Captured by the Highlander (10 page)

* * *

The precise moment they entered the forest, Amelia glanced over her shoulder and saw something speed by on the beach. It was Angus on his pale gray horse, his golden hair flying on the wind, his broadsword swinging over his head. He was
galloping
after the cowardly soldier who had been the first to flee the camp.

God help that wretched man now.

Then suddenly darkness laid siege to
all
that was visible, and they were whipping past branches and leaping over logs. It was quiet in the woods, except for the fast pounding of hooves on the ground and the snapping of twigs and dried leaves. The wind blew into Amelia’s face, and she clung more tightly to Duncan’s solid frame.

“Keep your head down,” he commanded, and she buried her face in the soft wool of his tartan, which was draped over his shoulder, across his strong muscled back. She squeezed her eyes shut and
willed
her body to stop shaking, but it was no use. It was a delayed reaction to the terror of what had just occurred when that despicable man was on top of her, tearing at her clothes and slobbering
all
over her.

She clung more tightly to Duncan, overwhelmed by gratitude and relief—
thank God he arrived when he did
—but at the same time she was disoriented by the dizzying about-face of her emotions.

He was her captor. It was his fault she was here to begin with, and it was not so long ago that
he
had pinned her to the ground while she struggled and fought against him.

Somehow, however, what had occurred with the English soldier had felt very different, and she was hard-pressed to understand it in her panic-stricken mind. She had been both infuriated and alarmed when Duncan threw her to the ground in the field that first morning, but she had always felt as if she were being toyed with. She’d sensed that he was just biding his time,
all
owing her to fight and claw at him until she was depleted of strength. It had been his intention to wait for her to give up. To surrender when she was ready to surrender.

It had not been like that with the drunken soldier. He most definitely would have violated her. He would be doing so at this very moment if Duncan had not arrived and thrown him into the lake.

So what was she feeling now, exactly? Was Duncan her rescuer? Her protector?

No, that was not correct. He had stolen her from the safety of her bed in a guarded English fortress. He wanted to
kill
her fiancé. He had
killed
hundreds of men. He was a brutal, vengeful warrior and she was
still
not entirely certain she would not end up dead. He may have saved her tonight only because she was his bait. He
still
needed her to lure Richard into his trap.

Even so, she was not yet ready to loosen her grip, and if someone tried to separate her from him now, they would not succeed. She was holding on as if her life depended on it, and she didn’t think she could pry her own fingers off him if she tried. She felt more safe here than she had back there on the beach—even in this wild, out-of-control moment while she was hurtling through the dark forest as fast as a musket
ball
.

She had no idea how long they
galloped
through the trees.

She didn’t want to stop. She wanted to keep going, as far away as possible, but then she felt Duncan lean back and slow the horse to a trot. She opened her eyes.

“Whoa,” Duncan said in that quietly commanding, authoritative voice.

They stopped in a moonlit glade, not far from a babbling brook.

Duncan was breathing hard. She could feel his chest heaving beneath her arms.

“Get off,” he snarled.

She swung a leg over the side, dropped to the ground, and straightened the strap that held the shield on her back.

He landed beside her and slapped his horse on the rear flank. The animal trotted to the water to drink.

Duncan faced her wildly. “Don’t ever do that again!”

“I won’t,” she replied, not sure, exactly, what he was referring to. The escape in general? Or the moment when she bashed him in the head with the rock?

He put a hand over his stomach. “Ah, Christ.…”

He turned away from her and strode to a tree, where he bent forward and retched. Amelia watched him in horror.

Was it because of what she’d done to him?

At least he was alive. She hadn’t
killed
him. Thank God for that.

“I’m sorry,” she said when he recovered himself.

He strode toward the rushing water in the stream, knelt down, and splashed water onto his face. After he washed the blood away, he cleaned his hands as
well
, scrubbing them together vigorously, violently, scraping at the skin with his fingernails.

“God help me, Amelia,” he said in a low, dangerous voice.

“I want to thrash you senseless. What were you thinking?”

She frowned at his broad back, for he was
still
crouching over the water. “What do you
think
I was thinking? I was trying to escape from my enemy and reach an
all
y—my own countrymen. It was hardly an outrageous plan, and you shouldn’t be surprised. Angus wanted to
kill
me tonight. What did you expect?”

