Page 8 of The Highlander’s Illicit Bride (Wicked Highland Lairds #1)

CHAPTER SEVEN

H e had to get to her.

Struan felt the heat from the flames upon his skin, making him sweat and squirm.

He was surrounded by fire and forced to fight off soldiers who poured in all around him.

Chaos reigned and the cries of the wounded and dying rang in his ears.

It was a terrible sound. It sounded like the gates of hell had been thrown open and all the demons it held back came rushing out, crowing with glee and malice.

The sound of it sent a cold dagger of dread through his heart.

“Rhona!” he screamed.

The light from a thousand torches on the battlefield glinted off the sharpened steel that hung above his sister. Rhona turned to him and when their eyes met, Struan saw the acceptance of her fate in her eyes.

“Nay!”

Struan fell to his knees and his tears spilled upon the ground, mixing with the river of blood beneath him. Rhona’s blood dripped from the edge of the sword as the man who wielded it turned to him. As Struan’s tears flowed, a slow, cruel grin stretched across the man’s lips.

Murdoch Mackintosh.

A bright bolt of fear shot through his heart, when a pair of hands reaches for his arm.

Struan sat bolt upright and, almost on instinct, grabbed at his unseen attacker.

His vision was still obscured by the cobwebs of sleep that clung to him, and his fingers wrapped around the skin of their throat, squeezing as hard as he could.

A gurgled gasp echoed in his ears and long, delicate fingers grasped at his wrist.

“Struan.”

The voice was a harsh, raspy whisper that tickled a bell of familiarity in the back of his mind.

He gave himself a shake, clearing away the last of the blurring as he came fully awake.

He gasped when he saw and realized his hand was wrapped around Isolde’s throat.

Struan immediately let go and she fell forward, coughing and hacking as she tried to draw breath.

Struan put a hand on her back, drawing soothing patterns. “I’m sorry, Isolde. I’m so sorry. I didnae mean tae dae that. I?—”

She held a hand up. “’Tis fine,” she croaked. “Ye were dreamin’.”

He nodded and jumped to his feet. Rushing over to her pack, he pulled out the skin of water and helped her to sit up and take a sip. She slumped against him, drawing deep breaths.

“I’m sorry?—”

“Stop sayin’ that,” she replied. “’Twas nae yer fault.”

His gaze fell as a river of shame washed over him. He noticed a small bowl of water with a damp cloth in it beside where he was sleeping. Cocking his head, he returned his eyes to her.

“What is that?” he asked.

An expression of uncertainty crossed her face, but she took another swallow of water which seemed to fortify her.

“Ye were restless in yer sleep. Ye were moanin’ and cryin’ out,” Isolde hesitated. “Ye were sweatin’ and ye were as hot as a fire in a hearth. I got some water from the loch tae cool ye down.”

Struan swallowed hard and tried to push down the shame that continued to well up within him.

Hurting a woman was not in his nature. Hurting a woman who was doing him a kindness was even worse.

And even worse still was that he had hurt Isolde.

For reasons he could not yet fathom, the mere thought of hurting her made him want to have himself flogged.

“I—I’m sorry, Isolde,” he said, his voice low. “I didnae mean tae?—”

“I ken ye didnae. Like I said, ‘tis nae yer fault. Ye were caught in a dream.”

A moment of silence passed between them and Struan found himself wishing they’d been able to get a fire going. He needed the warmth to melt the guilt and shame that had encased his heart in ice. He clenched his jaw and tried to force his way through it.

“Why would ye dae that?” he asked, his tone harder than he’d intended. “Fer me?”

She stiffened. “’Twas repayin’ a kindness fer ye helpin’ me tae escape from me faither,” she huffed. “A simple thank ye would nae go amiss.”

Help her escape her faither…

The words stood out to him, rang out as loud and clear as a church bell. It told him quite a lot about her state of mind and why she was there with him in the crofter’s hut to begin with.

To that point, he hadn’t thought about it too deeply, assuming she was just another disaffected girl, upset with her father and who thought that by running away, she would get his attention. But the fact that she felt the need to escape forced him to look at her in a different light.

