A Soldier's Salvation (Highland Heartbeats Book 7)

by Aileen Adams

  Which was more than enough reason to keep his hands to himself.

  “What is it?” he murmured, hoping to sound calm and reassuring.

  She was still panting for air as if she’d just run a footrace. “I was startled. I… I didn’t realize I’d fallen asleep.”

  “Aye, ye did. For quite a while, in fact.”

  “I did?” She ran both hands over her head, distracted and perhaps frustrated with herself.

  “It’s what people normally do at night, after all.”

  A brief smile flitted across her face. “I was unaware. Thank you.”

  He watched as she collected herself, amused the way a child unwilling to admit the truth to an adult always amused him. “Why are you so upset with yourself for having fallen asleep?” he couldn’t help but ask.

  “I was simply alarmed. I’m not upset with myself.” She fixed him with an icy stare. “Have you ever been startled out of sleep?”

  “Many times,” he whispered. He could remember very many times, in fact.

  “Well, then. You ought to know.” She stretched, groaning. “Sleeping on the ground doesn’t do any favors for my back.”

  “You are not alone in this.”

  “I know.” She looked around. “Are the others asleep?”

  “Aye—at least, they’re supposed to be.”

  “I see.” She looked at him from the corner of her eye. “And you? Are you not tired?”

  “I’m quite tired and would like very much to go to sleep. In a large bed with a fresh straw tick and linen sheets which have been hanging out in the sun all day.”

  A slow smile spread across her face. “A soft pillow.”

  He nodded. “Aye, and no reason to get up early in the morning. To lie about until I was good and ready to get up.”

  “That would be wonderful,” she sighed, pulling her knees to her chest before wrapping both arms around her legs. “I haven’t slept in a bed in so long. Floors, the ground.”

  “I rarely have the luxury of a bed,” he commiserated.

  A breeze blew past them, catching her before reaching him. The fragrance of her skin, her hair, the certain something that made her different from all the other women who’d ever lived. It touched him, wrapping itself around him like a blanket.

  The longing built in him again. He wanted so badly to touch her.

  He reached out, catching a strand of light hair between his first two fingers and testing its softness before tucking it behind her ear.

  She turned her face away, just slightly.

  “Should I not have?” he whispered, keenly aware of the presence of the other three so close to where they sat but unable to stop himself nonetheless.

  She shook her head. “No. Or, rather, yes. I don’t know. It’s all right.”

  He allowed himself the luxury of running the backs of his fingers over her jaw. “Caitlin. Lass. I know what you wanted to do tonight.”

  It was the wrong thing to say. The wrong time to say it.

  She jerked away, springing to her feet. He stood, too, holding a hand to his mouth to signal her silence. It wasn’t that he worried over waking the men for their sake, but rather for his own. He had no desire for them to learn how clumsy he’d been.

  She glared at him, stomping one foot in impotent rage and shaking her fists. “You are a brute. A horrible, horrible thing.”

  “Because I’m not the fool you take me for?” he hissed.

  “You’re so terribly… indelicate.”

  “Do not change the subject, Caitlin. You were planning on running away.”

  “What of it, then?” she challenged.

  “It’s the most foolish idea you could’ve come up with.”

  She stomped her foot again, harder this time. “You call what I wanted to do foolish, when you don’t understand that I only wanted to do it for you.”

  And like that, in the length of time it took to blink an eye, she sank to the ground and buried her head in her arms. Her shoulders shook with the force of her sobs.

  He’d hurt her. The last thing he’d ever wanted to do. He loved her, he wanted nothing more than to protect her from those who would do her harm, and he’d brought her to this state.

  He sank to his knees, close to her but careful not to touch in case she should become further upset. How absurd this was—he’d killed men, eviscerated and maimed and ridden endless days and nights over rough, rocky terrain. He’d survived his own wounds and tended to them on his own for lack of a healer, all of them far too concerned with the more severely wounded to treat a bloody head or broken shoulder.

  Yet he couldn’t stand the sight or sound of a sobbing woman.

  Especially when he was the reason for it and even more so because it was her.

  “Caitlin. I didn’t mean to make you cry so. I shouldn’t have said it.” He wondered if she could hear him over the force of her sobs, but he wouldn’t have raised his voice for anything. Better they not know he’d reduced the lass to tears with his clumsiness.

  He took a chance then, touching her back.

  She flung him off. “Leave me alone,” was the broken whisper he received in reply.

  He stood, knowing it was hopeless and knowing with even more certainty that he could not afford to let her out of his sight. Instead of his awareness dissuading her, she’d only be more determined than ever to show him she could escape.

  He returned to where he’d been seated, suddenly miserable and full of self-recrimination.

  Brice stirred. “I’d say that could have gone better,” he muttered before rolling to his other side.

  22

  You cannot be serious.” Caitlin looked from one of them to the other, searching for some sign of laughter. They often exchanged jests, seemed to always be chuckling over some joke or another—normally at the expense of one of them.

  They were all serious.

  Brice held out the rope. “I’m sorry, lass, but this is the way it has to be.”

