A Rogue's Heart
Auteur
Debra Lee Brown
Lezers
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Hoofdstukken
18
Chapter One
The Highlands of Scotland, 1213
Conall Mackintosh hated water.
Perhaps ’twas the ill-fated sea voyage he’d barely survived the year before, or the memory of being dunked in the horse trough once too often as a lad. Whatever the reason, he had a bad feeling about his brother’s proposal.
“Why me?” He shot Iain a disgruntled look. “Why not Gilchrist? He’s always splashing about in that bloody spring of his.”
“Ye know well his clan canna spare him for such a task. Nor can ours spare me. That leaves you.”
Conall swore silently under his breath.
“Negotiate the terms with Dunbar, build out the docks, and make ready for the first trade boats.” Iain nodded as if Conall had already agreed.
Boats. Docks and boats. His skin prickled at the mere mention of such things.
“Och, what are ye worried about?” Iain said. “’Tis no’ the western sea, just a wee loch. Ye’ll be done with the task and off to wherever the devil it is this time—”
“Glenmore. To hunt with your wife’s cousin.”
“—long before the winter sets in.”
Conall smirked. “’Tis easy enough for you to say, here at home.” He swept his gaze over Findhorn Castle, their birthplace and seat of Clan Mackintosh.
“So the adventurer tires of his lifestyle, eh?”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“What was it ye said last spring when the MacBains proposed a match for ye?”
Saint Columba, not this again.
“‘I’m no’ one for settling down’ is what ye said. ‘I prefer travel, adventure.’”
Conall rolled his eyes at Iain’s perfect but painful imitation of him.
“Well then, brother, here’s the adventure of a lifetime.”
Jupiter’s deep bark echoed behind them off the stone battlement where they stood overlooking Find-horn’s bailey.
“See?” Iain said. “Even your mangy partner agrees with me.”
Conall glared at the mastiff. “Traitor.”
“Och, come now.” Iain mustered what Conall knew was his most serious expression.
Here it comes. He waited for the inevitable lecture.
“Ye are third son and, as such, ye’ve been left with damned little to make a start of your own. Ye’ll always have a place here with us at Findhorn or at Monadhliath with Gilchrist, but—”
“A lifetime of domestic boredom doesna suit me? Aye, well, that’s the God’s truth.”
“That’s no’ what—” Iain closed his eyes and exhaled. Conall watched, amused, as his brother silently counted to ten.
“Hmm? You were saying?”
“I was saying, ye’ve traveled the bluidy world. Can ye no’ tarry long enough to do this one thing for us?” Iain clapped a hand on his shoulder in that annoyingly paternal way Conall hated. “For the Chattan?”
The Chattan. The five. Mackintosh, Davidson, Macgillivray and the rest. Five Highland clans aligned in peace. Well, most of the time. It had been their father’s dream, God rest his soul.
Iain had seen it through, forged the bond some ten years ago, with Gilchrist’s help. Conall had been a reckless youth at the time, more concerned with horses and women than with politics. In fact, he preferred them still.
“We need the trade,” Iain said. “Three hard winters in a row—we canna abide a fourth. Last year many died.”
Conall shrugged out of his brother’s grasp and stepped to the edge of the battlement. Jupiter nudged his hand. “Good boy,” he whispered, and patted the mastiff’s enormous head.
The bailey was alive with the shouts and laughter of their kinsmen: stable lads, fletchers, farriers, women with baskets scurrying between the timber cottages hugging the curtain wall.
“Will ye do it, Conall?” Iain asked. “If no’ for the Chattan, then for Gilchrist and for me?”
God knows, he’d done damned little for family or clan these last years. He wasn’t like his brothers, content to stay in one place with one woman. The wanderlust was in his blood. ’Twas part of him, the best part.
Perhaps he was being selfish. On the other hand, ’twas just like Iain to draw him into exactly the kind of life he didn’t want to live, one small task at a time.
“O’ course he’ll do it! He’s a good lad.”
