Tamed by a Highlander

by Paula Quinn

  “We’ve been training all morning,” said his lieutenant. “We’re off to the tavern. Join us, Captain?”

  “Go.” Mairi gave him a gentle push and a generous smile. “Drink with yer friends. I will see ye later tonight.”

  Tonight? No way in hell was he going to wait all day to see her. Oxford would likely hunt her down the instant Connor was away from her. “Mairi.” His hand on her wrist stopped her and she turned back to him. “Come with us. The men won’t object to yer company.”

  She looked at the others smiling back at her.

  “Mayhap”—Drummond offered her a reverential nod—“ye will share with us the ways in which yer blade made contact with the captain’s flesh on four different occasions.”

  Connor laughed and slung his arm around Mairi’s shoulder. “ ’Twas the color of her eyes, Lieutenant. The boldness of her tongue. She beguiled me—”

  “When he swings in an upward motion, he has a tendency to lean to the left,” Mairi told them, proving that it was more than an enchantment she had set upon him. “If ye wait just an instant to strike, ye might be able to find yer target.”

  “Ah.” Richard beamed at her. “Tell us more.”

  They left the grounds with Connor second-guessing his invitation… until she looked up at him and smiled.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Mairi didn’t usually drink, but today she could use the tallest tankard of ale her stomach could bear. She’d endured a restless night awake in her bed, partly because of her brother’s news, but Connor’s kisses haunted her as well. The way he’d held her, whispered that he loved her, and then showed her. Dear Lord, the man had stamina! Yesterday had been cast from the stuff of her dreams. The house he’d built was extraordinarily beautiful. That he had built it for her made her heart ache and her eyes burn, even this morning. Would she have come to him all those years ago if she had known about it? Would she stay with him now if he asked her? Aye, there were enough Catholics’ enemies here to keep her busy for three lifetimes; but now that enemies surrounded her on almost every side, she found she didn’t much care for all the danger. Mayhap, it was because her brother would now be living in the center of it all.

  Colin was staying. Och, but she could have clubbed him over the head with a stick when she’d learned of his intentions. How could her father let him stay? How could Rob have wed the king’s daughter? Her head still spun from it all. She’d left her bed feeling worse than when she fell into it last night. Her brother, the one she favored above the others, was staying in England. He was going to fight whatever enemies came against the king—and hell, there were many. What if he were killed?

  She looked at Connor as they entered the tavern and silently thanked him for doing what he could to aid Colin in coming out of England alive. But that meant he was staying, as well. He hadn’t mentioned anything about returning home to Camlochlin. He likely never would now that he had his own home to live in—and if he meant to keep Colin safe. Could she leave the Highlands for him? She’d asked herself that question a hundred times already. She didn’t want to think about the possibility of his not asking her to stay.

  She followed the men inside The Troubadour and looked around. She had never been in a tavern before. There were none in the Highlands, at least, not in the mountains. Men brewed their own whisky to keep warm in the cold months. She took in the sights and sounds around her, sensing the danger that was usually associated with too many drunken men crammed into one place. She understood why Connor came here often. It was more like Camlochlin’s Great Hall than anywhere in the palace. What would Connor do if there was a fight? How many noses had he already broken in places like this? There would likely have been a brawl if the men that Lieutenant Drummond had just shooed away from a corner table were not a group of cornets from Connor’s own company.

  They sat, each man settling comfortably into his chair, each falling directly into his role in what Mairi imagined happened whenever they came here. Drummond called for drinks. Edward did not sit for long but darted from his chair to pop over to another table to greet some friends of his.

  She was happy that Connor had asked her to come along. She needed a reprieve from the thoughts that plagued her. She liked men. She liked them better than she liked women. The women at Camlochlin were hardier than the powder puffs inside the palace, but even they did not share her interests in politics or in the certain tilt of the wrist that made a blade sing.

  “Good evening, Captain. What’s your pleasure tonight?”

  Mairi looked up at pretty blonde serving wench standing over Connor and wearing a suggestive grin on her plump lips.

