Page 13 of Beloved Enemy
“I’m not the one kidnapping and murdering people,” she said crossly.
No one said a word, and no one removed their befuddled gazes from her.
At length, Reid faced her again and asked, “How many were in the party that abducted ye?”
“Twenty-two,” she answered without hesitation.
Tavish scoffed. “We dinna see anywhere near that many. Either ye—”
“Are you saying I’m lying?” She confronted Tavish, eyes wide.
“I’m saying I count nine dead bodies and only one or two more running for their lives right now. That dinna make twenty-two.”
She shrugged and flopped her hands against her thighs. “Fine. I’m a liar.” She faced Reid again, lifting her hands. “I’d like to go now. Will you please cut through these ropes? Or do I have to gnaw my own hand off to be free?”
“Dinna untie her,” Tavish protested irritably.
She whirled on him. “What is your problem?” She inquired with an extraordinary lack of fear. “Are you afraid of me, too? Are you worried the woman half your size and without a weapon is going to harm you?”
Tavish sneered at her, his smirk lacking any hint of humor. “What were ye doing? Where ye coming or going when ye were supposedly kidnapped?”
“I was hiking, that’s all,” she answered, her frustration evident in her tone. “Hiking on this mountain, or rather somewhere on this mountain range. The other side, I think.”
“Hiking?” Tavish repeated the word as if it were foreign to him.
“Yeah, hiking. You know? Climbing the mountain for the sheer thrill of it? I wanted to see Scotland from the top.”
“See Scotland?” Fergus repeated, a sea of bewilderment in the question.
The woman closed her eyes and drew in what Reid supposed was either a fortifying or calming breath. When she opened her eyes, they were swimming in tears. “Please. I’m so confused. I’m beyond scared, beyond horrified. I have no idea what is happening or why everything is so...so unreal. I don’t know who those guys were. I don’t even know why they took me and tied me up. If you’re going to kill me, get it over with. If not, I just want to go home.”
Reid realized a bit of admiration at that moment, for the way she’d delivered her plea. Though tears spilled down her cheeks, these ones not at all black, she spoke with an unwavering voice, and with nary a hint of whingeing.
“Let’s get off the mountain,” Reid suggested. “Consolidate our position.” He didn’t like that his men were scattered all about, certainly not if more bandits were yet in the area.
While the men began to move, taking the path that had brought him up the side of the beinn, the woman met his gaze again. Her stare was beseeching as she once more lifted her hands to him.
“Nae yet,” he said, indicating with his hand that she should proceed him.
She growled at him—she actually growled her displeasure—and began to march down the rocky path. Stomped down the path, essentially, muttering to herself something aboutpigheaded menand that this would bemy last visit to Scotland.
Reid almost grinned at her petulance but then his attention was caught by the way she moved. Though he couldn't fathom the purpose of her strange trews—fitted snugly and unlike anything he’d ever seen—the view was undeniably captivating. She wasn’t very tall, and yet her legs seemed long and shapely, moving with an intriguing grace, and the way the fabric clung to her curves left little to the imagination. The snug material hugged her bottom, highlighting every blessed contour. Though he didn’t put much effort into it, he imagined it would be impossible to look away.
A rock underfoot rolled as she stepped on it and she listed dangerously toward the right, though caught herself with relative ease, resuming her downhill trek. “Lord help me,” she muttered testily.
His gaze still arrested on her delectable bottom, Reid thought the same.Lord help me.
They convened in the glen where they’d first been ambushed, now with half a dozen extra horses, and needed only to wait another quarter hour for every Nicholson man to be accounted for. As expected, almost every gaze fixed at some point on the woman—Charlotte, he reminded himself—no one taking any pains to hide their befuddlement. More than one fascinated gaze, many in fact, lingered on her legs and arse. And though he completely understood the dedication of their stares, Reid absolutely did not want her presence, for however long it would be, causing any kind of trouble within the ranks. He gave a good glare to several whose gazes seemed especially fixated, making it clear that any distractions would not be tolerated.
With all forty men gathered, Reid accumulated a full accounting of the number of dead reivers.
“The woman here,” he said, addressing his men as a group in their Scots tongue while the lass stood a few feet off to his left, “says there were twenty-two of them. They took her yesterday, but she saw nothing of their activities. As it stands though,” and if she was to be believed, he thought, “another dozen or so are yet at large. We’ll take a few hours today to see if we can’t discover their whereabouts.”
Whether or not any or all were displeased by this change of plans, knowing they wouldn’t reach home as expected, Reid didn’t expect to know about it. The men knew better than to gainsay his directives or even grumble aloud their displeasure.
As they readied to depart, Reid was compelled to inquire of the woman if she could ride a horse. He wasn’t sure why he suspected that she could not, but his intuition could not be ignored.
“Ride that?” She questioned, pointing with her bound hands toward his bay destrier as the lad, Simeon, brought it forward.
