Unwilling (4 page)

Chapter
Seven

Lindsay watched, stupefied, as man
was replaced by creature.  His muscles swelled and pulsed with blood.  Granite
black, humiliatingly familiar to her, encompassed his eyes.  Lips pulled back
from teeth that seemed to sharpen.  She hadn’t noticed that about him before. 

He’d traded his black tunic and
trews for a clean linen shirt and a deep blue and red tartan.  The MacLauchlan colors. 
Somehow, the black had suited him, and had reinforced her idea of him as a
demon.  Now, dressed like a proper highlander, he seemed more terrifying
somehow.  More dangerous.  Because she knew he was really a man, a MacLauchlan
highlander whose soul melded with a monster or was possessed by a demon. 
Despite his claims to the contrary.

He didn’t drop her wrists, but held
them up as though to show them to her, his features sad and accusatory.  An
animalistic sound of distress emitted from deep in his chest. 

“You’re the one who tied me up,”
she defended her actions.  “You’re a fool if you thought I would stand for it. 
I’d be a worthless ninny if I didn’t at least
try
to escape capture.”

In this form, at least, he had the
decency to look ashamed.  He rent the ropes and tossed her bindings into the
fire, then turned to examine her wounds. 

Lindsay could only stare at him. 
What had he just done?  Those ropes had been two fingers thick, at least, and
he broke them in a different place than where she’d been fraying them with her
stone.

Without a word, he swept her into
his arms and carried her to the pallet of furs he’d lain out after setting the
fire.  Instead of placing her upon it, he sat cRoss-legged and nestled her onto
his lap.  He reached for a skein of water from his belongings close by and took
one of her wrists from where she held them in the cloak.

Lindsay sat in wide-eyed passivity
as he drew her wrists out over the packed earth and rinsed the blood from them
with the clean, cold water from his skein.  She winced, but the chill of the
water seemed to dull some of the raw sting.  This behavior was absolutely
incongruous with what had transpired between them before.  Yet this was the lethal
warrior who’d slaughtered twenty men on his own.  Here sat the sensual incubus
who’d seduced her beyond her wits.  Though now he treated her with careful
tenderness and gentility. 

She watched the firelight play off
his brutal, enthralling face.  His brows drew down with concern as he
finished.  Some of the cuts still oozed, so he ripped strips of clean linen
from his own shirt.

“I cannot marry you, you know,” she
tried to tell him, keeping her mind off the pain.  Perhaps the Demon was more
reasonable than the man.  “I’m betrothed to another.  And even if you do kill Angus,
my uncle would never allow our union.”

He placed a soft kiss to her
forehead and nuzzled her hair with his nose as though she were an adorable
child, then proceeded to dress her wrists with the torn pieces of his shirt.

Lindsay could have laughed,
really.  Never in her life would she imagine this absurd situation.  All but
naked in the lap of a lethal reaper who tended her with gentle fingers, explaining
why she couldn’t become his demon bride.  In spite of herself, a wry smirk played
with the side of her mouth. 

Once finished, he lifted her wrists
and pressed the lightest of kisses to each one, as though offering a
benediction.  His lips paused above the line of the linen and kissed the
sensitive skin on the underside where the pulse furiously leapt beneath his
touch.  Then he trailed kisses higher, and higher still.  His full mouth worshiped
her flesh.  That predatory rumble vibrated through his great body and
reverberated through her. 

He pinned her with his unsettling eyes. 
She’d thought them fathomless and unreadable the first time they’d met.  How
wrong she’d been.  Emotions and needs, primal instincts and a bottomless desire
swirled within the pools of volcanic ebony.  And her face reflected in their
depths.  Only her and never another. 

The rumble intensified.

Lindsay broke contact by squeezing
her eyes shut and shaking her head.  How could she know that?  What were these,
desires of her own?  Nay.  She was merely frightened and weary.  Finding
meaning where none existed.

His lips touched hers.  Not claiming
or demanding, as they had before, but laced with a comforting, probing languor. 
She should have pushed him away, but didn’t.  Not because of the soft warmth
that spread through her at his kiss.  Not because his tender strength made her
feel protected and treasured, which she hadn’t experienced in a long time.  But
because he was a deadly hell-beast and she couldn’t risk his ire.  She was his
captive.  At his complete mercy.

