Page 6 of The Highlander’s Auctioned Virgin (Auctioned Highland Brides #3)

“‘I expect ye in me chambers’?”

“M’Lady?” Thomas said tentatively, his voice low.

“I expect ye in me chambers? Who the devil does he think he is? Does he think he can just come into me castle and order me around? This is me auction, and the tests were set by me!”

“M’Lady, I am certain the lairds understand that.”

“ I get to order these men around, nae the other way around.”

“They understand that as well,” Thomas assured her.

Elinor bit the inside of her cheek, a wave of despair crashing down on her.

This wasn’t what she wanted. Not in the slightest. She was back in her room and was fuming like a powder keg about to explode. An hour had passed since the first test started, and only a few men managed to sit beside her without causing offense.

Including Ciaran .

He was way too sure of himself, and she hated that. She hated how he carried himself with such effortless grace and how he managed to remain charming despite his reputation.

He was a killer. There was no way on earth a killer would make her a perfect husband. Not with the qualities she was looking for in a man.

“What else do ye ken about him?” she finally asked, once she had managed to suppress her anger.

Thomas shrugged. “Nae a lot, M’Lady. I ken that he kens how to kill. He killed a lot of lairds in his day and often worked with his braither closely.”

“His braither.” Elinor’s head snapped up and turned to him. “What can ye tell me about his braither?”

“I ken nothing about him other than the fact that he was the Laird of Clan MacGee. He was incredibly revered across the Highlands because he had the Hound at his beck and call. Nay one dares—or at least dared—to cross him. I heard that he died.”

Elinor shook her head. “I heard Ciaran tell Jack this morning that his braither was alive.”

“Oh well…” Thomas trailed off.

Elinor ground her teeth, her arms folded tight over her chest. “Find out whatever ye can about the Hound or his braither. This must end one way or another.”

“I shall send an emissary by first light to gather information.”

Elinor removed the sash from her shoulders and placed it on the bed. Then, she turned back and headed to the door, the sound of her footsteps echoing through the room.

“M’Lady, where are ye going?” Thomas asked, following closely behind.

“I need to go see him.”

“What?”

“’Tis the only way I can get him to stop with the smugness. I just need to remind him whose orders go around these parts.”

“Let me come with ye.”

“Nay. I need to do this on me own.”

“Ye’re going to shut yerself in a room with a man known for killing lairds?”

Elinor exhaled and turned to Thomas, her bright blue eyes boring into his. “I assume he is banking on that. If I go in there with ye, he’ll think I need protection from him. I want him to think that I’m nae afraid of him, Thomas. I need him to think so.”

Thomas took a step back and folded his arms behind him. “Very well, M’Lady. But at the first sign of danger, I will be there.”

“I daenae doubt ye will.”

Elinor turned again and reached for the doorknob.

Thomas gave her a brief nod, and soon she was out of the room and navigating the halls, the anger in her building up by the second.

The rooms on the second and third floors of the castle were all occupied by other lairds. She had asked a maid for the directions to Ciaran’s chambers and had gotten them. Now that she was heading there, she was determined to make her voice heard.

This was an auction for her hand, and for the first time in her life, she would get to choose her next husband. Nobody was going to ruin that for her. Not even a killer who was feared across the Highlands.

She stopped before his door and raised her hand to knock.

No. This was her castle. She needed to show authority. And that began with not requesting permission to enter his room.

She lifted her right foot and, with one swift kick, pushed open the wooden door. It swung wide, and she walked in, her hands fisting in the skirt of her dress.

The room was empty.

“Laird MacTraigh?”

“Who’s asking?”

He is in the bathing chamber.

“Get in here,” she commanded, despite every instinct telling her to leave and come back when he was finished with his bath.

But it was too late now. She could hear his footsteps draw closer.

As the door behind her closed with a soft thud, Ciaran came out of the bathing chamber and stepped up to her. His shirt was gone. His long, dark hair clung to his collarbones in thick waves.