  “Three whiskeys, Vicky,” Connor told her, then cleared his throat. “And a cup of yer good ale fer Mairi.”

  Vicky looked her over with surprise, as if she suddenly recognized her, or had heard of her before. “Pleased to meet you, Mairi,” she said, wearing a strained smile.

  Had Connor told this gel about her? Mairi cut her gaze to him. Was Vicky one of his lovers? How many more were there? She didn’t want to think on it.

  “Four whiskeys, please, Vicky.”

  She ignored Connor when he shifted slightly in his seat, obviously uneasy about the two meeting each other.

  “Why ye three?” she asked them, refusing to think about him naked with someone else. “Ye are together often. How did a captain, a lieutenant, and a cornet become such close friends?”

  “I’ve known Richard since I arrived here. He saved my life in Cornwall two years ago,” Connor told her. “We let Edward come along because he does what we tell him.” He tossed his cornet a grin and then winked at her.

  “What about the two of ye?” Lieutenant Drummond asked her as Vicky returned with their drinks.

  Mairi sipped hers. The whiskey was sour and watery. Shivering at the taste of it gave her something else to do besides blanch at the question and the thought of answering it.

  “What about us?”

  “We see ye together often,” the lieutenant said with a smirk, letting her know that being deliberately evasive was not going to work. “How did a Stuart captain and a wee Highland lass become friends?”

  She smiled, offering Connor to take this one. He declined by ignoring her and covering his mouth with his cup. Damn it. Hell, she did not want to talk about falling in love with him. The last thing Connor needed was more confidence. Look at him sitting there with a curious smile on his face, waiting for her spill her guts on the table.

  “Lord and Lady Huntley live in my faither’s castle. Connor… Captain Grant was born there.”

  The lieutenant nodded, along with Edward, waiting for more.

  Mairi twisted one of the ribbons in her gown around her finger. “He grew close to my brother.” She shrugged, hoping it was enough. It wasn’t.

  “He’s told us about Tristan,” Edward told her, swinging his chair around to straddle it and give her his full attention. “How did he become friends with you?”

  “She followed us everywhere.” Connor finally took pity on her and finished for her. When he continued, she wished she had kept talking. “She was no more than this high”—he held his palm to the top of the table—“a stubborn wee lass who never did what she was told. If we tried to climb the side of a mountain, she had to try too. I cannot tell ye lads how many times she spoiled a stealthy attack on the sheep because we didn’t know she was behind us.”

  “Proving that I was more stealthy than either of ye.”

  The men laughed and Connor tipped his head, giving her the win.

  “I knew she loved me,” he continued on mercilessly, his grin widening at her tightening lips. “I think ye were six when ye first told me, aye, Mairi?”

  She wondered what his men would do if she flung her cup at him. “I had to be quite young to be so foolish.”

  He laughed, then pouted, pretending insult. “What she didn’t know was that I returned her love. I was quite young and foolish also.” His smile on her softened and made her flesh tingle.
“It didn’t take her long to slip under my skin and behind my back when the three of us found ourselves in trouble. She never cried but her eyes would fill up with tears and shimmer like the mist draping Sgurr Na Stri. Her cheeks were always red from the cold… her lips, as well.”

  The men around the table grew quiet at Connor’s very telling tale.

  Then, “Captain?”

  Mairi blinked and remembered to breathe as Connor’s tender gaze moved from her to his lieutenant.

  “Do you know that man?”

  Connor turned, along with everyone else, to a peasant standing off by himself, a cup held to his bearded jaw. He was partially blocked by shadow but Mairi noted his height and the breadth of his shoulders. He turned away toward the door when he saw them looking at him.

  “I’ve never seen him before, why do ye ask?” Connor said, turning back to his lieutenant.

  Richard Drummond put his cup down and dropped his hand to the hilt at his side. “Because he’s wearing yer boots.”

