Page 6 of Outlaw Ever After (Highland Handfasts #3)

Fok

. He yanked back and lifted his palms in surrender as he searched her face.

Starbursts erupted upon her heart-shaped cheeks. She wet her lips. She was tense like a deer sensing danger, staring at him with those coppery-brown pools as fear danced in their depths.

Just

as she’d done when he’d first approached her.

He paced a step away, then raked his fingers through his hair, ripping the knot free so that locks fell around his face.

She’d once been wronged. No lass reacted so to a man unless they’d been horribly crossed by one before.

He’d only meant to hold onto this thread woven between them a moment longer before she vanished like a mirage he’d never see again.

“Who’s the whoreson who hurt ye?” he rumbled, still facing away as he rested his hands at his hips and looked up to the heavens seeking patience.

Fury took root. He’d never harmed a hair on a lass. He knew the helplessness that lapped like the devil’s tongue at being grabbed, restrained

, as one’s world burned down around them, and Christ but he could normally keep a partition between that darkness and the reality he lived in now.

She said softly, “I’m sorry I panicked. I’ve always been, eh, shy—”

“Who is he?”

He turned around to look at her.

She shook her head but wouldn’t return his gaze. “We’ve been reaved so many times… S-sometimes,” she wetted her lips again and furrowed her brow, “they were nay always…gentle…”

“Fok, if ye tell me ye’ve been—” Violated

, he wasn’t sure he could contain that fury. What kind of blackguard assailed a lady so?

Silence. Confirming his worst suspicion.

His jaw still pumped. He scoured it and stretched his neck. “Who was he?” he breathed so softly, he was surprised his voice carried, but at the gray fury on his face, she forced a smile, nodding.

“I’m fine, now, I am. ’Twas long ago.” She hurried to placate him, and he nearly laughed, because she had every right to be furious with him for offending her so.

He offered his hand down to her, unable to look her in the eye, and waited. Letting her decide whether or not to come to him

. The seconds crept by like years, as his hand hung in the air like an unfinished roof beam. Was she going to leave him unfulfilled? Standing here like an empty-handed eejit—

Wary fingers slipped into his. Energy buzzed up his arm at the gentle touch. Instinctively, his hand wrapped hers in a steady embrace as he helped her rise.

Relief at her moment of trust flooded him.

“I’m sorry to be so skittish,” she breathed.

She had every right to be skittish.

“Nay apologize,” he gruffed, too ashamed to look at her. “I should nay have grabbed ye. I just didna want to lose ye.”

More silence. He felt that chestnut gaze on his profile, shimmering amber in the afternoon sun.

“It’s all right,” she whispered. “Ye can t-touch me.”

He finally looked at her. Such a remark felt like he’d just earned courtly honors. He brushed his thumb across her kissable lip.

“Have a care what ye vow, songbird,” he warned, letting his thumb drop.

He squatted, his shoulder brushing down her sage satin as he shifted her slippers forth. He shivered at the fragrant rosewater that wafted from her and filled his nose. Tanned lambskin, her dainty shoes were stitched with delicate patterns.

He took her foot, gently, as if shoeing a nervous filly.

Her breath hitched, bosom rose and fell, but carefully, she braced his shoulders— The burn of this lass’s tentative trust scalded

. Her bare toes peeked out from the hem of her skirt.

A breeze rustled, like encouraging whispers.

Had he ever truly looked at the artistry of a woman’s toes? His thumb brushed over them. Her hands gripped his shoulders tighter and his muscles jumped, radiating sparks down his arms. She was clearly well manicured, yet her soles were dirt-stained as if she loved to frolic barefoot in the sidh

beyond the veils.

He suddenly wanted to know everything about her. Her past, her future, her dreams and…aye, her fears, too, for she was guarded.

Silence swallowed them as he touched her so… intimately

. Like a husband helping his wife. Want pinched his chest for a life he couldn’t offer anyone.

Branded an outlaw whose very name incurred wrath, and stripped of all inheritance, ladies weren’t lining up at the altar for a lifelong commitment.

He offered a good time. Not a betrothal contract.

The void that remained hollow within him had always been filled with meaningless swives as if a moment’s pleasure might heal a wound, yet making it fester more instead.

In this lady’s presence, for the first time, jealousy that he didn’t have those things to offer took root. He had no way of enticing someone like her.

But ye have yer certificate.

And a new employ. Soon, he’d be carving out yet another

new life. It wouldn’t make him rich. But it would be so

rewarding to review Freuchie Castle’s charter and find a chink in its contract to exploit.

He picked up her lyre and stood, towering over her. Her fingers enclosed on his as she took the instrument while he brushed a tendril over her ear.

Again, sparks shot through him like a lightning strike.

They both froze.

