Page 1 of The Return of the Heir

Prologue

Dunvegan Castle, Scotland

October 1st, 1737

Gwendolyn Harris stood alone outside the doorway of the chapel at Dunvegan Castle. It had been three years since the MacDonalds had raided their village and killed everyone except her sister, brother, and herself. Why they were spared when so many others perished that day, including her parents, made no sense.

In the days after the raid, there were times when Gwendolyn had wished she and her siblings had been killed. Death would have been preferable to the pain and sorrow they had experienced wandering through their lifeless village. It wasn’t until the MacLeod clan had arrived and helped them bury the dead—then taken them back to Dunvegan Castle—that hope for their future had taken hold.

Much had happened to Arabella, Samuel, and her in the past three years, but nothing more exciting than what would occur in a matter of moments when she would become the wife of Alastair MacLeod. The clan heir. The three of them would truly become a part of the Clan MacLeod, and all their troubles would be behind them.

A nervous fluttering took flight in Gwendolyn’s stomach as she peeked inside the chapel doorway, trying to catch a glimpse of her brother and sister. They should be standing near the front, yet she couldn’t locate them. With a frown, Gwendolyn shifted her attention back to the hallway where she stood, waiting for Norman MacLeod to escort her down the aisle to join her life to his son’s. Just thinking about being near the elder laird sent a shiver down her spine.

Since arriving at Dunvegan, she’d come to know why others referred to him as “Wicked Man” MacLeod. For daily he abused all those in his path—servants, clan members, his wife, and especially his own children. Even so, Gwendolyn and her siblings had kept their heads down and tried to only think of how grateful they were to him for taking them in when they’d had nowhere else to go.

Bringing her thoughts back to the present, Gwendolyn forced herself to stand taller and breathe slow and deep, keeping her excitement and her nervousness in check. It was hard to imagine only three days had passed since she and Alastair had been betrothed, on her sixteenth birthday.

The announcement and the signing of the betrothal document had come as a surprise to both herself and Alastair. They had spent some time together over the past three years, mostly at meals, and a few times alone in each other’s company. But they were essentially strangers, who were now thrust together at his father’s insistence.

Gwendolyn peered once more down the long aisle in the chapel to the man who waited for her there. Alastair MacLeod could only be considered breathtaking to anyone with eyes. The morning sun streamed through the chapel’s stained glass window to highlight the shining darkness of his hair and revealed the hint of a wave in its thickness. His sideburns accentuated the high cheekbones of his slightly elongated face, and the hollowed line of his jaw. His shoulders filled out the midnight-blue surcoat and tunic with a power and grace that rippled clearly from every taut inch of muscle; his legs, long and lean, peeked out from beneath the hem of his tartan in such a way that made her heart beat faster.

In spite of all that, it was his eyes that commanded most of her attention. They were dark, and at this moment, as dusky as the dark brown mane of his hair, and they were focused on her. When a genuine smile of appreciation touched his lips, Gwendolyn drew a startled breath.

An arranged marriage such as this was not uncommon. Her own mother’s marriage had been a prudent union between two clans with no thought whatsoever to affection, or whether the two parties concerned would eventually tolerate each other. Her mother had been happy enough until the day her marriage to a Harris ended her life because of a feud with a rival clan, the MacDonalds.

Her throat tight, Gwendolyn stepped back, out of view, trying to collect herself. Would her own marriage be similarly cursed? Or was Alastair’s smile a sign that theirs would be a different kind of union?

Suddenly footsteps sounded, coming swiftly towards her. She drew a deep breath and braced herself for the arrival of her soon-to-be father-in-law. Gwendolyn turned to greet him—but it was not Norman MacLeod who reached for her. It was not the Wicked Man MacLeod who clamped a brutal hand over her mouth to stifle her scream. She had never seen this man before, but she could tell he wasn’t a friend to the MacLeods. Her captor hauled her backwards, out of the hallway and out to the rear courtyard.

She tried to wrench away, but he was too strong. No one was around to witness anything since they were all packed into the chapel, waiting for her to marry the heir. She dragged her feet, trying to make it difficult for the brute who held her tightly in his grasp. Desperation brought a cold sweat to her skin as he pulled her to the wall of the rear courtyard that faced Loch Dunvegan.

Her captor’s hold on her lessened, and she twisted out of his grasp. She drew a ragged breath of the sea air even as her back pressed against the wall that separated the castle from the cliffs of the sea loch. She had nowhere to go but over the ledge. She turned to scramble up the wall when the whisk of drawn steel filled her ears.

A firm hand dragged her down, then thrust her backwards. She hit the wall hard as the deadly edge of a knife pressed against her neck, stilling her movements. “What do you want?”

“Take off your gown.”

Fear and desperation rose in Gwendolyn. She’d avoided all the unwanted attention that had come her way over the past few years, only to lose that battle now, on her wedding day, with a man who was not her intended spouse? Her anger flared as she twisted in her attacker’s arms and slammed her knee into his groin.

He groaned and hunched forward. Gwendolyn jerked away, racing back towards the castle. Her only hope was to either alert others to her attacker’s presence or find somewhere to hide.

“Get back here or your brother and sister will die.”

He was lying. He had to be, but then she hadn’t seen either of them in the chapel. She kept running even as the sound of footsteps sounded close behind her.

“I have them locked away. Stop, or I’ll kill them both.”

Gwendolyn stumbled, and turned as the man advanced on her, his dagger poised to strike.

“That’s better,” he said as he came close. “Now hold still or I’ll slit your pretty little flesh.” With a flick of the dagger, he caught the bodice of her gown and sliced it all the way down to the hem. Gwendolyn’s knees started to wobble as the weapon gleamed in the morning sunshine.

“Take me to my brother and sister.”

“Only if you do as I say.” He once again caught her against his chest and held the blade to her throat as he dragged her back to the cliff’s edge. She felt the dagger dig deeper into her flesh and the warmth of her own blood trailing down her throat. At the edge, her captor stopped and peeled her gown from her then wiped the bodice against her neck, smearing the fabric with the bright red blood. From his sporran he withdrew a sheep’s bladder filled with a dark red liquid. With his dagger, he pierced the vessel and doused her dress with the additional blood.

Fear rippled down her spine. “What are you doing?”

“Making it appear as though you jumped. Once Alastair finds your dress along the shoreline, bathed in blood, he will assume you are dead and won’t turn the countryside upside down looking for you.”