The Arrow Read online

  For years.

  He’d known. All this time, Gregor had known the identity of the man who’d attacked her village—the man who’d killed her mother and the unborn child—and he’d kept it from her. Nay, he hadn’t just kept it from her; he’d lied to her, telling her he didn’t know. She must have asked him a dozen times over the years. Why … why would he do something like that, knowing how desperate she was to know? Knowing how badly she’d needed to put a name to the face of the nightmares that haunted her?

  She was so lost in the hurt, she didn’t hear the door open behind her.

  “What are you doing in here, Cate?”

  Still holding the devastating missive in her hand, she turned to face John. “He knew.” She held up the letter, her hand shaking. “All this time Gregor has known the identity of the man who attacked our village.”

  John swore. “You weren’t meant to see that.”

  “Obviously,” she sneered. “I guess I don’t need to ask if you knew, too. How could you keep this from me, John? How could he? Don’t you think I had a right to know?”

  John’s mouth pursed in a hard line. He took her condemnation without trying to defend himself.

  She understood. “He told you not to tell me, didn’t he?”

  Clearly answering carefully, John tried to explain. “He was trying to protect you.”

  “Protect me?” she repeated incredulously. “From the truth?”

  “Fitzwarren has been in England since the attack—unreachable. But Gregor worried you might try to do something, uh … ill-advised.”

  “You mean foolish. He thought I’d run off and try to kill him myself, that’s what you mean?”

  “I believe he may have considered the possibility,” John said, hedging. “Do you deny it?”

  Tears blurred her eyes. It wasn’t the lie that hurt as much as it was what it signified. He hadn’t trusted—or respected—her enough to think she’d be able to handle the information and make her own decisions. She’d wanted Gregor to think of her as a strong woman—capable of taking care of herself—but he still saw her as the little girl in the well who needed to be protected. Even with their growing closeness the past few weeks he’d kept this from her, knowing how important it was to her.

  She wished she could be angry, but it was the weight of disappointment crushing down on her that hit her most. “I trusted Gregor when he said he would handle it. I would have listened to his explanations. But he never gave me the opportunity. He has no faith in me at all.”

  “Talk to him, Cate. He was only trying to protect you. Give him a chance to explain before rushing to judgment. He does have faith in you. It might not seem like it right now, but he does.”

  John was right. They needed to clear the air between them if this marriage was going to have any chance of working.

  She looked at the missive in her hand, the red wax of the seal catching her eye. It wasn’t only the contents of the letter they needed to discuss, but also the identity of the man who’d sent it. Gregor hadn’t been the only one to keep a secret.

  “Where is he?”

  “Washing for the evening meal.”

  Cate did the same, and then entered the Hall to wait for him. But Gregor didn’t appear. None of the Phantoms did.

  It didn’t take her long to discover they’d gone to the village. But it wasn’t until John kept dodging her questions and refused to look her in the eye that Cate guessed why.

  Horror descended over her in a smothering mask. Her last conversation with Gregor came back to her. She knew the way he thought. He’d taken her words as a challenge, and he’d gone to the alehouse to prove that what they had wasn’t special.

  She should have known better than to push him when he was like this. But she’d been so confident—so certain she knew him. So certain he loved her and wouldn’t be able to do it.

  Her stomach curdled. She wanted to bend over and wrap her arms around her middle, but she hid her pain behind a stony mask of calm as she finished the meal and walked upstairs to change. She would see the truth for herself. Only then would she accept what her heart was already telling her.

  “The handsomest man in Scotland and one of Bruce’s Phantoms? Just wait until I tell my sister.”

  If there was any doubt whether the news of his place in the guard had spread there wasn’t a few minutes after arriving at the ale house. The secret was out.

  Gregor’s smile hid the flash of irritation caused by the lass’s remarks. But rather than nudge her off his lap, he concentrated on the soft bottom rubbing against his cock, the full, heavy breasts brushing the hand that he had wrapped around her waist, and the very talented mouth that he knew from past experience would give plenty of pleasure.

  Also from past experience, he knew that she’d shout from the bloody rooftops that she’d had him in her bed. Needless to say, after the first time—no matter how pleasurable—he hadn’t gone back.

  But what the hell did he care? It was the way it was. Why fight it? She would get something to lord over her sister and the other lasses—war widows, mostly—who took advantage of the rooms above Annie’s alehouse for companionship, and he would get a night of mind-blowing, head-clearing lust.

  To hell with Cate and what she thought. She didn’t know a damned thing. She might have tricked him into marriage, but she sure as hell wasn’t going to get anything else from him. He could take whoever he wanted to his bed. Her “special” “only me” shite was exactly that.

  Maggie leaned closer. The blast of lavender smote him. Cate used lavender, but on her, the scent was soft and delicate and made him want to inhale and draw it deeper into his lungs. On Maggie, it was cloying and overpowering and made him want to run outside to get a breath of fresh air to clear the stench from his nose.

  He swore silently and reached for his tankard. Why the hell was he even thinking about her? Cate was wrong, damn it, wrong.

  Maggie had leaned in to whisper something to him. “Are they Phantoms, too?” she asked with a tilt of her head.

  “They” meaning his three frowning brethren crowded on the benches around the small table with him, who were doing damned fine impressions of Father Roland, the village priest.

  Nay, not priests, monks. But just because they’d been gelded by their wives and didn’t want to have any fun sure as hell didn’t mean Gregor couldn’t. To hell with them, too. To hell with all of them.

  “These three?” He looked over at his disapproving-looking companions. “Do they look like the best warriors in Scotland? They’re just West Highland brigands, hoping to make a few coins now that Bruce is poised for victory.”

  Even MacSorley’s eyes narrowed at that. Gregor glared back at him. What did they want, for him to confirm it for her?

  Maggie looked unconvinced as she scrutinized the fierce, hulking warriors. “I don’t know.” She wrinkled her nose. “They certainly look big and scary enough to be Phantoms.”

  “All muscle,” he said. “The Phantoms are clever.” Unlike these three, he left unsaid. That she seemed to accept. “If I were a Phantom”—the rumors might have reached the village, but Gregor wasn’t going to admit anything—“I would hardly be in their company so publicly.”

  “I guess you’re right,” she said, snuggling deeper into his lap. When that didn’t give her the desired effect, she started to circle her fingers on his stomach and rub her soft, in-danger-of-falling-out-of-her-bodice breasts against his chest.

  The lass had fantastic breasts. They were big and lush, and he could remember burying his face in the deep crevice, cupping, squeezing, and then sucking the cherry-red tips until they’d extended a good half-inch and poked against his tongue.

  Despite the generous size of her chest, Maggie was slender and dark-haired, the way he liked. She was taller than Cate but her body was too soft, not firm and taut like …

  He stopped, swore again—this time not so silently—and took another guzzle of his ale. The tankard was discernibly lighter than before. He shot