Page 107 of The Laird’s Sinful Secret

CHAPTER FORTY

Euan’s blade intercepted Keith’s dagger with a screech of steel on steel that made Moyra’s teeth ache.

“Ye want her?” Euan’s voice came out as a growl, feral and deadly. “Ye’ll have tae go through me first.”

He shoved Keith backward with brutal force, his sword already moving in a strike that would have taken the older man’s head if Keith hadn’t stumbled out of range. Around them, the MacKenzie warriors hesitated—caught between their orders to overwhelm the defenders and the sudden, visceral understanding that their laird was engaged in single combat.

“Stand back!” Keith commanded his men, his eyes blazing with fury. “This bastard is mine.”

“Gladly.” Euan adjusted his grip, moving to put himself squarely between Keith and Moyra. Blood already dripped from a gash on his arm, his breathing came hard, but his stance remained solid. “I’ve been wanting tae dae this since I found her in that cell.”

Keith circled, his dagger held low and ready. He moved well for a man his age—balanced, controlled, the competence of someone who’d spent years fighting. But Euan moved better. Moved like a man defending everything he loved against the monster who’d tried to destroy it.

They clashed in the center of the courtyard, blade meeting blade in a flurry of strikes too fast for Moyra to follow. Keith fought with calculated precision, each attack designed to test defenses, to find openings. Euan fought with barely controlled fury, his sword singing as it carved through the space where Keith’s throat had been a heartbeat before.

“Ye were supposed tae be easy,” Keith panted, disengaging to circle again. “A scarred cripple playing at being laird. But ye’ve proven more troublesome than anticipated.”

“I’m full of surprises.” Euan’s blade flashed out, forcing Keith to parry desperately. “Like the surprise that yer daughter is worth ten of ye. That she’s braver and stronger and infinitely more valuable than yer pathetic ambitions.”

“She’s a weakness!” Keith lunged, his dagger seeking Euan’s exposed side. “A liability that clouds yer judgment! Just as her maither was mine!”

Euan twisted, the blade missing by inches. His elbow came up, catching Keith across the face with a crack that sent the older man staggering. Blood poured from Keith’s nose, but he kept his grip on the dagger, kept circling.

“Moyra!” Keith’s voice carried across the courtyard. “Ye see what ye’ve done? Ye’ve made this man vulnerable. Made him weak. He’ll die because of ye!”

“Shut yer mouth.” Euan’s strike came fast and brutal, his blade catching Keith’s dagger arm. Steel bit through leather and flesh, and Keith’s weapon clattered to the stones. But the older man was already moving, drawing a hidden blade from his belt, lunging with desperate speed.

The secondary blade caught Euan across the ribs—a glancing blow, but deep enough that blood bloomed across his side. He stumbled, his scarred shoulder protesting, his breathing hitching.

“There!” Keith pressed his advantage, striking again and again. “There’s the weakness! The old wounds that never healed properly! Did ye truly think ye could match me, boy?”

But Euan’s stumble had been deliberate. As Keith overextended on his next strike, Euan’s sword swept up in a brutal arc that took Keith’s blade hand off at the wrist.

Keith’s scream echoed off stone walls. He fell back, clutching the spurting stump, his face gone grey with shock and agony. His severed hand lay on the stones, fingers still curled around the dagger’s grip.

“That’s fer the dungeon.” Euan advanced, his own blood mixing with Keith’s on the courtyard stones. “Fer every day she spent in that cell waiting fer ye to go save her.”

His blade flashed again, catching Keith across the thigh. The older man collapsed, unable to support his weight.

“That’s fer the villages ye burned. The children ye murdered.”

Another strike, opening Keith’s shoulder.

“That’s fer making her believe she was worthless. That she was naething but a problem tae be solved.”

Keith tried to crawl backward, leaving a trail of blood. His warriors had gone still, frozen by the brutal efficiency of their laird’s dismantling. Even Calum and Archibald had stopped fighting, watching as Euan systematically destroyed the man who’d caused so much suffering.

“Please—” Keith’s voice cracked. “Please, I’m her faither⁠—”

“Ye stopped being her faither the moment ye sent her tae die.” Euan grabbed Keith by the throat, hauling him upright. His eyes were black with fury, his face set in lines of absolute judgment. “And this⁠—”

His sword drove through Keith’s chest, punching through leather and bone to find the heart beneath. Keith’s eyes went wide with shock, with the sudden understanding that he’d lost, that his carefully laid plans had ended with his own death at the hands of the crippled laird he’d underestimated.

“This is fer Moyra.” Euan’s voice dropped to something quiet and final. “May whatever gods exist show ye more mercy than ye showed yer own daughter. Though I doubt they will.”

He withdrew the blade. Keith MacKenzie crumpled to the stones, blood pooling beneath him, his eyes already going glassy with death.

Silence fell across the courtyard like a shroud.