Page 2 of The Defiance of a Scottish Heart
All the things Taskill had sworn to avoid, crashing down on him at once.
“My father’s been dead two years.” The words came out harsher than intended. “And he made no such promise to my knowledge.”
Liar,a voice whispered in his head.You’re lying just like he did. Saying whatever serves you, truth be damned.
Taskill’s hands clenched into fists. No. He wasn’t lying—his sire hadn’t told him about any betrothal. But the ease with which the denial came, the practiced smoothness of it...
God help him, he was his father’s son.
“Taskill?” Lennox’s voice cut through the roaring in his ears. His brother strode toward the gates, assessing the situation with the swift calculation that made him a good chieftain. “What’s happening here?” Lennox had been chieftain of Clan MacVey since their sire’s death two years ago.
Thank Christ. If anyone could handle Dermot’s madness, it was Lennox.
Taskill stepped back, letting his brother take the lead. He needed space. Air. Distance from the words still echoing in his skull.
You’ll marry her now.
Movement at the corner of his vision made him turn. Sheona stood near the practice field with Eva, her face pale as moonlight. Their eyes met across the courtyard—green eyeswide with shock—and Taskill’s chest constricted so sharply he nearly gasped.
Five years. Five years since he’d let himself really look at her. Five years of training himself to turn away, to ignore the pull that had nearly destroyed his carefully constructed walls.
She was more beautiful than his memories allowed. The girlish softness had given way to elegant cheekbones, a determined jaw, copper hair that caught the autumn sun. She wore men’s trews and a practice tunic, an axe in her hand.
Still fierce. Still herself.
Still everything he couldn’t let himself want.
Her expression shifted from shock to something that looked like pain, and she turned away sharply.
That old, familiar ache twisted in his chest. The same ache that had lived there since the day he’d walked away from her at the water’s edge. The day he’d chosen to break her heart once rather than break her soul slowly over a lifetime.
“Dermot Rankin, stop acting like a fool and close your mouth!”
His mother’s voice rang across the courtyard like a battle cry. Rut MacVey stood on the keep steps, her posture rigid with fury. Even at her age, she carried herself like a queen—tall, willowy, beautiful, and utterly unwilling to tolerate any man’s nonsense.
She’d tolerated his father’s for years, though.
The thought came unbidden and bitter. Had she known? Had she looked the other way, pretended everything was fine while Douglas MacVey smiled and lied whenever it suited him?
Taskill forced the darkness down. His mother deserved better than his poisonous thoughts.
“Mother, I will handle Chief Rankin.” Lennox’s voice carried an edge of exasperation.
But Rut was already moving toward them like a ship in full sail. “Dermot, did you hear me? You wish to talk about my dear Douglas and what he agreed to? Then you better plan on talking with me, because I’m the only one who is aware of his dealings.
“Are you listening?” She came to a stop directly in front of Dermot’s horse, finger pointed like a blade. “Stop yelling at my sons and stop blaming them for all your problems. It’s not their fault that Sheona can’t find a husband. If she’d start acting like a woman, mayhap she’d find one.”
Anger spiked through Taskill’s veins, hot and immediate.Don’t.Don’t insult her. Don’t suggest she needs to change, to be less than she is, to diminish herself to fit some man’s narrow idea of what a woman should be.
But he bit his tongue. He had no right to defend Sheona. No right to speak for her, not when he’d spent five years avoiding her.
“What the hell does that mean, Rut?” Dermot’s face flushed red. “How dare you insult my sweet lass.”
“She may be sweet, and she is beautiful, but she dresses like a man. And I heard what you said. Douglas did not agree to have Taskill marry Sheona.”
Relief flooded through him so powerfully his knees nearly buckled. His mother would end this. She’d send Dermot home, and Taskill could go back to his careful distance, his managed pain, his solitary life.
The life where Sheona was safe from him.
