by Sara Bennett
He nodded without smiling and rode off into the deep shadows of the trees. The sun was a mere blur of gold above the horizon, streaking the sky with crimson. The long gloaming was about to begin.
Meg felt someone move up close beside her and turned her head, thinking it must be one of the other men, homesick, and wanting to ask permission to accompany Duncan. But it was Gregor. He was staring after Duncan, his face paler than it had been all day. In fact he had seemed remarkably well for a man whom she had feared at one point would not survive the journey. His arm had regained some of its movement, and when they stopped at midday, he had eaten quite heartily. If he had been quiet, keeping his thoughts to himself, then Meg did not mind that. In fact, she admitted, she preferred it. After this morning, when she had seen him bathing half naked in the loch, it had been a relief not to speak to him at all.
It was safer so.
Safer for her own peace of mind.
Meg knew that there was some feeling inside herself for him, some need for him that she had not experienced for any other man. But there was also a sense of danger, a need for self-preservation. Meg had decided, after the incident with Major Litchfield, that she must take a big step back. If she stayed away from him, then whatever this emotion was inside her might melt away, might vanish like ice in the sun.
But now, as she looked upon his profile, her gaze drawn to the straight slash of his brows, the steep line of his nose, the strong set of his jaw, and the sensuous curve of his bottom lip…Meg realized in dismay that her feelings might not be so easily dismissed. It rose up, a great rushing tide, filling her head and body, making her want to gasp for breath. It was only through a sheer effort of will that she prevented herself from actually reaching out and touching him….
“Duncan has gone ahead,” she said abruptly into the silence. Her voice was strange and stilted, held in check, because she feared herself too much to allow the slightest warmth to creep in.
He nodded brusquely, and they rode on together. Cragan Dhui was closer now, peering down at them, but Glen Dhui was still out of sight due to the rise in the road. As they came out of the forest and reached the final crest, they stopped as one. And there it was below them, the narrow head of Glen Dhui.
The rest of the glen followed the silver line of the burn to the southeast, widening out as it went, the rich green haughland lying flat either side of the broadening stream. In the gloaming, it looked secretive and shadowy, the mauve of the heather turning to brown, the slatey rock reflecting the sky, and the surrounding hills gathering their forested slopes about them. Down in the glen, heather-thatched crofters’ cottages were gray smudges, the brown shapes of cattle dotted about them. At the place where the gray stone bridge crossed the burn, an avenue of yew trees marched down a long driveway to Glen Dhui Castle. From this distance it was no more than a solid gray rectangle, decorated with four pointed towers, one at each corner.
The home of the Grants.
As always, the view took Meg’s breath away, but at this moment there was even more emotion than usual charging through her. And if she felt like this, then how must the man beside her feel? His stillness was so intense, it was painful. His hand was clenching and unclenching on his reins, and his face was set. Meg had already sensed his mixed feelings when it came to his return to Glen Dhui, and now she realized just how hard he was working to keep them contained. Suddenly her own need to put distance between them took second place.
“All is well,” she said gently.
He turned sharply at the sound of her voice, as if he had forgotten she was there. He was frowning, those dark brows lowered over his brilliant eyes.
Meg smiled. “Whenever I’ve been away, and I come home to see Glen Dhui like this, laid out before me like a tapestry, it’s as if I’m seeing all the peaceful lives being lived out within it, all the familiar faces, everything in its place and as it should be. I know then that all is well with my world.”
The frown had gone, though his face was still drawn tight by emotion, his slashing brows and the stubble on his jaw dark against his pale skin. He could easily be an outlaw, thought Meg, and a desperate one at that!
“Has it changed in twelve years?” something prompted her to ask.
He shook his head, not taking his eyes from hers.
“I pray…I trust this homecoming will not be too painful for you, Captain.”
He hesitated briefly, and then turned back to the glen. In that moment all his protective barricades were down. He gazed at it with the savage hunger of a man who has not had a proper meal in a very long time; he looked at his former home with a deep and agonizing longing that Meg could barely imagine.