Conall bit off a curse and turned toward the familiar voice.
“Rob,” Iain said. “Convince my brother here to pay Alwin Dunbar a wee visit.”
“Dunbar of Loch Drurie?” Rob cocked a tawny brow and fisted chubby hands on hips.
Conall crushed his conscience long enough to fight the smile tugging at the edge of his mouth. His short, balding friend Rob oft reminded him of the rotund gnomes of boyhood tales.
“Aye,” Iain said. “The same.”
“’Tis a fair piece o’ land he holds, The Dunbar,” Rob said.
Iain nodded. “Aye, and well situated for our purpose. We shall trade game and furs for grain.”
“And a bit o’ drink if we’re lucky, eh?” Rob winked, his blue eyes flashing mirth.
“’Tis a good plan,” Conall said warily. “I’ll admit that. But how do you know Dunbar will agree?”
Iain shrugged. “I don’t. ’Tis your job to convince him.”
Conall snorted. The only convincing he’d done lately had resulted in a thrashing from a village lass’s father.
“Och, come on,” Rob said. “Ye know ye love a challenge.”
Iain crossed his arms over his chest. “So he says.”
They had him on that, and they both knew it, damn them. “Whoresons,” he muttered.
Rob grinned. “I told ye he’d do it.”
Iain grunted satisfaction.
“I’ll not miss that hunt with Grant, mind you.” His words fell on deaf ears.
“’Twill be good for him to shoulder a bit o’ responsibility on behalf of the Chattan, eh?” Rob said.
Responsibility. Even the word made him itch. His coarse woolen shirt suddenly felt too tight about the neck.
His brothers’ responsibilities over the years had grown tenfold, their successes spawning only more work, not less, and staggering obligations. The years of hardship and struggle, a thousand forgone pleasures. And for what? He shuddered to think of what he would have missed of the world had he succumbed at an early age and followed in their footsteps.
Nay, ’twas not for him.
“There’s a fair reward for the service,” Iain said. He studied his fingernails in a way that made Conall instantly suspicious. “I nearly forgot to mention it.”
“What reward?”
“Oh, no’ much,” Iain said, not looking at him. “Some land, a bit o’ cattle—” he paused and met Conall’s gaze “—a bride, mayhap.”
“What the—”
“Only if ye wish it,” Iain said quickly. “She’s a bonny lass, the youngest daughter of one o’ the Chat-tan lairds.”
Conall shot toward him. “Bloody matchmaker. I’ll have none of it, d’ye hear?”
Rob—who was supposed to be his friend, the blackguard—dissolved into laughter.
“Suit yourself.” Iain shrugged. “’Twas just a thought. About the bride, I mean.”
“Aye, and by the new year you’d have me bound to some simpering virgin. A bairn on the way by Easter.”
“Och, surely sooner than that, eh?” Rob winked, and Conall shot him a murderous glance.
“All right,” Iain said. “Forget the lass, but ye’d be damned stupid to refuse the land and the cattle. ’Tis meant as a reward, no’ a millstone around your neck.”
“Hmph.” His gaze was drawn again to the bailey, where a group of children played in sight of their young mothers. He felt overwarm and sweaty, and pulled at the leather ties of his shirt. “I dunno.”
Jupiter let out a small whimper and licked his hand.
“Och, hang the reward,” Rob said. “We’ll do it for the fun, for the challenge, won’t we, Conall laddie?”
“We?” Conall looked his short friend up and down. “So you think to come with me?”
“O’ course. Why wouldn’t I?” Rob grinned. “Someone’s got to keep ye out o’ trouble.”
“Take Dougal and Harry with ye as well,” Iain said. “They’re good scouts and in need of a change.” Iain slapped him on the back.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Iain’s grin of satisfaction and Rob’s dancing eyes. “The two of you are thick as thieves. Did I ever have a choice?”
Jupiter barked and wagged his monstrous tail.
“And you.” He swatted the dog’s rump. “I suppose you were in on it, too?”
