She had been everything he couldn’t protect, everything torn from him while Kenneth walked away with blood on his hands.The Brute of Sleat.The man who had robbed him of the only thing in the world he’d cared about. Eilidh.
Aidan exhaled slowly through his teeth.
His spy continued. “And now she walks at his side. Eats at his table. Shares his hearth.”
Anger pulsed under Aidan’s skin like a second heartbeat.
This foreigner is being welcomed ontae the land that should have been Eilidh’s.
Another man stepped closer. “What are yer plans, me laird?”
Aidan lifted his gaze to the dark bulk of the distant castle as moonlight flickered off the wet leaves like shining fragments of ice.
Kenneth MacDonald had taken Eilidh from him and from the world. Taken her future. Her laughter. Her innocence. Her life.
If Aidan could not yet cut that man down without the proof of Eilidh’s murder as demanded by the king – and without which he risked everything he owned, including his life – perhaps justice would come another way.
A cruel idea slid into place, chillingly precise.
“Mayhap,” he murmured, “fate has dealt me another opportunity instead.”
The camp fell silent around him.
He could picture Kenneth’s face clearly. The stoic control. The protective stance around the Englishwoman. He considered the possibility – however small – that she meant something to him. He toyed with the idea, turning it over and over in his mind.
“If Kenneth has taken a lass under his protection,” Aidan muttered, his voice sharp as a deadly blade, “then he has presented me with a way tae cause him pain.”
One or two of the men exchanged uneasy glances, but none dared question him.
Aidan stepped closer to the fire, its light carving harsh lines across his features.
“Eilidh’s blood cries out fer vengeance,” he whispered. “And if I cannae yet kill the man who caused it, then I will take what he cherishes.”
He smiled then, a thin, cold, stretch of his lips that held not a jot of humor.
“Mayhap Kenneth’s English lass is exactly the key me vengeance cries out fer.”
He gazed toward the castle once more, rain dripping from his hair, storm winds echoing his fury.
Let Kenneth try tae protect her.
Let him watch her slip through his fingers.
Let him feel helpless and broken, just as he caused me tae feel.
Only then will justice begin.
Only then will Eilidh rest.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Selene retreated to her bedchamber, eager to bathe and to don something fresh and clean.
Two young maids came in, one with more logs for the fire and the other with a very welcome pot of tea, some milk in a little jug, and a bowl of sugar.
“We’ll bring ye some water tae bathe, milady,” the older looking girl said, bobbing a curtsy.
“Oh please, make it hot. I’ve a great desire to bathe in water that is not almost turning into ice.”