  “My name is Caitlin, for one.” She dug her nails into her palms, willing herself not to reach out and slap the rope from his hands. And perhaps claw his eyes out while she was at it.

  “My apologies. Caitlin. This is for the best.”

  “According to who?”

  “According to all of us,” Rodric replied.

  “I didn’t ask you,” she snarled.

  He bristled but continued nonetheless. “It’s for the best, Caitlin, because we cannot run the risk of you fleeing. No matter your reasons for doing so.”

  She hoped he didn’t see her flinch. Her behavior of the evening prior was not something she was proud of. The way she’d wept!

  Not out of heartbreak, but out of frustration at not being heard or understood. Not being able to explain herself fully. He would never know why she’d wanted to leave and would go on thinking it was a result of her stubborn nature.

  He wouldn’t know it was for his sake, in order to spare him any further danger.

  No, he’d rather believe himself the cleverest, the strongest, someone who knew so much better than she what was best for her.

  Her nails dug in deeper. The pain helped keep her from crying all over again. It was always one of her least favorite qualities, the way she often cried when overwhelmed by strong emotion—even when that emotion was rage.

  “Allow me to understand you.” She folded her arms, glaring at all of them until their gazes dropped to the ground.

  All of them except one, naturally. Rodric jutted his chin out, challenging her to make him look away.

  She scowled. “You expect me to ride with my wrist tied to one of yours at all times?”

  “Aye. That is exactly what we expect. ‘Tis the only way to ensure you don’t follow the desire to run.”

  “It is not my desire to run. I wished to do it because I knew I should. I still know it.”

  “Which is why you will be tethered to one of us at all times. It’s really quite simple. So. Are you ready to start out?”

  I
t was all too humiliating. He treated her like he’d treat a child, and when she was willing to sacrifice herself for his sake.

  She’d not make that mistake again.

  “Certainly. The sooner we arrive, the happier I’ll be.” It was a true challenge, keeping her head high as she went to her mare. The lovely animal dug at the ground with one hoof, snorting and whinnying in eagerness to be on her way.

  Would that Caitlin could share her enthusiasm.

  Rodric stepped up to her, the rope extended. “Your wrist, please.”

  “Which one?” she asked with a sweet smile which belied the rage bubbling in her chest.

  “The left, please. Your partner will ride to your left.”

  Brice held on to the mare’s reins as she allowed Rodric knot the length of rope around her wrist. She ground her teeth until her mouth ached but would not allow them to see her humiliation.

  “Not you,” she snapped as Rodric moved to tie the other end to himself. She knew he would tie it to himself, and that denying him would hurt his pride. “I want Brice.”

  The tall, forbidding man cleared his throat loudly to cover a chuckle. Caitlin didn’t look his way. She looked at Rodric, one eyebrow arched in a silent challenge. What do you think of that?

  His eyes narrowed, the muscles jumping in his jaw. “If Brice is amenable.”

  “I see no reason why not.” Brice stepped between them—likely a measure to keep them from brawling like a pair of drunken fools. “I’ve been in far less pleasant positions with lasses far less lovely than yourself.”

  Rodric all but threw the rope at his friend, which told her Brice’s remarks had hit their target.

  There was more than enough slack between them to allow for riding single-file if need be, but the road they started out on was wide enough to ride two abreast. Rodric and Quinn rode in front of them with Fergus bringing up the rear.

  As they trotted further away from Fiona and Kent’s farm—or, rather, what little was left of it—Caitlin’s heart clenched. She wouldn’t have looked back even if she could, knowing there was no longer anything to see but ruins and two mounds of freshly dug-up earth beside what was once a home.

  Quinn exchanged a look with Rodric before glancing back at Brice, then Fergus. Moments later he dug in his heels, flicked the reins and took off at a gallop.

  “Where is he going?” she asked. He hadn’t even said a word.

  “He’ll ride ahead of us,” Brice explained. “He’ll alert our friends to the goings on here. It might be best for them to send out a few riders to meet us along the way.”

  Her heart clenched tighter than before. “You believe we’ll need extra escorts?” If four fierce men such as these she rode with believed they needed assistance, was she as safe as she’d believed up to that point? Likely not.

  “It cannot hurt,” he replied, offering her a brash smile. She decided she liked him. He was rather rough, yes, but he had a sense of humor about him which she couldn’t help but enjoy.

  Even if she was tied to him, and him to her.

  She also enjoyed the way he made a point of throwing jests at Rodric whenever he could.

  “Might I ask a question?”

  Brice turned his attention to her. “Certainly.”

  Watching Rodric from the corner of her eye, she asked, “What is it you do together? The four of you, I mean?”

  Fergus, riding behind them, choked slightly.

  Brice’s eyes twinkled, but it was difficult to judge whether he smiled thanks to the unkempt beard which covered part of his mouth.

  Rodric did not react. Not that she could see, at any rate.

  “For starters, it isn’t only the four of us,” Brice explained. “We are what you might call the central group. The four who always travel together. There are several others who move in and out of our circle depending on where we happen to ride and what our destination happens to be.”

  “Why? And what determines your destination?”

