Highland Outlaw (Campbell Trilogy #2)(15)
A mercenary. Like her brother Duncan. She didn't know why it bothered her. A man could make his fortune—and his name—in such a manner … Duncan certainly had. But it just seemed wrong.
They fell into a comfortable silence until a few minutes later, when the group veered off the road and followed a much narrower path that wound through the forest to the edge of a small loch.
Lizzie sucked in her breath at the beauty of the natural splendor laid out before her. The loch was almost perfectly round and encircled with towering trees, their branches heavy with leaves, hanging over the water like a lush protective canopy. It was only twilight, yet the full moon could already be seen reflected like a disk of alabaster on polished onyx.
He must have noticed her reaction. “It pleases you?”
He'd dismounted and stood beside her, his hand raised to help her down. She accepted the offer and slid her hand into his. Even with the protective shield of gloves between them, she felt the strange crackle. The spark that slipped into simmering awareness.
Their eyes met. Her heart started to flutter like a bird with its wing caught in a trap. Dear Lord, he was gorgeous. A face to make a woman forget herself.
No! Never again.
She shifted her gaze and dismounted quickly, sliding her hand from his while trying to control the blush heating her cheeks. He must think her a complete ninny allowing such a commonplace occurrence as help down from a horse to send her into a feminine tizzy.
The state was so unlike her, she didn't know what to do. Lizzie knew her strengths, and usually acted with ease around men, but for some reason she found herself wanting to impress Patrick Murray, and her natural confidence appeared to have deserted her.
He was looking at her oddly, and Lizzie realized he'd asked her a question. She swallowed hard, trying to recall. … Ah, yes, the loch. “It's charming. How is it that Castle Campbell is but a few miles away and I've never been here before? And yet you, who are not from these parts, know of it?”
“There are few acres of forestland in these parts with which I am not familiar.” There seemed to be something behind his words, but before she could question him further about his meaning, he added in a clipped voice, “See to your needs, but do not wander too far. It will be dark soon enough and difficult to see where you step.”
He turned abruptly and moved off toward the trees, leaving Lizzie staring at his back and the hard set of his broad, muscular shoulders. Her breath caught. The man was a rock.
Wondering what she'd said to anger him, she wanted to call him back, but she let him go, cognizant that others were watching her. He was a stranger. A mere guardsman. Not someone she should be interested in, no matter what the circumstances. But …
No. She shook herself free from the dangerous path of her thoughts. Lizzie knew her duty. She sighed, watching as the handsome warrior slipped out of view. But it didn't hurt to dream.
Time was running out, and it was all Patrick could do to keep himself upright on his sodding horse. Rather than felling Elizabeth Campbell with charm, he was losing blood, and needed to see to the wound before he was the one who ended up flat on his back. He doubted that fainting would impress her into hiring him as a guardsman.
He didn't know what had possessed him to think that he could be charming. Perhaps he had more charm than most of his clansmen, but that wasn't saying much. The MacGregors were a brutal lot—hardened and toughened by years of relentless persecution.
But it was more than acting that failed him. Something about Elizabeth Campbell disarmed him. There was such an easy, unaffected way about her that he found himself wanting to talk to her. Really talk to her. When she gazed up at him with those wide blue eyes in that pale, serious little face, she looked so damn vulnerable that it made him feel like a brute for deceiving her.
She was a woman to protect and cherish. A fragile piece of fine porcelain in the hands of a ruffian.
He'd slipped into the trees out of sight, but not before he glimpsed her talking to his men and passing out food. As he'd noticed before on the battlefield, she saw to others’ needs before attending to her own. She did her duty well. A true lady of the castle born.
Knowing he had to act quickly before someone spied him, he shifted his thoughts from the lass and moved to the loch. After divesting himself of his weapons and leather cotun, he started to peel away the sopping linen that had worked its way into the crevice of blood and mangled skin. It was as he'd thought. The sutures of animal intestines they'd used to stitch the wound closed had torn apart, revealing a wide gap of raw, bloody flesh. If he had the time to build a fire, he'd take a hot blade to the wound just to stop the bleeding—even if he trapped the poison inside.
The pain was considerable, but it did not impede his motions. He'd endured worse. The memories made him grimace. Far worse. Discomfort was what he knew—constant cold, damp, hunger, pain … it was only the level that differed. The simple comforts of a hearth and home had been denied him for too long.
But that would soon change.
He moved swiftly and deliberately, tending to the wound as best he could. After rinsing it with clean water, he tore a piece of his newly purloined linen shirt—the cost of which would have fed his men for a week—and bound it tightly around his waist. The waste almost hurt more than the wound. He'd traded in his leine and breacan feile for the clothing favored by Lowlanders to further mask his identity.