She looked him squarely in the eyes, realizing that he was again working to put her in her place, to make sure she understood that she would never be able to control him or influence him with her femininity. She was a mere lamb to him. She was not a threat.
“You prefer it when people fear you,” she said.
He reclined against the tall chair and looked at her with a renewed sexual hunger that seemed to come out of nowhere. “I’m glad to see you’re catching on.”
Her heart began to pound, for there was nothing weak or cloudy about this man’s passions. He wanted to bed her in order to slake his lust, and he was fully confident that he would do so, without impediment, when the appropriate moment arrived.
She was offended by the notion of simply providing him with an outlet for his sexual impulses. He might be an unromantic, coldhearted warrior, but she was more sensitive than that. Before this invasion of her home, she had dreamed of a great love match for herself. She’d imagined a chivalrous Scotsman who would devote himself to her passionately until his last dying breath.
She was a romantic at heart, she’d always known it, but it seemed the time had come to accept a harsher reality. Soon she would be married to a ruthless warrior without a tender bone in his body, and it filled her heart with dread.
They did not converse during the rest of the meal, and only when dessert was served, did Gwendolen realize he still had not answered her question about why he left Kinloch two years ago.
“Are you ever going to tell me why you were gone for so long?” she asked, without looking at him. “Or do you intend to use the mystery of your absence to keep me guessing about your ferocity?”
He swallowed his dessert whole, then wiped his mouth with a linen napkin. “My father and I had a disagreement,” he told her. “I did something deceitful and will probably burn in hell for it. He told me I was no longer his son, and he ordered me to leave and never return. I abided by his wishes until Lachlan found me after a two-year search, and informed me of my clan’s defeat, and the loss of Kinloch to your father.”
Gwendolen regarded him with a persistent curiosity. “What deceitful thing did you do to deserve such a punishment?”
She waited, breath held, for a description of his offense.
“I betrayed a friend.”
“Why? Did he do something to you? Did you quarrel?”
“Aye, we quarreled a number of times. Let’s just say I did not approve of his choice of a wife, and I was adamant in my opinions.”
She mulled over his reply. “Were you in love with her yourself?”
“God,no! Did you not hear a word I said earlier?”
Gwendolen supposed she had become somewhat flustered since she sat down. “Pardon me. I wasn’t thinking.”
He picked up his goblet and held it on his lap. “I despised her, if you must know. If I’d had my way, she wouldn’t have survived long enough to bewitch him into marrying her.”
“Good heavens, would you have killed her?” The horror poured out of Gwendolen like a flash flood.
A muscle clenched at his jaw, and he spoke with a dark and quiet foreboding. “What doyouthink?”
Gwendolen leaned back in her chair. “That is why you betrayed this friend? Because he chose her, over you?”
He glanced the other way. “Aye.”
“I can hardly blame him,” she said. “Love should always triumph over evil.”
Remarkably unperturbed, he leaned very close. “You think I’m evil, do you?”
“You said yourself that you would burn in hell for your actions.”
“That I did. And I’m certain I will.”
A fiddler passed in front of them. He sang a lively tune in Gaelic, distracting them for a moment, then moved on down the table.
“Did you ever try to reconcile with your friend?” Gwendolen asked, reaching for her goblet.
“Nay.”
“Why not?”
