“Fine,” he said sourly. “Might be best if I can claim I waited ‘til the wedding anyway.”
“We’ll never be married, Archer!” Sabrina kicked the leg of the third man. He howled in pain and gave her a rough shake in response.
“He’ll publish the banns in seven days’ time, and we’ll be wed within a sennight.”
She jerked against the men who held her, but they laughed. Instead, she spat in Archer’s face with all the force she could muster.
“You’ll rot in the ground before I marry you.”
Despite all she knew about Archer’s cruel reputation, the blow had been unexpected. Her face flamed hot where he’d struck her, and the tears that blurred her eyes quickly rolled down her cheek. Her throat caught and she struggled to breathe.
“You’ll hold your tongue, wench,” Archer snarled, inches from Sabrina’s face. “Or you’ll not have a tooth left in your mouth by the time we arrive at Blackhaven.”
* * *
Ramsey Munro’s head felt as though it had been split in two with a dull cleaver. He’d have retired to his chambers for a nap if it hadn’t been for the chattering and noise coming from the hall down below. As he sat up in bed, his head screamed in protest and he cursed the earl’s rotgut wine. And the earl’s niece. Both put him in the present state of mind and both were about as bad for him as a cask of the meanest Highland whiskey.
Lady Margaret had caught him as he departed the great hall and had dragged him to see her father, a small, thin man named Richard.
He was so out-of-sorts, it had taken him a good several minutes to sort out that Richard was discussing something resembling a marriage contract between Ramsey and Margaret.
That irritating little chit? She had smiled and fawned over him, and he had tried not to fall asleep where he stood.
Apparently, there had been something of a misunderstanding at the feast. Margaret had taken his attention for something far more than he intended, and had gone to her father with news that she’d finally met her beloved.
He might have swords for Scotland, his practical side whispered. Men you could trust to fight the Gunns.
But that would mean putting up with Margaret, and Ramsey was not at all certain he could manage that without lashing out.
Unfortunately, there was no easy way to extract himself from the situation, and so he ended up riding over the grounds with the chit and her father, listening to the man nattering on about lineage and dowries and shared enemies.
At times, he was able to reduce the man’s voice to a dull background hum, and Ramsey’s thoughts inevitably turned to Sabrina. What was she doing? Had she run to her uncle to tell him of how Ramsey had dishonored her?
No, that did not seem like Sabrina’s way. She would instead nurse her hurt and anger, keeping them to herself. She would be quiet about it, and friends would ask what was wrong, and she would say nothing at all.
She would be howling with rage on the inside, though. He knew her well enough.
At least she would not make another attempt. He’d delivered a dark blow to her pride, and that was the one thing Sabrina de Montfort would never forgive—or forget.
But what else could he do? She would not give up just because he told her to. She would never give up. It was one of the things he so admired about her.
Stop thinking about her, Munroe.
“What do you think, Ramsey?” Richard asked. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Aye,” he said automatically, not sure what he was agreeing to. They were sitting in a particularly lovely green field, so he supposed they might have been discussing the landscape.
“Yes, beautiful,” Margaret tittered.
Ramsey ground his teeth.
Using Margaret as a distraction during the feast had clearly not been a good idea. He was paying for it dearly now.
By the time they released him from their company, it was far too late to start for home, and he resigned himself to another night spent in Ernald’s keep. His host would be pleased, though Ramsey supposed he’d have to lock himself in his room to keep from stirring Sabrina’s wrath again.
“Everything all right, sir?” a servant inquired as he retreated to his chamber.
“Aye,” he said, though nothing was all right. He dropped into his bed and shut his eyes, falling into a semi-sleep that did little more than stir up his thoughts.
His hours spent with the high-pitched Margaret had not helped his pounding head, and her father had been only marginally more tolerable. Her father was dead-set on a marriage with him, and Margaret had apparently decided they were quite suited to each other.
Richard had actually tried to open up negotiations while they strolled the keep’s grounds after their ride, much to Ramsey’s horror. She had clung to his arm while he tried to reason with her sire, laughing at inappropriate times and gazing up at him with a silly grin.
He’d maintained a smile for propriety’s sake, but had imagined Sabrina scowling at them from some hidden tower more than a few times during the course of the conversation. Sabrina...
Even her name made his body come alive. She had grown into an exquisite young woman, her long tresses a pale, burnished gold, her eyes alive and challenging his every move. How close he’d come to losing his resolve and kissing her in front of them all!
It would ruin her, though.
He needed to leave today, before she could tempt him a third time. And she would, if only by breathing. Sabrina might well ignore him for the rest of his stay, but her mere presence in the keep was driving him to distraction.
Ramsey’s sleep had been fitful at best. Once he put Richard and Margaret from his thoughts, Sabrina returned to him, albeit a much younger version of her.
