The Pride of Lions (44 page)

He paused at the edge of the garden and plucked a snow-white rose.

A wife, a lover, a mother for his sons …

Alex stopped. This time the uneasy feeling was too insistent to ignore. He stared hard into the trees on either side of the path and tried to determine what it was that was out of order, but he could see nothing. He could hear nothing but the faint lapping of water against the shore and the incessant screaming of the birds.

His hand fell to his waist and he gaped down in shock as he realized he had been so distracted in his haste to dress and chase after Catherine, he had neglected to bring along a weapon of any kind—a precautionary habit that had become as instinctive to him as eating or breathing during the past fifteen years. And looking down, he saw something else. A bright patch of color where there should have been only the drab brown and green of the hedgerow.

Alex bent down and clutched the dainty satin slipper in his fist, and again his eyes bored into the maze of trees and glittering slivers of sunlight. There was no movement, no sound. He pushed aside the bushes that bordered the path and almost missed it: a long, shiny thread of silver-blonde hair caught on a branch.

“Catherine—”

There was more. Freshly scuffed earth and the clear imprint of boots had left evidence of the struggle that had taken place before they had managed to quiet her. Alex whirled and ran back to the garden, shouting the alarm to the guards on the castle walls before he had even cleared the trees.

21

S
truan MacSorley was just pacing himself toward the final rush of orgasm when he heard the alarm sound in the courtyard. His eyes bulged wide and he sucked in an enormous breath as he caught Lauren midstroke and tossed her summarily off his thighs. She gasped and scrambled blindly to reseat herself, but he was already off the cot, unmindful of his nudity or glaring tumescence as he took up his sword and flung himself out the door.

He was back less than a minute later.

“What is it?” she cried. “What’s wrong?”

“Get yersel’ dressed an’ out o’ here, lass,” he ordered sharply. “There be Campbells on the land.”

“Campbells? Here at Achnacarry? But how—”

“Are ye deif, woman? Dinna stan’ there askin’ daft questions.” He flung himself on his tartan and rose seconds later fully covered. “I said get dressed. They’ll be countin’ heids in the great hall an’ yers had best be among them—wi’ all yer claythes
on
.”

Lauren glanced down along her flushed and gleaming body. “Surely they havena come tae attack the castle? An’ how did they get so far onto Cameron land?”

“The point is tae no’ let them get off again—an’ no’ wi’ Alasdair’s wife.”

“The
Sassenach
? They’ve taken the
Sassenach
?”

“Aye, that they have, sneakin’ thievin’ swines.”

Lauren sank back against the wall, her eyes shimmering with the excitement that raced through her body.
She could scarcely believe it. She could scarcely believe it had happened so swiftly.

“Gie us a wee kiss f’ae luck, lass,” MacSorley demanded, scooping her lustily into the circle of his arm. He was about to promise a finish to what they had begun, but halted when he saw the malicious little smile playing on her lips. “Here now, why d’ye look so pleased wi’ yersel’?”

“Pleased?” She blinked and tried to concentrate on his craggy face. “I’m no’
pleased
, Struan MacSorley. But I’ll no’ lie by sayin’ I’m sorry it were her they took instead o’ … instead o’ Lady Maura, f’ae instance. Or one o’ the ithers. Or even
me
.”

“Aye, well … the
Sassenach
is still a Cameron,” he grumbled, “an’ it shouldna be so easy tae lift her out o’ the gardens.”

“Nae wonder they took her there; it’s where she spends most o’ the day. She has naught tae do wi’ anyone ither than tae peer at us down her long English nose an’ laugh ahind our backs. Why, she thought I were a laundress the fairst day she were here. Told me so tae ma face, she did, an’ me there tae lend her claythes an’ welcome her tae the family. Welcome her, hah! She never wanted tae come tae Achnacarry; she were brung here against her will. Kidnapped, she was, an’ used as hostage tae see Alasdair an’ Aluinn through the patrols.”

Struan’s eyes narrowed. “What are ye talkin’ about? What do ye mean she were brung against her will?”

