The Viper (Highland Guard #4)(40)

There was something between these three men. Some kind of bond strong enough to send Lachlan into a burning building after one of them.

Magnus helped William to his feet, and Bella turned to find Lachlan extending his hand toward her. She slid her fingers into his, feeling the unmistakable rush of warmth at the contact. Her gaze found his.

He must have felt it, too, because his mouth was set in a grim line as he helped her to her feet.

“Ready the women,” he said, looking away. “We need to go quickly. If anyone is nearby they will come to investigate.”

He turned to leave, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm. He stilled at her touch; she could feel the rigid muscles flexing under her fingertips.

“Why did you do it?” she asked. “Why did you go after him? You could have died.”

He looked down at her, and Bella felt her chest squeeze. A corner of his mouth lifted in a wry smile. “You won’t get rid of me so easily, Countess. I’m not so easy to kill.”

She suspected he was very hard to kill, but he was evading her question. “Why are you really here? Why are you fighting for Bruce?”

His gaze held hers, piercing. “I already told you why.”

“Aye, money and land, but I think there is more to it. What is between you and William and Magnus? And Boyd and Seton, for that matter?” His expression didn’t flicker, but she sensed a steel curtain go down. “Who are those men to you?”

His eyes were hard and his voice flat. “Warriors under my temporary command.” He pulled his arm away from her grip and started to move toward the other men. “Do not invent noble purposes for my actions, my lady. You will only be disappointed.”

“You make it difficult to trust you.”

He gave her a long look. “Trusting me is the last thing you should do.”

He walked away, his none-too-subtle warning ringing in her ears. She sensed he spoke the truth, but she also knew it was more complicated than that.

Something had changed. She could no longer see him as the mean, opportunistic brigand, working completely for his own ends. Selfish men didn’t race into burning buildings to rescue a man who should have been dead. A heartless man wouldn’t have taken it upon himself to take a message to her daughter.

There was good in him, whether he wanted to admit it or not. He wanted everyone to think that he was mean and heartless, a hardened mercenary who didn’t care about anything, but it was only a mask. Beneath the mask of mockery and indifference, she sensed the pain and restless energy teeming inside him, ready to explode.

Something deep inside her made her want to trust him—despite what he said. And if her reaction to the thought of his death was any indication, she was no longer indifferent. Sometime in the past few months, Lachlan MacRuairi, the scourge of the West, had come to matter to her. Matter to her quite a lot. And no matter what he wanted her to think, she knew he was not indifferent to her.

He wasn’t noble, damn it. And Lachlan didn’t need the countess looking at him as if he were.

He didn’t leave men behind; it was as simple as that. He wasn’t going to let William die, not if he could do something to prevent it.

If the face of his foster brother had flashed before his eyes, he’d pushed it aside. He’d done everything then, too, but it hadn’t been enough. This time it had.

But if the countess’s newfound belief in his nobility had made him uneasy, he didn’t have time to think about it. After securing horses—which hadn’t been easy in the war-torn area—they were on the move. And moving is exactly what they did for the next two days. The women and children doubled up on the horses, while the men kept pace beside them. Sometimes at a fast march, more often at a slow run.

He drove them relentlessly, mercilessly, stopping only for brief periods to rest. The men slept for a few hours at a time; the women took turns sleeping in the saddle.

On the third day it started to rain. A nonstop heavy rain with swirling wind that lashed and flailed like a whip, sapping their strength and demoralizing their spirits. As they neared the Moray coast that night, he sent Gordon ahead to scout. He returned with bad news. Not only were the rough seas too perilous to attempt a journey, galleys patrolled the coastline.

They had to go farther north.

Waiting for the weather to break, Lachlan drove them on. He couldn’t escape the feeling that their enemies were closing in on them. The ships in Moray had bothered him. It was almost as if their enemies knew where they were headed.

At dusk the following day, they stopped to water the horses just outside of Tain. He was bent over a crude map with MacKay and Gordon discussing their route. He wanted to get out of the area quickly. They were in Ross, and to say that he and the earl weren’t friendly was to put it mildly. Ross was every bit as much a threat as the English hunting them.

“We’ll take the road north into Sutherland.” He indicated the route on the map. “And then into Caithness. Hopefully by the time we reach Wick, the weather will have calmed enough to make the crossing to Orkney.”

It was MacKay country. Saint would be able to get them through it.

He sensed her presence before she spoke. His skin prickled with awareness, every nerve ending flaring to life.

“We can’t go any farther tonight; we need to rest.”

He turned slowly to face her. “Not yet.”

An angry flush rose to her cheeks. “We have to. The children can’t go on like this, and some of the women are so weak they are about ready to fall off their horses. We are soaked to the bone, hungry, and need to sleep for longer than a few hours.”