  Connor was out of his chair and on his feet before the man reached the door, but Richard Drummond got to him first. Connor did not pause in his gait while his lieutenant, who was almost as tall as the thief, gripped him by the back of the collar and practically kicked him out the door.

  Mairi was right behind Connor when they left the tavern, her hands tugging up her confining English skirts so that she could get a hold of one of her daggers.

  “Ye look afraid, stranger,” Connor said, reaching the man still clutched within his lieutenant’s beefy fingers. “Do ye think ye’re looking at a ghost?”

  Mairi studied the assailant and was certain that he was, in fact, the brute who had stabbed Connor. Those were indeed Connor’s boots on his feet and true terror widening his eyes.

  “Ye tried to kill me.” Connor moved closer to pin him with his level gaze. “Why?”

  “Silver,” the thief admitted, gathering up some of the courage that had abandoned him a few moments earlier. “Twenty pieces.”

  Hell, then it was true, the man had tried to kill Connor for more than just his boots. Mairi edged closer and twirled her dagger in her fingers. “Let us kill him after he tells us who paid him and then toss his body into the day’s waste.”

  “In a moment,” Connor said, then gave the man’s bristly cheek a mild smack to keep his eyes on him and off Mairi. “What are ye called?”

  “Harry Thatcher.”

  “Who paid ye, Harry?”

  “Don’t know.” He shrugged and turned away from Connor’s watchful gaze. He doubled over an instant later from the powerful blow Connor inflicted to his guts.

  “Mister Thatcher.” Connor’s voice remained as silky smooth as when he told Mairi he loved her. “Ye’re going to hang. I can put in a word fer ye to the king if ye tell me the truth. Mayhap, he will be more lenient on ye.” He waited patiently while Richard yanked him straight. “Who paid ye?”

  “I don’t know,” Harry repeated. This time it was Connor’s lieutenant who struck him in the mouth.

  “He gave the coin to my sister.” Harry swiped the blood from his lips. “I never saw him and Linnet didn’t tell me his name. We were supposed to kill you that night… the night you left the tavern with her after the first rain.”

  Mairi turned slowly to Connor. He’d left the tavern with a woman? Did Harry Thatcher speak of the night Connor had danced with her? The night he’d told her she had meant everything to him? Och, the bastard! She could forgive him for Vicky, since she had no way of knowing how long ago Connor had slept with her. But the night he came to Mairi in the rain? Where had he taken the trollop? To his manor house? She stared at him while her blood began to boil. Och, but she was a fool to believe his words of love… to believe anything he ever told her! Her throat burned and her eyes stung, but she would not weep! She remained silent while Harry tried to answer more questions. She didn’t hear any of them. Linnet. Och, but she sounded like an English trollop. Pity the woman had not killed Connor while he made love to her.

  “Take us to yer sister then and we will let ye go.”

  Mairi scoffed at yet another falsehood falling so easily from Connor’s tongue. But, aye, take her to this Linnet so she could run the both of them through and be done with him once and for all.

  “She’s gone,” Harry told them. “She left London with the coin in her purse.”

  “And ye with my boots.”

  And quite possibly with Connor’s bairn in her womb. Mairi looked away when his gaze met hers. She tucked her dagger back into its hiding place beneath her skirts and walked away. He was not even worth killing. She would return to the palace and bolt the door to her room until it was safe to return home. Until that time, she would avoid Connor Grant the same way she had when she first arrived.

  She did not stop when Connor called her. Nor did she slow her pace back to Whitehall when he reached her side and asked her what troubled her. He did not even have the decency to feign remorse. She rethought her decision not to stab him in the heart.

  “Go to hell.”

  “What?” He stopped and grabbed for her arm, stopping her with him.

  “Hell, Connor!” She pulled herself free of his hold and flashed him her most hateful glare. “The place ye sentenced me to seven years ago!”

  “Are we back to that again?” he called at her back with the audacity to sound angry.

  She was too furious… too hurt to turn around and give him the cutting retort he deserved. She hastened her march, relieved to see the gate in sight.

