“’Tis the only thing that will save us now.” Finnan gazed seriously into his friend’s eyes. “You do not have to stay, you ken. No dent in your loyalty if you go. ’Tis my fight, this.”
“And since when has one of us had a fight without the others?” For a moment, Danny’s open face clouded. “I am that convinced we—the three of us—should never have parted ways in the first place, nor let Master Geordie go off by himself.”
Finnan shrugged uncomfortably. “He’d had his fill of killing, could stomach no more. Should I have dragged him into this slaughter?”
“I do no’ ken. But I am sure had we stayed together he would still be alive now. You always looked after us, Master Finnan, always.”
Finnan heard Jeannie say again, “Where were you when Geordie needed you in Dumfries?” He had been turning himself into a hare here. One more thing for which he could feel guilt.
He became distracted from his thoughts when the cottage door opened and Jeannie emerged, barely visible in the dim light. She carried a white cloth in her hands and did not so much as glance at the guards along the way before she walked round the side of the cottage. There she paused and flapped the cloth the way a woman might shake away crumbs from a table covering after a meal.
Finnan’s eyes narrowed. A signal? He watched as she marched deliberately to the rear of the tiny building and spread the cloth over the prickle bushes. Then she went inside and shut the door firmly.
The dark was now almost complete. Even in the west the light sank into a mere haze that reflected off the burn. Had he not seen them, he would not know the guards were there on the rise.
Nor would they be able to see him very easily.
“Jeannie needs to speak with me,” he told Danny softly. And he to her.
“But ’tis too dangerous, surely.”
Finnan drew himself up. “The Avries have overstepped themselves this time. Let them deal with the spirit of vengeance.”
****
Finnan held himself still as the trees beneath which he had paused, the dirk clutched between his teeth. He thought about the night, listened for the way the breeze bent the gorse and rough grass. He imagined himself invisible, even his breath suspended.
He heard the two guards speaking to one another in low voices, never suspecting they were overheard.
“Damned fine-looking woman,” one of them murmured with a lecherous undertone. “And we are not getting paid enough to stand out here all night when there are warm women inside.”
His only reply came as a grunt from the second man.
“’Tis my opinion this fellow they are chasing will never be caught, by any road. He is a phantom. How long have we been after him now?”
Finnan bared his teeth around the blade in a grim smile.
“No phantom, he,” the second man said, “but a turncoat. Took pay to kill his own kind at Culloden.”
The first man ignored that opinion. “You keep watch here; I am going to see if I can get inside yon cottage.”
“To what purpose? Those are respectable women.”
“And maybe lonely. I have a flask here. Do you really want to spend all the night out on this trail?”
The second man never answered. Finnan had moved, silent as the shadow he imagined, and muffled the fellow from behind with an arm about his throat. The dirk swung up in a short vicious movement, and Finnan lowered his victim softly to the ground.
One taken care of, but he had to silence the second man also. He saw the fellow swing round with the gleam of wide eyes alerted by instinct.
“Donald?”
Finnan leaped for him out of the deeper darkness and bore him over backward before he could draw his sword. The dirk, already well-wetted, did its work again, and Finnan breathed a fierce prayer of gratitude before dragging both men off the trail into the gorse.
His arm, stiff and enflamed, screamed at him as he wiped his dirk on the grass and returned it to his boot.
The cottage door opened and light spilled out. He saw Jeannie’s golden head, and his heart leaped disconcertingly. By all that was holy, he had missed her. And not just her kisses.
Still silent, he started up the trail to her gate. He felt it the instant she caught sight of and recognized him. She hurtled through her doorway, leaving the brightness behind.
They met at the gate, and she threw herself into his arms. Her hands caught at him and his, equally eager, caressed her hips even as he drew her nearer.
She did not speak, not in words. Instead she reached for him with her lips, bestowed small, desperate kisses on his mouth, his cheek, his chin. He felt her tremble.
“There now, lass,” he murmured, trying to tell himself he remained unaffected by the greeting even as his heart pounded and he went lightheaded.
“I was so afraid for you,” she told him between the kisses. “Are you all right? Are you whole?”
Finnan’s heart thudded perilously. This, he reminded himself, was the woman he lived to punish. He could not let himself care for her; he would not.
“You signaled me?” he asked.
“Come inside out of the light.” In defiance of her own words, she held him there and kissed him, keeping him in the radiance that spilled from the cottage. Her mouth, hot and hungry, pulled at him, very nearly irresistible.
If he died now, he thought as his tongue swept the inside of her mouth, if a troop of the Avries’ men should come up behind and strike him dead, it might very well be worth it.
She broke the kiss and tugged at his hand. “Come.”
As soon as she had him inside, she shut the door and turned to her maid, who stared. “Cover the windows, Aggie—quick.”
Aggie did not move. “What has become of those men out there?” Her gaze dropped to Finnan’s hands. “That is blood!”
“They ha’ been removed,” Finnan said baldly, and the lass’s eyes widened with alarm.
“Where is Danny? Is he all right?”
“Up on the hillside.”
Jeannie had hurried to cover the windows when Aggie did not comply. She turned back, and Finnan felt her gaze all over him, full of distress.
