by Paula Quinn
The treacherous cliffs of Elgol were no match for Tamas Fergusson. He found so much delight in the roar of the waves below the narrow precipice that he roared back. It was jarring enough to hear him screeching at the top of his lungs, but when he leaned over the side of the laird’s horse as far as he could to have a look down, everyone behind them let out a shout. Either he had complete trust in the man securing him by the wrist, or his fearlessness went beyond anything the rest of them knew—especially Will, who nearly passed out just peeking over the edge.
Topping the cliffs, they came to a high ridge overlooking a vast, heather-lined glen and a wide bay to the west. Quaint, thatch-roofed bothies littered the landscape while snowcapped mountain ranges cut across the northern sky. In the center of it all, Camlochlin Castle rose out of the dark curtain wall behind it, the Devil’s fortress cupped in God’s glorious hand.
Isobel took a deep breath and found the air moist and refreshing to her lungs. Now, if she could just get her heart to slow down.
There were already a number of people spilling out of the bothies, as well as the wide castle doors, eager to see the approaching riders. Rob took off into the glen first, his horse’s hooves trampling the heather as he raced toward a woman breaking from the small crowd to meet him. He bounded from his horse before it came to a complete stop and swept her off her feet and into his arms.
There were other women waiting, two in particular who watched in silence as the remaining riders trotted toward them. One woman, the taller of the two, fixed her dark eyes on the laird and Tamas first and then on Isobel.
“Fergusson prisoners?” The smaller woman, standing a bit hunched beside the first, quirked a raven brow at Cameron.
“Just Fergussons, Maggie.” Coiling his arm around Tamas’s waist, the laird dismounted and deposited the boy at her feet. Maggie and Tamas gave each other a level stare before Maggie huffed and watched him run off.
“Tamas!” MacGregor called out after planting a kiss on the taller woman’s mouth. “Stay oot of trouble!”
“Yes, Callum!” Tamas called back.
After a brief but frigid glare at her husband, the woman turned her eyes on Tristan. “It is good to see you alive, my son.” She didn’t wait for his response, or for introductions, while Tristan helped Isobel dismount, but turned on her heel and strode back to the castle without another word.
Watching her, Tristan’s father ran his hand over his bristly jaw. “I will speak to her,” he murmured, more to himself than to anyone else, and promptly followed her inside.
“What will yer father speak to her about?” Left alone with them, Maggie MacGregor fisted her small hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at Isobel and Cameron. “What have ye done this time, Tristan?”
Isobel hadn’t been around so many people inside one structure since Whitehall Palace. Camlochlin was not as grand as the king’s place of residence, but it was big enough to house more MacGregors than she was comfortable with. The halls were cavernous, with thick iron candle stands and bracketed wall torches lighting the maze of corridors.
Isobel did not smile at the faces staring back at her but reached for Cam’s hand instead. She should not have allowed him to come. Her fear about her error in judgment was validated when three enormous Highlanders sauntered toward her and halted in their tracks when Maggie spoke the word, “Fergussons.”
“Hell,” one of them growled deeply with disgust.
“Are we havin’ them fer supper, then?” Another, with red bushy hair peppered with gray and a long scar running from ear to chin, snarled.
“Easy, Angus,” Tristan warned him with a wry smile. “This bonnie lass will bite ye back.”
Isobel wanted to smile at him for crediting her with more courage than she probably had, and for coming to her rescue nonetheless. No matter what they thought of him here, the man she knew would have made Arthur Pendragon proud.
“Angus! Brodie!” The laird called out brusquely from the top of the stairs. “See that Camlochlin’s guests are treated well.”
The threat in his command did not need to be spoken aloud. The two burly Highlanders stepped away without another word or glance in her direction.
“Jamie,” he called to the third. “Bring Cameron oot to Finn and keep an eye on the wee one called Tamas. See that no harm comes to him.”
“Aye, Laird.”
