All the fight drained out of Reid. He was suddenly exhausted. “Go on then,” he said, waving with his sword. “On yer way.”
Ramsey of Taffbury, along with his companions, turned and scuttled away as fast as their legs could carry them. The Muir plaid was left in a heap in the dirt.
Reid leaned on his sword, exhaustion washing through him.
Abigail!
The thought suddenly spiked through him. He spun, scanning the ground. There! She lay in a tangled heap a few meters away. He scrabbled over to her. She lay sprawled on her back, her hair fanned out around her head. Her eyes were closed.
He went cold. “Abigail?” Scooping her up, he held her close. “Abigail?”
Her eyes fluttered open and relief washed through him in a deluge so strong that it made him dizzy. “Are ye hurt, lass?”
“I...I don’t think so. Is the horse all right?”
Reid looked around and saw the horse cropping grass on the other side of a hummock. It looked like she might have thrown a shoe but he could see no other sign of injury.
“She’s fine,” Reid said.No thanks to me.Shame washed through him. What had he been thinking?
He didn’t look at Abigail as he climbed to his feet and helped her up.
“Come. Let’s go home.”
***
THERE WAS A KNOCK ONthe door. Abi ignored it. A moment later the door opened and Reid stuck his head in.
“May I come in?”
“No.”
He came in anyway. Abi hated the way her traitorous heart fluttered at the sight of him. She was angry with him, dammit!
“Would it help if I apologized?” he said softly.
Abi looked at him. “It would help if you’d explain just exactly what got into you. You could have gotten us both killed!”
She’d been terrified when Reid had taken them galloping off like that without a word of explanation. And why? Because he’d spotted somebody he thought he recognized. This Cinead Muir—whoever the hell that was.
When they’d returned an hour ago, she’d left Reid to see to the horse and stomped up here to quietly seethe. Two days had passed since Whitefoot’s injury and she and Reid had been getting on fabulously. Or she thought they had. But then he goes and does something like this. And for what?
“I know. I shouldnae have done what I did.”
“What is going on?” she asked, turning to look at him and crossing her arms. “Why won’t you tell me why you hate the Muirs and why just the mention of this Cinead guy makes you lose it? Who is he?”
Reid looked away and remained silent for so long that Abi thought he wasn’t going to answer. His expression closed, his walls coming down again, and he twitched as though he wanted to get up and leave the room.
“Tell me,” she urged. “You can trust me.” He’d let her see him at his darkest when he’d been terrifying those villagers. Yet this, this secret he carried within himself, he refused to divulge. What could be so bad that he found it so hard to share?
He sucked in a deep breath, let it out again, then met her gaze.
“Cinead Muir is my brother.”
Abi blinked, taken aback. That wasn’t what she’d been expecting to hear. “Your brother?”
“Aye. My brother.” He sighed. “I’m afraid ye dinna know me as well as ye think ye do, lass. In fact, ye dinna know me at all.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
