Page 12 of Laird of Secrets
Just then, Miss MacCarran grabbed her knapsack and swung it hard enough to knock the weapon out of Ranald’s hand. Snatching the bag, Dougal fell across her and held her down, losing the plaid in the process. Ranald was swearing a fair storm, shaking his hand. Andrew leaped out of the cart to grab the fallen pistol and jumped back to the bench to take the reins, while the horses sidestepped uneasily.
“Och, that’s an excellent lass!” Ranald crowed. He stashed the gun under his jacket. “Go, Andrew—go!” His son slapped the reins and the cart rumbled onward.
“Are you mad, both of you?” Dougal pressed the girl beneath him, throwing one leg over both of hers, while she writhed and he tried to pull the plaid over both of them again. He flipped down its edge. “Uncle, what in all hell was that about?”
“Sorry, Kinloch. I thought to keep her quiet or she might make trouble.”
“And she did,” Dougal said, while the girl pushed hard against him. “Stop,” he told her. “That pistol could have gone off and killed someone.”
“Then he should not have pointed it at me. Get off!” She shoved hard.
Sighing, he shifted his weight off of her, keeping his leg over hers, and pinning her down with one arm over her chest. Her breath heaved under his entrapment. He regretted using his strength, should apologize, but it could not be helped for now. He closed his eyes for a moment—she was soft, curvy, and fit, and she was damned distracting.
“What do smugglers care if someone is killed?” she asked. “Kidnapping and murder, smuggling and breaking the king’s law—it is nothing to such as you.”
“Ruthless, we are,” Dougal drawled. “Blackguards, we three.”
“Wretches,” she agreed. “Scoundrels.”
“Och, we are not so bad,” Ranald called back. “Not so bad as gaugers.”
“Some might say the opposite,” she rasped out, nearly breathless.
“Whisky smugglers are not all bad sorts,” Dougal said. “Often they are decent men driven to correct bad governmental regulations.”
“You mean driven to blatantly ignore the law.”
“Highland whisky makers have the born right to do as they please with their own damned barley.”
“The new regulations—“
“The English crown has no right to tax any product a Scotsman makes from barley grown on his own land. Yet they do.”
“You cannot argue with that, lassie,” Ranald called back over the rolling rhythm of the cart in motion.
“Revenue men earn an honest living upholding the law,” she answered.
“Hah!” Ranald grunted. “Dougal, the lass is Scots, is she not? She speaks the tongue of the Gaels, but defends English law. Does she understand Highlanders?”
“I do,” she said in Gaelic. “I appreciate and respect the Highland nature.”
“If so,” Dougal said, “you would feel safe with Highland men of good character, and unsafe with gaugers who would take a life for one bottle of the barley brew.”
“You are smugglers,” she said.
“I never said no or so. But I promise you we are no friends to customs men who profit from the extra fees the government pays them for whisky taken from Highland men.”
“My brother is a fine officer, interested in bringing criminals to justice.”
“He is green still, but he will learn. And if I were you,” Dougal said, “I would not be telling Highland folk about that brother.”
“Keep it quiet in these hills,” Ranald agreed. “I, for one, do not want to hear it again.”
“Ranald, keep quiet yourself, or you will be heard,” Dougal said.
“Kinloch, the king’s men are just ahead,” Andrew said then.
Yanking the blanket securely over his head and the girl’s, Dougal slid down.