He’d been twenty-four years old then, a man barely in control of his impulses whenever Sabrina came around. It was the summer she would turn eighteen and she was, in every way, coming into full bloom.
It was the night the rains had begun. The storm settled in and trapped them in the blacksmith’s abandoned quarters after they’d gone out riding that morning. The downpour drenched them within minutes and they’d sought shelter in the first building with a roof they’d found.
It took little time for Sabrina to have a fire started, and they’d hung their outer clothes on a rack they found in front of the fire. Both bundled in blankets found in a large oak chest beneath the bed, they’d sat side by side beneath a pile of rugs and blankets Ramsey had shaken out.
They spoke of trivial things like the new baker in the kitchen, a foal who had been born that spring, and his brothers. But it wasn’t long before the attraction they’d both been denying all through their long years together burst forth like a river after heavy rains.
He’d caught the glint of her yellow hair against the firelight and reached out to stroke it without thinking. Sabrina closed her eyes and leaned against his touch with a sigh. When she opened them, her green eyes were on fire, challenging him to make the next move.
Ramsey did. He grasped her face with both of his large hands and covered her mouth with his, delving his tongue into the sweet taste of her mouth. She moaned and pulled Ramsey with her as she lay down, running her hands on his shoulders, his back, down the corded muscles of his stomach until she very nearly touched the head of his shaft through the linen breeches he wore.
He almost pulled away—almost.
Then her fingers touched him, and his arms wobbled. He rested his body against hers, taking in the sweet taste of her lips, the soft yield of her body. When had she become a woman? When had she grown from the wee twig into the lovely girl she was now?
Braced on his elbows above her, Ramsey waged a war against himself for control. Her body was soft and willing beneath him—Sabrina, the girl he’d loved from boyhood, wanted him as much as he wanted her.
But Ramsey also knew his time at Newgate was drawing to a close and not even his love for her could convince Ramsey to risk Sabrina’s life in his homeland. Their war was not hers, and would
likely kill himself and his brothers before their time. That was not Sabrina’s lot in life.
“Ramsey,” she whispered into his ear. “Ramsey, take me, please.”
He wanted to. Oh, how he wanted to. He need only push up her skirts to make her his, to claim her forever.
But how is that fair to her?
There on the floor in the soft glow of the firelight, Ramsey let out a curse and pulled himself to his feet. His body rebelled against him, so he walked outside into the rain. When he returned, Sabrina had pulled her clothes on and sat on the bed.
“Did I do something wrong?”
The hurt in her eyes had nearly killed Ramsey.
“We’re leaving Newgate, Sabrina,” Ramsey had said. “My brothers and I. We doona belong here.”
The tears in her eyes were immediate and like a punch in the gut to Ramsey, but he’d steeled himself the best he could. Despite her pleadings on the ride back, despite the begging for him not to go, he’d made up his mind.
“Doona be a foolish chit,” he’d cut her off harshly as they rode through the gates into de Montfort’s courtyard. “You and I doona belong together. We never have.”
Ramsey swore he’d never torture himself by being near her again, yet there he was, in the earl’s keep with Sabrina somewhere close by.
Ramsey pulled on a pair of pants and linen shirt slowly, cursing aloud as he bent to pull his leather boots on his feet, lest he catch his death in the drafty halls of Earl de Montfort’s keep. Once dressed, his mind returned to where it had been the past five years since he left—Sabrina. He’d been aloof to her on purpose—any hint of feeling on his part might open a floodgate of emotion he’d worked hard to suppress.
So she still felt the same. He was almost relieved that she did, for he was not the only one suffering with this burden. Yet it made staying here—and leaving—all the more difficult.
Oh, Sabrina...
He’d returned to the village Newgate as a favor to de Montfort, the man who’d saved his life. Stealing his niece and carrying her off to the Highlands, despite how badly his heart ached for the green-eyed vixen, would dishonor the family who raised him to be a man. Nay, he’d vowed to leave Sabrina to the life of comfort and safety she deserved.
He would forget her, one day. He hoped.
You’ll not forget that lass, Ramsey, and you bloody well know it.
He stalked down the hall and took the stairs two at time until he arrived on the bottom floor. The hall was noisy as guests and servants rushed about, spreading news and waving their hands about, trying to be heard above the noise of the chaos.
“Laird Munro, there you are!”
The grating voice of the Curtmaine chit floated above the others. Ramsey cursed himself for encouraging the woman’s attentions last night, and her attachment to him this morning seemed to be his penance. She’d not left his side once after he removed himself from Sabrina.
“Have you heard yet? It’s Sabrina…she’s been kidnapped!”
Had he not felt the breath leave his body at the news, he’d have wrung the scrawny redhead’s neck for the joyful way she announced the fact—as though it were titillating gossip and not Sabrina’s very life at stake.