The flickering firelight spilled gold across his body, making his shadow dance across the wall just a few feet beside him. He looked like he was carved from the land itself.

Elinor’s eyes dropped from his face.

She shouldn’t stare. She didn’t want to.

But she felt like her heart would burst out of her chest if it continued pounding so hard.

She watched as droplets of water slid down his throat, over the hard plane of his chest, and down the ridges of his stomach.

They stopped right at the edge of his brown belt, which held up a dark green kilt that hung low on his hips.

“M’Lady?” she could hear him call, but his voice sounded distant, almost an echo in her ears.

It was almost indecent how he wore it. Bare-chested, barefoot. Scars lined his chest from the middle to the edges, like the map of a treasure island.

“M’Lady?” his distant voice called again.

But she couldn’t stop staring. Not at the way the fabric hugged his waist, not at the muscles of his arms and abdomen, or the deep grooves that narrowed down to his–

“Elinor!”

She blinked.

Her mouth had gone completely dry, and she felt like her knees would buckle at any moment and she would fall to the floor.

Ciaran took a few steps closer to her, and suddenly, as if she became aware of the situation for the first time, she turned around, her eyes landing on the door to the room.

“’Tis a bit too late for that, would ye nae say?” Ciaran called behind her.

Elinor didn’t respond. Instead, she remained still, balling her hands into fists as heat crawled up her cheeks. Heat that she let crawl up her cheeks.

“Ye can turn around, M’Lady,” Ciaran coaxed. “If ye’re going to confront me, the least ye can do is face me.”

Elinor pressed her lips together and slowly turned back to him. The water droplets were drying up, but his skin had a sheen to it.

She couldn’t be around him for long. Not like this.

“Ye cannae ask me to come to ye in yer chambers.”

Ciaran folded his arms across his chest and arched an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

Elinor narrowed her eyes at him. There was no way in heaven he was not doing this intentionally.

“In case ye have forgotten, Laird MacTraigh, this is me castle. Me castle. I already let one man dictate me life, and I willnae do it again. Especially a man like ye.”

“A man like me? What do ye mean?”

“Ye ken exactly what I mean.”

“Nay, I daenae .”

“Dinnae play these games with me.”

“I thought those were yer specialty, M’Lady. The games.”

“This is different.”

“Nay, this is the exact same thing, from where I stand. So, tell me, why do ye think a man like me cannae win the games– ”

“Challenges,” Elinor corrected.

“—the challenges ye have so carefully put in place?”

It was Elinor’s turn to move closer to him.

His haunting green eyes grew brighter, like the shiniest of leaves looking back into her eyes.

Was this the last thing they saw? The people he had killed? Were his green eyes the last thing they saw before closing their eyes forever?

“Because the challenges are made to only be passed by the best of men.”

“Aye, I remember the qualities. Protective, caring, and humorous.”

“Ye’re a killer. Ye cannae have all three. God, ye cannae even have two out of the three. If I were ye, I would just turn around and go back to me clan. The challenges werenae made to be passed by a killer.”

Elinor didn’t wait for him to speak; she turned around and made for the door.

Except she didn’t go far. Not in the slightest. She had felt it around her wrist before she could register what it was. His tight grip.

“If I’m getting this right…” he said, turning her around slowly. The feel of his cold hand against her skin sent shivers down her spine. “Ye’re asking me to leave the castle before the games even start?”

Elinor looked up at him and smiled. “’Tis a shame that ‘understanding things very quickly’ isnae one of the qualities I am looking for in a man, or ye would have been a top contender.”

Ciaran chuckled. “Listen to me, M’Lady. If ye’re asking me to leave without trying after sending an open invitation, that isnae very wise.”

Elinor eyed him narrowly. “What?”

His grip loosened on her wrist. “Aye. I am certain ye are familiar with the laws of the Highlands. Ye ken that kicking a laird out of an event after sending an open invitation is tantamount to declaring war.”

“Are ye threatening me, Laird MacTraigh?”