For the first time since she stepped into the castle, Isobel breathed a sigh of relief. And she had him to thank. She looked up at Tristan’s father with appreciation in her eyes instead of hatred. The images she had of him, created from the horror of her childhood, were slowly being replaced by merciful glances and the tenderness in his large, scarred hands as he closed his plaid around her smallest brother. Somehow, Tamas had won his favor. That alone said much about him.
“Ye two.” There was nothing merciful in his eyes when he pointed down at her and Tristan. “Come with me.”
They followed him down a softly lit corridor, lined with heavy tapestries and littered with laughing children running for the stairs. When he reached the door, Tristan’s father did not pause in his stride but pushed open the thick doors and plunged inside.
“He is here. Speak to him.”
Kate MacGregor offered her husband a scathing glare but turned to them when they entered the large private solar.
“Very well,” she said, her stinging glance settling on Isobel. “Miss Fergusson, I am certain you are a lovely enough woman, but you do understand that your father coldly took my brother’s life. You and your family will not be welcomed here by me.”
Isobel nodded, having nothing to say. She felt as if she were looking into a pool, gazing at herself. Those were her eyes filled with anger, her unyielding lips, speaking unforgiving words she understood all too well. What could she say?
“Should they suffer fer the crimes of their faither?” Tristan said for her. “Mayhap we should ask Maggie and know her answer.”
“Tristan,” his father warned. “Mind what ye say.”
“I’ll mind what I say if I’m wrong, faither. Am I?”
“Nae, ye are no’ wrong,” the laird admitted even while his wife turned from him. “Katie,” he said more gently than Isobel had heard him yet.
“No, Callum,” she refused his unspoken plea. “You should understand better than anyone else. Growing up, your sister was all you had. You did not let your enemies kill her.” She turned again to Isobel and Tristan, this time with tears in her eyes. “We were orphans, left alone to be raised by a handful of old soldiers. Robert was the one who gave me courage. He was more than my brother. He was my playmate, my dearest friend, and the most chivalrous man I know. He did not deserve to be shot down in the dark by a madman whose pride was wounded.”
“I dinna’ dispute the truth of that,” Tristan told her gently. “Ye know that I loved him.” His gaze flickered to his father, then away again. “But Isobel lost much also. She and her brothers—”
“I do not wish to hear of it!” his mother’s voice overrode his. “Yer uncle was a good man, a fair man. He—”
“Ye know what he was, but ye would no’ have it of me,” Tristan accused.
“Not for the Fergussons!”
“Then that is a pity,” he countered meaningfully, “because I love her and I intend to make her my wife.”
Isobel drew in a sharp breath and closed her eyes, not wishing to see or feel the pain they had caused. Oh, but they were fools to believe the past could be so easily forgotten. The hatred would never end, and Tristan was about to lose his family because of her.
“You have betrayed us, Tristan,” she heard his mother say.
“So be it.” He took Isobel’s hand and led her toward the door. “I will nae longer betray my heart.”
Cameron watched Isobel and Tristan leave the solar and disappear down the corridor. Stepping out of the shadows, he looked at the heavy doors separating him from the freedom of ten years of guilt and cowardice. Thanks to Tristan, he refused to be tha
t man anymore. Girding up his courage, he lifted his hand to knock just as the door opened again.
“I heard everything,” he admitted to the tall warlord hovering over him. “Yer wife is wrong about one thing. A madman did not kill her brother. I did.”
Chapter Thirty-eight
Tristan’s chambers were not what Isobel had expected. To start, she had imagined a bigger bed, one covered in furs or silks to provide more comfort to the ladies who’d visited in the past. She was surprised to find his bed only slightly larger than Alex’s. There were no draperies covering the two deep windows on the western wall to offer warmth or silence from the whitecaps rolling in from Camas Fhionnairigh bay below. A worn chessboard rested uselessly on a table in the corner, many of its pieces missing.
At first glance, one might consider the man who slept here to be careless and inattentive. But crossing the room to the cooled, soot-stained hearth, Isobel noted the old swords hung with care above, the polished bookcase to her right, carved in rich walnut wood, each shelf neatly lined with books. She smiled. He took great care of the things that mattered to him.
