The Reluctant Bride

by Temple Hogan

  “Come out, wench, wherever you are,” he bellowed, his voice ringing in the great hall’s vaulted dome, reverberating from the stone walls, growing in volume until it seemed like the voice of doom itself. “You’ve cost me one son this day and many of my clansmen. I’ll not be cheated of m’prize now.”

  Logan snatched Cailla backward, pressing her against the wall. They waited, holding their breath lest even that be heard by the milling men below. Any moment they’d climb the stairs in search of her. Logan seemed to sense the need for haste, for he nudged her forward. She understood they must get out of the open. Staying low and against the wall, she crept toward the east tower where they could hide undetected. They were nearly there!

  “Halt!” The cry came from below.

  “‘Tis the wench. Get her,” Donel Moncrieffe snarled and his men raced for the stairs, their armor clanking ominously against the hallowed stones.

  Logan grabbed hold of Cailla’s hand and led the way to the east tower. There was nothing for it but to climb the narrow spiral staircase to the upper floor. Even as they ascended she could hear the outraged bellows of her pursuers.

  They entered a sitting room, but Cailla didn’t pause, racing instead to another short corridor that led to the nursery where once she’d played. Cailla turned sideways and edged her way through the twisting space deliberately made so as to be a deterrent to would be captors. A full-sized man in battle armament could not negotiate such a narrow pathway. Behind her, Logan inhaled sharply as he squeezed between the narrow stone walls. Cailla burst into the nursery and drew a breath, her gaze sweeping around the room until it settled on a large wooden chest.

  “Christ’s blood,” Logan muttered under his breath as he gained the nursery at last.

  Cailla paid him no mind, but rushed to the chest and raised its heavy lid. She threw out the toys and blankets that filled it, then pushed against the bottom searching for and finding the secret latch that sent the bottom sliding away. A black hole gaped below.

  Logan glanced at her in surprise but made no comment.

  “Hurry,” he urged.

  Without hesitation she swung one leg over then the other, her feet automatically feeling for the rung of a ladder she knew to be there. Logan followed, closing the chest lid. Cailla reached up to press the bottom of the chest back in place. To any who looked, the chest would appear normal. The action brought her close to Logan, and they pressed tightly together, chest to chest, groin to groin. She glanced at him keenly and even in the pitch blackness she sensed the hunger in him, sharp as a razor, insistent and not to be denied. He lowered his head as if to kiss her. Her heart hammered in her chest but not from fear, at least not the fear she’d known thus far this day. She took her foot from the rung and slid downward, feeling every inch of his body along the way, even the bulge that had suddenly appeared midway. Curiosity assailed her and a sudden sweet longing she’d never known before pierced her senses.

  She clambered down the stairs in the darkness, but she was unafraid. Logan was right above her. His presence gave her a sense of security she hadn’t known except in her father’s presence. At the bottom of the stairs, she stepped back to allow Logan to descend. He looked around and when he saw they were in a closet of some sort, he breathed a sigh, then without warning, he gripped her shoulders and pulled her into his embrace. His lips lowered to hers in a hard kiss that softened only enough for him to press his tongue between her teeth and invade her mouth. His taste was hot and masculine. It aroused something inside her that she recognized as lust only because she’d heard the maids talk about it. She’d never comprehended what it really was before, but now she did.

  Despite herself, she answered his kiss, opening her mouth to him, trembling in his embrace. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her tightly against him, until their bodies melded as one. She felt the bulge of his cock against her stomach, felt the power of his frame, his thighs. She wanted to touch him in all sorts of intimate places.

  He ended the kiss and stood back. It was too dark here to see his face, but his breath was hot on her cheek, his chest rising and falling with the deep rhythm. Desire filled the small dark space with its breathless, slick need.

  Logan took her hand.

  “Where to now?” he demanded.

  “Come!” She raced up the stone steps and led the way cautiously past the kitchens to a small door that opened into a private courtyard. This had been her mother’s favorite place because the redolent scent of herbs, sage and thyme and lavender filled the air. Vegetables were planted along the sides and fruit trees dotted the grassy center. Birds flitted in and out among the branches and butterflies rested on delicate blossoms. Death seemed far away from this spot.

