Kate’s blood boiled. She was tired of hating him. Or trying to. And besides, if what Graham told her was true, her reasons to hate him were completely unjustified. But Callum’s weren’t. She took another step forward. She didn’t want him to hate her, no matter what had been done to him. He was swimming farther away from her, and the more he swam, the angrier she became. She refused to fight with him ever again, and she was determined to prove it to him, even if it killed her. Before she could think clearly enough to stop herself, she unfastened her kirtle and kicked it away. She stepped into the loch and swam toward the belligerent chieftain in her shift and hose.
He heard her splashing behind him but did not bother to turn around, which infuriated Kate all the more. When she was close enough to reach out and touch him, a strange comfort washed over her. She had traveled in his embrace since the moment they met. His closeness was becoming familiar to her, enjoyable, safe.
“Why are you running away from me?” she asked, frowning at him, and at the dull pain beginning to throb in her shoulder.
He turned and opened his eyes to look at her. His long hair swept over his forehead, gleaming black down his shoulders. Droplets clung to his long lashes, giving more potency to his hard blue-green gaze. “I’m no’ runnin’, lass. I’m floatin’.”
“Do I frighten you, then?” she charged, fueled by his nonchalance. For in truth, she knew she was the one who was afraid. Not of his strength that could overpower her so easily, but of her own maddening attraction to him.
“How could a wee thing like yerself frighten me?” He turned and swam away again.
Kate swatted the surface and gritted her teeth. “You’re afraid of Campbells, then!”
It was definitely the wrong thing to say, she realized when he pivoted around and impaled her with his angry glare. He rose out of the water, looming over her and blocking out the sun. She had to fight to keep herself from withering in her spot. “Woman,” he said very slowly, the word rumbling on that bear’s voice. “I’ve crushed more Campbells than ye’ll ever know, and I’ll go to my grave with a Campbell’s heart clutched within my fingers.”
Kate tipped her head back. The intensity in his gaze held her still, but her heart roared within her chest. His face was so hard, so unforgiving. She wanted to look away, for she knew now the passion that burned within. How deeply was his hatred emblazoned on his heart? He’d had a lifetime to nurture it. He would die hating her. Nae. She did not want it to be so. She raised her eyes to the dark, damp strands of his hair falling around his shoulders, the faint trace of blood not completely washed away by the water. She should fear him, but there was more to him than anger and malevolence. She had sliced open his leg, and he had not sliced off her head in return. Even when she fired his fury, he had not put his hands to her. His eyes were sharp and hard, but sometimes, when he looked at her, his gaze grew tender, as if he could not sustain his resolve to hate her.
“Will that heart be mine, my laird?” she asked quietly.
“It might,” he answered, pulling her gaze back to his.
“Nae.” She shook her head. “If you hate me so much, why did you save me? I do not believe you would hurt me.”
Callum wanted to mock this trust she so freely granted him. Trust that poured from her lips, from her eyes every time she set them on him. Trust he did not deserve. But instead, he found himself enraptured by it. “Ye dinna know anything aboot me.” His voice rumbled like thunder, a low growl of warning, and something else . . .
“I know what people call you,” she said. “But mayhap they are wrong. Mayhap you are more like Sir Gawain or Percivale than Satan.”
Callum reached for her then and slid one arm around her waist. Drawing the lower half of his body flush against hers, he leaned toward her, his long, sable lashes swept downward. “Ye dinna know me, Kate.” His velvet baritone was an erotic caress as seductive as the smirk that curled his lips when she struggled to free herself. “Or what I’m capable of doin’.” Her flesh felt warm and soft beneath her wet shift, igniting a fire that blazed through his veins. He kept her still while he spread his palm over her belly, then upward, slowly, deliberately between her breasts and over her collarbone. Her lips parted on a sigh that mingled their breath even as she fought him. Hell, how easy it would be to take her. He lowered his head and covered her mouth with his. Her protests ended instantly, provoking him to taste her more fully. He swept his tongue inside her, then out again as he slanted his lips to take her at an even deeper angle. His kiss was fierce, possessive, his tongue probing, stroking her with sweet, hot, melting desire until she groaned and looped her arms around his neck.
When Callum felt her tongue flick against his, he grew hard against her. He could tear the thin barrier between them away and with one forceful surge impale her to the hilt. He wanted to show her that he was not the gentle man her eyes hoped for. He was no knight on a quest to save bonny damsels, though, by God, she was the most beautiful of them all. He could take her now, shatter her fanciful notions of him. God knew he could do it, for she tempted him beyond reason. But he knew the harsh reality of the world, and what would become of her if he took her. For her own good he had to keep her heart out of his hands.
He broke their kiss, letting his mouth hover over hers. “I am the MacGregor,” he whispered on a growl that sounded harsh to his own ears. “The most feared enemy of yer clan. Dinna ferget it, Kate.”
With every ounce of control he possessed, he released her and leaned back in the water. He was a murderer, aye, not a violator of women. “D’ye want to know why I saved ye?”
She shook her head no. But he saw the new spark of fear in her eyes even before he gave her his reason. He forced a thin smile. She deserved to know what a ruthless bastard he was, though at present he hated himself more than when he was Liam Campbell’s prisoner. “Ye are more valuable to me alive than dead.”
Kate’s arm stung, along with her heart. She felt tears slowly rising to the rims of her lashes and grew angry with herself for letting him see the effect of his words.
“I want yer uncle’s head,” he continued, “and when he comes fer ye, I will take it with nae mercy—his and those of any others who come with him.”
Kate’s heart lurched. Terror washed over her, as frigid as the water beginning to numb her limbs. Her uncle had already proven her value to him when he fled against the McColls. He would not come for her. But her brother would. Robert would search for her. “You said Robert was your friend.”
“Nae, I never said I was friend to any Campbell.”
He was going to kill her brother! She had to do something. She could not allow Robert to die for her.
“I fear you’ve made a terrible error,” she said, doing her best not to weep. It would do no good against his hardened heart. “My uncle will not come for me.”
“Aye, he will.” Slowly, Callum treaded toward her again. When he reached her, he lifted his fingers to a tear spilling down her cheek. “I know he will, because I would come fer ye.” She broke away from his touch and swam back to the shore. He watched her snatch her kirtle from the ground and then flee, satisfied that he crushed any hope she had placed in him.
“Aye, Kate, if ye were mine and someone took ye, I would follow him to the ends of the Earth until I got ye back.”
Chapter Eleven
KATE BURST INTO THE CAMP, clutching her kirtle to her chest. She stopped for a moment to look at the four faces staring up at her from their pouches of dried mutton and bread, then rushed to Callum’s horse. She had to find Robert before he found her. Her chest burned. Her muscles felt frozen, save for the throbbing in her arm. She tried to pull herself up into the saddle, but a bolt of pain shot through her and almost made her retch.
A large pair of hands caught her by the waist and steadied her.
