He glanced at his friend, and Kenneth had an amused twinkle in his eyes.
“Ye shut yer mouth,” Magnus chided, and the other man chuckled.
“Protection? Is that what they call it?”
“She is alady,” he said fiercely.
“And ye are alairdin need of abride. That is all I’m sayin’.”
“Well, ye can unsay it,” Magnus grumbled, staring into the fire, his mind wandering to places it should not venture to.
“It could delay things,” O’Malley mused.
“What’s that?”
“Yer alliance,” he said slowly, swirling his whisky in his glass, contemplating it as he held it up to the light. “They will recognize the stability it brings. It may nae be a marriage, but it is a welcome advancement. They’ll be pleased ye’ve made afriendoutside the castle walls.”
His smile was mischievous, and Magnus glowered at him anew.
“I’ll do what is best for me people. The lass has nothin’ to do with me clan. She is simply in need of a place to stay. She cannae leave soon enough,” he muttered.
“Aye, I’m sure,” O’Malley replied.
“I must change for dinner,” Magnus snarled, swallowing back the rest of his whisky and placing the glass on the mantelpiece. “We can talk more about this later.”
“Enjoy yer dinner guest—I mean, dinner with yer guest,” O’Malley said with a grin as Magnus slammed the door shut behind him.
CHAPTER 7
“Thank you,I can manage from here,” Leah said softly as the servant girl laid out a change of clothes on the bed and hurried away.
She dispensed with the heavy cloak around her shoulders and threw it over a chair beside the fireplace. The room was extremely warm and cozy, and she felt instantly more like herself as she kicked off her sodden shoes and padded across the floor, looking into every nook and cranny to familiarize herself with her new home.
The view from the window was impossible to see clearly. She could vaguely discern some shadowy hills in the distance, but the lack of light meant that the world was simply a black wall in the continuing storm. The rain was still falling, but more slowly now. She could see the droplets caught in the torchlight below.
Her room was almost overrun with candles, and the roaring fire was banked up to the brim. With the number of fires and torchesshe had seen on her way to the rooms, she imagined Laird MacWatt must go through a forest a day.
She went to stand beside the fire, allowing the heat to permeate her chilled clothing and letting the glow of the fire bathe her in its warmth.
This may have been a temporary home, but it was a pleasant one, and despite her host’s rather grim personality, she felt welcome.
She had no idea where she would be in a month or with whom she would be living. The uncertainty concerned her greatly, and now that she was alone, her mind began to examine every possibility available to her, becoming more far-fetched and unpleasant the longer she considered each one.
Despite the bravado she showed to MacWatt, she was well aware that if her father truly followed through with his threats, she would have little agency to change his mind. Short of running away and swimming for her freedom, the best place she could be in was this island.
Her thoughts drifted to her friends and how worried they would be when they found her gone. Katie had suggested finding a hiding place, but she was not aware of exactlywhereLeah had hidden, and now, as far as her friends were concerned, Leah had vanished without a trace.
She remembered how she had felt when Oskar had kidnapped Daphne. She knew all too well the worry her friends would be feeling and resolved to write to them as soon as possible.
I wonder if barbarians have writing implements in their castles.
As she thought of Laird MacWatt again, she felt the same tug in her chest as she pictured his handsome profile. Despite his eyepatch and surly expression, he was exceedingly attractive.
She wasn’t sure what it was about his face that she found so interesting. Oskar was a handsome man, too, but MacWatt had a different kind of face.
MacWatt’s gaze was brooding and filled with promise, a dark invitation Leah could not explain. She found herself imagining what might have befallen her if his reaction to discovering her in his carriage had been quite different.
Perhaps he would have punished her for her actions, telling her that she was his to control now. She pictured him trapping her against the soft walls of the carriage, his huge hands imprisoning her, leaving her no room for escape, teaching her a lesson she was more than willing to learn.