“They are my uncle’s swords,” he said, coming up behind her.
“I thought as much.” She took a step away from him and went to the window. She couldn’t be near him. His warmth, his touch, his scent all worked diligently against her good sense. “Tristan, I… I cannot let ye lose yer family because of me.”
He did not move to go to her but remained where he stood in the middle of the room, alone, as he had been for most of his life. “Ye are my family, Isobel. Ye and yer brothers. Ye are all I want.”
“But we are not all ye need. Ye risked so much by trying to help my family because of who ye are… who ye have always been. But I fear yer purpose will fail. In the end, ye will only have us…”
“Then ’twill be enough.”
“No.” She turned to look at him, letting her tears fall freely. “Yer honor is what makes ye who ye are, Tristan. How will it be enough when ye must betray yer family? Ye heard what yer mother said—”
“It will be enough because ’twas their choice. No’ mine.” He went to her, shortening the distance between them in two long strides. “Isobel, ye are the one who makes me what I want to be. Ye are what I need.”
“There is something else,” she cried, looking away from his fervent gaze. “Something I have not told ye that will change everything.”
“I already know ’twas Cameron who shot my uncle, Isobel.” He took her in his arms when she looked up at him, stunned and terrified. “He told me at the inn, and I dinna’ care.” He withdrew just enough to cup her wet face in his hands and look deeply into her eyes. “It doesna’ change how much I love ye. Nothin’ ever will.”
He knew and he didn’t care. She smiled at his blurry face, certain that no lady from his books had ever loved her knight so well. But…“But if they find out and come against us again, how will ye stand on our side?”
“They will no’ find out. They will no’ come against ye. My faither is no’ the man I thought him to be. But even if I am wrong, Isobel, I will stand happily at yer side, knowin’ I have made the right choice.”
He had promised to dash her fears to pieces and change the things that saddened her to things that give her heart joy, and he kept his word. Finally, she allowed herself to breathe freely, to love him without apprehension. She wasn’t going to leave him, and she would battle anyone who tried to keep them apart.
“I will make ye happy, Tristan.”
“Ye already do.” He bent his face to hers and kissed her. She curled her arms around his neck, keeping him close even after he withdrew. “I should send word to fetch the priest,” he whispered against her ear.
“The priest can wait.”
He looked at her, his sexy dimple deepening, and then he kissed her again.
His breath was hot against her mouth, his kiss even hotter. She opened to his marauding tongue and moaned with pure pleasure at the feel of him against her, inside her. She missed the way he kissed her, but this was different. He took deliberate leisure with her mouth, taking what he wanted at his own pace, as if defying the world outside to stop him. He drove her mad, but she liked it. She was his, and he would let no one separate them.
“I cannot wait…” she moaned against his teeth.
He laughed and, snaking his arm around her waist, snatched her clear off the floor. Her breath quickened, and she smiled as he carried her to his bed.
He undressed her slowly, spreading his tongue over every inch of flesh he exposed, whispering of how fine she was, how sweet she tasted. Her muscles twitched beneath the mastery of his mouth. In the soft candlelight, his deft fingers explored her most sensitive creases, making her wild for him. She wanted to give him everything, everything he wanted until there was nothing left. The brush of his hair across her cheek as he kissed her eager mouth sent tantalizing quivers to the tips of her toes. Dear God, she wanted him, more of him, all of him. She told him so on a breathless sigh that pulled a groan from the back of his throat.
“How long will ye make me wait?”
He rose above her, smiling like a pagan prince ready to take what was rightfully his. “No’ too much longer,” he promised, unfastening his belt.
She watched him strip out of his clothes and ran her fingers down the ripples of his tight belly. The delicate brush of her palm over his swollen head both mortified and thrilled her. She’d never touched a man so intimately before. Emboldened by his husky groan, she stroked him from the tip of his head to the base of his shaft. He closed his eyes and leaned back on his thighs, his hands splayed behind him. At this angle, his stiff erection jutted upward like a lance, inviting her to take her pleasure. Visions of climbing atop him and straddling such a beast made the muscles between her legs tighten. She closed her fingers around him, astounded by such a mixture of satin and steel and that he fit entirely inside her. He was too big for one hand, so she used both to pet him gently.
