A Gypsy in Scotland (MacCallan Clan Book 1)

by Tanya Wilde

  “His name is Danior,” he admitted. “Our relationship is . . . complicated.”

  “Complicated?” Hugh’s incredulity tore through the room.

  Lash sighed. “Danior has always loathed me. One eve, there was an incident with the man my sister favored. Danior beat him to a pulp. There’d been no need for such force. My sister was devastated. I stood up for her, fought Danior to teach him a lesson. I thought that would be the end of it.”

  “But it wasn’t?” Honoria asked.

  Lash shook his head. “Even after agreeing to leave willingly in the morning, that night they came to cast me out, Danior and our cousins, looking to shed blood.”

  “But to kill you? I thought the Rom valued life?” Honoria asked, saddened that his brother could be such a monster.

  “Not all of them.” A dark glow entered his eyes. “My father is an evil man, and my brother inherited that darkness. The Rom Baro, the leader of our tribe, banished our family after my father beat me near to death because I wouldn’t help him and my brother steal from gadjos. My father never forgave me; neither did Danior. But the night I knocked him out changed everything for the worse.”

  “That is detestable,” Isla murmured, clutching her throat.

  Honoria agreed. She wished there was a way to comfort him, to take that look from his eyes. It must have been dreadful to live with such cruelty. “You never mentioned a brother when I asked about your family.”

  “Danior is dead to me.”

  The finality of the statement tore at Honoria’s heart.

  “And the tribe will not take you or your sister back?” Hugh asked.

  “No—The Rom Baro’s decision is final. Blood is blood.” Lash sighed. “I was resigned to depart from my sister. But a week after I left, I received word from a friend that Syeira had run off in search of me. Something must have happened for her to leave. . . Maybe I was wrong. Maybe she wasn’t safe from them as I first believed. I’ve been searching for her for seven months. Her path led me to the Highlands—only it seems Danior followed me here.”

  “Why would he follow you?” Honoria asked.

  “That I cannot say.”

  Honoria’s heart pinched as a shadow passed over Lash’s face when he spoke of his sister. She couldn’t imagine a life without her brothers. It had been heartbreaking when Ewan died, and they all still felt his loss keenly. But to have your brother stab you? Your sister missing? She could not begin to imagine how Lash must feel.

  “But why does your brother want you dead so badly?” Isla murmured. “Pride alone?”

  “You will have to ask him that.”

  “Did you not have time to ask as he stabbed a knife into your gut?”

  “Hugh,” Honoria admonished. “Have you no shame?”

  “I’m ensuring I don’t miss anything.” To Lash, he said, “Regardless, you will stay here until my brothers return and we are strong in numbers. Then we can figure out what to do.”

  “You hospitality is generous, but Danior won’t stop until he finds me. As you might have gathered, it’s dangerous for me to stay here.”

  Hugh’s lips flattened. “They cannot breach our walls.”

  Lash shook his head. “They won’t have to, he will wait me out—he is that determined.”

  “He may have believed us,” Honoria pointed out. “We might have convinced him you’re not here.”

  “You were as convincing as a duck masquerading as a cat,” Lash muttered. His eyes turned grave. “They made a mistake by not confirming I was dead. Danior will be back, perhaps with more men. Seems he has formed a band of mercenaries.”

  “Then we must come up with a plan,” Honoria announced. “If he won’t stop until he finds you, then we give him the proof he wants.”

  “And how are we going to accomplish that?” Isla asked.

  “I have no clue,” Honoria muttered.

  “Nay, it is too risky,” Hugh said. He glanced at Lash. “Once you are healed and my brothers return to guard my sisters, I will help you find yours. For now, we remain on guard until Adair arrives and he decides what to do about your brother. At the very least, we will not be outnumbered should your brother return. In the meantime, you will stay inside where it is safe, all of you.”

  “That is a bit dramatic, Hugh,” Honoria insisted.

  “I still think it’s best if I leave,” Lash said.