“Your arm—”
“Sore, that is all. I am fine.” Better now—well enough, certainly, to ravish her on the spot, if only her maid were out of the way.
“Did you signal for me?” he asked again.
She nodded, a grave expression filling her eyes. “I needed to tell you: your sister is here in the glen—at Avrie House.”
Chapter Thirty
“Deirdre? Here?” Finnan spoke the words and swayed where he stood. Jeannie wanted to reach for him again, for she saw the color drain from his face. She nodded and wondered why he took the news so hard.
“How do you know?”
“I saw her today at Avrie House. Here, come and sit down.”
She drew him in beside the hearth even as Aggie seized a shawl and pushed past them out the door. In truth, Jeannie barely saw her maid go, focused as she was on the great well of pain that had opened in Finnan’s eyes.
She shoved him down onto the bench. He leaned forward and forced his hands through his hair, looking like a man who had received a blow.
“I believed her dead. Truly, I did not know, but I told myself she must be. Perhaps I even prayed so.” He looked up, and his gaze scoured Jeannie’s. “Are you certain? How did you know ’twas she?”
Jeannie crouched beside him and laid her hand on his knee. “She has the look of you. And the Dowager Avrie referred to her as her grandson’s wife.”
Finnan shuddered. “Did she say which of those vile blackguards wed her?”
“She is wife to Stuart, so the Dowager said.”
“I will kill him. So I swear upon all that is sacred to me.”
Dismay flooded over Jeannie. “Finnan, I did not tell you this to intensify your hatred or so you would spill more blood. I thought it would do you good to learn what happened to her. All these years of wondering…”
He gave h
er a wild stare.
Jeannie went on, desperate to soothe him. “She did not look unwell or particularly ill-used.” Grave and unhappy, perhaps, but strong for all that.
Bitterly, Finnan said, “They took her against her will, and Gregor Avrie wed her to his son in order to legitimize any claim they might have here. Once I am dead—”
He stopped speaking abruptly. Alarm flared in Jeannie’s heart. It made a valid reason, beyond highland spite, for the Avries to see him slaughtered.
“I must get word to her that I stand ready to help her,” he said. “Let her know rescue is at hand.”
“But, Finnan, how are you to rescue her, and you hunted like a hart these many days?” Jeannie knew this man by now, understood the depth of loyalty that possessed his heart—for this place, for Danny, for Geordie. How could she expect him to withhold it from his sister? Yet the prospect of him endangering himself terrified her.
She knew then that among all the things she had given Finnan MacAllister—her virtue, her concern, her peace of mind—foremost she had given him her heart. She loved this man desperately and completely, and the truth of that frightened her more than anything, for she had no evidence that he would ever love her in return.
“I ha’ just killed two men,” he told her harshly, “and I can slay as many more as need be. I will take them one by one in the dark, if I have to, and so free her.”
“A valiant enough plan,” Jeannie said ruefully, “but impractical, I fear. You are exhausted and badly injured.”
“And armed with my anger. I need only deal with them one at a time.”
“Well, it will not be tonight. Give it some time and catch your breath. Stay here the rest of the night.”
His gaze seared her face before he looked to the door. “Danny—”
“I suspect Aggie has gone to him. Do you truly wish to interrupt them? Let them have their time, Finnan, for it is precious for them as well as us.”
He continued to gaze at her as if trying to see inside her, and Jeannie hid nothing from him. If they were to have only this moment—only this night—she would give him all she had, including her honesty.
After a moment a new emotion flared in his eyes. What was it? Gladness? Relief? Passion? The corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile, and he raised a hand to cup her cheek.
“Jeannie,” he said—only that, but coupled with the brush of his fingers it set her heart into a new rhythm, double time.
“Finnan.” She turned her face into his touch and kissed his palm, still splashed with blood.
He sucked in a great breath. “’Tis madness for me to stay here tonight.”
“Surely not. The Avries have posted their guards. They will suspect nothing.”
“And should they come searching and discover the fate of those guards? Or if new men come to relieve them?”
Jeannie got to her feet. “Then I had best get that arm of yours tended quickly and see you rest as best you may.” Before he went from her again, as he must. Jeannie’s heart twisted in her breast. He might be the wrong man for her to love, yet she was his this night and for all time.
****
“Tell me of your sister,” Jeannie urged as she soothed Finnan’s arm with cloths soaked in witch hazel. “Tell me what happened that night you left the glen.”
Finnan sipped the willow tea she had brewed for him and looked again at the door. He did not want to speak of that; he barely wished to remember that night. Yet Deirdre was here in the glen. Duty beyond even what he owed Geordie called to him.
Best to finish with Jeannie MacWherter here tonight, and be done. He had seen what lay in her eyes, knew he held her in thrall. As with a defeated opponent in battle, he had only to lay the final stroke.
Yet he felt less than sure he wanted to do that, when it came to it. He no longer knew how he felt about this woman—warm, vital, and so bonny it hurt him to look at her. She possessed grit and courage as well as beauty. But he had made a vow, and the man he was would not let him shrink from it.
