“Have a care. The MacGregor is powerful, and there are rumors...”
So, Toran did ken more than he’d admitted last night. “What kind of rumors?”
“Rumors telling me he may no’ be a good match for our Caitrin.”
“OurCaitrin, is it now?” Jamie ran a hand through his hair. What was Toran leading up to? “Last night, ye wrote her off as a horse-faced pest.”
Toran stood. “I didna call her horse-faced, as well ye ken. I said she might have fallen off a horse onto her face. She was a bit clumsy in the early days.”
“As are most lasses—and lads—at that age. I recall a few trips and spills of my own—and yers,” Jamie retorted.
“She was a bit of a pest. Ye have to admit that.”
“I dinna have to admit anything of the sort, least of all to ye.” He bent and retrieved his bag and longsword then faced his laird again, one eyebrow cocked. “She worshipped the ground ye walked on. I’d think ye wouldha missed her, given nay other woman has been fool enough to do so since.” Jamie hefted his claymore and turned toward the door.
“Until Aileana? Or do ye mean Coira?”
Toran spoke so softly, Jamie barely heard his question. He glanced over his shoulder and instantly regretted his words. Toran’s expression told him his comment had brought Coira to mind, the woman who stabbed Aileana at their wedding dinner had nearly been killed by Donal in defense of his laird’s new bride. Though badly wounded, Aileana managed to save Coira’s life. Toran had sent Coira home as soon as she could travel. Her escort had returned, reporting her safe delivery and that had been the end of it. Jamie was perfectly at ease with the fact that they’d never heard from her again. Bringing her to Toran’s mind was a mistake. He mentally kicked himself. He had wanted to keep his leave-taking lighthearted, despite their disagreement over this mission. They’d been friends too long to part in anger. “I suppose every woman has her weakness.” It was a feeble jest, but the best he could manage.
Toran glanced up, grunted, and gave Jamie a lopsided grin. “Perhaps Caitrin will be weak where ye are concerned.”
“Dinna be ridiculous,” Jamie answered with a snort. “Ye sound like an auld woman.”
Grinning now, Toran continued as if Jamie had not spoken. “If so, the MacGregor might, for the sake of yer former acquaintance, give ye a chance to explain yerself, or he might hang ye all the faster.” His expression turned serious, and he held up a hand, forestalling Jamie’s objection. “I ken what I’m asking of ye, but I trust ye to do what’s right. Hear me on this, Jamie. MacGregor is rumored to be raiding his neighbors. If he’s foolish enough to risk another clan war, and if yer mission goes wrong, it could undo all the work we’ve done on the treaty. Get him to sign so the treaty clans can control him. And get the betrothal done.”
Jamie gave up trying to lighten Toran’s mood—or his own. “Ye give me nay choice in the matter,laird.”
Toran stepped forward and clapped Jamie on the back. “Let’s get ye on yer way. I canna wait to hear how this turns out.”
****
Caitrin Fletcher shook out an undershift and paused to watch the dust motes dance in a beam of sunlight. Here she was, eleven years later, in her old room at Fletcher, doing the same thing she’d been forced to do as a nine-year-old lass, preparing to go live with strangers. Much about today differed from the last time—a dark, foggy morning then, a bright, sunny afternoon now. This time, she did the packing, while her old nursemaid, Rona, sat by, keeping her company. Then, she’d fought and cried, and begged her father not to send her away. This time, her father had gone ahead to negotiate the terms of the betrothal, and she looked forward to joining him.
She folded the garment and picked up another. It wasn’t that she yearned to marry, or to marry the MacGregor in particular. She didn’t know him, or even much about him. Rich and powerful, with lands and an army of his own. That about summed up all her father had told her. Things important to a man, to a laird, but not the other things she wished she knew, such as his age, his temperament, or what he looked like. But her father very much wanted this match to improve the standing of the Fletchers. If she became the MacGregor lady, surely her clan would benefit. She would see to it.
Again, she paused to imagine how her future husband might appear. Dark red hair, she decided, so dark it might be thought brown or black in some light. Tall and strong, with a square jaw and commanding manner, but a sense of humor, too. Deep blue eyes that warmed her with a glance and sparkled with mirth when he laughed.
But wait. Suddenly, she felt flushed all over. Though it grieved her, at this moment, she was glad Rona’s eyesight was poor enough she would not see her skin pinking from head to toe. The image forming in her mind was not of a stranger, but of a lad that she’d known well, until six years ago. A friend, the only Lathan male who tolerated her childish presence at first.
Jamie.
Not that she expected to see him again. Her father had asked for the Lathan to escort her, feeling the presence of the young laird, who had influence in the highlands, might increase the clan Fletcher standing in the negotiations, and in the eyes of the MacGregor. So Toran would be her escort. She stifled a quick flare of disappointment. Seeing him again, she supposed, would be good. But, he was not the one she wanted to see.
Unless, among the men who surely would travel with Toran as guard and escort, he brought Jamie. Her pulse kicked up at the thought. The highlands were still a dangerous place, despite Toran’s best efforts to mend relations between formerly feuding clans. Toran would bring a dozen men, she guessed, perhaps more, to avoid risking her person or his relations with the Fletchers or MacGregors. Surely, he and Jamie were still close. They’d been thick as thieves as boys, never one without the other.
Nor without her, when she could catch up to them.
Once he knew they were to escort her, their wee pest of a friend they hadn’t seen in six years, surely he’d bring Jamie with him.
Caitrin clutched a kirtle to her chest and sank onto the bed, heedless of sitting on the clothes waiting to be sorted and folded.
“What is it, lass?” Rona might be nearly blind, but her ears were sharp as a bat’s. From her seat in the rocking chair across the room, she missed nothing, not the slight shift of fabric, nor the give of the ropes beneath the mattress.
“What if Jamie comes with the Lathan? He and Toran were inseparable.”
“That was six years gone, ye ken. They’re men grown. I doubt they’re in each others’ pockets the way they were back then. And if they are still close, perhaps Jamie is the one Toran trusts to leave behind in his stead to hold his keep.”
Caitrin’s heart sank. She clutched the kirtle, wrinkling the fabric mercilessly. “Ach, I didna think of that.”