He gripped Margaret’s arms tightly enough to make her cry out. “What do ye mean, she’s been kidnapped?”
She tried to wrench herself free, but he only tightened his grip. “She’s been taken! Laird Munro, you’re hurting me.”
Ramsey released Margaret without speaking a word, and found Ernald in the crowd. His face was white and stricken and he clutched a crumbled paper to his chest.
“Archer has taken her,” Ernald said in a soft voice to Ramsey. “And it is my fault that we cannot get her back.”
“Why not?” he asked. “What did Archer say?”
Ernald looked as though he were about to shatter. “Not here, Ramsey. Come with me.”
Perplexed, Ramey followed Ernald into his study, leaving the crowds of worried people behind. “Ernald, this is no time for discussion! We must get her back!”
“That is precisely my point, young Ramsey.” Earl de Montfort drew in a long breath and closed his eyes before he spoke.
Ramsey waited.
“I am gravely in debt to Archer,” Ernald said at last. “These past summers, when the rains have not come and our crops have withered, I have taken money from Blackhaven to keep us fed and our people housed. We had a good crop this year and I thought I’d be able to repay Archer in two summers’ time. But he has called forth his debt, and either I go to prison and let the families that depend on us to starve, or I publish the banns and allow the man to marry my Sabrina.”
Their earlier discussion, never continued, suddenly made a great deal more sense. “That is why ye could not hire mercenaries,” Ramsey said. “That is why ye asked my help with your enemies—you’re between the devil and a hard place.”
“To my great shame. I’ve managed to keep it quiet enough, but this...” He waved a hand, then made a fist, striking the wall. “You see what has happened here, Ramsey. If Archer holds onto Sabrina, the debt will be forgiven and I may yet fight off my enemies and protect my people.”
That was all very noble, but what about Sabrina? Ramsey could scarcely believe it. “So that’s it?”
“I fear it is.”
“And so you’ll just let him steal her? With no fight?” The rage boiled within him that Ernald would let this Archer win without attempting to free her.
“This is not the Highlands, my boy,” Ernald said with a sad sigh. “My hands are tied by the very law that protects us, and Archer has finally won. I just pray he does not abuse her—she has spent the past four years refusing him and he’s not a man to stand rejection.”
Ernald went on mumbling about ways he might make amends with Archer, but Ramsey stopped listening. His mind raced from scenario to scenario and they all ended with the same conclusion—either he or Archer would be dead before the sun set.
***
Sabrina counted the steps the man took as he paced back and forth. Twelve across. Twelve back. Lord Archer hadn’t bothered restraining her, perhaps thinking her too weak-hearted to attempt an escape.
He was in for a dreadful surprise.
She could sprint quite well when the situation demanded it. Her head had cleared somewhat, and she had observed her surroundings carefully when they brought her in. She only needed a handful of seconds to get past him—she knew Blackhaven well enough, having accompanied her uncle while he negotiated with Archer. If she could just get past this brute...
He glanced at her, his gaze cold and considering. In truth, she was mildly surprised Archer had told the man not to touch her; presumably he wished to have her pristine and unmarked when he hauled her to the altar.
As if I would let him do so!
She waited until the man had reached the other side of the room and begun his slow turn. Her leg muscles bunched, and she sprang forward, her bare feet slapping against the cold ground as she raced across the room.
She heard his startled shout and his scramble to catch up with her, but she was already through the doors, spinning to the right. An open corridor beckoned to her, and she raced down it, pushing her legs to move faster, ever-faster.
“My lord! Lord Archer! She’s fleeing!”
She ran wildly through an antechamber, startling a maid and what looked like a guard. If memory served, there would be another door, a back door—
The first came out of nowhere, striking her sharply across the face. Sabrina’s knees crumpled beneath her, and she hit the floor hard, tears springing to her eyes.
“Going somewhere, m’lady?” Lord Archer taunted. “’Tis not very kind for a woman to run out on her intended, is it?”
Her head was ringing, and her cheek throbbed where he’d struck her. She pushed herself to her knees, unwilling to let Archer see her weep. He does not get to see my tears.
He hauled her to her feet, tsking softly to himself. “Just thought
you were going to skip out the door, did you? And where, praytell, would you go? The stables? Out into the fields? There is nowhere for you to flee, Sabrina. You’d best get used to Blackhaven.”
Never, she thought, but held her tongue.
He gave her a jerk and pulled her back down the hallway. “I do not wish to be a harsh master to you,” he said as they walked. “I can be kind, even loving. But you best do your duty, Sabrina, lest I bloody your pretty face. ’Tis your choice.”
She maintained a stony silence. You wait, Lord Archer. You wait until your back is turned again...
***
The Scottish laird arrived in the village of Treadwell with murder in his eyes.
The Munro Clan Highlander Collection (The Munro Clan Highlander Romances) Page 4