He glared at her over his shoulder. “I
’ll
not let anyone
kill
you. I told you that already.”

“But Angus seems to be at odds with your decision making in that regard.”

“He
’ll
do as I say.”

“How can I be sure of that? I know nothing of him, or you for that matter.
all
I know is that you abducted me, and that you want to
kill
my fiancé, and that the entire English army is quivering in their boots right now because you are a wild, brutal savage with impossible strength who carries a big axe and wants to slay every last one of them in their sleep!”

He rose to his feet and stalked toward her.

She backed up in fright.

“Those men,” he said in a low and threatening voice,

“wanted to dishonor you. You shouldn’t have gone there.”

“I didn’t know that when I left you!
all
I wanted was to feel safe again.”

“You’re safe with me.”

Something inside her shifted and tipped over onto its side. “I find that difficult to believe.”

«Well
, believe it.” He turned away to fetch his horse. “And I hope you learned your lesson tonight.”

“I did,” she admitted grudgingly. “I think.”

He whirled around to face her again. “You
think
? Do you have rocks in your head where your brain should be?”

“What do you expect, Duncan? You’re the Butcher, and you brought me here against my
will
. You abducted me and made me your prisoner!”

He stared at her in frustration. Animosity seethed in his voice. “Aye, because I couldn’t just leave you there.” He raked a hand through his blood-soaked hair and spoke in a low growl. “If only you knew how badly I wanted to
kill
that soldier tonight. Seeing him on top of you like that, groping at you like some kind of animal, when clearly you did not want it.

And the others, standing by and watching…” He shook his head. “I want to go back there now and finish what I started. I want to shove his head under the water and watch him splash and kick and die. Why’d you stop me?” Duncan’s fists were clenching and unclenching.

“Because I … I couldn’t bear to watch.”

He seemed to be fighting some inner demon that wanted to break free. He wouldn’t lift his eyes. Amelia stared at the top of his head,
still
matted with blood. His shoulders heaved with each breath.

She was
still
so unsure of him, so fearful of his explosive, hot-tempered nature. He had beaten those men insensible back there and
still
wanted to go back and do more damage.

And yet he wanted to do those things to protect her. To wreak vengeance on those who tried to dishonor her.

Or perhaps it was not
her
dishonor he wanted to avenge.…

“Thank you,” she softly said, for she did not know what else to say. “Thank you for rescuing me from those men.”

He looked up in anger—or was it remorse?—then put a hand to his head and staggered sideways. “Ah, bluidy
hell
.”

She dashed forward and tried to grab hold of him under the arms but could do nothing as he sank heavily to the ground in a huge tartan-covered heap.

She leaned over him on her knees and slapped at his cheeks. “Duncan! Duncan!”

Good God!
Sitting back on her heels, she pressed a fist to her forehead. He had just saved her from those awful men.

She was alive and
still
in possession of her virtue because of him. What had she done?

An owl hooted in the treetops, and she looked up at the moonlit sky. She had no idea how to help him. They were in the middle of nowhere.

Then she heard a noise from beyond the glade—a cow lowing in the night. Perhaps there was a herd, and if there was a herd, there might be a drover, or even a crofter’s cottage with a barn and a family with food and clean water and supplies.…

Rising to her feet, she looked down at Duncan unconscious on the ground, glanced briefly at his horse nibbling on the grass, then darted off in a run toward the sound she had heard and prayed it was not another troop of drunken English soldiers.

A faint, flickering glow
ill
uminated a window. It drew her out of the trees and across a field to a
small
cottage, built of rough stone and thatched with hay. A ribbon of smoke trailed upward from the chimney to the clear, starry sky, and she heard again the sound of a cow lowing somewhere in the darkness.

Hoisting her skirts up to her knees, Amelia dashed across the uneven ground, then reached the door and rapped hard upon it. She’d already decided what she was going to say, for she had no idea what to expect from these Highlanders, or what manner of household she had chanced upon.

The wooden door creaked open, and she found herself looking down at a frail, elderly man in a kilt. He leaned over a rough-hewn wooden cane, and his snow-white hair flew fantastical y outward in
all
directions, as if he hadn’t combed it in a decade. His saggy skin was creased with deep grooves that looked as ancient as the bark on a two-hundred-year-old oak.