“She didna come tae Achnacarry by choice,” she repeated tersely. “She has neither a love f’ae Scotland nor a love f’ae Alasdair. She keeps a separate bed an’ bars the door at night. I heard them fightin’ the fairst night. I heard her talk about her
fiancé
back in England. A sojer! A lieutenant in the dragoons! She threatened tae send f’ae him, tae send f’ae her fancy sojer an’ his whole regiment o’ lobsterbacks if Alasdair didna let her go home!”

The wiry froth of Struan’s beard split over an ugly
scowl and he gripped her tightly by the shoulders. “Ye’re speakin’ through yer teeth, woman. Why would he bring her here an’ call her his wife if it werena true?”

“I dinna ken the answers, Struan, only more questions. Were I you, I’d be askin’ them too. I’d be askin’ how the sojers knew tae find them by the Spean. An’ why did the
Sassenach
stop Alasdair from killin’ Gordon Ross Campbell when he had the chance? I might even go so far as tae ask how the Campbells knew she’d be alone in the garden today, an’ how they were able tae take her wi’out a sound in the full daylight.”

“I dinna like what ye’re sayin’, lass,” Struan hissed, his breath hot on her face.

“I dinna like the idea o’ the pair o’ ye ridin’ out after her, wi’ most o’ the men still away wi’ Lochiel an’ scarcely a han’ful left tae chase after God only knows how many Campbells. I dinna like tae think it might be the
Sassenach
’s way o’ winnin’ her revenge, tae set a trap f’ae Alasdair an’ turn him over tae Argyle.”

He relaxed his grip and stepped back from the cot, his every instinct fighting against the ring of truth in her words. But the facts were there. Had he and Alex not spent the better part of two days negotiating passage back to England for the lass and her maid? Struan had not questioned his reasons and no explanations had been offered, but Alex had seemed almost relieved when the arrangements had been finalized—as if he could not wait to get his bride out of Scotland.

Something was not right, Struan admitted, but just what that was he couldn’t say.

Lauren studied the changes in his expression intently. “Are ye thinkin’ on Annie, yer own sweet sister deid these many years? Are ye thinkin’ on what she would make o’ such a shameless bed o’ lies?”

“I’m thinkin’,” he said evenly, “that ye’ll wish it were you an’ no’ the
Sassenach
stolen by the Campbells if I hear ye’ve breathed one word o’ this tae anyone else.
Anyone
, d’ye hear me?”

“Aye, Struan, I hear ye.” Rising onto her knees, she pressed her moist, imploring lips over his. “Struan … dinna be angry wi’
me
. I couldna bear it if ye were angry wi’ me f’ae speakin’ the fear that were in ma heart.”

His eyes lost some of their fierce glaze and his hands closed around her arms again, this time lifting her so that her mouth was crushed brutally against his. She clawed her fingers into his shoulders and matched the violence of his kiss, groaning as she did so.

“Ye will be careful, will ye no’?” she cried softly. “If it
is
a trap—”

“If it’s a trap it will be sprung on the one who laid it. Now, get dressed. Lady Maura will be needin’ ye.”

Lauren watched him snatch up his blue woolen bonnet and set it on a slouching angle over the straw-colored hair. Without a glance he left her, his angry steps fading away on the cobblestones.

She released a long, pent-up breath and massaged the tender flesh of her upper arms, cursing him for the bruises that would be there come the morning. She did not particularly relish a lover with an unpredictable temper. A violent passion was one thing, threats of violence against her person were quite another.

Deep in thought, she dressed and slipped out of the guardhouse unnoticed. Instead of following instructions and making her way to the great hall, she veered toward the dingy, sooty structure that housed the castle smithy. There was no one working over the coal pit, no clang of hammer on anvil, and she moved on quiet feet through to the small chamber in the rear.