“On the contrary, M’Lady,” he replied. “I am stopping ye from making a rather dangerous decision. One that could cause a lot of harm to yer clan.”

He then released her wrist and dropped his hand to his side, feeling her eyes bore holes into him as if he had just declared war on her clan.

“Do ye ken why I called ye here? Nay matter what ye may think, I asked ye to visit me because I have a proposal for ye.”

Elinor swallowed.

“And I can see ye arenae ready to listen to me proposal. At least nae if ye keep letting yerself be blinded by me reputation.”

Silence descended on the room, thick and incredibly uncomfortable.

Elinor tried to look anywhere but his face or his glistening skin. Yet there wasn’t much to look at. Ciaran’s quarters only boasted a chair and table, a bed, and a few candles. Hence, she stared out the window for a while.

Then, like a witch recovering from a spell, she decided to break the silence.

“Well, I suppose I will see ye at the trials, then.”

“Very well,” he responded. “May the best man win.”

Elinor nodded.

She walked out of the room almost immediately, her heart fluttering in her chest, her feet pounding hard on the floor as she headed back to her quarters.

What is happening to me? Why in God’s name am I letting a man like Ciaran get to me?

Ciaran paced his room for hours after Elinor had left. He had tried his best to relax—lying on the bed, looking out at the night sky, even taking another bath—but none of it had worked. She was intriguing. Far more intriguing than he had expected.

He didn’t like this.

This was supposed to be a way to form alliances. He had come to this event, considering it as nothing but a business transaction. But now that he was here… Now that he had met her , his thoughts were all over the place.

He had not expected the lady of the castle to be so fearless. She was the only one so far who had managed to look at him without lowering her gaze. She never hesitated to bring up his history and couldn’t care less about the consequences.

He hated the effect she had on him and how intrigued he was. He hated that he wanted to get to know her better and feared that this would no longer be as seamless as he had thought it would. The last thing Elinor wanted was a business transaction; that much was obvious now.

He lay down in his bed anyway and stared up at his ceiling, his hands clasped beneath his head. He would just keep thinking about Elinor and how fearless she had been, and hopefully, sleep would claim him.

Just as his eyes fluttered shut, a knock sounded at the door.

His eyes snapped open. Was she back to confront him again? Did she ever get tired of this?

But then Elinor would not knock. It had to be someone else.

A knock came again, and he swung his legs off the bed and headed to the door.

He pulled it open and found himself staring at a maid who had the most nervous look on her face as she gripped a bowl tightly.

“Is it nae a little too late for food?” he asked, his eyes darting between her worried face and the bowl in her hands.

“I-I am supposed to give this to ye, M’Laird,” she stammered.

Before Ciaran could ask anything else, like where the bowl had come from and who would ask that it be delivered to him, the maid held it out, almost shoving it into his chest.

Slowly, he took the bowl and gave her a reassuring nod. “Is there anything ye can tell me about the bowl?”

“I am afraid nae, M’Laird,” she responded, before scurrying down the corridor.

Ciaran walked back into his room with the bowl in hand, his eyebrows knitting together in curiosity. If it wasn’t food, then what in God’s name could it be?

He placed it on the table by the wall and stared at it, letting a thousand thoughts race through his mind.

“Ach, to hell with it,” he groaned and lifted the lid off the bowl.

In it was a red apple and a torn piece of parchment at the very bottom.

He reached for the apple and took it out, examining it. Then, he placed it on the table and took out the torn parchment. There was writing on it that he couldn’t properly see until he brought it closer to one of the flickering candles.

The hand was smooth, clear, and readable.

Yer bride is stuck in the woods alone. Find her and bring her back before something terrible happens to her.

A smile spread across his face, and he looked up from the parchment.

“So the games have begun. Well played, Lady MacAdair,” he muttered.

Without overthinking things, he reached for his shirt and belt. In a few seconds, he had dressed up and was ready, sleep well and truly forgotten.

He took one last look at his sword before heading out of the room.