  Hugh shook his head. “Have a heart, man. If you go, you leave me with the impossible task of keeping my sisters from charging after you with swords drawn.”

  Honoria pounced on that. “Aye, we will not let you face your brother alone.”

  Isla nodded. “Aye, stay.”

  Lash looked unconvinced, but he wasn’t arguing, and that was something. If he left today and she tried to follow him, she’d have a fight on her hands. In fact, she was sure he’d march her straight back to the castle. He needed more time to heal.

  And she needed more time with him. That is, more time to convince him to take her and Isla to Edinburgh when he did eventually leave.

  That was what she meant.

  Surely, he’d want to look for his sister in the city, wouldn’t he? The city would be a perfect place to disappear, too, if his brother was indeed in pursuit—something she wasn’t sure was definite, as she thought they had been rather convincing earlier. In any case, they’d help him search for his sister, and when they found her, then she and Isla would be free to live their lives on their terms.

  It would all work out.

  “Trust us, Lash,” Honoria ventured, moving to lay a comforting hand on his arm. “You are safe here.”

  Trust us.

  Everything in Lash protested at the idea of placing his life in the hands of gadjos. And the MacCallans . . . He hardly knew them. They weren’t of his blood. They had no real obligation to protect him. And still they insisted upon doing that.

  He should leave. That is what he ought to do. Turn on his heel and walk right out of their lives. He spent seven months searching for Syeira. Seven months of failing to find her. Now he was injured with Danior at his heels. He should leave this instant.

  He did the opposite.

  The image of Honoria following him on horseback, wrapped in plaid, sword drawn, ran through his mind, and his feet remained firmly rooted to the spot.

  Lash realized then, his feet might always stay rooted where she was concerned.

  Amber eyes lifted to meet his. Her vivid gaze a shock to his system. The blood quickened in his veins. His heart throbbed against his chest. How unnerving to think it took so little to stir his blood—her soft gaze pinning him. That was all. It was damn unsettling.

  The logical solution would be to stay, gather his strength, and then leave to resume his search for his sister. But in his heart, Lash knew that it wasn’t as simple as healing. Not anymore. He scowled down at his boots as if the fault lay with them for failing to react.

  “I will stay,” he muttered, and Lash swore her smile reached the stars.

  “Good, I will inform the servants and tenants to be on the lookout for suspicious riders so that we are not caught off guard again,” Hugh said.

  Lash nodded. It still did not sit well with him to put them in danger, but he decided he would trust them. As loathe as he was to admit, he needed the MacCallans.

  “And since we have been ordered to remain in the castle, perhaps you can teach us the Flamenco,” Honoria suggested, her smile sly as a fox’s.

  Lash inwardly groaned.

  “What the deuce is Flamenco?” Hugh asked.

  “Sounds like a tropical language,” Isla said.

  A string of vile curses violated his mind. Teaching Honoria to dance . . . It would set fire to his blood. He was sure of it. Already, with the barest of mention of it, his body coiled in anticipation of watching her move along the rhythm of the music. And it was a language, of sorts. Only this language he spoke with his body, and not his mouth. It was a language of passion, of love.

  Honoria was still watc
hing him, doubtlessly sensing his discomfort. Women did things like that. They sensed things. Things better left not sensed at all. And as her smiled widened, he couldn’t help recall Hugh’s words.

  My sister has taken an interest in you.

  Damn if he hadn’t taken an interest in her, too.

  Chapter 13

  She entered the stables quarter past noon. Lash knew it was her for the scent of rosemary and jasmine that made its way to his nostrils. Always it lingered in her wake. He paused in the act of rubbing down a young copper thoroughbred, allowing her sweet fragrance to wash over him.

  He hadn’t asked permission to be in the stables, but then, the confines of the castle had become unbearable since the Highlander announced their confinement the day before. He was healing. And the more he regained his strength, the more intolerable it became. The stables were more comfortable, the caring of horses familiar.