He cleared his throat. “Thank ye.”

“Dae ye have bad dreams like that often?”

Struan stilled at her question. Her father was a cruel man, ruling with a cruel fist, which made Struan wonder if that was how he raised his daughter too. Isolde might not seem like Murdoch, still Struan could not be certain yet of what she might do with any sort of personal information about him.

Besides that, Struan was not a man who opened up to people easily.

But there is something about Isolde that makes me trust her…

It went against his every instinct. And yet, there was that small piece inside of him that wanted to share with her. It was confounding and Struan didn’t understand it.

He cleared his throat. “Aye. Sometimes,” he admitted quietly. “But nobody has ever been there when I have. Nobody’s ever woken me from one and taken care of me the way ye did. So… thank ye. I… I appreciate ye fer that.”

“Ye’re welcome,” she replied, just as quietly.

Their eyes met and Struan felt a surge of lightning course through his body that jolted his heart, then spread outward like ripples on the surface of a pond. He licked his suddenly dry lips and tried to swallow down the lump in his throat.

The moment lingered between them, charging the air with a powerful electricity that crackled, raising goosebumps on his arms and he had the crazy notion to lean forward and kiss her.

But she lowered her gaze and the moment popped like a bubble.

Struan felt his body sag and he sat back, trying to clear his mind.

“What did ye dream about?” she asked gently. “What had ye in such a state?”

He shook his head. “Just bad memories. A battle.” His answer was deliberately vague and noncommittal.

Isolde seemed to pick up on that because she scrunched up her face, curiosity gleaming in her eyes. “Ye talked while ye slept. Yelled, more accurately,” she said.

“Did I?”

“Aye,” she replied. “May I ask ye a question?”

“Ye can ask.”

“Who is Rhona?”

His sister’s name spilling from her lips sent a lance of pain straight through his heart, grounding him.

He gritted his teeth, and his hands balled into fists, the memory of his sister’s murder still fresh in his mind.

The memory was as indelible a stain in his mind as the shadow that had cast over his heart with her death.

“Rhona was me older sister,” he said.

“I see,” she replied. “And… why is she in yer nightmares?”

That dagger of ice in his heart felt like it was twisting, sending white-hot pain coursing through his veins. Images from his dream—from his memory—flashed through his mind, making that pain in his heart ever sharper. He swallowed it down.

“She… she was killed,” he said.

“I’m so sorry.”

The irony of Isolde apologizing for her father’s actions without even knowing about them wasn’t lost on Struan. Still, telling her more of how Rhona died was the last thing he wanted to do.

Struan got to his feet and stretched his back. He looked to the windows and saw the sky in the east beginning to lighten behind the bank of thick, dark clouds.

“’Tis daybreak,” he changed the conversation. “We should be on the road if we hope tae reach Achnacarry at some point in this life.”

Isolde gave him a disappointed yet sympathetic look. She seemed curious about Rhona but she picked up it was a memory that caused him tremendous pain, so she did not press. Struan was grateful for that.

Instead, they both ate from their meager rations of food and washed it all down with some water. After that, Struan refilled their skins with water from the creek behind the hut, then made sure the horse, which had been grazing all night, got one of the apples Isolde had filched.

Once they were ready, he helped her to mount the horse then jumped up behind her and they started off.

They still had quite a way to go to get to Achnacarry—a normally arduous journey made even longer by the necessity of sticking to the back roads and hunting trails to avoid being spotted by either her father’s soldiers, or bandits roaming the countryside looking for victims.

Though a long and grueling ride, Struan could not deny, even to himself, that he was enjoying being in Isolde’s company. It was yet another confounding thought on a list that was growing ever longer because of her.

Dae I count her as a friend or foe? Or perhaps, just a temporary ally?

He reminded himself, not for the first time, that none of what he thought or felt mattered. She was a means to an end and once she revealed where Finlay was being held captive, their arrangement would expire, and he would be free of her.

Or rather, she would be free of him.