“Och, no,” he said, his voice gruff and raw, “’tis not too painful for me, my lady. I can bear it. Shall we go, before Duncan comes to fetch us?”
Meg hesitated. The former Laird of Glen Dhui was sick with longing for his home, but he did not want her to feel sorry for him. Instead he meant to ride sedately beside her, all the way down the glen to his former home, every step full of heart-wrenching, squirming agony for them both.
Meg knew she couldn’t do it. Not like that. His homecoming should be a joyous thing, or at least it should be gotten over with quickly.
Her mind made up, Meg gave a sudden whoop, and dug her heels into her mare’s sides. The tired animal reared, and then put her head down and flew. Down the turning road, down the steep hill, down into the glen.
She heard his shout behind her—anger, surprise or sheer wild excitement? She wasn’t certain which, only that the thud of his horse’s hooves was quickly following. When she glanced back, she saw the shape of him against the fading sky. Pursuing her.
Her blood drummed in her veins, her body tightened, and Meg found herself laughing aloud.
Home.
The sense of it filled him, completed him, and overflowed. His head was spinning, and not just because of his wound. He felt so alive, so much a part of this place, that he tingled. He was Grant of Glen Dhui, and to have denied it all these years seemed like the worst sort of foolishness.
But what had coming back here done to him? He had opened himself to pain, to the longing for something that was his home no longer. It belonged to her, to the woman riding in front of him. Just as he now belonged to her.
Pride and anger rose up in him, threatening to make him do something foolish—like turn around and ride all the way back to Clashennic. He stifled the impulse, just as he had learned long ago to stifle any impetuous impulses. He could not afford them, not anymore.
She rode low on her mare, her plaited hair spearing out behind her, her slim body at one with the animal. The two of them sped through the night like a shot from his gun. And suddenly he had the feeling that she, too, belonged to this place, that she had the same sense of belonging as he did.
His horse stumbled. He held it up, despite the wrenching pain in his arm, and they were in pursuit again. But it was enough to bring him to his senses. He was behaving wildly, foolishly, more like the lad he had been than the man he had become. Captain Gregor Grant was not likely to race a lady down a dangerously narrow road in the near dark. It was the sort of impetuous behaviour he had just been telling himself he no longer indulged in.
He came abreast of her.
Her face, what he could see of it, was ablaze with excitement. She meant to best him. She was that sort of woman. Best him, or die in the attempt.
He was tempted—the subtle lure was thrown to him again—but he ignored it. He was a responsible man, a tough and practical man. This was madness. If one of them should fall and be hurt—if she should be hurt…In that instant, he snatched her reins from her and dragged at her mare. Both horses began to slow, not putting up much of a fight. They were weary, they had had enough.
They came to a halt. The silence was broken only by the blowing of the horses and the thud of Gregor’s heart. Startled, still in the grip of the race, Meg spun around to face him, her breasts heaving under her jacket, her eyes wild. S
he pushed back a curl of red hair, tucking it behind her ear, and he could see the flush on her skin in the pearly light. She looked hot and mad with excitement, and he wanted her.
It wasn’t the same sort of want as he had felt at the pass, when Major Litchfield had kissed her hand. That had been the kind of jealous feeling that any man might have, when another threatens the thing he has been secretly coveting. He had seen the way the major looked at her, and he knew he had a rival.
This was different. This was a simple, basic, earthy need. Gregor saw her, and he wanted her in his arms. He wanted to taste her skin, to thrust his tongue deep into her mouth. He wanted her under him, her naked skin against his, and he wanted to hear the sound she would make when he pushed himself inside her.
“I would have won.”
He blinked, thrust away his own madness, and leaned closer. She didn’t pull back, but he saw the question in her eyes.
“Do you think it quite proper for the Lady of Glen Dhui to arrive at her doorstep looking like she has been rolling in the heather?”
Anger flared in her pale eyes. “You only say that because I would have beaten you.”
