The Chief Read online

  He acted as if he didn’t care, but she knew something had caused him pain. “It was thoughtless of me not to realize that they would bring back painful memories. You must have cared for your wife a great deal.”

  “Wife?” He shook his head. “They did not belong to my wife; they were my mother’s.”

  She paused, digesting the information. She knew so little of his family. “Your mother, she died?”

  “Many years ago. With my father in a raid on Skye.”

  He said it without any hint of emotion. He could have been talking about the weather. But she knew there was something he was not saying. Something terrible had happened. “How old were you?”

  His fingers tightened around his goblet, and there was a guarded look in his eye. “Ten.”

  Only a child. Her heart went out to him. All she wanted to do was throw her arms around him and comfort the boy who still missed his mother. It was clear he did not want to talk about it, but she couldn’t help saying, “You must have loved her a great deal.”

  But her gentle tone was a mistake. This fierce Island warlord did not want comfort from her. He was like a big, angry lion with a thorn in his paw.

  His gaze met hers, cold and impenetrable. “I barely remember her,” he said flatly. “I was seven when I left to be fostered.”

  But Christina was not fooled by his harsh response. She was getting used to his blunt talk and brusque manner—it was just his way. He might think himself without emotion, but she knew that it was there, buried deep inside. She’d seen his reaction to the tapestry. He had loved his mother.

  And if he’d loved once, he could love again. He just needed someone to remind him how, someone to care about him. Tenderness lurked beneath the hard, icy shell, and she intended to be the one to uncover it.

  There it was again, Tor thought. The expectant look in her eye that made his defenses flare.

  He was used to people looking at him as if they wanted something from him, but with her it was different. Christina Fraser was the only one who’d ever made him feel lacking for not giving it.

  He’d never felt beholden to anyone, but this tiny girl made him feel like a churl for not saying good-bye or noticing the changes she’d made in the Hall. The first had never occurred to him and the second was something he didn’t concern himself with—a warrior didn’t care that the room was bright, clean and smelled fresh.

  Except for the tapestry. Seeing his mother’s treasured tapestry, depicting the Boyhood Deeds of Finn MacCool, had shocked the hell out of him, bringing back memories he’d thought long forgotten. Of the mother he’d adored, who’d been raped and then murdered by the men following the orders of the Earl of Ross—her own kinsman.

  He bit back the reflexive surge of hatred. Thirty years ago, when the Isles became part of Scotland, Skye had been placed under the sheriffdom of the Earl of Ross. Ten years later, Ross ordered an attack on the MacLeods that had claimed both his parents’ lives and those of so many others. Not even the children had been spared. He and his sister and brothers, home for the Yule and Hogmanay celebrations, had escaped death only by hiding in the nave of the church.

  It was the past. Tor didn’t dwell on things he couldn’t change, but seeing the tapestries had reminded him of the lesson learned from his parents’ murder: the importance of keeping his own counsel. His clan’s safety rested on his shoulders and his alone. He didn’t like being questioned, and his young wife would have to look elsewhere for shared confidences.

  The good-byes, the womanly touches, the questions. His first wife hadn’t troubled him with such expectations. He knew where this was going, and it was exactly what he’d feared. He didn’t have the time or inclination to navigate the dark maze of a sheltered young woman’s tender feelings. He had other things to worry about, such as who was behind the attacks and how to keep his part of the bargain of training Bruce’s secret army without endangering his clan or being arrested for treason.

  He had no wish to hurt Christina, but neither did he want to encourage the fantasy that she was building around him. First rescuing hero, now doting husband. Neither one was a mantle he wished to don. He was a warrior chief—a man who led his clan in battle and in peace, and nothing more.

  “If you’ll excuse me,” he said, standing up. “My men are waiting for me.”

  Her face dropped. “But you’ve only just returned. I thought…”

  She lowered her gaze, the long, sooty lashes brushing against the pale curve of her cheek. Fragile. Delicate. Seductive beyond measure.

  He steeled himself against the urge to say something to comfort her. He knew what she wanted. But he was not a man to dance attendance upon his wife, and it was better for her to learn how it would be from the start. He had duties and responsibilities, which right now included making arrangements for the arrival of the warriors who could appear at any time. “I have matters I must attend to.”

  “Of course,” she said with a wobbly smile, making him feel like even more of an ass. “I understand. I will see you at the evening meal?”

  She gazed up at him expectantly with those dark, entrancing eyes, and he felt the force of her plea straight in his groin.

  In the space of one long heartbeat—when the blood rushed and swirled inside him—he almost changed his mind. That the lure of pleasing one woman could so easily override his duty sent a chill through his blood. If he didn’t know better he would think it was something akin to fear, which was laughable. He was fearless. But this lass wielded more power in one seductive glance than an entire army did on the battlefield.

  “I don’t know,” he said, turning away before he saw the disappointment in her gaze.

  She reached out and caught his hand. He felt as if a ball of fire was exploding in his chest. The soft press of her fingers unleashed every animal instinct inside him. He wanted to feel her hands all over him.

  “And later?” she said softly.

  A siren’s call.

  His cock and his bollocks tightened hard against his body. He felt the blast of heat as desire flooded his senses. “Aye,” he said roughly, his gaze burning into hers. “I will see you tonight.”

  He would make her his. He would make her no other promises, but that she could damn well count on.

  There was little to do inside the bedchamber to pass the time as she waited. Christina was tempted to pull out her book from the hiding place in her trunk, but she wasn’t sure how her husband would react to the knowledge of her learning. Her father’s reaction was still too fresh in her mind, and her marriage still too new. Though she did not think he would be angry, her husband was painfully difficult to read. Just when she thought she was getting a glimpse of the real man behind the fearsome warlord, the steel curtain slammed back down with a resounding thud.

  So she tried embroidery. But after a few pricks of the needle, she realized her nervous energy was not exactly conducive to needlework, so she put it away. If she had chalk and a piece of slate—which she didn’t—she could draw. If she were more like her sister, she could pray. Though for what she didn’t know. Patience? Maidenly modesty? Both would be welcome at this point. She feared she was too eager for this night, and that perhaps her eagerness was unseemly. She was an innocent maid; she should be quaking in fear, not tingling with excitement in places that she should not think about.

  She almost regretted sending Mhairi away so early, but she hadn’t expected to be waiting half the night. It must be near midnight by now.

  She did regret refusing the bottle of the sweet wernage wine the wise serving woman had offered to fetch. Anything to take the edge off her frazzled nerves.

  Tired of watching the shadows from the flame of the candle flicker across the ceiling, Christina tossed off the bedcovers and hopped out of bed. The shock of cold air on her skin and feet from the icy stone floor felt strangely calming. She paced until the candle dwindled to nothing. Until the Hall was painfully quiet.

  He wasn’t coming after all.

  Telling herse