The mastiff cocked his head, looking up at him with huge liquid eyes. Iain and Rob grinned.
“Boats,” he muttered. “Docks and boats.” Already his stomach grew queasy.
“Mairi Dunbar!”
She froze at the rich, familiar timbre of Geoffrey Symon’s voice. The ax she wielded hung in midair, poised over the felled larch.
“What in God’s name are ye doing?” Geoffrey bellowed from behind her.
Dora looked up from her work gathering kindling, and rolled her eyes. Mairi glared at her, then dropped the ax and quickly wiped the perspiration from her face.
“’Tis his second visit in as many weeks,” Dora hissed, and shot her one of those I-told-ye-so looks Mairi hated.
Mairi ignored her, squared her shoulders and turned to greet their visitor. “Geoffrey, what a surprise.”
He was alone, which was unusual, and dressed in some of the finest garments she’d e’er seen him wear. Hmm, even more unusual. His plaid was newly woven, laced with rich colors—nothing like the common hunting plaids most everyone wore.
Atop his dappled gelding he sat tall, chin high, more like a prince than the lesser chieftain he was. His jet hair was tied back, as always, with a leather thong, accentuating his fair features and crystalline blue eyes.
She would think him handsome if she had a mind to notice such things, but she did not. Geoffrey was just like her father. She mustn’t forget that, not ever.
He slid easily from the horse’s saddle and smiled at her—a bold, disarming smile that made her blush involuntarily. Of all the stupid responses.
She fisted handfuls of her gown, soiled from a morning of hard labor, and boldly returned his gaze. “What brings ye to Loch Drurie again so soon, Geoffrey?”
“Ye know why…Mairi.”
The way her name rolled off his lips caused a small shiver to course through her. She wasn’t certain if she liked it or not.
Dora snorted behind her. Mairi glanced back in time to see the older woman pick up the ax and hack at the felled tree with renewed vigor. Dora shot them both a disgusted look.
Geoffrey laughed. “Your friend doesna like me much.”
Dora hated him, in fact.
“No matter,” Geoffrey said. “She’ll come ‘round, as will ye, Mairi Dunbar.”
“Geoffrey, I told ye I—”
“Hush.” He crossed the tiny clearing and put a finger to her lips.
She drew back, bristling. No one told her to be quiet. No one. “I’ve work to do, so state your business.”
He laughed again. “Ah, that spirit o’ yours is as fiery as your red head. ’Twill get ye into trouble yet.”
A smart retort burned on her lips, but she clenched her teeth against it.
Geoffrey’s expression sobered. “Mairi, I would speak to ye alone.” His eyes darted behind her to Dora, who, from the sound of it, was hacking the larch to splinters.
The chopping abruptly stopped.
“Dora is clan,” Mairi said. “There is naught fit for my ears that she may no’ hear.” She arched a brow, her terms set.
The edge of Geoffrey’s mouth twitched. He studied her for a moment, then said, “All right, then. Ye know of what I wish to speak.”
Mairi’s pulse quickened. The chopping recommenced. She knew all too well why Geoffrey was here. “My father’s debt.”
“Aye.”
“Well, what of it? I told ye I’d pay by the new year. ’Tis two months away yet.”
Geoffrey grasped her hand, and she tensed. “Why d’ye fight me, lass? It doesna have to be this way.”
“I dinna know what ye mean,” she lied, and pulled her hand away.
“This.” He pointed past her to the tiny, ramshackle village lining the shore of the loch. “And this.” He lifted the skirt of her filthy gown.
Dora grunted with another stroke of the ax.
“Women shouldna be forced to such labor,” he said. “If ye were my wife, Mairi, ’twould no’ be so.”
“Wife?” The word made her cringe.
“Aye. I’m willing to forgive the debt.” He paused. “And what’s passed between us.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, a derisive sound escaping her throat. Perhaps he was willing, but she was not.
“Come now, ye know ’tis the best thing for ye and what’s left of your clan. Just look at the place.”