He stiffened. “No.”
Her mouth tightened, but she made it smile. “We shall see, Captain. There is always another day.”
So saying, she straightened her back proudly, tugged the reins from his fingers, and put some space between them.
“Are you ready, then?” she asked him. There was a flicker in her eyes, an uncertainty, that had not been there before.
It made him wonder, briefly, if the whole thing had been a ruse, a distraction, to take away his pain at returning home. He dismissed it. Why should she care? Besides, she had been as caught up in the race as he.
“Of course,” he said coldly, and she rode off at a more sedate pace, with him following. He did not watch the way her hips swayed in the saddle, or the long line of her legs in their tight trews. He stared ahead, to the gray bridge and the avenue of yews, to the place he had loved and lost.
Glen Dhui belonged to her now. Once more he gave himself the grim reminder.
And so did he.
Chapter 10
Glen Dhui Castle sat solid against the last faint glow of the sky. With its rectangular base and stiff turrets and gables, it was more like a fortified home than a castle, but what it lacked in fairytale prettiness, it more than made up for in solidity and security. There were many stories of raids by other clans upon Grant territory, of battles fought and enemies slain, and of womenfolk safe within these walls, while a ferocious foe waited outside.
Gregor had been brought up on these tales.
His throat felt dry. This is no longer my home, he reminded himself yet again. No longer mine. Then why did it feel like home? His heart, which he had fortified as strongly as this house, was swelling with regret, with longing, but he would not let the emotion spill free.
He dared not.
The main door was open. A plump, dark-haired woman stood hesitantly in the light from the lantern she held. Beside her hovered a lad who was nearly as tall as she, his fair hair like a halo. Gregor recognized the woman—it was Duncan Forbes’s sister, Alison. The woman Malcolm Bain had planned to marry, until the 1715 Rebellion interrupted their dreams of bliss. It would be their first meeting since then, and as Gregor recalled, Alison had always had a fiery temper.
“Lady Meg!” Alison came down the steps, her voice trembling with concern and relief. Behind her, the lad remained on the step and peered suspiciously at the new arrivals. “Thank the Lord ye are all right. I expected to see ye back yesterday.”
“We were delayed.” Meg dismounted and reached out to give Alison a hug, adding a smile for the fair-haired lad Angus.
Alison might be her maid, but she was also her friend, and had been since Meg first arrived in Glen Dhui. And Meg was concerned for her. She had not known about Malcolm Bain, although of course she knew there had been a man. But she didn’t know the details, and she had never pried into Alison’s personal life, unless Alison broached the subject first.
This situation would be difficult.
“Ye must be famished,” Alison was saying. There was strain in her eyes, so dark, like her brother’s. Her gaze strayed beyond Meg, toward the troop of horsemen waiting a little behind her, and quickly slipped past the familiar faces she knew from the glen. She found Gregor’s tall shape, hesitated, then seemed to set him aside for later consideration. Finally, she found and settled on the stranger with the broad shoulders, whose face was in deep shadow.
Meg felt Alison’s sudden rigidity; it was as if the other woman had simply turned to stone.
“Alison?” Meg said gently, giving her a little shake.
“Malcolm Bain…Duncan spoke true. It is ye….” Alison’s whisper was no more than a sigh.
Malcolm Bain could not have heard her, but it was as if he had, because he was looking directly at her. A torch held by one of the grooms sputtered and flared brightly, briefly illuminating his face. He was pale, and the lines about his mouth were carved deep. Meg thought he looked like a man who had been visited by a spirit.
Abruptly, Alison turned away, staring at Meg, waiting for her instructions. Her usually full lips had gone straight and hard.
“Please make up a room for Captain Grant, Alison,” Meg said gently. “We will sup together, in the little parlor, I think. Is the general awake?”
“He’s in his room, Lady Meg. I will let him know ye are here. He will want to see you.”
“Tell him I will be up directly, Alison. And thank you.”