And he could do whatever he wanted
with her.  Aye.  Of course that was the reason.

To her absolute shock, he didn’t
press her further, but pulled away and wrapped the cloak more tightly about her
body.  Repositioning her, he stretched out on his side and nudged her to do the
same.  He created a pillow out of his bent arm and folded the fur upon which
they lay over both of them.

There was no way she’d sleep
tonight, Lindsay thought as her wrists began to throb.  Fears of the coming
dawn and what it would bring would surely keep her awake.  As would plots of
escape.  Yes, she must focus on her getaway.  At the very least it would
distract her from the feel of his hard, warm body behind her.  She tried to
form a brilliant plan whilst listening to the rolling, content sound he made. 
It reminded her of an approaching sea storm, the heavy and expectant stillness
in the air broken by a distant rumble.  She had never slept so well as in a
thunderstorm.

***

Connor always thought that women
talked too much.  It seemed they were bred with the need to discuss their every
thought, desire, action and emotion.  In the past, he found it irritating and
would make a hasty escape when a gaggle of twittering ladies would cross his
path.  Now he’d give anything for a word from the lass who currently rode
secured between his thighs.  But, she’d clenched her pretty lips and refused to
speak to him all morning.

He’d never been more disconcerted
then the moment he’d awoken in the cave, her sleeping form curled against him. 
His blood had pulsed with awareness, with need.  As had other parts of him. 
Though what astounded him most was the comforting familiarity of her proximity
to him.  He’d never be able to sleep again.  Not without her beside him.

Dammit.

“We’re close to Castle Lachlan.”  He
gestured to the top of the gentle emerald hill they climbed.  “It’s just over
that rise.”

“What are you going to do with me
once we arrive?  Lock me in the tower until our wedding day?”  Aye, her voice
lashed with barbs, but at least she was speaking to him.

“Nay,” he answered carefully,
unsure of whether he headed into a trap of feminine designs.  “Ye’ll be allowed
free range of the castle and the MacLauchlan grounds.  My clan will welcome ye
as one of their own.”

“Really?  Do they extend that
courtesy to all the women whom you’ve captured and nearly raped, or do I get a
special honor because you’ve arbitrarily decided to make me your demon bride?”

Her words should have angered him,
but Connor felt startled amusement.  A bark of laughter escaped him at the same
time his blood heated at the memory of her responsive body in the mist. 

“How many times do I have to tell ye
that I’m not a demon?”

“Until Lucifer, himself, verifies
the claim.” She gave a saucy flick of her hair.  “Or, until you tell me what
you really are.” 

“I’m a Berserker.”

“A Berserk—no, those are stories
told by ancient bards and fishwives.  There are no such things.  Besides,
Berserkers have to kill anything they come across, and you let me live.”

“That I did.”  He smiled, if a bit
smugly, very glad, indeed, that she lived.  “’Tis why I have to marry ye.  And,
ye werena almost raped.  Ye desired me in that coach.”

She twisted in the saddle to pin
him with an incredulous glare.  “You’re really so self-important to think I
wanted
that?  You, sir, are sorely mistaken.”

Of this, he could be certain. 
“Aye, lass, ye wanted it.  For, a Berserker canna bring harm to his mate, he
canna lay claim to her body unless she wants him to.”  He understood this
painful fact all too well.

Chapter
Eight

“Connor Douglas Gerard MacLaughlan!” 

Lindsay watched with astounded
fascination as a wide-eyed Evelyn MacLauchlan dropped her bandaged wrists and
charged her captor with the incensed fury of a mother bear.  “
You.  Tied. 
Her.  Up?
”  She punctuated each word with a sharp swat on the arm with a
wooden spoon she’d swiped from her apothecary table. 

“Wha—she was goin’ta get away.”  He
ducked her barrage, attempting an unsuccessful retreat around the large, round
table. 

So, his name was Connor.  Lindsay
never thought to ask.  A name made him seem more real, somehow.  More—human.  It
was a good name, too.  Fitting, somehow, to the brutal handsome face.

