Ravished By The Iron Highlander (Steamy Scottish Historical Romance) Read online

  “Why?” Isabella asked again. “Why would she try to poison Ewan, why…why would she do all those things? And my aunt. Why would she try to kill her? All my aunt had ever done to her is to take her in and give her a life away from poverty. She told me herself that when she was orphaned, my aunt took her in. Why repay such kindness with cruelty?”

  Stroking her head, he breathed deeply. “We’ll ken it all when she gets here.”

  Her face twisted and a soft kiss was dropped on his clavicle. “I hope so. I hope your mother recovers so I can accept her apology with one of mine.”

  * * *

  Two days in, no word had come from the soldiers about Agnes. His scouts had come back empty-handed and winter was too cold and bitter to send a messenger bird out. Thick snow was constant and the poor bird might become a ball of ice halfway through the journey. The loch had frozen to a stream of ice and the mountain tops were clothed in blue mist.

  His mother was in and out with stages of consciousness and sleep and Isabella was always at her side. At night, when he had pulled her—reluctantly—away from his mother’s side, she had admitted that she had been foolish in not accepting Lady Elsbeth’s apology and that she would live with regret if the lady passed and she had not been given the chance to speak to her.

  Miss Dellendine had recovered from the tainted soup to ingest the bitter knowledge that it was Agnes who had done all those things to her. She had admitted the only reason she had made it through, was that she had taken two mouthfuls and had felt her stomach revolted. The poison had already sunk into her empty stomach.

  “It’s just the grace of God, Isabella,” her aunt said while being carried back to her room.

  They had refrained from making love but he made sure to hold her at night. Isabella was not herself and he was not sure what it would take to get her back to the woman he knew and loved. On the third morning, he woke up alone.

  Last night had been hard, a blizzard had rolled in and he and his men had rushed to get the most vulnerable of his people from impending death to his great hall. The blizzard was swirling sheets of white, and he had barely seen more than five feet ahead of him but he had pushed through and led almost fifty people into the castle.

  Isabella had met him with a blanket, a warm bath and broth and herself in his bed beside him. Now, she was gone and he wondered why. He stood and rubbed his eyes. Rolling his neck, he felt some of the tension for the past few days slither away.

  Quickly, he washed and donned a thick shirt with his plaid and then left the room. He entered the great hall where his eyes immediately landed on Isabella. The tables had been pushed to the side to let the people spread out mats and sleep. She was weaving through the clusters with cups and trenchers of bread and cheese, and his heart seemed to swell two sizes.

  He went inside and greeted those who he met on the way. Isabella looked up and for the first time in a good while he saw a glimmer of happiness in her eyes. Her spark was back, she was serving his people and they were responding to her with kindness and gratitude.

  As he neared, he heard her speaking and her thick English accent did not seem to bother anyone. He waited until she handed a cup of milk to a boy and ruffled his hair before he took the tray from her hand, spun her around and kissed her—a soft, loving kiss that had the whole hall go silent.

  * * *

  Her heart pitter-pattered as he pulled away with his love bright in his eyes and while her cheeks began to flame, she held her head up high. Duncan held her tight to his side. “Most of ye ken that I love Miss Isabella but what ye dinnea ken is she has agreed to marry me.”

  The announcement was met with another hush and the faces all around were stunned. She felt the need to bolt, but Duncan’s arm held her fast.

  He added, “Aye, I ken many of ye are shocked, some might nay be, but most of ye were hoping for this moment. I’m finally happy.”

  Isabella was sure of Duncan’s love and every time she looked at him, the ember of love that had embedded itself in her breastbone, flared to life. His bold confession had made the flare a tempered bonfire, spreading through every limb.

  “Erm, Duncan…” she hissed through the side of her mouth while tugging him to the side, “what are you doing?”

  “What I should’ve done the moment I kent I loved ye,” he said, then gave her the lopsided grin she loved. “They are all going to ken anyway. Why? Did I do something wrong? Did I upset ye?”

  “No, no,” she shook her head. “I was just…taken aback, that’s all, but I am happy.” She licked her lips and aimed a soft whack to his arm. “Just warn me next time.”

  He dropped a kiss on her head. “I promise.”

  * * *

  The last day of Yuletide ended with a deceptive calmness and in the privacy of his room, Duncan was making love to her. Laying on a thick fur rug beside the roaring fire, they joined slowly, murmuring sweet nothings to each other. She ran her hands gently over his battle-honed body, every inch of his toned limbs precious to her.

  His slow thrusts were deep and ignited all the passion she had inside her. When his mouth left hers, he spoke Gaelic in her ear, the soft serrations lighting more fire to her blood. The man’s sensuality was as sharp and skillful as his sword.

  His kisses raining down her neck, the soft suckles on the collar bone, the hardness of him inside her and the slick slide of his skin on hers had her peaking. When Duncan pulled away, she uttered a cry of loss but his kisses peppered her neck.