  “Do you know what you’re doing, lass?” Logan asked under his breath as he regarded the open area they must cross.

  “Aye, we have but to climb those stairs to the parapet and enter the North tower through that door.” She motioned to the other end of the courtyard and a door set in the stone wall. “When we were children we used to…well, let me show you.”

  Logan muttered under his breath. Twilight was settling over the castle, casting pools of shadows along the walls of the courtyard but the courtyard itself was still well lit, as was the parapet above.

  “‘Twill soon be dark,” Cailla whispered. “We could wait and try it then.”

  Voices came from the kitchens behind them. Logan shook his head. “Nay, we’ll be found. ‘Tis now or never. Stay close to the walls.” He took hold of her hand, propelling them both out into the courtyard.

  Having no choice, Cailla ran as she’d never done before. Behind them came a roar that sent her heart into her mouth. They were so close to escape. But Logan took no chances, jerking her toward a shadowed corner under the stairs and crushing her against his side as if to communicate through this contact the need for silence.

  They stood pressed against the stones, chests heaving, struggling to still their desperate gasps for air. And behind them came the bellow of Donel Moncrieffe as he stomped out into the courtyard followed by his sons.

  “Find her or by the gods I’ll have your heads nailed to the front gate. She’s but a woman and she confounds you. What kind of men are you?”

  Sullenly, his remaining sons glanced at each other. The look on their faces clearly said they’d fought long and hard this day at their father’s bidding and longed for a flask of ale and a soft wench on their lap. Logan motioned to the stairs and stealthily they made their way up while below Donel berated his whining sons.

  “Bah, get out of my sight,” he said finally, as if reading their minds.

  With alacrity they spun to make their escape but another man had entered the courtyard and reluctantly they stayed at their father’s side. At the sight of this newcomer Logan tensed, his whole body bunching as if readying to launch an attack. Cailla held her breath, darting him a quizzical glance.

  “By the gods, what’s happened? Why haven’t you found them?” The man’s tone was clearly derisive of the clan leader’s failure.

  “There must be another way out of the castle,” Donel Moncrieffe grumbled defensively. His voice had taken on a whine not unlike his sons. “Otherwise, we’d have them swinging from a rope now.”

  Logan edged forward to stare down at the men. His face was grim, his mouth a thin slash in his beard, his features as hard as chiseled stone. She sensed a dangerous tension in him that might explode at any moment and peered over the edge to see what had brought about such a change in him, but his hand pressed her down against the stones. Still she could see the men clearly. Donel Moncrieffe, broad and towering, appeared almost humbled before the other man, a waspishly sparse man with sharp features, thin blond hair and darting eyes.

  “Is it Lundy MacAuley?” she whispered.

  Logan made no answer but she knew from his hawk-like visage that it was. Cailla shivered, grateful he was not counted among her enemies and turned her attention to the two men in the courtyard.

&nbs
p; “Bah, ‘tis incompetence!” Lundy sneered. “You’ll receive no reward if MacPherson and his men are not found.”

  “You promised me the castle and the lass in return for my help,” Donel Moncrieffe howled. “I’ll hold you to it or—”

  At Lundy’s back, Kenneth drew his dirk and crept closer.

  “Or what?” Lundy snapped, spittle forming in the corners of his mouth.

  In one swift movement, he drew his dagger, turned and slashed Kenneth’s throat. A look of surprise distorting his face, Kenneth’s hands pressed to his throat but the blood poured through his fingers and down onto his chest. He fell to the ground, his eyes staring sightlessly at his father.

  “Aigh!” Donel cried and turned on Lundy, barrel chest heaving in grief, his small mean eyes blood shot.

  Drawing his dirk, he stepped forward and drove it toward Lundy, who turned aside and seized Donel’s arm, twisting it back until the weapon fell from his hand and he crashed to the ground, groveling.

  “I’ll kill you,” Donel wept.