“Out!”  The woman pointed to the
doorway, currently filled with the bulk of her husband, Roderick. 

Connor rubbed at his abused arm,
looking like a gigantic chastised boy.   “But she’s
my
—”

“
Out
!” 

Roderick pushed his wide shoulder
from the doorframe and clapped his elder brother on the back.  “Come, let’s let
yer woman bathe and dress, we have much to discuss.”  In an identical move,
both men looked back to where Lindsay perched on the window seat.  She could
only stare at them.  They could have been twins but for a few minor
distinctions.  The same green eyes set in harshly-angled, handsome faces.
Though Roderick’s sparkled with an untroubled mirth and Connor’s narrowed with defensive
concern.  Comparable bodies of pure sinew and strength draped with the Lachlan tartan
drew an appreciative eye.  Their hair was the same color of ebony, though
Roderick wore his long and Connor cropped his almost to the skull.  Lindsay
thought it added an air of dangerous brutality to the elder brother.  That, and
the fact that Roderick seemed downright affable in comparison.

Connor looked like he wanted to say
something to her, but he glanced at his brother and sister-in-law and stormed
out.

Roderick turned and bowed to the
ladies with a wide smile.  “
Cuisle mo chroi,
” he crooned to his wife. 
Pulse
of my heart.

“Thank you, my love.”  Evelyn
winked and tilted her head to watch in appreciation as her husband ambled off
in the direction of his brother.  Once Roderick was out of sight, Evelyn set to
work at the table, pulling jars and clay pots from various shelves.  “I called
for a bath to be brought.  They should haul it up as soon as the water is hot. 
You just relax there and I’ll make you something that will heal your wrists.” 
She bustled about until she found a mortar and pestle.  “I could just
strangle
Connor.  I love him dearly, but sometimes that man is thicker than the
walls of a mire dwelling.”

Lindsay had liked the Englishwoman
the moment she’d laid eyes on her, and her esteem had only grown within the
last few moments.  Though she was short and on the stout side of curvaceous,
her golden hair and flaxen eyes set off the sweetest smile Lindsay had ever
seen. 

“Your husband, Roderick, is he—what
I mean to say is—does he turn into…” 

“A Berserker?”

Lindsay nodded.

“He does.”  Her lips tilted up in a
secretive smile.  “He’s been teaching me some of the alchemic magic I’ll be
using to heal your wrists.”

Now regarding the accoutrements
with a dubious skepticism, Lindsay raised her eyebrows.  Magic?  Didn’t the
woman know she could be burned for speaking of such things?  Of course, if she
spent her days attached to the two Berserker brothers, what cause would she
have to feel fear?  Silently, Lindsay turned to look out the casement over Loch
Fyne and the bustling, successful village of Strathlachlan.  She couldn’t see
one church steeple in the entire valley.  Did these MacLauchlans follow the old
ways?  Living as a far north and west as they did, and isolated by the perilous
terrain of Scotland’s highland lake country, it would be easy to hide
themselves from the eyes of Rome. 

Evelyn startled her by picking up
her hand and gently applying a gritty yellow poultice to the cuts and irritated
flesh of her wrist.  “I noticed your accent is different than what I’ve heard,”
she said conversationally.  “Mind you, I’ve only lived here and Aberdeen
besides London, but I can’t place yours,”

Everywhere the poultice spread, the
pain instantly cooled and disappeared.  Lindsay watched her gentle
ministrations with awe.  “I hie from Glasgow, but I was educated in London for
a while where my father served as a Scottish emissary before becoming Regent.”

“That explains it then.”  The woman
wrapped soft linen around the first wrist and moved to the next. 

“I’m inclined to believe this
is
magic,” Lindsay moaned.  “The pain has vanished.”

 “My husband saved my life with
this once.  It was the day I accepted him as my mate.  His enemy slashed my
thigh with his sword and I would have bled out had he not treated me with it. 
‘Twas a miracle.”  Evelyn smiled at the memory, reaching for another clean
linen.  “Trust me, take those bandages off tonight and you’ll be good as new.”