She did look, and hardened her heart against what she saw. Rickety timber cottages, leaky boats, docks mildewed and rotting. Her father had done this to them, the negligent clod. She bristled at the memory of his sloth and gambling.
Her gaze lit on two women scrubbing dirty clothes on a rock at the water’s edge. Children played in the mud with makeshift toys. Most of the men were dead or gone, all but the old and infirm. Driven out by her father’s oppression, or their own disgust.
“Ye canna survive another winter like the last,” Geoffrey said. “Women and children, alone, with but a handful of ragtag clansmen to protect and provide for ye.”
Mairi clenched her teeth. He was right, but she’d never admit it. She’d find a way to pay the debt and get them through the winter without starving. She had to.
“We’re doing just…fine,” she stammered, and nodded once for emphasis, more to convince herself than him.
Geoffrey mouthed a silent curse and kicked at a pile of wood shavings near his feet. “Ye’ll be paying me a visit afore the winter’s e’en here. Methinks ye’ll change your mind. Ye need me, Mairi, admit it.” She tipped her chin at him, and he grabbed her wrist. “Mark me, Mairi Dunbar. I’d have ye willing, but I’ll have ye—one way or another.”
“Presumptuous lout!” She jerked her hand away and shot him a murderous look. “Think ye to control me, as did my father? Think again.”
He had the nerve to smile at her.
“Get off my land! And dinna return till ’tis time to collect your payment.”
Geoffrey shook his head, and his expression softened. “I love ye, lass, don’t ye know that?”
“Aye, ye love my land. Now go!”
He looked her up and down as if he were appraising a sheep. Another smile curved at the edge of his mouth and his eyes danced like bright blue flames.
Her blood boiled.
He mounted the dappled gelding and raised a hand in farewell. “And when I break ye of that wild spirit and no’-so-comely boldness, ye’ll make a fine, obedient wife.”
“Obedient wife?” Mairi repeated, and fisted her hands on her hips.
Dora dropped the ax and stepped to her side, breathing hard, her face sheened with sweat. “Aye,” she wheezed. “When pigs fly.”
Jupiter bounded ahead along the well-worn forest path, making occasional detours into the brush to ferret out hares and other small game.
“Does the beast never tire?” Dougal asked.
Conall grinned. “He’ll be plenty tired tonight.”
“Aye,” Rob said. “Mind, Dougal, he doesna curl up in your plaid with ye.”
Dougal smirked at them.
“Dinna laugh,” Conall said. “He’s kept me from freezing on many a winter’s night in the rough.”
Harry urged his mount even with Conall’s and leaned in close to whisper. “Dougal’s afraid of him, is all.”
“Who, Jupiter?” This surprised him.
“Aye, and who wouldna be?” Harry’s gaze followed the mastiff as he burst from a tangle of gorse and spooked Dougal’s mount. “Look at the size of him. What does he weigh, ye reckon, ten or twelve stone?”
“Fifteen,” Conall said.
“The devil, you say! That’s more than a man.” Harry lifted a brow in appreciation.
“More than most. I’m heavier, but not by much.”
Rob spurred his white gelding up beside them. “Aye, but ye’re no’ a man, Conall laddie, ye’re a giant.”
“Nay,” Conall said. “’Tis just that you’re a dwarf.”
Rob tipped his bearded chin high. “No’ where it counts.”
The three of them melted into laughter. Indeed, over the years Rob had proved quite the ladies’ man in spite of his diminutive size.
“What are ye yappin’ about back there?” Dougal called over his shoulder.
“The usual topics,” Harry said. “Dogs and women.”
“Aye, ye can hang the one,” Rob said, “but I’ll take some o’ the other.”
Harry and Dougal snorted in unison.
Conall was pleased Iain had suggested he take the lads along. They were young and eager, two of the Chattan’s finest scouts. Dougal was a Mackintosh, and Harry a Davidson, but the two clans had lived amongst each other for so long it hardly mattered. The two youths were close as blood kin.