  “You’ll do nothing of the sort or you’ll have all of Leslie’s forces down on your backside and your precious clan will be broken and your lands confiscated. Besides the boy was trying to kill me. What did you think I would do, let him? Enough whining and excuses. Find MacPherson and his men or by god’s blood you and the half-witted son you have left will find a rope around your dirty fat necks.” Turning on his heel, the thin man stalked across the courtyard, but Moncrieffe’s words stopped him.

  “You have a real hatred for this MacPherson,” he jeered, staggering to his feet and staring at his son’s executioner with hate. Obviously he was hoping to inflict some damage back. “Why didn’t you capture him long before he came here?”

  Lundy turned on him, his gaze dark and threatening. Donel took a step back.

  “I will tell you once and only once so you’ll know what manner of man you’re dealing with,” he said ominously. “Listen carefully. I know this man from boyhood. Once we were like brothers, but he betrayed me. He’s wily and dangerous, a brutal desperate man who will let nothing stop him. He has the strength of twenty and no allegiance to anyone but himself. He’d put a knife through his own brother’s heart if it benefited him. You’ll find no mercy from him.”

  Cailla heard Lundy’s words and was bereft. In the desperate hour just past, she’d come to trust Logan. Now she heard words that painted him as a different man—a brutal, murderous man who would stop at nothing to get what he wanted. For a moment, the world tilted and her vision was blocked by a blackness so deep and pervasive she saw nothing, only felt the deadly terror that filled her mind and heart. What had the man called Logan MacPherson done to deserve a reputation as a desperate and brutal man? Yet Lundy had just proven his own brutality.

  It mattered not about either of them, she decided. She was more desperate than they, so she would become more brutal. She would use Logan MacPherson to attain what she needed to save her home, then she would kill him if she had to. Until then, she would pretend to trust him. Suddenly, Lundy’s voice sounded again.

  “There they are on the wall! Both of them.”

  “We’ve got them now! Get him Will or you’ll not have your comforts this night!” Donel shouted gleefully.

  “Damnation!” Logan muttered, his dirk out.

  With a quick flick of his wrist, the weapon flew through the air and lodged itself deep in Donel Moncrieffe’s fat neck. His strangled cry was cut off. Blood welled from his greasy lips and stained his dirty beard as he fell to the ground lifeless. He shuddered and lay still, but Lundy MacAuley was already drawing his sword and William Moncrieffe was running toward the stairs they’d taken moments before.

  “Go, go,” Logan whispered urgently, shoving Gowain’s daughter toward the tower door. Once inside he dropped the bar in place and looked around for an exit. Seeing none he turned on her in frustration, his eyes glittering with incredulity.

  “Damnation, it’s a trap. There’s no way out.” Outside the chamber they’d entered came the sound of men throwing their weight against the stout oak door in an attempt to break it open.

  “My father didn’t send you, did he? He’d have nothing to do with a man like you,” she spat at him. Her chest heaved with each gasp of air, auburn hair, loosened from its confining braid, swirled around her shoulders. Indeed, she looked every inch the avenging angel he’d imagined her before, but Logan had no time to admire her beauty. He released her hands and searched around the room.

  “There must be a door,” he muttered while from beyond came the battering of wood against wood. Soon Lundy’s men would succeed in breaking down the door, bringing certain death to them both, but the girl couldn’t see that now. “Where is it?” he shouted, glancing at her. “What, you don’t want to escape? You want to be captured by the man you just watched murder people in cold blood?”

  “I didn’t say that,” she stammered, moving toward him. “It’s just I don’t need to escape now. Thanks to you, Moncrieffe is dead. I’m safe from him.”

  “But not from Lundy, who is ten times worse,” Logan shouted at her. “If you know a way out, then show me. Then you can stay and enjoy Lundy’s hospitality all you want. I won’t die with you.”

  At that moment the door splintered. It was too late. Logan looked around for a weapon and saw a rusty claymore resting atop some barrels. He ran across the room and snatched it up, then halted, his gaze raking across the scene. What had caught his eye? There, a door set into the wall in such a manner as to be almost invisible, but even as his gaze fell on it, Cailla leaped forward and pressed her foot against a lever on the floor. A door swung outward.