Lindsay sniffed it doubtfully.  “What
is in it?”  It didn’t have a detectable scent, and the texture was unlike any
she’d felt. 

“Like I said,” Evelyn winked at
her, finishing with a gentle knot on the bandage.  “Magic.  One of the
multitude of advantages to being mated to a berserker.”

“Indeed?”  A bolt of curiosity
snaked through her.  She hadn’t been seeing her situation as advantageous in
the least.  In fact, she’d been en route to one imposed, undesirable marriage
and found herself thrust into the path of another. 

“Oh yes!  Magic is just part of
it.  There’s long life, for one.  You see, your life forces would be entwined
and a berserker lives maybe four or five times the length of an average person.” 
Evelyn talked as she tidied and Lindsay got the feeling she was a woman who didn’t
like to be unoccupied.  “My Roderick is very attentive and thoughtful.  He’s
blessed by a Goddess, you know, so that accompanies unnatural strength and…
stamina.”  A pretty blush tinged her flushed bosom and crept into her cheeks,
but she went on. 

“He’s very protective, but also learned
and fascinating.  Oh, you should see the MacLauchlan libraries.  Being an
educated woman and all, I’m sure you’ll want to pass some time in there.  That
reminds me, be careful not to get those two into a political discussion upon
which they disagree, because I just commissioned a new table for the great hall
and I’m somewhat attached to the scroll work—”

“These are all qualities of
your
berserker,” Lindsay interrupted the woman before she got too distracted by a
tangent.  It was easy to see Evelyn was happily matched.  She glowed with an
inner happiness and contentment that made it difficult to be in the same room
with her for too long before feeling woeful and inadequate.  And more than a
little envious.  “What about Connor?  All I know of him is that he’s a
berserker mercenary.”

Evenlyn’s face fell while she
thought for a moment.  “Connor’s a very good man,” she stated as though she had
every confidence.  “I admit, he tends to be surly and serious and more than a
little high-handed, but he’s been Laird of the Lauchlan clan since he was
sixteen.  That came with a Baronetcy and an abundance of pressure and
responsibility.  Also, his father was a rather unpleasant sort who treated his
sons abominably and killed their Mother in a violent rage.   Roderick has told
me that Connor protected him from his father’s punishment many times when they
were boys.”

“I see.” Lindsay studied her bandaged
wrists, trying to ignore the pity clenching at her chest.  She had to hold onto
her righteous indignation.  If she didn’t she’d have to face her part in what
they did together in that coach.  And she couldn’t.  Not yet.  “While that’s
very regrettable, I don’t think it excuses him abducting betrothed noblewomen
and forcing them into marriage.”

A tin bowl made a loud clatter to
the table as Evelyn stopped to face her, her eyes wide with incredulity.  “He
didn’t explain it to you?”

Lindsay shook her head, a lead
weight in her belly.

“Oh, darling, he can’t force you to
marry him.  Once a berserker chooses his mate, it is up to
her
to accept
him
.  They’re powerless until you do.”

Lindsay’s eyes narrowed.  “Is that
so?”

***

Connor paced the length of the
armory, trying his utmost not to use his fist to wipe the obsequious smile from
his brother’s face with fists.  Or something sharper.

He was familiar with every inch of
this room, from the weight of each weapon stored at the stocks, to the family
heritage of each coat of arms hung on the stone walls.  Every kin and clan that
claimed protection from the MacLauchlan house was represented above the weapons
used against their enemies.  It had been a prosperous time, of late, for the
MacLauchlans.  Though the clannish wars raged in the Lowlands, and noblemen
fought for scraps of English favor like savage hounds, his valley had been
protected from all that.  Since the death of his warlord father, Connor had
used his own reputation, forged on the battlefield, to create new alliances, broker
peace and trade with neighboring clans.

  Now, because of the actions of
his berserker, he risked the ire of the great Ross clan and the vicious
MacKays.  All for a raven-haired woman he did not want nor ask for.

Nay, he couldn’t claim that as
truth.  He wanted her.  He wanted her like a starving man hungered for a meal
or a doomed man yearned for mercy.  He wanted her with a great, yawning
desperation that startled him with its savage intensity.   He wanted her spread
before him, beneath him, screaming his name loud enough to rouse the Gods.