  Lash circled the horse, and Honoria’s bright countenance appeared in his line of vision. She was so damned beautiful, dressed in a simple blue day dress and wrapped in tartan wool. A few curls had escaped the confines of her braid and stuck out from all sides, windswept, her cheeks tinged with a soft rosy hue.

  She struck him speechless. Every damn time.

  “He’s a big beastie, is he not?” she said as she approached them, her lips widening into a grin as she trailed a hand of the colt’s neck. “I named him Bach.”

  “He’s yours?” Lash managed to find his voice.

  “Aye, Adair bought him last year as a consolation gift after declining my request to join them in Edinburgh. I have many of those.”

  “Horses?”

  She gave a rueful laugh. “Consolation gifts.”

  “Why do they not take you with them? Seems like less trouble.”

  “Numerous reasons, I suppose, though I suspect the foremost being they do not wish for me to intrude while they are off philandering.”

  Lash blinked. “A lady should not know of such things.”

  “And yet I do,” she murmured, her gaze settling lovingly on the horse. “Most men seem to be under the assumption they are good at keeping secrets, when in fact, they are not.”

  The edge of his mouth twitched. “I suppose we are not.”

  Her incredulous gaze flew to him. “You are not going to argue? Straighten your spine and march off offended?”

  “Will there be any point?”

  She laughed. “Nay. If only my brothers could stop treating me like a bairn. They are determined to nurse me until I am an old maid.”

  “You are certainly no infant.” He swept her curves with a look of appreciation. “You are all woman from where I stand.”

  “Try and tell them that.” Her cheeks flushed with color.

  Lash grinned. She was beautiful when flustered. Had he been her brother, he’d lock her away from any men who came courting, especially someone like him. There was no denying the more time he spent with her, the more fascinated he became.

  Had he been a better man, he’d have scolded the Highlander for not keeping her away from him. But Lash was too bloody selfish to risk the man forbidding Honoria to be near him. No matter how he tried to shut her out of his mind, she kept breaking through all of his barriers. Their lives might take them on different paths, but for the time being, he could at least be near her.

  “Are you certain you should be doing that?” She motioned to Bach and the brush in his hand. “You ought to be resting to regain your strength. I should dress your wound again.”

  “I seem to recall you had no problem forcing me to dance in the garden the day before.”

  “I was testing your strength,” she replied, tickling the back of Bach’s ears. “And since you are much recovered, perhaps you would like to go for a ride?”

  His eyes snapped to hers. “That’s not a good idea, Honoria. Your brother is right to keep you confined to the castle. You shouldn’t even be in the stables.”

  “Neither should you,” she countered.

  Lash shook his head. “I blend in with the stable hands, you do not.”

  Her lips pouted. “I’m dying for a run through the fields. We shan’t go far.” She offered a sweet smile. “You will be safe with me.”

  She was the last person he was safe with. She was downright lethal. If they were to be alone . . . Without any prying eyes . . . That was the polar opposite of safe. The temptation to kiss her would be impossible to resist. And there was Danior, scouring the countryside.

  “But you will not be safe with me,” he finally answered, watching as her eyes rounded at his statement.

  Lash smirked.

  “That sounds like a wicked thing to say.”

  His smile vanished. Did she have to infuse such a note of sensuality into her voice? Almost as if she wanted to be alone with him and wished for it to be wicked?

  He spun away from her, balling his hands into fists. “Gadje Gadjensa, Rom Romensa,” he muttered under his breath, reminding himself of their respective places in the world.

  “What does that mean?” she asked, her rustling skirts alerting him to her sudden proximity.

  He sidestepped her and resumed rubbing down Bach. “It means, Gadjo with gadjo, Rom with Rom.”

  “And by gadjo, you mean us, I presume?”

  Lash gave a curt nod. “Not of our blood.”

  “Does that mean you are not allowed to consort with someone not of your blood? Because you are staying with us, and we shared a kiss.”