  He faced forward, his chest puffing out as he drew a deep breath. “Oftentimes, there are people who need protection. Yourself, for instance. You need protecting at the moment because there are those in the world who might wish harm to ye, or who would have ye do as they say—while they might not have your best interests at heart, so to speak.”

  “I see…”

  “It’s up to men such as ourselves to ensure you’re looked after. We provide protection, assistance, and the like.”

  She was no clearer on the subject than she’d been minutes earlier. “You say it’s up to you to do this. Why? According to whom?”

  He chuckled. “According to ourselves.”

  “Why?”

  “Simply because it’s what we want to do.”

  Fergus spoke up from behind her. “None of us could see the virtue of returning to lives of boredom after what we’d been through in the army.”

  “It would be the first thing on my mind,” she admitted with a shrug. “After all of that, I’d want nothing more than to settle into safe boredom.”

  “And there are many who share your opinion,” Brice replied, tugging a bit on the rope which connected them when she veered slightly to the right while looking over her shoulder to where Fergus rode.

  She turned her attention forward to prevent that from happening again. “You prefer living as you do, then?” she asked, the question directed at the back of Rodric’s head.

  He remained still and silent.

  “Prefer?” Brice asked, scratching his wild hair until it looked wilder than ever. “I don’t know that I’d use that word. But there’s no fitting in with the civilized world for the likes of us.”

  She kept her gaze trained on Rodric. “You truly believe that?”

  Brice grunted. “Aye. We do.”

  Rodric gave no movement, not a single flinch. Nothing to show her whether he agreed with his friend or not.

  For the moment, something else took precedence over the many questions going through her mind. “You earn a living, doing what you do?”

  “Aye. A lot of good it would do us if we didn’t,” Brice chuckled, and Fergus joined him.

  “Who is paying you to do this for me?”

  Brice’s chuckles turned to coughs.

  “I have no silver of my own, you understand,” she explained. Was that what they expected? That she would make it worth their while?

  Rodric had to know better than to believe she could hope to compensate them for the time and trouble they’d taken.

  “We’re aware of that,” Brice assured her.

  “Then, why? Why go to this trouble when no one is compensating you for it?”

  He cut his eyes in the direction of his friend, whose straight back gave no indication of his even hearing their discussion. “Why, I don’t know. Perhaps you’d better have that out with someone who knows better than I do.”

  For the first time since they’d begun speaking, Rodric reacted. He turned his head just enough to meet Brice’s gaze—and a stormy expression twisted his handsome features into a mask of fury. “Perhaps ye should mind matters which apply to you and allow others to take care of the rest,” he suggested in a cold voice.

  “This was your idea?” Caitlin asked, genuinely surprised. “No one alerted you to my peril? No one offered a reward for your claiming me?”

  “Who would have, lass?”

  It came out as a snarl, like that of an angry dog, and she recoiled from the power of it. She hadn’t intended to bruise his pride, but the damage had already been done.

  He snapped the reins, turning his attention to the road ahead as the horse carried him in a fast trot far from them.

  Her heart sank. More than anything, she wished to ride ahead and apologize for having hurt his pride. Perhaps it was indelicate of her, asking such questions in front of the others, but she truly hadn’t counted on Rodric convincing his friends to go to this trouble without any other motivation other than her welfare.

  She chewed her lip, lost in thought. I
t all became murkier with each passing day, the tenuous relationship they shared. As though she walked in a loch with a muddy bottom, her feet kicking up the silt until what had been clear before her entrance was now hopelessly clouded.

  Brice clicked his tongue sorrowfully. “Och, lass, it’s sorry I am for pushing your lad too hard. Sometimes I do that, jesting when the time for jests has passed. It’s difficult, ye see, because I don’t know the time has passed until it’s already passed.”

  “You don’t know you’ve gone too far until it’s too late.”

  “That’s the truth of it,” he agreed.

  He’s not my lad, she wished to protest, but that would have made her appear childish. There was no reason to argue the point, especially when Brice had just made it clear that everything they did, they did because Rodric had decided they would.

  They rode on in silence. It seemed the safest course.

  Rodric continued to ride far in the lead, his straight posture and refusal to so much as turn his head to the side making his feelings a mystery to her.

  23

  There had only come a few times over the course of their friendship when Rodric had sincerely wished to kill Brice—or at least to maim him in some lasting way. The scars, he reasoned, would serve as a future reminder that he was not a man to be trifled with.

  As he rode ahead of the group, he thought this might be the time to make good on that which he’d only imagined up to then.

  It was a hot morning, which meant the day would likely be just as hot. Dark clouds were building on the horizon and slowly making their way east, telling him a storm would hit before the day was out. There would likely be a great roar in the sky. Even now, long before the clouds reached him, he felt a surge all around him. The hair on the back of his neck stood up, the horse beneath him behaving skittishly.

  “Whoa, there,” he murmured, patting its neck.

  His attitude could have been what bothered the animal so, he reasoned. Animals were able to get the sense of a situation even if they didn’t understand the subtleties. The tan gelding between his thighs couldn’t have offered an opinion on the situation, but he knew Rodric was in no good mood as a result of it.