They rode for a time in silence, snaking their way south through the Highland wood. The day was warm for so late in the year, and Conall was glad he’d worn a sleeveless tunic instead of the woolen shirt Iain’s old housemaid had bade him don for the journey.
Their mounts kicked up a firestorm of brightly colored leaves as they cantered along the path. Gold and green and cinnabar—autumn’s palette. The sky changed as morning gave way to afternoon, startling blue against the thick canopy of larch, laurel and the occasional pine. After a time the trees thinned, and they came upon a crossroad leading west. Conall reined his black stallion to a halt.
“Monadhliath lies that way,” Rob said.
Conall nodded and let his gaze drift along the path. Monadhliath Castle, seat of Clan Davidson, his mother’s people. His brother Gilchrist was laird there now—had been these five years past.
“Shall we pay them a visit?” Rob asked. “’Tis but a day’s ride out of our way.”
It had been nearly a year since Conall had seen Gilchrist and his wife. Too long. They’d had another child, so Iain had told him. All the same…
“Nay,” he said, and urged the black onward. “We’d best keep moving. ’Twill be nearly dark by the time we reach Loch Drurie.”
Rob shrugged. “Suit yourself. I just thought—”
Not waiting for Rob to finish, Conall spurred the black into a gallop, outdistancing the rest of their party. He was more than ready for something new, something dangerous, perhaps, and exciting. There’d be plenty of time for family and domestic obligations later.
Much later.
Two hours hence they broke out of the trees onto a rocky ridge. Loch Drurie lay below them, stretched out like a lazy cat warming itself in the afternoon sun. The placid water glimmered a deep, mysterious blue—the color of a woman’s eyes. Not any woman Conall had ever seen, but it reminded him of one all the same.
Rob drew up beside him and nodded to the loch below. “’Tis no’ so big.”
“That’s only the tip of it. The rest is around that bend there.” Conall pointed to what appeared to be the far end of the loch.
“Oh,” Rob said, clearly disappointed. “Well, then, we’d best get down there, eh?”
They rode on as the sun dipped low in the sky, transforming the loch’s surface into a golden looking-glass. He’d seen one once in France, in a lady’s bedchamber. The lady he could not recall, but the glass, now that was something special.
“Ah, here it is,” Dougal said, wresting Conall from his thoughts.
“Aye, I see it now,” Harry added.
Conall peered ahead through the trees, narrowing his eyes as if that would allow him to see better. He turned to Rob and arched a brow in question.
Rob shook his head. “I canna see a bluidy thing.”
Conall laughed. “Aye, that’s precisely why Harry and Dougal are the scouts.”
They stepped up their pace and followed the two younger men, who seemed to know exactly where they were going. The trees thinned, and then he saw it.
“Saint Columba, will ye look at that!” Dougal said.
Rob let out a long, low whistle.
“This is it?” Harry looked to Conall for confirmation.
Conall shrugged and let his gaze drift over the ramshackle grouping of timber cottages and sheds, rotting docks, and twisted, sunken piers. A good-size fortified house stood on the hill above them. It had seen better days and looked all but abandoned.
Few people were about—women and children mostly, and a few old men. Jupiter barked and bounded ahead, kicking up clods of mud and rocks along the water’s edge. When the villagers caught sight of the huge dog and Conall’s party of mounted warriors, they fled to the safety of their cottages.
“Where are all the men?” Rob asked.
“I know not,” Conall said. “But ’tis clear something’s amiss. We’ll dismount here. I dinna wish to frighten them.” He slipped from the black’s saddle and his men followed suit. They tethered their horses at the edge of the wood and waited for further instruction.
“Rob, come with me,” he said. “Dougal, Harry, wait here with the men. I’ll call if I’ve need of you.”
The two scouts nodded.
Conall and Rob approached the village on foot. Sets of eyes peered out at them from windows draped in tattered furs and bits of dingy plaid. Children’s squeals and women’s hushed censures drifted from behind tight-shut cottage doors.
