Sheer suffocating panic squeezed the air out of her lungs.
She wished she could scream for help, but something was paralyzing her—a strange, almost hypnotic power that turned her muscles into useless pools of liquid.
He moved slowly around her. “It’s been a while since I’ve had a woman.” He circled around to the front, lifted his axe, and touched the hook to her shoulder. Her mind flooded with alarm as the smooth steel slid over her flesh.
“Are you his beloved?” the Butcher asked.
“Of course I am,” she proudly replied. “And he is mine.”
She loved Richard withallher heart. Her father had loved him, too. And God help this dirty Jacobite when her fiancé learned of this.…
“Is that a fact?”
She turned her raging eyes to meet his. “Yes, sir, it is a fact. Though I doubt you would know the meaning of the wordlove.It is outside your realm of understanding.”
He leaned close until his lips touched her ear. His hot, moist breath made her shiver. “Aye, lass, I have no use for tenderness or affection, and you’d dowellto remember it. So it’s decided, then. I’ll killyou instead of him.”
Terror swept through her. He was going to do it. He truly was.
“Please, sir,” she said, working hard to soften the animosity in her voice. Perhaps she could distract him with a desperate plea for mercy. With any luck, his entry to the fort had been noticed and someone would soon come to her rescue. “I beg of you.”
“You beg of me?” He chuckled grimly. “You don’t strike me as the begging type.”
He was enjoying this. It was a game to him. He had no compassion. None atall.
“Why do you want tokillmy betrothed?” she asked,stillhoping to delay the inevitable.
Please, God, let someone knock on the door. A maid.
My uncle. The cavalry. Anyone!
“How do you know him?” she asked.
The Butcher lifted the axe off her shoulder and tipped it upward to rest on his own. He continued to circle around her, like a wolf studying its prey. “I fought against him at Inveraray,” he said, “and again at Sheriffmuir.”
The Jacobites had been defeated at Sheriffmuir. It was the battlefield where Richard had saved her father’s life. It was why shefellin love with him. He’d fought with courage and valor, with unwavering honor to the Crown—unlike this savage moving around her, who didn’t seem to understand the rules of war. He seemed bent only on exacting some dark, personal revenge.
“Do you intend tokillallthe English soldiers you fought against that day?” she asked. “Because that may take you a while. And there were Scots there, too, fighting for the English Crown.Campbells, I believe. Are you going to butcherallof them aswell?”
He circled around to her front. “Nay. It was only your beloved I wanted to slice in two this evening.”
«Well, I am sorry to disappoint you.”
Visions of war and murder spun before her eyes. How unfair itallwas. Her father had been dead for only a month, and she had come here to FortWilliamunder the guardianship of her uncle to marry Richard. Her protector.
What was going to happen now? Would she die a grisly death here in this room, under the cold, heavy blade of a Highlander, just like in her childhood nightmares? Or would he leave her to live while he went on in search of Richard and succeeded inkillingthe man she loved?
“But I’m not disappointed, lass,” the Butcher said, cradling her chin in hiscallousedhand and lifting her face, forcing her to look at him. “Because tonight I stumbled on something much more appealing than a swift, clean death for my enemy. It’s something that’llmake him suffer much longer.”
“You’re going tokillme, then?”
Or perhaps he was referring to something else.…
Fighting againstthe knot of upheaval in her belly, she glared at him with hatred. “I am betrothed, sir, to the man I love. So if you mean to rape me, I promise you, Iwillscream my guts out—and you cankillme if you want to, because I would rather die a thousand agonizing deaths than be violated byyou.”
His eyes narrowed; then he swore something in Gaelic and let go of her chin. He strode to thetallwardrobe where her clothes were stored.
After tearing through the costly gowns of silk and lace, he threw them to the floor in the center of the room, then found a simple skirt of heavy brown wool. Hepulledit from the wardrobe, along with drawers and stays, stepped over the other gowns, and thrust the articles at her.