Amelia’s hopes sank. She thought she might be greeted by an able-bodied young crofter, who would hurry to the glade with her and perhaps even carry Duncan to shelter.

“My apologies for disturbing you at this hour,” she said,

“but I am in need of assistance. My…” She paused, then started again. “My
husband
is injured in the forest.” She turned and pointed.

The door opened more
full
y, and a young barefoot woman stepped into view. She wore a plain white shift. Her flaxen hair
fell
in loose curls upon her shoulders, and she held a baby in her arms.

“She’s English,” the old man said in a scratchy, suspicious voice.

Then, to Amelia’s incalculable relief, a younger, more stalwart Scotsman appeared in the doorway. He was fair in coloring and wore a loose nightshirt. “Injured, you say?

Whereabouts?”

“In the glade not far from here,” she answered. “I can take you there, if you
will
help us.” She decided it would be prudent to offer some additional information: “My husband is Scottish.”

The young man nodded. “No matter, lass. I
’ll
hitch up the wagon.” He turned to his wife. “Put the kettle on the fire and fetch some blankets.”

He disappeared for a moment, then came back wearing a kilt, which he fastened over his shoulder while he
followed
Amelia outside. She was uncomfortably aware of Duncan’s shield bouncing lightly at her back.

A short time later, they were
rolling
through the woods on a rickety wagon with a squeaky axle, behind a stout white pony who plodded along too slowly for Amelia’s current state of anxiety.

“It’s just through there.” She pointed toward the moonlit glade, then hopped down from the seat while they were
still
moving. She ran ahead and found Duncan exactly where she’d left him.

“Here!” she
called
out. “We’re over here!”

Please, God, let him be alive
.

Dropping to her knees, she touched his cheek. His skin was
still
warm, and a strong pulse throbbed at his neck.

The wagon creaked to a halt, and the Scotsman hopped down. “What happened to him?”

Amelia paused, searching for a plausible explanation while the pony jangled the harness. “He
fell
off his horse and hit his head.”

The Highlander glanced briefly at Turner, nibbling quietly on the sweet green grass, then leaned forward on a knee. He glanced also at Duncan’s axe and claymore, then proceeded to examine his scalp. “It’s a deep gash, to be sure, but at least he didn’t split his
skull
wide open. Help me get him onto the wagon bed.”

With a great deal of combined effort, they managed to lift Duncan and set him on a bed of hay in the back. Amelia climbed in with him and held his head on her lap for the short return journey to the cottage.

They reached the croft and slowed to a halt in front of the door. The young man lifted Duncan over his shoulder and carried him inside. A fire blazed in the hearth. The crofter’s wife was now dressed in plain brown homespun.

“Gracious,” she said, setting her sleeping infant down in a basket. “He’s one strapping giant of a Highlander. What happened to him?”

“He
fell
off his horse and hit his head,” her husband answered skeptical y, giving her a sharp look.

“What’s your name, lass?” the woman asked. Her tone was direct but not without kindness.

“Amelia.” She decided not to mention her family name or title. They did not need to know she was the daughter of an aristocrat.

The woman stared at her curiously. “I’m Beth,” she said,

“and this is my husband, Craig. We’re MacKenzies, and you met my father at the door. He’s a MacDonald.”

“I’m honored to make your acquaintance,” Amelia replied, nodding respectful y at the old man who stood hunched over his cane in the center of the room, not looking at her. His angry, incredulous eyes were fixed on Duncan.

«Well
, let’s see if we can bring this clumsy Highlander around,” Beth said, reacting casual y to the tension in the room while she crossed to the rough-hewn table. “He’s your husband, you say?” She did not meet Amelia’s eyes.

“Yes. Can you help him?”

Beth exchanged another dubious glance with Craig, but Amelia could not concern herself with their suspicions now.

Al
l
she wanted was for Duncan to wake up.

“We
’ll
do our best.” Beth picked up a plate and mashed its contents with a wooden spoon. “You said he was wounded, so I prepared an ointment of foxglove leaves while you were gone. This should do, but if it’s a serious head wound, there might be
swelling
of the brain and there’s not much anyone can do but wait and pray.”

Amelia suppressed her fear, then glanced uneasily at the old man, who backed away toward the
wall
and watched her with dark, menacing eyes. The old man’s expression harkened straight back to the terrifying nightmares of her childhood.