Page 77 of Highlander’s Quest of Desire

“Aye.” Laird Labert nodded sagely from his seat. “’Tis a grave insult to nae say a man’s name correctly. Are you going to disrespect yer new relations on yer wedding day, Sinclair?”

Leo grinned but it was all teeth and no mirth. He was getting annoyed, but Elspeth could feel hysterical laughter bubbling up inside her. If Bruce needed time to stop the wedding, then she would buy him that time.

“It is a matter of honor,” Elspeth said, emphasizing on the word honor, and giving Leo a pointed look that he seemed to understand very well. “Ye will nae dishonor my clan on our wedding day, will ye dear?”

Leo bit the inside of his cheek. “I had meant nae disrespect.” His Scottish accent was back. Probably a show for the lairds and ladies present in the kirk. She was sure he would slip back into his natural English tones once they left. “The name is Domnhall. Just drop the d at the end of Donald and give depth to the o.”

“Doonall?” The priest tried.

“Nae!” Leo snapped. He took a moment to compose himself. “It’s like dough, ye ken? For bread. Dough and nal, like dull.”

“Dough and dull?” Domnhall stood up, the picture of affront. “Is that what ye think of me? I have never been more insulted in my life!”

Elspeth held her hand to her mouth to stop from cackling with laughter. The suppressed mirth was causing her stomach to hurt. The look of frustrated rage on Leo’s face was priceless.

But it all changed swiftly.

“Domnhall,” Leo warned. “Sit down. Enough if this delay. Elspeth! Answer the question. Will ye marry me?”

He squeezed her fingers until they mashed painfully together, bones striking on bones.

The silence in the kirk was palpable. It had a nature of its own, an unpleasant one. Leo had borne naked the face of his ambition and the lengths he was willing to go for it. It had been witnessed by all present, and they detested him for it. In their circles he was still the upstart half-English the Grants had taken into their family bosom, not one of Scotland’s nobility. He was an ‘other.’ And his obnoxious treatment of one of them was not appreciated.

“Nae.” Elspeth said, snatching her hand away from his grip. A small gasp rippled across the kirk. “I will nae have ye if ye were the last man on God’s green earth.”

“Ye’ll regret this,” he seethed.

Noise grumbled from outside the kirk, and they heard men shouting. Everyone turned their heads to the closed kirk doors. Elspeth stepped away from Leo, even as he tried to grab her by the arm. In two swift steps Domnhall was on the raised dais and by her side, a shield against Leo.

The shouting outside culminated into a violent crash, and then silence. In the pregnant silence, footsteps echoed. With a tortured groan, the heavy kirk door opened, and a lone figure stood in the bar of sunlight.

“Hello, Leo. Did ye really think I wouldnae make it to yer wedding?”

Laird Bruce Grant, sword in hand, grinned up at his childhood friend, a hundred men behind him.