“Charming place, eh?” Rob whispered.
Conall cast him a cool look.
A branch snapped up the hill to their left, and they whirled toward the sound. Conall’s hand flew to the hilt of his dirk, Rob’s to his bow.
An old man stood in the open doorway of the fortified house, a bucket in each hand. His brows shot up when he saw them. “Ho, visitors!”
“I am Conall Mackintosh,” he called up the hill to the man. “I have business with your laird.”
The old man set the buckets on the ground. “Ye do?”
“Aye, we do,” Rob said.
They climbed the short, steep hill to the run-down house. Conall nodded to the old man. “This is Alwin Dunbar’s clan?”
“Aye, what’s left of it.”
“Is the laird about?”
“Oh, aye, he’s here all right.” The old man looked him over. “Conall Mackintosh, ye say—of the Chat-tan?”
“Ye know us, then,” Rob said.
“I’ve heard o’ the alliance. ’Tis a good thing, methinks.” The old man continued to scrutinize Conall, who quickly grew impatient with the chitchat.
“Where’s your laird?” he demanded.
“Oh, Alwin? Over there.” The old man nodded to a small, overgrown garden at the far end of the house.
Conall made for it, and Rob followed. The so-called garden was a tangled mass of weeds and dead summer flowers. No one was there. No one alive, at any rate. A pile of stones covering what looked to be a shallow grave dominated the center of the weedy enclosure.
“Where is he?” Conall asked.
The old man appeared behind him, buckets in hand. “Who, Alwin?”
Conall’s patience was at an end. “Nay, the bloody King of England.”
“Testy, ain’t ye?” the man said to Rob.
Conall had had enough. He reached out and grabbed the old man by his shirt.
“Ho, wait—he’s there!” Conall instantly released him. The old man set the buckets down and pointed to the grave. “Alwin Sedgewick Dunbar, laird.”
“What?” Conall snapped. “You mean he’s dead?”
“Oh, aye, nearly a month now.” The old man matter-of-factly dumped the contents of the buckets at the foot of the grave. Ear-shattering squeals pierced the air as two sows raced from the back of the house and devoured the stinking pile.
“God’s blood.” Conall wrinkled his nose in disgust as he sidestepped the pigs. “Who the devil is in charge then?”
“Oh, down there.” The old man nodded toward the loch below.
Conall turned and immediately stopped breathing. His eyes widened as they followed the length of a narrow pier he’d missed earlier. The floating timbers began at the far end of the village and extended a hundred feet or so out into the loch. A radial raft of logs floated tethered to its endpoint, topped by the strangest-looking house he’d e’er seen.
“What do you make of that?” he asked. “’Tis…round.”
“Aye, ’tis a crannog,” Rob said. “A lake house. Did ye no’ see them in Ireland?”
Conall shook his head.
“Oh, they make fine lodgings—if ye like the water.”
Conall smirked at him.
“Well, we’d best get out there and see the man in charge.”
“What, you mean…out there?” Conall stared at the rickety pier.
“Ye wish to cull the deal, do ye no’?” Rob didn’t wait for an answer. He grabbed Conall’s arm and pulled him down the hill. “Come on, it should be fair easy, given the state o’ this place. I expect they’d take any offer ye make them.”
“If ’tis dealing ye’ve come to do, have a care,” the old man called after them.
Conall wondered what the elder meant by that, but had no time to think. His stomach was already churning at the thought of merely negotiating that pier, let alone the deal.
As they passed through the village, Rob tugged on his arm and let out a low whistle. Conall followed his friend’s gaze to an open cottage window where two blushing maidens leaned on the sill, gawking at them. Conall glared back and they giggled.
“Cloying virgins,” he muttered under his breath.
“Ye dinna fancy them?” Rob asked as he steered Conall toward the pier.
“Nay, I prefer women of substance.”
Jupiter’s high-pitched yelp cut the air. Conall froze.
