Page 84 of Love with a Scottish Outlaw
She didn’t answer, just dismounted, her leg sliding over the mare’s saddle, her skirts bunching but revealing only a wool-covered ankle. Where Catriona was concerned, that was almost as tantalizing as bare skin.
He walked his horse closer, still towering above her, and raked her saddle with a withering glance. “You have no supplies at all, not even water.”
“Why would I need supplies? I thought you were just going for a ride to exercise your mount.”
He dismounted and stalked toward her. “Do not be foolish, Catriona.”
She flinched as he used her Christian name, and he thought perhaps it was the first time she’d heard it in a long while.
“Tell me why ye were following me.”
“Because I had something to discuss with you, and I was hoping to do it in private. We seldom have any privacy.”
He stood with his hands on his hips, looking down at her. “Very well, if ye need more privacy, then by all means, let’s have some.” He took her elbow and began to tug.
“Where are we going?” she asked sharply.
“Ye followed me about the countryside, a woman alone, risking yourself. I’m damned sure ye must be out of your mind with curiosity. And we need privacy, of course, as ye’ve so smartly pointed out.”
“Duncan—”
“Be quiet, woman, or ye’ll risk our lives.”
Her mouth snapped shut. At least she could be smart about some things. He gathered the reins of both horses and began to pull them along as well.
“I can walk on my own!” she whispered.
But he didn’t let her go, although he did take her hand instead of her elbow. He tugged her and the horses along behind him, then at just the right spot, ducked beneath a spray of ferns, to a hidden path down toward the water. He heard her suck in a breath in surprise. The horses followed them easily, this being well-known to them. The path grew muddy, their footsteps causing ripples along the shore of the calm loch. Her foot slipped once and he pulled her upright, catching her around the waist. Her hands flat on his chest, she stared up at him in shock.
“Should I not have touched ye, my lady?” he said emphasizing her honorific title.
“Ye’re a Carlyle,” she shot back.
They both knew that wasn’t the reason. Yet her Scottish lilt was back, and foolishly he rejoiced, even though it should mean nothing. But it made her seem of the Highlands, as if he could have her forever.
A warning bell sounded somewhere distant in his mind, but he ignored it.
She pushed at his chest, and for just a moment he kept his arm around her narrow waist, looking into those flashing golden eyes and thinking how much he admired her. At the outset she’d been calm and sweet, then gradually revealed her hidden fire and outrage, unafraid to speak her mind, though he was the chief of her enemies. He desired her more now that there were no lies between them, a powerful yearning he had no answer for.
But he let her waist go, kept hold of her hand and continued on the narrow muddy path, still hidden by the trees, and the growing size of boulders strewn along the loch, a giant replica of Finn’s stone village. Past the last boulder, he saw the tiny house, built into the rocks themselves. It could have been a fisherman’s home, and most who came upon it would think it that. But it wasn’t.
At the door, he pushed Catriona to the side and put a finger to his lips. She nodded, looking to the door with eagerness. She was brave and fearless, his Catriona.
Not his, he warned himself.
He knocked a specific beat, and when the door opened, he was staring at a cocked pistol. Catriona gasped, and the pistol turned toward her.
Duncan stepped between her and the barrel. “’Tis me,” he said softly.
The pistol lowered, and out of the gloom stepped a short, hulking man who always seemed ill-at-ease and lumbering on land, but moved with surprising balance and agility on his small sailing vessel.
“Carlyle,” Reid said. “It took ye long enough.”
The man stepped back as Duncan looped the horses’ reins around a tree branch, and pulled Catriona inside with him. It wasn’t as dark as it had first seemed. Reid turned up a lantern and added peat to the low fire. He saw Catriona glance around curiously, and understood what she saw. The front of the little building seemed sparse, with a neatly made box bed built into a wall near the hearth, a table and two uneven chairs, and a cupboard with shelves holding the barest necessities with which to cook meals. Along one wall were stacks of wooden crates piled to the ceiling.
“I came as quickly as I could,” Duncan said.
Reid looked at Catriona with lascivious interest. “And who be you?”
