Highlander Unchained Read online

  The old gown he’d borrowed from his sister was a shade small and clung to her breasts and hips, emphasizing the seductive curves of her body. Her long blond hair tumbled in loose waves around her shoulders, catching the sun in a golden halo of light. Freshly scrubbed cheeks revealed the translucence of her pale skin, a luminous contrast to sea blue eyes framed in thick dark lashes and to her bold red lips.

  It was her mouth that was driving him mad. Filling his mind with dark, erotic images. Her lips were soft and wide with a deep, sensual curve, highlighted by a tiny naughty dimple on one cheek. He thought of how close he’d been to kissing her and regretted the forbearance that had only increased his hunger. He wasn’t a patient man by nature, especially when he wanted something. And he wanted Flora MacLeod. With a force that sent a surge of heat rushing through his veins.

  Tearing his gaze from her mouth, he realized she was waiting for his response. Though she’d spoken derisively, Lachlan heard the underlying challenge in her question. What did marriage have to offer her? Stretching his legs out in front of him, he leaned back in his chair and took a long draught of ale. “Obviously you have no need of connections or additional wealth.” He wished he could say the same.

  She lifted a finely arched brow, surprised that he was taking her question seriously. “Obviously.”

  “Hmm…” He paused, considering. “May I presume that love is too trite a reason?” Although in his experience, young women—his sisters included—thought of nothing else.

  “It’s as good as any, I suppose. Though perhaps not a practical one. One may wait a lifetime for such an occurrence—if it happens at all.”

  Her answer surprised him. He would have thought her pragmatic like him. Romantic love had no part in his decision to marry, simply because he would never allow emotion to influence his decisions. Love was for other people. His devotion and loyalty belonged to his clan and to his family. No one woman would ever change that. And certainly not this one. He was too old to confuse lust with love.

  She would bring him much. But love wasn’t part of the bargain.

  But Flora was not wholly without illusions of romantic love. He filed the knowledge away for later, when it might be helpful. First he needed to understand the way she thought, before he decided how best to approach her with his offer. He hadn’t told her of his intentions from the first, because he knew she would be too angry to see reason. And he’d been warned of her contrariness. But he would do whatever it took to secure her agreement to marry. When he played, he played to win. He hadn’t survived the years of attack by shirking from doing what was necessary.

  He held her gaze. “Then what of passion as a reason to marry?”

  He thought a tinge of pink appeared upon her cheeks, but if she was embarrassed, her response gave no hint of the fact. “I do not believe one is a prerequisite for the other.”

  The flash of anger hit him swift and hard. Had she and that popinjay…? The mere thought filled him with rage and a feeling of incomprehensible possessiveness. Why the lass’s innocence was important to him, he didn’t know. Simply that it was.

  “What do you mean?” He held his voice even, though his knuckles turned white as he gripped his goblet.

  She shrugged. “I do not believe passion is confined to the marriage bed. In fact, from what I can tell, the marriage bed rarely holds much passion at all.”

  He didn’t like the cynicism of her answer—even if he happened to agree with it. Lack of passion in the marriage bed was one of the many reasons he’d delayed taking a wife. That and the fact that he’d been too busy defending his land from attack and his people from starvation.

  “Yet the marriage bed is the only respectable place for a woman of your position to find it.”

  She bristled. “I do not need to be lectured on respectability by you. A man who abducts women is hardly in a position to be casting stones.”

  He didn’t miss that she hadn’t answered him. He leaned closer and looked her straight in the eye. “And are you respectable, Flora?”

  Her eyes sparked with anger. “How dare you! It’s none of your damn business.”

  God, she provoked him. This woman possessed an uncanny ability to rile his anger. He wanted to grab her arm and shake the truth out of her, but instead he took another drink of his ale and allowed his blood to cool. It was his business, although she didn’t know it yet.

  But she would.

  She pushed back from her chair and started to stand up. “If you have run out of reasons—”

  “Protection.” He took her wrist, holding her in her seat. His fingers wrapped around bare skin. Incredibly soft, bare skin. Though tall for a woman and well curved, she had slim, delicate bones. Suggesting a fragility otherwise obscured by the outward strength of her character. “An unmarried woman, especially one with wealth and lands, is vulnerable without a husband to protect her.”

  “I don’t need—” She stopped, realizing that her very presence in his keep was proof to the contrary. She lifted her chin. “My mother protected me.”

  “But your mother is gone.” He stated it simply, as a fact, but she flinched as if he’d struck her.

  She turned to him with such a look of despair in her eyes, it cut him to the quick. “I’m well aware of that,” she said softly.

  He felt a strong urge to comfort her but held it back. Feeling sorry for her would only complicate matters. He couldn’t allow compassion to interfere. But he didn’t miss the flash of loneliness.

  “And yet for all your protesting to the contrary, you’ve implicitly acknowledged that there is some benefit to marriage.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do you forget your betrothed already?”

  Her cheeks fired. “Of course not.”

  But it was clear she had. “So was it protection or love, Flora?” he asked quietly. The answer was somehow important. He wouldn’t consider the other possibility—passion.

  She looked away. “Lord Murray was my choice.”

  She’d said as much before. He was beginning to understand what might have caused her to elope. “Rory would not force you to wed.” Which was the very reason he was in this predicament. He needed her agreement.

  A wry smile turned her lips. “You know him so well?”

  “Well enough. He’s spoken of you.”

  It surprised her. “He has?”

  She tried to hide her eagerness by shifting her gaze to her plate, but not before Lachlan had glimpsed the yearning. Did she think her family had forgotten her?

  “Of course. You are his sister.” He saw the disappointment in her face, and before he could stop himself he added, “He cares about you.”

  Her eyes brightened, and he felt a sharp tug in his chest. This urge to please her was dangerous, and one that he would need to keep a tight rein on.

  “Even so,” she countered, “my cousin might.”

  The Earl of Argyll. Lachlan masked his reaction, understanding too well why she would fear her cousin’s interference. Her fear was warranted. Although Rory controlled her marriage, he—like Lachlan—had entered into a bond of manrent with Argyll. That alone gave Argyll plenty of influence in the decision.

  “Your cousin has a habit of interfering where he does not belong.”

  “And I’ve seen too often the misery that type of interference can bring. When I marry, if I marry, it will be my decision and no one else’s. Not my brothers’, not my cousin’s, but mine.”

  She spoke with such passion, he knew that this was the crux of understanding her. Her elopement was not simply the actions of a spoiled, headstrong girl, as he’d first thought. There was a far deeper reason. A real fear behind her actions. It wasn’t marriage itself she feared, but being forced into it.

  He tested his theory. “But it isn’t a woman’s right to make such decisions. Like it or not, the choice of your husband doesn’t belong to you.”

  She looked at him as if he’d struck her. The irony, of course, was that she had more power t