Alison whirled about and vanished inside, shooing the fair-headed Angus before her. The men were dismounting—Meg heard the clank and creak of harness and saddle, and glanced around for Gregor. He was gingerly extracting himself from his horse, holding his hurt arm and shoulder unnaturally still. For a long moment he stood, head bowed, while the other men, riders and grooms, went about their tasks. Meg waited for him to gather himself, to lift his head and find her. His eyes gleamed yellow in the flickering light, like a wounded animal. Out in the darkness, above the rush of the burn, a curlew called him a mournful welcome home.
“My father may want to see us straight away,” Meg said.
“Of course.”
Whatever feelings had gripped him on the road above the glen were gone, wiped clean. Very well, if that is how he wants it… Meg turned briskly toward the door and stepped into the Great Hall of Glen Dhui Castle with the former laird close behind her.
Gregor felt distinctly odd as he strode into Glen Dhui Castle and back in time. As if the past had shifted into the present.
The Great Hall reared up about him, chilly and shadowy despite the tall candles and the fire in the big granite hearth. The arched ceiling was in darkness above his head, but the stone walls gleamed with weapons and the heads of stags and other beasties captured in various hunts. The wavering light caught a glassy eye here and a claymore there. In the place of honor, in a walled case directly before him, was a hunting horn carved in ivory—a gift from Queen Mary herself.
Gregor felt his heart stop beating, and then restart like a drum. Nothing had changed. It was as if he had stepped out for a breath of air, rather than been gone for twelve long years.
“Captain Grant?”
Her voice steadied him. Held him safe from the maelstrom that he felt he was very close to tumbling down into. Gregor turned his head, blindly, and found her. She was standing in the door of the room his mother had always called the Blue Saloon. The candles on the table beside her bathed her in their warm light, shining on the buttons of her jacket and the glory of her hair. There was compassion in her gaze, a watchful sympathy. It turned him cold. He did not want her pity, he didn’t want anybody’s pity.
“When my father came he bought everything just as it stood,” she explained quietly. “It seemed wrong to replace what was already here—the past, the memories, the history…”
She waved her hand awkwardly, indicating the Gr
eat Hall with its stone and dark-paneled walls and gleaming weapons. “So he kept what was yours, Captain. He paid your mother, all was settled between them. It gave my father pleasure and it did no harm. I am sorry if it distresses you.”
He shrugged as if it didn’t matter. And it shouldn’t. She was right, better her father make use of the history of the Grants than it be lost, forgotten. And yet it hurt, it felt as if something had been stolen from him. “You and the general are more than welcome to my disreputable ancestors and their spurious histories,” he said coldly.
Her eyes flashed but she didn’t respond as he expected. “We can talk in here,” she said with a polite smile, and gestured for him to follow her into the Blue Saloon.
It was no longer blue.
With a huge sense of relief, Gregor strode farther into the room. His emotions had taken enough of a battering for one evening, and the changes were very welcome. There were still a number of objects he recognized, but others were foreign, and the softly ticking clock that sat upon the mantel was not something he remembered. With a sigh he turned and found Meg behind him, standing perfectly still, watching him.
He wondered what she saw in his face. He was not foolish enough to think she did not see something in him to concern her. He was not made of stone, although there had been times when he wished it were so. But whatever she saw and felt, she was not going to let him read it in her slightly wary blue eyes again.
“Meg,” he began quietly, meaning to try and explain—a little—but before he could go on, a third voice interrupted them.
“Lady Meg?”
Alison hovered in the doorway, her dark eyes anxious. “The general says he will see ye now. He will see Captain Grant after ye have both had supper.”
“Thank you, Alison.” Meg glanced over at Gregor with a faint smile. “I won’t be long. Please, warm yourself by the fire and remove your…ah, your knives and pistols.”
He felt himself smile in response. His knives, huh? Well, he wouldn’t remove all his weapons, but he would warm himself by the fire. A moment alone would be welcome, and he could gather his wits for his meeting with the general. And more important, for supper with Lady Meg.