Page 73 of Captured By the Highland Devil
“MacPherson!” Ruben snarled as he launched from his horse, “Ye are going to die tonight!”
Her father laughed while yanking Paige behind him. “Ye walked right into me trap! Men! Fight! Kill him!”
More men launched into the clearing while he pulled her away from the battle. Paige yanked her arm from him, then picked up her skirts and ran. She skirted the active battlefield and hunkered behind the cart while drawing a dagger from her boot.
In her line of sight, she could see Ruben fighting swiftly, methodically cutting men down left and right. When a rider came on him with a raised sword, he met the blow quickly swung his sword low and slashed the man’s gut, ripping him open from one side to the other side.
Plucking the sword out, he went on to cut down every man who came against him. Looking around, she tried to find her father in the fray, but he was nowhere to be found.
He was a full-grown man who’d seen hundreds die, perhaps thousands, yet there were things he couldn’t stand to hear. Someone yanked her from behind the cart man she did not know, so Paige struck.
The man’s arm was up so she slashed under his arm to his armpit then swiped the blade across his inner elbow.
“Ye bitch!” he hollered.
Undaunted, she jabbed at the man’s belly and sunk the blade to the hilt. She yanked the weapon out, he grabbed at her, but she ducked and ran to hide behind a tree.
“MacPherson!” Ruben roared. “Show yerself, ye coward!”
Peeking around the tree trunk, she realized the battle was over, the ground was littered with bodies. The rest of her father’s men, the few that were alive, were knelt on the ground.
Ruben spun on his heel, searching the trees with a snarl of rage on his face.. “Where are ye, ye bastard?”
Tentatively, Paige stood, relieved. She headed to Ruben—only to get grabbed again. Her father yanked her to his front and before Paige could react, he pressed the tip of the sword against his belly.
“Give up, McKinnon,” Angus spat. “I demand ye return the lands to me, forget the bet, and give us free passage away from here. That is unless ye daenae want to see yer wife and spawn again.”
Her head snapped to him. “Father! W-what are ye talkin’ about? I am nae with child.”
Angus did not seem to hear her. “If ye have any heart inside that carcass of yers. Let us go and I will consider lettin’ ye see them.”
“Father—”
“Let her go, MacPherson,” Ruben said, lifting his sword. “Kennin’ what horrors ye put me sister through, I have the mind to hang ye by yer toes and let yer blood drain like a deer. Let her go and yer death will be swift.”
“Last warnin’, beast,” her father spat.
Paige stifled a sob. She knew what he had done to Norah, but how could her father use her, use his own daughter as a shield? Her father was a selfish, cruel man with no compunction, shame or conscience.
“Paige.” For just a moment, the rage faded from Ruben’s face and his snarl eased. “Do ye trust me?”
“Aye. I do.”
“Then float.”
“‘Tis easy. Go limp. Ye simply trust…”
Paige closed her eyes and dropped to the ground. Surprised by the sudden weight, her father bent downward and jerked back upright.
He dropped the blade as Ruben darted in, dropped two blistering punches to his midsection, and had him on the ground. Elijah ran to her and pulled her from the two. Ruben had his boot on Angus’ neck.
“Ye’re a disgustin’ swine,” he swore. “Ye abducted me sister, almost had yer nephew killed, and now ye tried to kill me wife. Admit it.”
Angus’s face soured, “I should have never let yer sister go alive. And that spineless cousin of yers deserved the death he should have gotten. But he slithered away like the snake he is.”
Paige pressed a hand to her pained heart, the truth of all if made her blood go cold. How could anyone do something this heinous to another person, an innocent one at that?
She watched as he pulled up a leg and if it was not for the moonlight glinting on the head of a steel dirk, she would not have seen it.