  Without breaking stride, she raised her palm to him when he caught up with her. “Never speak to me again.”

  “Why?” he asked, following her through the gate. “What has come over ye?” He brought her retreat to another grinding halt, tempting her to do all sorts of violent things to him. “Are ye angry that I didn’t let ye kill Mister Thatcher? I—”

  “I am angry that he didna’ kill ye!”

  He let her go with his blackest look yet. He remained silent and utterly still while his men hauled his attacker past them, pausing momentarily in their steps to hear what she and Connor were arguing about. After a warning glare that set the men on their way again, Connor returned his attention to her. When he spoke, his voice was rapier sharp, his eyes as dark and as menacing as the thick clouds forming again above their heads.

  “If I hadn’t just caught my confessed attacker, I might think ’twas yer hand behind that dagger.”

  “If I had any sense, it would have been!” She whirled on her heel to leave him for the last time. Instead, she found herself spun back in his direction then hauled over his shoulder.

  She was too stunned to speak. She wanted to scream, but she refused to give him the satisfaction. Besides, why call more attention to her humiliation? “Let me go,” she warned, and pounded her fists into his back.

  He smacked her hard on the rump in response. She gasped and reached around for her skirts. Unfortunately he knew what she was going for and yanked her hem over her knees. He plucked the first dagger away from her left calf, and then the other from the right. The two she had strapped to her thighs came next, accompanied by a muttered oath from his lips.

  “Give me back my blades, ye lying pig!”

  “Be silent.” He smacked her bottom again.

  Fortunately, the sky opened up and a peal of thunder absorbed most of the curses she shouted at him. The rain, though, chose not to fall quickly enough. For when they entered the courtyard there were enough people still about to get a good look at her. One of them was Lord Oxford.

  “Captain Grant, I insist that you release her this instant!”

  Huzzah, Henry! Huzzah! Mairi cheered silently, dangling over Connor’s back end. When he walked past Henry without pause, she looked up and offered the earl’s son a helpless look. If Henry saved her from this she might just kiss his face. Mayhap, she would even do it while Connor watched.

  “Grant!” her champion called out gallantly. “Put her down or suffer the cons
equences.”

  Ah, finally Connor stopped. He turned slowly, blocking her view of Oxford. “What consequences would those be, Oxford?”

  Och, this was about to go sour. Henry should not have threatened him. Connor had not risen up in rank so quickly because the king showed favor to his family. Gossip had not spread about his bedroom victories alone. He had earned respect on the battlefield and proved his worth to the Royal Army. Mairi knew firsthand how deadly his blade was, for she had watched him practice with his father. She prayed Henry had the good sense to know when to retreat. She could not see him to urge him to use caution.

  “I will see you in the lists and trounce you properly.”

  Mairi closed her eyes and pounded Connor’s lower back softly. Fool! However, she reasoned suddenly, she was in his one hand, and four of her daggers were in his other. Connor would have to put her down if he meant to fight. This could still work in her favor. Och, but poor Henry.

  Her eyes shot open when Connor’s rough palm dragged over her buttocks then patted her at the end of the trail.

  “I’ll meet ye there after I remind this wench of a few things.”

  Mairi struggled to wrench herself around and slapped Connor in the back of the head. He turned to give her a dark look that promised retribution. She wanted to slap him again but he swung back around, taking her with him.

  “If ye want to try to stop me,” he drawled, turning back to Henry with a lethal little smirk, “give it a go.”

  Mairi did not breathe in the dead silence that followed. Henry was not so foolish, after all. He possessed no more courage than she did against the knuckle-dragging oaf waiting patiently for Henry’s next move. When nothing came, Connor chuckled and turned away.

  He walked straight into Captain Nicholas Sedley.

  “Grant, who do you have there?” Mairi heard him and turned a deeper shade of crimson. “Where did you find him?”

  “Who?” Connor asked, turning around in his spot to see whom Sedley spoke of.

  “That peasant being escorted by your lieutenant.”