Chapter Fifteen

Once Lillian was out of earshot, Kirk turned back to Patrick.

“I’m sorry to put ye in this position,” he said quietly, “but I cannae explain right now.”

Patrick waved away Kirk’s apology. God, it had been too long since Kirk had been able to call on a true friend.

Before being sent to Edward Bruce’s army in Ireland, Kirk had served Robert the Bruce in his quest to unite all of Scotland’s clans against the English. The Bruce had battled the Rosses and the Comyns many years ago, which meant Kirk had passed through Inverness to fight alongside the loyal clans in the Highlands many times. He’d found first a drinking companion and then a true friend in Patrick, a salty old MacDonald who worked as one of the King’s messengers.

Patrick, like Kirk, used Inverness as a hub between the Highlands and the Bruce’s headquarters in the Lowlands. Whenever Kirk passed through, he always searched out Patrick, and if they happened to be there at the same time, they made a point of sharing stories over a few mugs of ale.

Kirk said a silent prayer of thanks that Patrick had just been departing Inverness, for he was the surest way Kirk could think of to get a message to one of the Bruce’s men.

“I need ye to deliver a message. Do ye ken Colin MacKay, of the King’s inner circle?”

Patrick lifted his eyebrows. “Of course. MacKay’s wife, Sabine, oversees the King’s network of messengers now.”

“Aye, good,” Kirk said. “I need ye to get in touch with MacKay as soon as ye can. Tell him that I sent ye to him. He needs to meet with me.”

Patrick frowned at that. “I am headed to the Highlands, but last I heard MacKay was at the Bruce’s side in Lochmaben.”

Kirk cursed quietly.

“I could pass yer message on to one of the other messengers,” Patrick offered. “Davies is en route from the Highlands to the Lowlands, I believe, or—”

“Nay,” Kirk interjected. “No one else can hear of this. It is bad enough that I’m telling ye.”

The weathered lines on Patrick’s face deepened with worry. “What trouble have ye gotten yerself into, lad? Does it have to do with the lass?”

Kirk dragged a hand over his face to scrub some of the weariness away. “Aye, but I cannae speak on it. I’m putting ye—all of us—in danger by contacting ye at all. Just… ”

He released a ragged breath. This had been his only plan—a far-fetched hope, really—to get word to Colin that the entire mission was in danger of unravelling.

“Just try to find Colin MacKay,” he said at last. “Tell him to meet me at Loch Inchmahome, on the southeastern edge of the Trossachs. There is a ruined cottage along the eastern shore of the loch. I’ll wait for him there if I can. If I cannae, tell him…tell him that I am still loyal, and that I am doing my best.”

The sad truth was, Kirk’s best had meant kidnapping an innocent woman, attacking a member of the Bodyguard Corps, and now handing that woman—an asset to the Bruce’s cause—into enemy hands.

Patrick nodded curtly, turning from friend to King’s messenger once more. “I’ll do what I can to deliver yer message. Take care, man.”

“Ye as well.”

Kirk watched as Patrick led his horse from the cover of the trees and mounted, spurring the animal toward the northern road and riding hard for the Highlands.

It was only then that Kirk realized it had been far longer than a count of one hundred since Lillian had slipped into the woods.

Foreboding lanced through him. She hadn’t given him reason to think she would attempt aught foolish. Then again, he had put her in the perfect situation—close to a town, and out of his earshot while he spoke to Patrick .

Cursing himself, he barreled through the underbrush in the direction she’d gone, calling her name in a low, sharp voice.

No answer.

Unease tightening his chest, he looked around for signs of her. A few broken twigs and crumpled ferns trailed toward the edge of the trees. He followed the faint signs until they stopped where the foliage ended.

Shite . There was still a slim chance that she’d simply hidden somewhere in the woods, but he knew in the pit of his stomach that she was too clever for that. She would know that going into town would mean safety for her—and danger for him. He’d made that clear by steering them away from even the smallest villages, and lurking outside Inverness to avoid showing his face.

Aye, she’d probably crossed the bridge and gone looking for help. Kirk’s pace picked up as he trotted over the bridge, his gaze darting down the multiple branching side streets on the other side.

Just as frustrated helplessness swamped him, he saw a swish of blue skirts disappear behind the corner of an ale house

Kirk bolted into a sprint, skittering around the corner.

What he saw made his stomach twist and his blood turn to ice.

Nay .

Two men held Lillian against a wall. One had a hand over her mouth and the other was reaching for her skirts. She was kicking and clawing at them, but they held her fast.

Blinding, white-hot anger crashed over him. Before he knew what he was doing, he’d grabbed the man about to raise Lillian’s skirts and lifted him clear off the ground. He turned and threw the man so hard against the backside of the ale house that the man bounced off and landed with a wheezing moan on the ground.

Kirk rounded on the other man, who had removed his shaking hand from Lillian’s mouth. A smudge of dirt from the man’s hand marred Lillian’s pale cheek. Kirk snarled like a wild animal at that, launching himself at the second bastard who’d dared to touch Lillian.