  “Come on,” he shouted, grabbing Cailla’s wrist and yanking her forward. “There’s still time to escape.” A dirk, thrown through the splintered opening, hit the stone wall near Logan’s head and landed at his feet.

  They scrambled through with surprising speed. The men hacking away at the wooden door had widened a considerable hole. Now, seeing their quarry so close and about to escape again, they set up howls of frustration. Logan paused and shoved his blade under the lever and wrenched it downward thereby breaking the blade and rendering the lever no longer usable. The door swung closed so quickly he barely had time to get clear.

  They were on a small wooden landing scarcely wide enough for two people to stand. Logan peered over the edge. A ladder led down the steep incline to a tiny shelf of a beach. Beyond that was the cold, deep loch.

  “We can’t be caught on the ladder,” he muttered. “We’d be too vulnerable and unable to fight back.”

  “There’s no other way down save the obvious,” Cailla said.

  Eyeing the cold water, Logan shuddered. “Can you swim?” he demanded, shucking off his heavy mesh shirt.

  “When I was but a wee bairn, the other children and I dove from the hoardings into the loch below.” She said disdainfully. “Of course, there are the rocks. They’re no danger to you, if you know where to jump.” She grinned with a nasty satisfaction upon seeing the shudder he was unable to suppress as he stared at the dark, swirling waters with obvious dread.

  The sound of cries came to them from the stone tower. It was only a matter of time before Lundy’s men found the latch. They had to act quickly if they were going to escape at all.

  “Are you afraid?” Cailla asked, casting him a deprecating look.

  “Nay, I’m not afraid, but I’ve no death wish either,” he replied calmly and, taking hold of her hand, stepped forward into space, dragging Cailla with him.

  The sense of lightness, of soaring, rushed over her in their mad plunge but she barely noticed. Her heart was heavy with dread and disgust for her gullibility that she’d allowed him to kiss her, had allowed him to awaken such responses. Let them hit rocks and let his life be dashed away, she prayed though hers would end as well. What did it matter now? She’d lost Tioram to her father’s enemies and through her own foolish trust delivered herself into the hands of a man as unscrupulous as Donel Mo
ncrieffe himself.

  Anguish filled her heart and a keening wail escaped her lips, echoing against rocks then the dark loch waters closed over her head and the night grew still again.

  Chapter Five

  The height of their jump drove them deep beneath the water. Logan’s feet still hadn’t touched bottom before he began the rebound to the surface. Somewhere in that wild leap, he’d lost his grip on Cailla. He broke the surface and tossed his head, sluicing water from his hair while his gaze swept the dark waters. There was no sign of Gowain’s daughter. Had she been killed by the fall? Nay, such as she would not die so easily.

  “Where are you, lass?” he whispered harshly, looking around with a sense of dread. At that moment, a sleek head popped to the surface nearly on top of him.

  “You…you…” she cried, swinging at him.

  He ducked, grabbing hold of her shoulders and pulling her hard against him while his strong legs treaded water.

  “Hear this and believe it if you can,” he said into her ear, relishing the shapely warmth of her body against his.

  “‘Twas not as Lundy said,” Logan said forcefully. “I’m not all those things.”

  “You haven’t killed other men??” she asked disbelievingly, stiff and shivering in his watery embrace.

  He could feel the tension in her body pressed as it was against his. “‘Tis not the time or place to go into this, lass. They’ll be after us any moment.”

  “I have no fear of the men above,” she gasped. “They cannot be of any greater danger to me than you are.”

  “Nay. I’ve come to protect you,” he assured her. His hold tightened on her. He needed her cooperation if they were get out of this alive, but her fierce accusing gaze showed clearly she would not be persuaded about him. To argue with her now was pointless.

  Torches flared on the ledge above as men lined the battlements to peer into the waters. She coughed and he clamped a hand over her mouth, a strong arm pinning her against his side. His long legs scissored through the water keeping them both afloat. Torchlight swept over the dark water.