Leave this lady to her life. She’s too good for ye.

Carefully, his fingertips brushed hers. How had a lady so fine earned these calluses?

She didn’t pull away. Didn’t

flinch. Those sparks burned his fingertips and he indulged in the heat.

“I must go. I promised my sister I’d visit and…” She bit her lip.

He arched a brow. “And?”

Her gaze darted askance and her brow twisted with dislike. Now she did pull away. “And I have to meet a suitor.”

A twist wrung in his chest. Flashes of some nameless man rutting her, debauching her, stabbed like rib slitters.

She swallowed. Glanced up at him as if ashamed, as if she thought he wouldn’t be interested anymore—

“Meet me here on the morrow,” he rushed out.

He brushed his thumb across her lip again, unable to resist. He never

kissed the lasses. But this

mouth that had sung such a song… Christ if he knew what he was saying, for she was telling him where he stood.

Blush raged pink on her cheeks.

“Surely many of the lasses would indulge ye,” she hedged

He stepped closer to her for another dose of rosewater, bodies nearly brushing.

“That depends on what I need them to indulge.” He toyed with a lock of her hair, inspecting the brown nuances. “I nay think they can meet my expectations on this account.”

He’d never worked so hard for a measly scrap of a lass’s attention. His fingertips traced her empty ring finger and her breath hitched. He shouldn’t try to imagine a bond existed between them. But that song

…

He leaned into her ear. Breathed in her fine milled scent as he felt her tremor from his beard tickling her collarbone. “Ye’re nay married yet, songbird.”

She hurried away.

Fok, he’d offended— He scoured his chin.

She whirled over her shoulder before vanishing around a bend, fingers curling around a tree for leverage as her hair splashed around her, and those chestnut gems met his eyes.

“Bring yer lyre.” He jutted up his chin, as if she’d agreed to return, but an anchor dropped in his gut that he’d just dashed it all.

…

Second day of Lughnasadh

“

Eyes of deepest greenwood, ’twould be so swift to drown there…

”

Peigi hummed. Stroked her comb through her hair by the fire so her rosewater would dry.

“Ye’re humming.”

Lady Elizabeth, her sister-in-law, came to sit beside her and bounced her babe, Peigi’s niece, on her lap.

“I always hum when I’m happy.”

“Ye’re singing a new song.” Elizabeth sighed. “And this lassie refuses to nap.”

“Merely a tune that came to me yestereve.”

Emerald eyes. A man who said he didn’t want to lose her. Somehow, he’d deciphered one of her secret pains, and had only treated her as if he beheld a treasure, not damaged goods.

“Ye’re going to great pains to look fetching.” Elizabeth settled a floral crown atop her head.

The babe grabbed Elizabeth’s snood, tangling her fingers in the netting and yanking. Peigi looked to the early morning sky, the stark light washing out the peaks of the Cairngorms.

Elizabeth suppressed a smile, disentangled the child’s fingers from her hair. “Ye bathed.”

“I needed it after yesterday’s heat.”

“With yer rosewater again.”

“I often do so.” Peigi laughed.

Her mystery warrior with the flute, ink-stained fingertips, and hope for his new future had liked her scent. She’d heard him inhaling her aura. For the first time, she didn’t want to be invisible. Not to

him

. She

wanted

to be bonny.

Elizabeth smirked. “Nay when we travel and nay have the amenities of home. I’ve never seen such a dreamy side to ye, for as ye combed yer hair, ye looked positively smitten.”

Just the thought of her warrior’s teasing sent a shiver though her.

His easy laugh. His taunting, as if she were a novelty he needed to unravel.

His self-deprecating self-disappointment, gilded as a devil-may-care nonchalance.

His unabashed awe at her voice. That he seemed unbothered by her past. His admission about his sire.

“

And

ye’re crafting a new song. Ye only do that when ye’re inspired.”

“I

am

inspired,” Peigi relented to her excitement. “I’m with my family at a festival. I’ve just seen my sister Aileana for the first time in months.”

“Posh.” Elizabeth leaned in and lowered her voice so Seamus wouldn’t hear, even as wee Beata squirmed and flopped her body in hopes of slipping off Elizabeth’s lap to crawl away. “Ye were singing about a fellow.”

Peigi shook her head, but the corner of her mouth wouldn’t stay down as her smile grew.

“I kenned it! Who is he?” Elizabeth teased. “Ah…

That’s

why ye go to pains right now.”

“Whatever are ye havering about?” Peigi tsked.

“Why, he comes to visit Seamus—

ouch

.”

Beata had Elizabeth’s earring in her fist, pulling.

“Come here, wee urchin,” Peigi said, setting aside her comb and taking the infant. “And give yer poor mither a moment’s rest.