“Then you train me,” she said.
He made a sharp sound that said, “not a chance.” “You know how I feel about this. I won’t forbid it, but I sure as hell won’t encourage it. Next thing you know my wife will be outside alongside you trying to swing a sword.”
If she’d been through what I went through, you might want her to know how to defend herself.
Annie wanted to say it, but she didn’t. She knew how hard it was for her big, strong brother to be reminded that he hadn’t been able to protect her. But no one could protect someone else all the time—no matter how big and strong they were. That was the point. That was why she wanted to do this. The only person who could protect her was her, and Annie intended to take control of her own defenses.
She’d fought back with a ferocity that had surprised her attackers. It had taken three of them to pin her down. But even though she was extremely strong for her size and sex, they’d eventually been able to overpower her. She’d been able to get in some damage but not enough.
If she’d known how to use a knife, it might have been different. Maybe she would have been able to give herself time to escape. Maybe she wouldn’t have felt so helpless. Maybe she could have killed one of the scourges to prevent him from doing it to someone else.
“I think all women should know how to defend themselves.”
Annie didn’t realize she’d said it out loud until she saw the sadness—and guilt—on her brother’s face.
It was a man’s job to protect his women. That was what Patrick thought. That is whatthe entire worldthought. By doing this, not only was she upsetting the natural order of things, it was also making it seem as if she didn’t have faith in him. Patrick saw her wanting to learn how to fight as his failure. He didn’t understand that it had nothing to do with him. This was about her.
But maybe she didn’t give her big brother enough credit. When he voiced the reason for his concern, it didn’t have anything to do with his ability to keep her safe. “Training with weapons is dangerous, Annie. I just don’t want to see you get hurt.”
That was something they could both agree on. “Neither do I. That’s why I need to do this.”
Their eyes held, and he nodded. “I’ll tell Robbie you can start tomorrow.”
She smiled broadly, for the first time in a long time feeling like herself. “Thank you, Patrick. You won’t regret this.”
He laughed. “I already do. A lass training to be a warrior? What will you be wanting next?”
She eyed him playfully. “Those trews you are wearing look comfortable. How about some of those?”
He rolled his eyes and guffawed. “Lasses wearing trews? I’d like to see that. Maybe you’d like wings to fly to the moon, too?”
* * *
One Week Later
“I’m sorry, Niall. There is nothing I can do. You know how stubborn Annie can be. She doesn’t want to see you.”
Niall’s jaw clenched. He could see the sympathy in Patrick MacGregor’s expression—sympathy that hadn’t been there before the other man’s marriage. But it seemed that the new MacGregor chief had learned that when it came to lasses and matters of the heart, sometimes you made mistakes.Bigmistakes. Mistakes that Patrick, at least, had had forgiven.
If Niall could just go back to that day at Dunvegan…
It hadn’t taken him long to realize that he’d made a mistake. Part of him had known it when Annie walked away. The sick feeling twisting his gut had been trying to tell him. But he’d mistaken it for guilt.
He hadn’t meant to hurt her. Hadn’t meant her to think that she wasn’t good enough for him. He’d been one and twenty and trying to act like a man and do his duty, damn it. She should have understood that.
But what he’d attributed to guilt had quickly turned to anger. Her cold attitude and refusal to look at him the rest of the week had infuriated him. She’d acted as if she didn’t care when the women had swarmed him after he’d won the foot race. When he’d overheard her say that it was no surprise as “Lamonts were good at running away,” he’d nearly made a fool of himself by storming across the hall and forcing her to take back her words.
Instead he’d let one of the prettier lasses fawn all over him. But that had been a mistake as well. The woman’s compliments and admiration only made him feel more pathetic for seeking it out, and nothing the lass said could make up for the disdain of the only woman who mattered.
But he’d been too damned proud to admit he’d made a mistake. He’d waited, trying to prove to himself over the next months that he was too young to want a wife. That it didn’t matter whom he married. That kissing her wasn’t special.
That he would be fine without her.
But by the time the Gathering had come to Ascog the following year, he’d realized what his body had been trying to tell him that day at Dunvegan. The illness that had gripped him wasn’t guilt. It was panic. It was the knowledge that he’d done something horribly wrong that he might not be able to take back. That in trying to do his duty, he’d unintentionally made the woman he loved think she wasn’t good enough. That to a proud woman like Annie that would be unforgivable.
When the MacGregors had called on the old bond of hospitality between the clans to take refuge near Ascog Castle, Niall had confided his mistake—and that he intended to make it right—to Iain. His friend had looked at him coldly and said, “She’ll not have you now, and I can’t say I blame her. You didn’t want her.”
Niall never had a chance to try to prove Iain wrong. Before he could attempt to make amends, Ascog was attacked, his father and brother killed, the MacGregor chief was tricked into surrendering and executed, Iain was killed, and Annie was…
