Page 103 of Promised to the Forbidden Laird

Roy remained facing the falls.

“Ye may turn.”

He did. His eyes found her and became very still. The wet linen clung more closely than the gown had done. She felt heat rise through her despite the cold air.

Roy removed his boots and outer shirt with practical efficiency, though the movements seemed less assured beneath her attention. Scars crossed his chest and shoulders, pale against skin browned by wind and years outdoors.

She had seen them before. She touched them in the infirmary and kissed the one beneath his collar in her chamber.

Yet here, in the open light, they seemed part of him rather than injuries requiring care. Each marked some moment he had survived, some loss his body carried even when his silence refused it.

Roy stepped back into the pool. Donaldina went deeper before courage could fail. The bottom fell away abruptly. Cold water closed over her shoulders, and she pushed forward, swimming toward the center. Her braid floated behind her like a dark rope before loosening entirely beneath the weight of the water.

He followed. They circled each other at first, separated by several yards of rippling silver. She had not swum since childhood, when Lachlan taught her in a smaller pool near Dun Ard and promised not to tell anyone how loudly she screamed upon first touching the bottom.

She had forgotten the freedom of it. Water bore her weight without asking what duties she carried. It did not know of Cormac, royal decrees or clan boundaries. It did not care that men watched her for signs of fear or weakness.

She turned onto her back. Above her, the sky appeared between the trees, blue-gray and endless.

A splash sounded near her head. Donaldina righted herself to find Roy within reach.

“Ye swim very quietly,” she said.

“I had hoped tae frighten ye.”

“Ye should practice.”

He disappeared beneath the surface. Donaldina waited. And then, a hand closed around her ankle. She cried out and kicked free, sending water into Roy’s face as he rose.

“Ye barbarian!”

His laughter broke fully then. Donaldina struck his shoulder. Roy caught her wrist, but she twisted away and swam toward the rocks beneath the waterfall. He followed. She reached the ledge first, pulling herself onto the slick stone as water streamed from her hair and shift.

Roy surfaced beside her.

“Ye cheated,” he said.

“I was faster.”

“Ye kicked me.”

“War rarely rewards courtesy.”

He braced one arm upon the rock and climbed beside her.

For several minutes, neither spoke. They sat with their feet in the pool while the waterfall thundered behind them. Cold water ran over Donaldina’s skin, yet sunlight touched the stone beneath her hands. Her breathing slowed.

Roy leaned back upon his palms. The strain had left his face.

For the first time since her abduction, she did not wonder where Cormac hid or whether guards stood where they had been ordered. She did not picture the lodge or feel rope cutting into her wrists.

She looked only at Roy beside her, wet-haired and bare-chested, appearing younger without his sword, cloak and burden of command.

“Ye should look like this more often,” she mused.

He turned his head. “Half drowned?”

“Untroubled.”