  He spun back to her, pinning her with an unyielding look. The mere mention of their kiss set his body ablaze. “You are brazen for a lady.”

  “Aye, I am,” she said pertly. “A useful trait when living with a brood of Highland men.”

  He shrugged. “I hardly recall the kiss.”

  “Liar, it must have been some kiss for a man to swoon directly after. Unforgettable, even.”

  “I did not swoon, I collapsed from overexerting myself.”

  She arched a brow, a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. “Will you get into trouble for kissing me, me being not of your blood, and all that?”

  Lash swallowed. He swore he burned from the heat of her body lapping up at him like dozen little flames. There was no getting into trouble; he was already knee deep in it.

  He stepped away from her disorienting nearness, her bewitching scent. “The Rom would say your kiss tainted me.”

  “I beg your pardon?” She sounded so offended, Lash almost laughed.

  “Do not take offense,” Lash said. “There are Rom who believe merely crossing paths with a gadjo renders you unclean, so they avoid them at any cost.”

  “What nonsense.” Her eyes narrowed on him. “There are more of us than there are of you.”

  “True, but for the most part gadjos cluster in cities, while Rom prefer the wild.”

  “Do you believe crossing paths with me, kissing me, tainted you?” she asked.

  God help him, but he did not.

  Ever since he was old enough to remember he had felt like he did not quite fit. Not with his tribe. Not anywhere else. Like a tiger trapped in a circus act.

  As a child, he’d shrugged it off as the result of belonging to a cruel family and wishing he’d been born into another. A family that prided kindness as strength—not weakness. A family that loved rather than loathed. Built, rather than destroyed.

  But even after leaving the only life he’d ever known behind, that feeling had never parted with him. It’d still clung to him like a layer of second skin.

  Until Honoria. With her sweet smile and innocent eyes, she had seeped into his bones and replaced that schism with one of belonging.

  She felt like home.

  Lash sighed, drawing his fingers through his hair before meeting her eyes. “I am marime—an outcast—and therefore already considered impure and unworthy to my kind. But as a Rom without a tribe, I answer to no one but myself.”

  “That does not answer my question. Do you believe I tainted you?”


  “No.” He held her gaze, willing her to see the truth there. “You could never pollute anyone.”

  She was beauty and light. She was the only light that had cracked through the shroud of darkness surrounding him the past seven months.

  Her silence lasted only a heartbeat before she breathed air into his lungs with words he never thought he’d hear from anyone.

  “You are not unworthy or impure, least of all to me.”

  Emotion clogged his throat. She would never understand how much her words meant to him. “Your words are a precious gift.”

  Her smile turned sheepish, and she chewed on her lower lip before asking, “Where do you suppose your sister could have gone?”

  The unexpected question crashed into him like a wave, knocking him over and hurling him into watery depth. It was a question he had asked himself a thousand times. Syeira had a terrible sense of direction and Lash suspected her lost, hurt, and alone. Not thoughts he willingly ventured into.

  “I am not certain,” he finally answered. The painful thud in his chest steadied. “It has been seven months. I’m starting to lose hope that I will ever find her.”

  “Are you sure she’s in Scotland?” she asked, gently dragging her finger over Bach, pressing her cheek against his pelt.

  “I left a parting letter with my travel plans so that she would not worry. She knew I was traveling to Ireland, Cork. I have hunted down the captains of every ship that docked in that harbor with no luck. Then I learned a ship had been lost on the coast of Ireland and the few survivors that were hauled from the sea were transported to the Port of Inverness. One woman matched my sister’s description.”

  And Lash would have felt, deep in his bones, had she perished.

  “But if you are both in search of each other, both moving constantly, how will you find one another?” Honoria asked. “Perhaps if you remained in one place and left word of your whereabouts with shops, farmers and country folk, she might find you.”

  Lash blinked. He hadn’t considered that. Then he thought of his brother and shook his head. “With Danior in Scotland, I cannot take that chance.”