“What, ye mean like that?” Rob pointed to the lake house at the end of the pier.
Jupiter stumbled on the rickety timbers in a tug of war over what appeared to be a ham. His rival for the savory loin was—Why, ’twas a woman! A barefoot woman with wild red hair and skirts rucked up to her knees.
Jesu, he breathed, and took in the fine curve of her calf silhouetted against the setting sun.
Her hair was a brilliant fusion of cinnabar and sunlight, whipping in the wind off the loch. The huge mastiff cowered as she thumped him squarely on the nose, but he did not release the meat. Conall grinned.
“He’ll take her hand off!” Rob cried, and pushed him toward the pier.
Conall’s grin widened, his gaze fixed on the woman. “If he wanted to, he’d have already done it.”
Conall stepped out onto the pier—“Whoa…w-wait”—and instantly tried to step back again as the unanchored timbers rolled under his weight. Rob moved behind him, a short but solid wall barring his retreat.
“Is this your dog?” the woman shouted at them.
“A-aye, he’s mine,” Conall called back.
“Well, come and get him!” She thumped Jupiter again with the flat of her hand. Jupiter let out a low whine, but did not let go the meat.
Conall drew a breath, fixed his gaze on them and put one foot in front of the other. “Bloody hell.” The pier rocked, but not so violently he couldn’t maintain his balance.
“Come on, come on.” Rob prodded him in the back.
Halfway there. Keep moving. The water was all around them now, and Conall’s stomach tightened.
“Hurry it up,” Rob said.
“Aye, before I decide to butcher the dog instead o’ the ham!” the woman shouted.
Just a…few…more…steps. Conall grabbed the mastiff by his thick leather collar. “Jupiter, drop it!”
The dog obeyed instantly, releasing the ham.
“He’s ruint it!” the woman cried. “Ye’ll pay me for this in kind, d’ye hear?”
Conall stared at her, transfixed. Her face was flushed from her struggle with the dog, and her eyes flashed anger. Blue eyes, deep as the still waters of Loch Drurie.
“Well, are ye dumb? What say ye, will ye pay or no’?”
She was tall for a woman, much taller than Rob, but she still had to tilt her chin upward to look Conall in the eye. He fought to keep his gaze from drifting to her breasts, then smiled at her. She glared back at him, her eyes jeweled daggers.
“Who’s in charge here?” he finally had the presence of mind to ask, ignoring her question.
“I am.” She redoubled her grip on the ham and tipped her chin higher.
“I see. Hmm…”
He liked her. She was bold. His gaze was drawn to her mouth and he found himself wondering if her lips were soft, if she’d taste of honey and wine.
“I’ll have my payment now,” she quipped, and arched a delicate, fiery brow.
Conall ignored her demand. “Where is your husband, madam?”
“Husband, indeed. I have none. Now, my payment if ye please.”
“Payment?” What payment? “Oh, aye, for the ham.” On impulse he grabbed her and kissed her hard on the mouth. Rob wasn’t the only one who had a way with women. Mmm, her lips were indeed soft and her breath sweet. “There, paid in full.” He released her, and she staggered backward on the pier.
For a moment she seemed dazed, then recovered herself. Her eyes blazed murder. “Of all the—”
“Watch out!” Rob cried.
She swung the ham and it caught Conall full in the gut, knocking the breath from him. He grunted, his arms closing over the smoked loin as the force of the blow knocked him clear off his feet.
The next thing he knew he was in the water, flapping arms and legs madly in an attempt to stay afloat. He went under and came up choking. The woman stood at the edge of the pier, hands on hips, smirking at him. Impudent wench!
Jupiter barked frantically and ran back and forth along the rickety timbers. Conall couldn’t tell if the dog was alarmed over his master’s plight or merely upset at the loss of the ham, which had sunk like a rock.
He slipped under a second time, paddling furiously to no avail. His eyes widened in panic.
“What’s wrong with him?” The woman’s smirk melted quickly into a frown.
Rob shook his head. “He canna swim.”