He watched her with hooded, hungry eyes and covered her hands with one of his to guide her over him with more pressure. When a silken thread of moisture seeped from his tip, he stretched out his long legs and lay back.
“Come here.” His voice was thick with desire as she climbed over him.
“Where, my love?”
“Right here.” He spread his knees and cradled her between his thighs.
Isobel gazed down at him while he guided his passion into hers. She clutched at his chest as he took hold of her hips and thrust himself deeper. She delighted in the delicious tightening of her nipples and the wild hunger of his mouth as he sucked each in turn. He flicked his tongue over her and raked his teeth against her taut flesh while his hands directed her up and down over his long shaft. When he stretched beneath her, her eyes traveled over his lithe, muscular angles and she impaled him to the hilt. His body twitched with pleasure, and Isobel felt a hot spasm of satisfaction that he was hers to do with as she pleased. And she pleased him well. When she spread her tongue over his nipple, he smiled, tunneling his fingers through her hair. He pulled her closer to his mouth and branded her with a kiss. He held her tight against him, looking into her eyes while he slid his hand down her back and bent his knees to take her deeper.
Violent jolts of pure bliss scored her soul, her nerve endings, until she panted above him, her breath mingling with his. And still he drove into her harder, closer, grinding his hips with hers and watching her with his whole heart in his eyes while she found her release with his name on her lips.
“I love ye,” she whispered while he threw back his head and clenched his jaw. She felt him fill her with his hot seed, over and over until nothing remained but his hard, heavy breath and his wickedly satiated smile.
Later, Tristan ordered a bath prepared for them in his room. As he had promised, he climbed inside behind her, settling her neatly between his legs.
She rested her head on his chest and traced her fingers over the shapely contours of his calves, remembering
the time she had cut his boot to get to the arrow John had put there. The wound had healed nicely.
“Ye dreamed of me once,” she told him, recalling how he had called out her name while he recovered from his head wound… er… wounds.
“I dream of ye often.”
As he scooped her hair away from her neck, the husky pitch of his voice at her nape sent warm trickles along her spine.
“Tell me now why ye risked so much to go to my home?”
“ ’Twas yer ankles.”
“My ankles?” She lifted one leg out of the water and held it up to look.
“Aye.” He closed his arms around her and kissed her neck. “Whenever we spoke ye always ended up stormin’ away from me, exposin’ yer ankles to my admirin’ eyes.”
Isobel thought about it for a moment and then turned in the bath to lie atop him, her breasts pressed against his chest. “Are ye never serious, then?”
“Only in how much I love ye, Isobel.”
“And I love ye, Tristan.”
He rose out of the water with her in his arms, his big hands cupping her wet rump as he made his way to the bed. They never made it to the soft mattress. When she coiled her legs around his waist he hefted her higher over his sleek, hard belly and made love to her where they stood.
Isobel woke sometime later alone in Tristan’s bed. The sun had gone down outside his window. She sat up, wondering where Tristan was and hoping he’d gone to fetch them some food. She was as hungry as a bear, but the idea of leaving the room and running into his kin alone—especially his mother—made her heart pound.
When another quarter of an hour passed without his return, she girded up her loins and left the bed. She hated the idea of dressing in her dusty kirtle, but when she looked for it, she found that it, too, was gone.
In its place, draped across the bottom of the bed, was a gown of undyed lambswool and matching leather slippers. She picked up the gown, instantly admiring the luxurious fluidity of the fibers. She held it close to one of the dozen candles Tristan must have lit before he left. The stitching was exquisite, done in gold to match the thick braided girdle that hung low on the hips. Who had left it for her? She didn’t care. She had never owned anything so fine and quickly put it on. It fit, though a bit snugly around the waist. The fibers felt warm and wonderful against her skin, and her mood quickly lightened. She ran her fingers through her auburn locks, slipped her feet into the slippers, and left the room.