Page 86 of Love with a Scottish Outlaw
“Ye think so?” Now she pointed her finger in his face. “If ye believe that, it’s obvious ye didn’t finish the letters; ye don’t know what kind of a man your father was.”
“I know he was the kind of man who killed my mother.”
“So when it’s convenient, you refer to her as your mother, rather than the woman who spent her life making you miserable, who tortured poor Maeve?”
“Convenient?” he yelled. “You think because she was a monster, she wasn’t my mother?”
“I’m not saying that. This is about your father. Though ye think ye know—and disdain—everything about him, he had his own secrets, just like you do.”
Secrets? He took a breath to calm his frustration and steady his thoughts, even as uneasiness began to kindle inside him. “Speak plainly.”
“Your father knew about the stolen children, and was actively working to right that terrible wrong.”
He stiffened. “What are ye saying?”
“I read his letters, some even from the Earl of Aberfoyle, your enemy—”
“Your father.”
“—who was threatening your father because of what he knew. Oh, Father didn’t say it outright, but I understood what was happening.”
His mind spun as he tried to resettle this new picture of his father, but it was like a globe that circled and circled, never settling back where it had started.
Catriona lowered her voice and spoke calmly. “Your father had his beliefs, Duncan. He was fighting for them in his own way, not with his sword, but with letters.”
And for his part, Duncan had charged off, speaking rashly until it had gotten him imprisoned. He shook his head, forcing aside his own mistakes. “Ye didn’t follow me to tell me this. Ye could have said it right in the great hall.”
He glimpsed panic in her golden eyes before she replaced it with deliberate confusion. “I said I needed to speak with ye in private. I had no idea we were going to ride for hours. I lost ye at one point, but luckily I found ye again, and then it was too late to go back.”
“Ye’ve an answer for everything.”
That seemed to touch something within her. “Excuse me?” she said quietly, formally.
“Ye did not follow me to talk about letters. Ye could have caught up to me anytime, but ye hung back so ye could see where I went, where the whisky is hidden. With your foolish curiosity, ye put yourself in danger—”
He saw the moment something snapped inside her.
“I put myself in danger?” she cried, throwing her arms wide.
“Aye, ye did, at every turn. Do ye believe yourself so above the hazards of the road? Ye traveled to Glasgow with only two guards—”
“Two strong, talented soldiers!” she cried.
“Ye went up to the dangerous ruins of my castle—”
“I had to, or I’d never have left the cave!”
“And now ye followed me on treacherous paths where outlaws could have been hiding—”
“Outlaws like you!” she cried.
They were leaning toward each other, hands on hips, both furious.
“Aye, I’m an outlaw,” he said gruffly, “and outlaws take what they want.”
He pulled her to him, relishing every curve of her body pressed hard to his, and kissed her.
Chapter 19