Anyway, he thought now, even had she been the bonny angel she appeared, there was no future in it. Aye, best to break it with her now, before she saw him lying in his own blood beneath an Avrie sword.
For he could not be certain he would survive this battle.
He said nothing at all, and she smoothed the ends of his bandage with those careful fingers and rose from the floor where she knelt.
“Come,” she urged. “Rest until Aggie returns.”
“I cannot rest. I must remain vigilant.”
She tugged at his hand and drew him into the bedroom where they had been before. Immediately a score of memories flooded his mind—the heat of her welcome, the scent of her, and the taste on his tongue. And aye, if he were to break her heart this night, should he not take her body first?
He stood unmoving, his heart at war while she began to remove his clothing and then her own. The only light came from the other room, yet he could see her—oh, aye—when she unfastened her bodice and shed her skirt. Naked, she stepped into his arms and pressed herself, trembling, against him.
“Please,” she beseeched. “I must have you this night.”
Somehow, by a miracle of will, he held himself back. “I thought you wished to hear a dire tale.”
“I do, if you will tell me. Come, lie with me.”
They lay entwined atop the blankets, she close to his side, her lips just a breath from his ear.
“Tell me,” she urged once more. “I may be able to help you reach Deirdre, woman to woman.”
He laid one hand on the soft flesh beneath her breasts, narrowed his eyes, and thought back to the night in question.
“I was asleep,” he began like a man in a dream. “My mother woke me, calling my name and weeping—she, who never wept easily. Her tears fell all the while she told me what they had done, Gregor Avrie and his two young sons. They had walked into my da’s library where he sat reading, wounded him mortally, and then hauled him out onto the stones of the courtyard to finish him. She saw it all and hid herself. When Gregor sent men to search the house, she knew what they were after. She reached me first and implored me to flee. I wanted to take Deirdre with me, but we could not find her, and the wolves were on the hunt.
“By then, our household guard had roused and engaged Avrie’s men. ’Twas the distraction we needed. My ma and I crept to the courtyard, where I took my da’s torc still with his blood upon it, and his sword. My ma sent me away by a route known to no one but the family and promised to send Deirdre after.”
Jeannie’s hand crept to his chest, a gesture of comfort. But comfort lay well beyond his reach. “I made my way out and waited for Deirdre at the head of the glen. She never came, and I had vowed to my mother I would go. I know now the Avries must have seized Deirdre even before coming after me. Clever of them, really, for they knew with me dead she represented the best claim on the land.
“I still remember how my mother looked when I parted from her, weeping and begging me to go, that I might come back some day and regain what was rightfully ours. I did not know ’twould be the last time I ever saw her.”
“What happened to her?” Jeannie whispered.
“For years I did not know. I only learned later from a family friend in Fort William that she had died.” He paused and swallowed painfully. “I have had plenty of time to wonder about it since, and to be certain I never should have left that night. I should have stayed and battled to protect her—to protect both of them—and the glen.”
“You were but a lad.”
“Old enough. I could ha’ taken up leadership of the household guard, fought the Avries and their hirelings back. I might at least have saved Deirdre.”
“How, if they had already seized her?”
He shook his head. “I swear I did suppose her dead all this while—oh, perhaps not that night, but long since. All these years, for her to live so. I should be slain for permitting it.”
“You did the only thing you could,” J
eannie comforted, “came back when you were able, and regained the glen.”
Finnan turned his face to her. “Did I? Then why am I on the run? And they hold her still.”
“She must know you are here, must have heard them speak of you. She will know you have come for her.”
“She will scarcely be able to imagine the man I have become,” Finnan said bitterly. Sometimes he barely recognized himself. “And I am sure I will not know her.”
“You will. She has the look of you. She appeared steady, and strong.”
“And has Stuart fathered his brats on her?” he wondered aloud.
“Aggie has never spoken of seeing children in the house, not in any of her visits.”
“’Tis a blessing.” Possibly the only one.
“Anything I can do for you,” Jeannie vowed, “you need only ask.” She followed the words with a kiss upon the corner of his mouth and then another square upon his lips. He felt her devotion pour into him and knew to his soul this was what he had awaited. He could—should—break her now, consider Geordie well avenged, walk away and never look back.
Or he could love her first.
His hand slid from her belly upward to cup one naked breast. He knew the depth and intensity of the fire that burned within her, knew exactly what it took to fan it. He brushed his thumb across her nipple, and she caught her breath.
She whispered into his mouth, “I would do anything you ask, Finnan. You know that.”
“I do, Jeannie.”
“Let me show you.” Her body glided over his, silken skin making a delicious friction, even as she began to worship him with her mouth. Hot kisses, followed by the ministrations of her tongue, trailed downward. Finnan knew he must remain in control, but his desire rose as helplessly and unpreventably as his manhood. Aye, and he must savor this—every motion—as justice, when he laid his final blow.
No sword needed for this—his only weapons lay between his legs and in his cruelty.
This will be the last time, he told himself even as she took him into her mouth, as he threw her on her back and suckled her deeply, as he entered her with a rush of hunger that set them both afire.
His Wicked Highland Ways Page 17