  Her breast was still heaving when he pulled her into his arm and she rested her head on his chest. “I know why you pull away,” she said, tracing his flat nipple with the point of her finger. “But one day…I want to have your child.”

  The touch of his calloused fingers on the sensitive skin on the back of her neck had her shuddering. “One day, love but ye’re young. I want ye to enjoy at least two more years before ye even ken of having a bairn.”

  She elbowed him, “And yer thirty, you’d be fifty by the time our son or daughter would be my age.”

  “Our daughter eh,” Duncan grinned. “With our combined strength, she will be a force to reckon with.”

  Craning her head up to him, she inquired, “What would you want first, a son or a daughter?”

  “Doesnae matter,” he replied with a nip to her ear. “He or she would come from ye and that’s all I would care about.”

  His fingers tapped the pendant on her chest. “Why do ye wear this?”

  She touched it. “It was a birth gift my mother gave me. It is a reminder for me to act like the virtuous woman I’m named after, Isabella of Portugal. She was born a princess but was humble and served her people with love and sacrifice.”

  A kiss was dropped on her forehead, “Ye’re already following in her footsteps, love.”

  She drifted off to sleep to the comforting sound of his steady heartbeat against her ear. She awoke from a peaceful rest to feel the cold rays of winter dawn coming through the window. Duncan was still asleep and she admired the cut of his jaw and the dark hair curling around his nape.

  As satisfying as the sexual release was, she felt more filled with the love he had shown her, the once empty void of her heart that cried out to be filled in was bursting at the seams. God’s truth, she loved him.

  There were tiny stress lines at the corner of his eyes and she knew where they were from. All search for Agnes had halted. The winter was too hard, icy and relentless. It was nearly eighteen days since Agnes had run, the mountain passes were almost impossible to go through and the plains were heavy with snow. After days of searching, the soldiers had reported their belief that the woman had either made it to safe harbor or she was dead in the forest somewhere.

  His mother had slipped into a deep comatose state but was still alive and she felt the pain of his loss. She felt it too as she deeply regretted not having accepted the woman’s apology at the time.

  Sliding her hands up his chest, she felt him groan. His eyes slit open and his gaze was humored. “Din
nea ye get enough of me last night?”

  “I did, but—”

  A loud horn blazed through the air and Duncan was up like a shot. He grabbed his clothes, and put them on with fury as the horn came again. She was up too and grabbed her discarded trews with a fearful cry. “Duncan, what is happening?”

  29

  “Attack, lass,” he shouted grabbing for his sword. “We’re under attack. Stay here.”

  “No!” Isabella shot back. “I’m going with you.”

  “Isabella, stop!”

  She had run to the door but Duncan got there ahead of her. His eyes were hard and demanding, “Stay here, do nay disobey me! Use your daggers and my second sword under the bed if ye need to but daenae come out! And latch the door behind me!”

  Then he was gone, shoving the door behind him and she felt as if he had slapped her across her face. The horn came again and she heard the cry of men. Rushing to the window, a window that faced the sheer drop of the cliff, she felt her heart begin to pound. Men, cloaked with the red tunic of—bloody hell, Lord Lofter—were coming in from all sides.

  Good God! What is this!

  Duncan’s men spewed out, with a deafening roar, with the man she loved at the head of the charge. She spotted Ewan and Fergus both flanking the man. His war cry was deep as he slashed his way through the press of the English men. Her heart was in her throat when she saw the slash of a blade, inches away from his throat that nearly killed him.

  “No!” she cried out, grabbing at the window in fear.

  He drew up his sword to counter a blow while Fergus knocked the sword of another red coat away with his own, then brought his blade down to finish the man.

  She slapped her hand over her mouth when Grant was run through and collapsed in a heap. A sword nearly cleaved Duncan’s head in two, missing by a hairsbreadth when he jerked away. He raised his sword and his weapon met the man’s in midair, the sound of metal against metal echoing in the dawn.

  Her heart nearly failed her and she grabbed at the window sill for support. She wanted to think this was a dream, a horrible night terror that she would wake up from. The cold air from the window proved her wrong.

  That was when she saw the plumes of black smoke streaming up the air from the direction of the town. Lofter’s men were animals, they did not leave anything alive. Her knees buckled as images of dead bodies, burnt homes, ravaged fields, and dead animals, danced before her eyes. She had brought devastation to this home.

  With pain cramping her stomach, she grabbed at the window again when she saw men coming over the cliffside. They had probably come by the sea in a galley and through the forest onwith horses. The whole castle was surrounded and the village was probably in ruins.

  But how! How had the man found her? And if his men were here, the chances were that her brother was there too. There was no question, she had to get into this fight!

  Pinning her hair uptight, she slid her daggers into her boots and slid through the window. Holding on to the ledge, she shimmed along the stone ledge. She spotted the hulking black hull of the bailey and the truth slapped her like a mallet.

  Agnes! Agnes had burned the bailey to hobble Duncan’s men then had fled to England to her brother. Making sure to try and kill Lady Elsbeth, her aunt, and her along the way. She had been planning this all along. But why!

