing to say,” Alexander mumbled as he watched his friend mount up and begin their voyage up the hill.

“What is a strange thing to say?”

Alexander turned, and there was Margaret, her head cocked to one side with curiosity. Considering the state that she had been in last night, the worst thing about her appearance today was a twin set of dark circles beneath her eyes. The rest of her seemed perfectly well, with her even having the energy to rise early to go off somewhere in the house. When he asked her where, she said it was to have the maids do her hair properly. It seemed like an unnecessary amount of effort to put into a day of traveling, but he had known since she had written her letter to him that her image was of the utmost importance to her. So, since there was nothing harmed by a few braids in her hair, he said nothing.

What was proving harder to go unmentioned was her riding frock. The linen dress was dyed a shade of green so rich that it took a rich man to purchase the fabric. From there, it was neatly embroidered with white flowers that Alexander knew would be stained brown within minutes of riding down the dusty summertime road. When he had seen her emerge from behind her dressing screen in this dress, he tried to warn her that it would likely be ruined on their journey. She scoffed and looked away with a roll of her eyes, asking him if he expected her to wear peasant clothes instead.

“What else do you expect the daughter of a laird to wear?” she asked, and Alexander had taken the question as rhetorical until, when he looked at her, he noticed a sort of softness to her expression that made him wonder if the question was not said out of scorn, but rather genuine curiosity. Before he had fully realized it, though, and come up with a suitable answer, she left the room in search of Ann.

That same look of curiosity was on her face again now as she asked him about Rob. Alexander examined it, hoping to memorize each of her expressions so that he could identify them without pause in the future. If her words never would reveal the truth of her soul, he would have to rely on the flashing expressions that slipped through the fog of unknowing that she had put between them.