The Rock Read online

  Focused on movement beyond the castle walls, he didn’t pay much attention to the footsteps coming up the guardhouse stairs, assuming it must be the officer in charge. It was, but Carrick’s lieutenant wasn’t alone.

  “MacGowan. You are needed below. Peter will take your place until you return.”

  Thom didn’t argue. He was so glad to be relieved he didn’t question the cause. It wasn’t until he was led into a small guardroom built into the stone wall—probably a place where the English had temporarily kept prisoners—and saw who was waiting for him that he wished he could return to his frigid post.

  Elizabeth.

  She didn’t greet him right away, but turned to the lieutenant with a grateful smile. It was a smile to make men silly, even humorless old warriors like Sir Reginald Cunningham. “Thank you for finding him. I promise this will only take a moment.” When it looked like the man intended to stay, she added, “What I have to say to Thom is of the utmost secrecy. If you could see that we are not disturbed, I would greatly appreciate it.”

  The old warrior looked uncertain. “Does your brother know you are here, my lady?”

  She gave him a dazzling smile. Having been on the other side of that smile more than once, Thom knew a falsehood—or at least a misleading statement—was on its way.

  “He knew exactly where I was going.”

  Which answered precisely nothing.

  Thom’s mouth fell into a hard line as Sir Reginald, still in a bit of a blinded stupor, grinned back at her and left them alone.

  She immediately spun around to look at him and raced into his arms.

  He was so startled that they instinctively closed around her. She melted against his chest, her soft feminine curves pressed against him in all the right places. He inhaled the delicate scent of her perfume and felt the memories crash over him. She’d always smelled so sweet and fresh.

  For one treacherous heartbeat, he forgot everything. Where he was. That three years had passed. How hard it had been to get over her. That he didn’t still love her.

  For that one treacherous heartbeat, he thought she’d reconsidered. He was so overcome by the rush of emotion that when she looked up at him and said, “I need you,” he heard, “I want you.”

  Lost in the entrancing sea of her eyes, he’d felt himself falling. His mouth lowered, and it was only when her eyes widened in shock at what he was going to do that he snapped back to reality.

  “I need your help,” is what she’d said.

  She hadn’t reconsidered. She didn’t want him, she wanted something from him.

  With a sharp curse, he let her go. But the emotion—the lust—pounded through him like a bitter drum.

  They stared at one another for a long moment. Elizabeth in surprise, and he in anger—at himself. He’d moved on. He didn’t love her with every fiber of his being anymore. Elizabeth Douglas was his past.

  Seeing his expression, she took an instinctive step back.

  He forced his anger to cool. She’d lost the power to hurt him three years ago. “What do you want, Elizabeth? I’d wager a week’s wages that Jamie not only doesn’t know you are here, but explicitly told you not to come here.”

  She bit her lip guiltily, and he had to force his eyes away from the sight of those tiny white teeth with that plump lower lip in their tight grasp. It made him think of taking the velvety red softness between his own teeth. It made him think of sliding his tongue over the marks and then into her mouth, finally tasting her.

  Past, he reminded himself.

  Instead, he focused on trying to control the temper that was threatening again. “Did you listen to nothing I said before? I asked you to let me be, and now you are dragging me away from my duty. You can no longer come running to me whenever you want. This is my job, Elizabeth. I have responsibilities and people who are counting on me. I am no longer yours to command.”

  She blinked at him, wide-eyed, obviously taken aback. “I never thought you were. And I wouldn’t have come to you if it weren’t an emergency. I need—we need—your help. It’s Archie.”

  Thom didn’t know her younger half brothers very well, but he knew how much she cared about them. “Has he been found?”

  “No . . . Yes . . . I don’t know.” With tears glistening in her eyes and emotion thick in her throat, she blurted out a garbled explanation. From what he could tell, Archie had been taken by Henry de Beaumont’s men to Bamburgh Castle, and Jamie and a small group of warriors were planning an attempt to rescue him.

  “But the only way into the castle is up a steep cliff, and I thought . . .” She looked up at him expectantly.

  He knew exactly what she thought. “You thought I would drop everything, ride not just halfway across Scotland but also across the enemy lines, climb not just a dangerous cliff but also the wall of one of the most fortified castles in England, and then somehow find your brother—in prison, no less—release him, and get him to safety without being discovered by an entire garrison of English soldiers. Does that about sum it up?”

  Big blue doe eyes lifted to his in a face that had lost some color. She stared up at him wordlessly, making him feel like he was kicking a blasted puppy.

  But this wasn’t his problem—she wasn’t his problem—and he wasn’t going to let himself get sucked back in. It had been hard enough to get over her the first time.

  But it wasn’t just that. He’d worked hard to be where he was, and he wasn’t about to let her interfere. She’d pulled him from his duty, damn it, without a thought. What would she do next time she “needed” him?

  She finally found her voice. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but Jamie will be with you along with . . .” She chewed on her bottom lip as if contemplating how much to say. “Some very good warriors. The best.” Suddenly, she gasped and covered her mouth with her hand as if something had just occurred to her. “Of course, your shoulder! It must be causing you pain.”

  “My shoulder has nothing to do with this.” It was still sore, but he could climb if he wanted to. “I have nothing to do with this. So why come to me, Elizabeth?”

  “I thought you would want to help.”

  He lifted one brow in challenge. “I very much doubt you thought about me, or what I wanted, at all. You just assumed that all you would have to do was ask, and I’d come running like I always have. Well, I’m sorry, but I can’t. Not this time. You’ll have to find someone else who wants to help.”

  She gazed up at him, stunned. “You are saying no?”

  She looked so incredulous that if it wasn’t at the expense of his pride he might have laughed. “It probably never occurred to you to think I would refuse, did it?”

  The guilty flush that pinkened her cheeks put the first crack in his composure. He took her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him and hear what he said. “I don’t have to play the doting servant to your princess anymore. Nor do I have to hold my tongue around my ‘betters’ and jump to you or your brother’s bidding. Let James work another one of his miracles, or better yet, have him ask me himself.” He laughed as if he knew it would snow in hell before her brother ever came to him for help. “I have other things to do.”

  He tried to turn away, but she reached out to catch his arm. The injured one, but that isn’t what made every muscle in his body seize. “That is not why I am here. You are being unfair, I’ve never thought of you like that.”

  “Haven’t you? Am I not someone to rely upon? Someone who has always been there for you?”

  “Yes, that is why I came to you. That is what friends do.”

  “Don’t you mean that’s what I do? Your idea of friendship sounds rather one-sided.”

  She blinked up at him. “I . . .” Tears welled in her eyes. “I didn’t realize . . .” She drew in a ragged breath that made his heart skip. “I’m sorry, Thom, I didn’t mean to be such a burden to you.”

  She’d let his arm go, and he raked his hand back through his hair. Bloody hell. He hated this; hated refusing her anything. It made him