“But she…she…”

The man’s desperate cry was cut off when Kirk’s fist slammed into his jaw.

“She’s mine .” Kirk threw the second man to the ground and began pummeling his face.

Distantly, a voice whispered that both men were down, incapacitated enough for him to grab Lillian and flee.

But fleeing wasn’t enough. He wanted to beat these men until they could never touch Lillian again.

The man beneath him blubbered a plea for mercy. Kirk lifted his fist in preparation to drive it into the bastard’s face once more, but something brushed his shoulder, soft as a bird’s wing.

He turned to find Lillian standing behind him, her brown eyes wide and terrified as a hunted doe’s. Tears streaked through the smudges of dirt on her face.

“Th-they thought I was a prostitute,” she stammered.

“That doesnae matter,” Kirk barked, then winced at how harsh his tone had been. His blood ran hot with rage, his pulse hammering wildly with the need to destroy these two men. “I saw ye struggling,” he said, willing his voice to lower.

He turned back to the man pinned beneath him. “Prostitute or nay, ye’ll never again lay hands on an unwilling woman, else I’ll hunt ye down and unman ye—both of ye.”

It was madness to make such a statement, for he would likely never see these two sorry excuses for men again, but he wanted them to be terrified, just as they’d terrified Lillian.

“Aye, aye!” they both cried, one through his bloodied face and the other from the ground against the ale house.

Kirk rose, his hands clenching at his sides so as not to pummel the men further. He turned and found Lillian standing behind him. She looked so small and fragile, her whole body shaking like a leaf in an autumn wind and her eyes glassy with unshed tears. As much as he wanted to pound the two drunkards into naught but mangled flesh and broken bones for hurting her, his priority was to get her out of there.

Without thinking, he closed the distance between them in one stride and scooped her up into his arms. He held her close to avoid jostling her, then took off at a sprint. He ran across the bridge and back to the safe cover of the trees where his horse waited.

Christ, he’d been scared. Scared that she would escape and he’d fail his mission, aye, but more than that, scared that she’d be hurt. His fear had turned to a snarling ball of anger in his stomach—anger at her for fleeing, anger at this whole damned situation, but most of all, anger at himself for letting her bolt right into the path of danger.

He unleashed all that rage—the fear, the frustration, the powerlessness—on her. He set her down beside the horse and gripped her by the shoulders.

“What the bloody hell were ye thinking?” he snapped.

Her eyes went even wider, but then she lifted her chin in defiance. “I was thinking to escape!” she shot back. “You couldn’t truly believe I would go with you to those monsters who’ve hired you without a fight, could you?”

Even with his blood still running hot from fighting off those men, a flicker of admiration for her grit cut through the fog of anger. He shoved it aside. “I warned ye no’ to cause trouble,” he ground out. “And instead ye bolt into town where those two drunken bastards nearly—”

He cut off suddenly, a wave of sickness at the thought of what those men would have done to her nigh choking him.

“What would you have me do?” she demanded, but the defiance she’d shown earlier now morphed into desperation. “Simply let you take me to the men who killed my husband? Let them torture me even when there is naught to tell?”

Kirk raked back his hair with one hand. Nay! his mind screamed. Yet he could not untangle himself—or Lillian—from this web of danger. Both his missions—for the Bruce, and for the Order—had been set into motion now, and there was no stopping them. He might as well try to keep a boulder from tumbling down a mountain slope.

His own words came back to him.

She’s mine .

Christ, where had that come from? The truth lurked darkly in the back of his mind. He was in far greater danger than he’d feared, for in saving Lillian from those men, he had not solely been acting in the interest of his mission. Nay, he wanted Lillian for himself—wanted to shield her from the deadly peril swirling all around her and tuck her into the safety of his embrace.

It was madness to feel aught for her. She was his captive, naught more than a pawn in the Bruce’s mission to take down the Order. Yet he could not deny the longing that twisted his gut as he stared down at her.

“I dinnae ken what ye are supposed to do,” he said at last, holding her searching gaze. “I cannae fault ye for trying to escape.” He let out a long breath. “Ye have every reason to flee. But it is my responsibility to keep ye safe. I failed ye.”

Kirk was a coward for hiding behind his mission. Aye, he had to keep her in good health for Roland’s client who’d bought Lillian’s life, but that wasn’t why Kirk had nearly torn those two men limb from limb with his bare hands.

Suddenly her slim, delicate hand brushed his face. Her fingertips scraped over his stubble to trace his jawline. “You saved me from those men,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

He should have stepped back out of her reach. He should have chastised her once more for putting them both in danger. He should have set her on his horse and ridden out of Inverness as fast as possible. Instead, he stood frozen, transfixed by Lillian’s gentle touch.

“Who are you, Kirk MacLeod?” she murmured.

Hearing his name—his full name—on her plush, rosy lips snapped something deep inside him. God, how he longed for their softness. After so many long, terrible years of war, the only thing he wanted in the entire world at this moment was to taste her sweet mouth.

As if under a spell, he closed the distance between them and lowered his head to hers, claiming her lips in a kiss.