A frustrated snarl escaped him as
he ran a hand over his skull.      

“I doona see why yer so provoked,
Connor.  A mate is a great boon to ye.  In fact, with both of us mated, the
magic we would wield would serve to mitigate the danger from the Norse
berserkers who would see line of the Celts ended.”  Roderick leaned against the
armory doorway.

“Do ye think that hasna crossed my
mind?”  Connor well remembered his brother’s battle with Alrik the Blue, a
frenetic berserker from the Norse lands.  He’d taken Roderick’s ability to
speak, and almost abducted his mate, as well.  It was Roderick’s devotion to Evelyn
and her acceptance of him that won Roderick the battle and the use of his voice.

“Well, then tell me why yer acting
like hellhounds are nipping at yer heels ready to drag ye to perdition?” 
Roderick blocked his path, interrupting a perfectly good pace. 

Connor growled at him.

“Ye’ve got a beautiful, fiery lass
up there just waiting to be wooed.  She desires ye, anyone can see that.  In my
experience, ye can use that to yer favor.”  He gave a lascivious waggle of his
eyebrows. 

Shoving his brother out of the way,
Connor resumed his pace.  “That’s not an option,” he insisted. 

“Well, if yer preparing to win her
with yer personality, I’d say my plan has a better chance, but I willna—”

“I’m not going to fucking win her!”
Connor exploded.  Grabbing a rack full of pole arms, he heaved it over.  The
weapons toppled out in dangerous directions, but none of them had a point for
him.  The outburst didn’t aid the helpless frustration churning within him. 
Shoulders sagging, he let out a deep breath.  “I should just pack her up and
send her away,” he muttered.  “I was a fool to bring her here.” 

“Connor,” he felt the weight of
Roderick’s hand on his shoulder and it only added to the load threatening to
topple him.  He didn’t even have the strength to shrug it off.  “Why don’t ye
tell me what this is really about?”

“You know what it’s about.”  They both
knew.

“Father?”

Connor glared at the mess of
weapons strewn over the packed earth.  “We’ve always been told that a berserker
canna hurt his mate.”  He turned to face his brother, who regarded him with a
concerned frown.  “But a
man
can.”

Roderick looked away, the pain of
their mother’s death still a fresh wound in his eyes.  They’d both found their
father that day, years past, when he’d struck their mother too hard while he’d
been drunk.  They buried their father that day, as well, and had never spoken
of it again.

“Since ye’ve been mated to Evelyn,
havena ye ever been afraid that ye’ll—”

“
Never
.  Doona even say it.”

“Well
I
am, Goddamnit!  I am
afraid of the rage that burns inside of me.  Not the rage of the berserker, but
that of a man who carries an anger toward the souls who depend on him, this
world who would strike him down, and the father who sired him.  I’m fit for no
woman, Roderick, especially not that infuriating lass upstairs.”

“Yer not him, Connor,” Roderick
insisted. “Ye’ve proven it to everyone in the highlands but yerself.”

“Not to myself.  And not to Lindsay. 
You saw her wrists.”

“You said she did that to herself,”
Roderick said. 

“Aye, trying to escape me.”  He
heaved a great sigh.  “I made a vow that I woudlna take a mate, that I’d never
kiss a woman.  Just because my berserker bungled that doesna mean I have to
break the promise.  It’s better this way.  Safer.”

“I suppose so.” Roderick turned
away from him, heading back toward the stone entry.  “Per her betrothal
contract, she’ll have to wed the heir to the MacKay clan.  I imagine she’d
rather take Rory’s hand than Angus’s.”

Connor grunted, a hollow emptiness
opening up in his chest where his heart should be.

Roderick continued, his even voice
a little too merry for the exchange.  “Rory’s a good man, if a bit foolhardy. 
I’m certain he’ll tend to her needs… planting little MacKay babes in her belly
night after ni—”

With a roar, Connor rushed his
brother, pinning him against the armory wall by the neck.  He could feel the
air pumping though his lungs as his beast rushed to the surface, infuriated at
the thought of another man touching his mate.