  Cautiously, she jumped to another ledge and hid behind a column. The sounds of battle drew her eyes across the land, the sheer drop of the cliff’s edge. Looking down, she spotted ledges that were on the second story and the ground. She gritted her teeth and after a quick timing, dropped herself over the edges.

  Repeating the same process with the two ledges beneath her, she dropped to the ground and hunkered down. Crouching there, she spotted the blade of a fallen soldier, crawled to it, pried his hand from the hilt and grabbed it. It was a tapered English blade; one she was luckily familiar with and sprang up, rushing into the fray.

  Red coats rushed toward her and she struck out with deadly precision, catching the first soldier in the chest. The man fell to the ground, as blood bloomed. Quickly, she had slashed his leg, then across his throat and ran into the thick of the fray.

  The mercenary was lifting his sword to strike but she ducked and stabbed the man in the leg with her dagger. She jammed the hilt of her sword up into his chin and he swooned. Scanning the melee, she fought her way to her brother, determined to get to him.

  While fending off her attackers and dispatching them off to the realm of the dead, she got a glimpse of Duncan holding off three men at a time without a flicker of hesitation. He swung his sword low, slashed at one and pushed him off, hit another in the back and cut the legs of another from under him.

  A man came charging at her but she bowed at the waist to shoulder him in the gut, flinging him over her back and then run her blade through him. She was near her brother now but her worst nightmare was coming through when Duncan was backed up against the cliff’s edge, his blade flashing as another—Ralf—descended on him.

  Her vision split between the reality of his near-death and the horrifying dream she had after her accident on the horse. Three more feet and he would be tumbling off the edge, tumbling to his death into the rocky canyon below.

  “Ralf!” she screamed in pure, molten terror. “Stop! Stop!”

  He spun, his face red with exertion was now darkening with hate. Her blade was dripping on the grass when he came near her. “Sheathe your weapon, dear sister. It’s not going to help you, you little hellion.”

  She lifted it. “Let these people go, they have no quarrel with you.”

  He blinked and his head swiveled to the war around them. “Au contraire, sister, the moment you chose to run here, you put them in our quarrel and their blood and the blood of the Baron’s men will be resting on your hands. No one had to die if you had just submitted to my will and married the Baron. I will give you one choice, come with me and they live, or refuse and they will die.”

  She swallowed. “Leave, Ralf, I will never go with you.”

  He sighed, “Then, I have no choice. Remember, dear sister this is your fault,” He spun and, Duncan reacted by bringing his sword up, but did not plan for Ralf’s foot that rammed his side. He toppled over the cliff’s edge and she screamed.

  Everything inside her seemed to die and horrified, she flung herself to the cliff, frantic to see that he was not dead, when rough hands dragged her back. She stomped on the toe of who held her and flung herself at Ralf who grabbed her and with a laugh of glee, grasped her now-loose braid and yanked her head back with it. “Give it up, sister.”

  She fell to her knees wincing at the pain while devastation caged her chest in a prison of ice. He looped his hand in the braid and yanked her up, forcing her to walk into the castle. All around her, she spotted Duncan’s men being overpowered by Ralf’s men and as bodies fell and cries of the wounded clogged her ears, she was forced into the castle.

  Red-coated men were inside, hovering over the poor people in the great hall like giants from ancient times. He marched into the middle and forced her on her knees. “My good people, I must apologize to you before you die on behalf of this little hellion at my feet.” He yanked Isabella’s hair. “She had no reason to bring this upon you, if she had just listened to me. Sadly, your deaths are the price she will pay for her stubbornness.”

  On her knees, Isabella felt a cell of ice imprison her heart. What was to live for when the reason she was alive was dead in a rocky canyon. If she joined him, she would not mind. While Ralf was pontificating over her head, she said her prayers, then reached for the dagger in her boot.

  I’m sorry Duncan, I know you loved my hair…

  Ralf grabbed her hair again and when the hair was taut, she swung up and shirrrr, the braid was cut and she sprang up to lob a dagger at a mercenary near her, not even blinking when it embedded itself in his neck. She tackled Ralf to the ground and began to tussle with him.

  He cursed loudly while grabbing her throat with his
hand. “You little—”

  Someone yanked her off him and she scuttled back while trying to get to her feet. “Hold her,” Ralf ordered as he got to his feet and slapped her across her face. She tasted blood and her head spun while a gasp of disquiet came from the people near her. She bowed and forced her eyes to focus.

  He grabbed her short hair and yanked her head back, “I’m going to have a lovely time seeing Lofter tame you.”

  “How did you get here without a word of your march coming to us?” Isabella questioned. “Did you have a guide?”

  “Yes, we had one and we took the pleasure of killing anyone who dared run to this filthy place,” he looked down at her with disgust. “Father did you a disservice giving you all that freedom. Look at you, in a man’s clothes and wielding a sword. You’re an aberration, sister, and you need to know a woman’s place.”