Page 5 of It’s in his Highland Kiss

Then again, Mary has several beautiful dresses. She probably doesn’t even like this one.

“Nay, nay . . . I went to the manor to arrange our escape,” Eiric said, a conspiratorial smile on his lips. He looked like a sly fox, delighted about his deception, and Marion would be damned if she had seen a man as attractive as he was.

She couldn’t help but wonder, though, if his kindness had something to do with the way that she perceived him. After all, there were many handsome men for whom Marion had fallen, daydreaming about a time when even one, any one of them, would pay attention to her. And yet, she had never felt the same kind of heat gather on her cheeks and in her belly every time that she looked at them.

It only happened whenever she looked at Eiric.

“Our escape?” Marion managed to mumble, despite her sudden embarrassment. “Where are we going? Wait, no . . . Eiric, I can’t go anywhere! I can’t simply leave! She’ll have my head! She’ll come and find me, wherever I am. There is nowhere for me to go but home, but thank you . . . thank you for the dress, and for going into all the trouble for me.”

“Marion?”

“Hmm?”

“Do ye always talk this much?”

Marion blinked a few times in surprise at Eiric’s comment. She could feel her cheeks burning once more, though this time her embarrassment was different, angrier. She certainly didn’t appreciate that comment, but she decided that perhaps Eiric was right; she talked too much whenever she got the chance.

“No, I usually don’t,” she said, her tone scathing. “I usually don’t talk at all, actually, unless I am spoken to, and even then . . . well, even then, I tend to not speak much. Forgive me for bothering you.”

Eiric seemed to freeze, his eyes wide as though in panic, before he rushed towards Marion, his hands reaching for her own and tangling through the fabric of the dress as he held them. It was Marion’s turn to freeze, then, her entire body going stiff when he touched her.

“Nay, forgive me,” Eiric said. “I didna mean to offend ye, Marion. It was merely a joke, a bad one. I only meant . . . och, I dinna ken what I meant, I’m a bampot.”

“It’s . . . alright,” Marion said with a small, confused frown. Eiric sounded sincere, very much so, and a wave of guilt crashed over her for thinking that he was trying to hurt her.

“Weel, lass . . . then I have one thing to ask ye,” Eiric said, his spirits rising once more as though nothing had happened—it was something that Marion envied, that ability to instantly forget. “Do ye trust me?”

Against her better judgement, Marion nodded in agreement.

Chapter Three

Eiric MacLeod was the kind of man who could get away with murder if he only flashed a smile and showed a dimple. For the most part, though, he tried to use his powers for good.

And what better reason to put his charms to work than to save a beautiful young woman from the clutches of her family who would sooner see her dead than let her live her life? Eiric knew Marion well. He knew that under all the matronly dresses and the unkempt hair, there was a beautiful girl just waiting to be discovered. He also knew that she was kind, that she had a warm heart, and that she didn’t deserve the treatment that she received from her mother.

After leaving Marion at the stables, Eiric made his way back to the manor, a plan already formulating in his mind. Deceit had never been a friend, but it was the only way that he could convince someone like Marion’s mother to let go of Marion.

Eiric frowned in disdain the moment that he stepped foot back into the manor. There were so many people there, all those Englishmen with their scathing looks and their women with their barbed tongues. Eiric loved his cousin Mary; she was a sweet girl, and she didn’t know any better. He just couldn’t stand the rest of them, feasting and entertaining themselves while Scotland suffered.

Making his way through the crowds, Eiric found Marion’s mother easily. That woman always stood out like a vulture among pigeons, her severe gaze drawing Eiric in and repulsing him at the same time. He remembered being a boy, no more than seven years of age, and meeting her for what was perhaps not the first time in his life, but the first one that he remembered.

How unkind she had been when she berated him for his rambunctiousness.

“Lady Hadlee,” Eiric said with a small bow of his head when he reached the woman. She didn’t even stand to greet him, but rather looked up at him with an annoyed frown, as though he was interrupting her—though from what, he couldn’t possibly tell. “It’s so verra lovely to see ye again.”

“Eiric MacLeod,” the woman said, and the look on her face could have fooled Eiric into believing she had suddenly tasted a lemon. “I see that you haven’t lost one bit of that accent you have.”

“Weel, I live in the Highlands, ye see,” Eiric said, as he took a seat next to her. “To me, I dinna have an accent.”

Lady Hadlee didn’t seem to want to grace Eiric with a reply. She kept her gaze forward, and though she tried her best to seem nonchalant, Eiric could see that her eyes were searching for something; someone.

“Lady Hadlee,” Eiric said, once again trying to get her attention. “I wished to speak to ye about Marion.”

That seemed enough for the woman to turn and look at him, cocking one curious eyebrow. “And what could you possibly want to tell me about my daughter?”

“Weel, ye see . . . me maither, she has fallen ill,” Eiric said, the first lie that jumped to his head when he entered the manor. He could only hope that the two women hadn’t had any recent contact, but knowing his Mother, she wanted nothing to do with Lady Hadlee. “She would verra much like to see Marion. She is the closest niece she has, apart from Mary, ye ken . . . there are nay other lasses in the family.”

“Adaria wishes to see her niece,” Lady Hadlee said, and it didn’t sound like a question, but rather like an accusation. “Mary is closer in relation to your mother than Marion. Take her.”