Page 4 of Captured By the Highland Devil
Her father was in his finest clothes, his kilt trimmed with a fur collar and hemmed in gold. Paige inhaled deeply and tried not to cry. She couldn’t be weak even while grief sat like a boulder in her chest, but she would not succumb to it.
“Hold yer chin up.” Her father told her. “Ye cannae be soft in front ofhim.”
As if summoned, her gaze lifted to the man at the other end of the hall. His tall, lean body, broad shoulders, and muscular chest were clothed in a great kilt of reds and gold tartan.
The tunic underneath was crisp white and richly embroidered with gold threads. It stretched tautly across his, the tunic fell to his knees, meeting the tops of fine leather boots. The sun gave his thick, tawny brown hair a burnished gleam and he was clean-shaven, which was odd for a highland Scot.
His granite chin and hard-edged features gave him a distinctively wolfish mien. He was too far away to see his eyes, but when he met her gaze, her heart beat a rapid staccato.
The priest was waited for them at the altar. Laird McKinnon turned to nod to the man beside him, moments before he strode over to her. Paige felt like a mouse trapped in the eyes of a goshawk as he came closer.
“MacPherson,” he addressed her father while his eyes rested on her. “A moment with yer daughter alone.”
“I’d prefer if I stayed?—”
“I dinnaeask,” the beast said, “We will talk alone.”
His stern tone had the people around them bowing away, even her father, who looked mulish doing so.
This close, his heavy-lidded eyes half-covered his intense blue-black irises. The color was like that of the deepest loch, bottomless and infinite.
Half his hair hung down to his shoulders, and half was tied back with a leather thong. A thin crimson scar pulled taut along the right side of his face near his mouth.
“I daenae want this,” Paige said, bitterness turning her voice brittle.
“Neither do I, but here we are lass,” he said, the hard lines of his mouth softening for an instant. “There is nothin’ ye can do about it. Or do ye want to face the King’s wrath?”
“I ken who ye are. Ye’re a murderer,” she said hollowly.
His lips tightened, “Have ye ever been in war lass? Nay, of course ye havenae. Nae with those butter soft hands of yers, I reckon. To survive, it is kill or be killed. If we daenae marry, the king will make sure we are dead.”
She turned away and muttered, “That might be better.”
A snort came from him and then she heard the subtleshrrkof metal against leather. “Have at it then.”
What?
Paige turned to find him holding the handle of a dagger to her by its cross guards.
The blade glinted in the bright sunlight and her belly shivered at the insinuation. His face was unreadable as he held the weapon to her; her eyes flickered from the weapon to the man holding it.
It felt like a cruel taunt.
“Put it away,” she said.
“Are ye sure?” he asked, “Ye said ye’d prefer to be dead than marry a murderer.”
“Ye’re a brute,” she whispered.
The brute had a glint in his eye as he sheathed the dagger. “Stop ragin’. We will marry.”
Paige’s throat was constricted, and she felt tears sting her eyelids. “Why do ye want me to have a new maid? I already have one.”
“I daenae trust yer faither and I will nae have a spy in me house,” he said.
“Me maid is loyal to me.”
“Yer maid is bound to yer faither and if he wants something he will have it,” he said.