He was there, asleep in a curled fetal position, an empty jug of whisky cradled in his arms. Lauren stared at the thin, bony frame of the man and felt a shudder of revulsion ripple through her. She could scarcely believe she had let him crawl over her body or that she had allied herself with such a vile, foul-smelling creature. But it had been a necessary evil. Doobie Logan was the lowest form of life imaginable to a Highlander—a clansman who
spied and informed on his own kin to their enemies. Logan was paid well by the Campbells to keep them abreast of the comings and goings at Achnacarry. Lauren had passed him the odd tidbit—like the decision to send young Iain Cameron to London to meet the
Camshroinaich Dubh
—and she had been paid
extremely
well, though the price Logan had demanded in turn for keeping her secret as a fellow conspirator had made her scrub her body raw afterward.

She approached the snoring figure, and her hand crept stealthily beneath her skirt. She experienced a cool shiver of gratification, almost sexual in nature, as she withdrew a wickedly sharp dirk from its hidden sheath and plunged it deeply, repeatedly, between the jutting plates of his shoulder blades.

Catherine did not regain consciousness until her kidnappers had carried her several miles away from Achnacarry. She was on horseback, supported roughly on the saddle by a bare-armed, barrel-chested Highlander who smelled abominably of old sweat and rotten teeth. The garron they shared was one of the short, stout ponies common to the mountainous reaches of Caledonia, but the animal’s surefooted attack of the path they were on was no consolation for the view of the steep and jagged cliffs they were climbing.

There were three of them, one riding ahead, one behind. There was very little light left in the sky, only the post-sunset hues of murky purple and blue that distorted the shadows and made the ground they covered seem twice as ominous. The features of the man who rode in the lead were already distorted, but not by the shadows so much as by the beating he had taken beneath Alexander’s fists. Catherine had never thought of Gordon Ross Campbell as a particularly handsome man, and now, with his nose flattened across the bridge, his teeth cracked off at the gums, and his eyes sunken in deep hollows, he looked simply ugly. He had not shaved in many
days—possibly because of the gouges, cuts, and scabs that still showed through the dirty stubble. Whatever youth he had possessed—or pretended to possess—had vanished, and she would not have recognized him in the garden had it not been for the hatred blazing from the cold blue eyes.

The shock of seeing him at Achnacarry, of realizing too late she had dashed out of the castle without alerting any of the guards, had delayed the reflex to scream long enough for Campbell’s filthy hand to clamp viciously over her mouth and smother it completely.

She had kicked and squirmed, her nails had torn at the flesh of his forearms, but he had simply dragged her through the hedge and whistled softly to the other two men lurking behind the trees. One of them carried a large burlap sack, and seeing it, Catherine had bitten the flesh of Campbell’s palm so hard her mouth had filled with blood. But he had only grunted and brought his other fist down against the side of her head—once to break the hold of her teeth, a second time to knock her soundly unconscious.

They were moving very fast, with no thought to spare for their captive’s comfort. They all rode with one hand on the reins, another on the muskets that rested warily over their hips. Who they were was apparent, where they were taking her was a matter of conjecture, and what they planned to do with her once they got there was something she did not care to contemplate. Obviously they had been watching the castle and knew Lochiel and most of his men were away. They had watched and waited, and she had presented them the perfect target for a quick raid—something she had been warned about time and again, though not that it could happen so close to the castle itself.

The shiver of apprehension that coursed through Catherine’s body did not go unnoticed by her captor. He shouted something to Gordon Ross Campbell in Gaelic,
and at the first reasonably wide ledge in the hazardous trail they were following, the young Campbell called a brief halt. He drew his horse alongside Catherine, and she tensed inwardly at the leer on his broken, battered face.

“An’ so we meet again, Mrs. Cameron.”

“Where are you taking me? Why are you doing this?”

His grin was little more than a dark, evil slash. “Where we’re takin’ ye is o’ nae concern ither than f’ae ye tae behave well enough tae live tae see it.”

“Alex will never let you get away with this. He will come after you.”

“Aye, I’m prayin’ he does. I’m countin’ on him followin’ us all the way tae Inverary, where there’s a hangman’s noose waitin’ on him.”