Abby didn’t expect the knock on her door so soon after Daniel left. Was it him? Had he returned to apologize for kissing her? Saints, she hoped he wasn’t sorry. Her body still tingled everywhere, especially her lips. Consumed in his embrace, set aflame by his tongue and the play of his mouth. Heavens, his hungry mouth… it drove her mad. When had she become so reckless? Could she keep her heart guarded from him much longer? There was another knock, interrupting her thoughts.
She opened the door, unsure if she would scold him for coming back or fling herself into his arms.
But the man standing across the threshold wasn’t Daniel. His smile, darker than the deepest shadows, spread over her. The absence of his leather hat did nothing to lessen his dangerous appeal.
“Mr. MacPherson, may I help ye?”
“Aye, Miss Campbell, ye may.” He moved the arm she was using to block the entryway of her room and stepped inside. “Ye may tell me why ye speak like a Highlander and why ye’re traveling with one of the queen’s most infamous generals.”
Abby looked down both corners of the hall. Daniel was gone, and so was Nora. Damn it, she couldn’t tell MacPherson the truth. But this man was no fool. He’d see right through her story.
It didn’t matter what he thought of her. She was sticking with the plan her father and uncles had agreed was best. To say as little as possible.
“I was adopted into a Highland clan and General Marlow is delivering me to the queen.”
“Fer what purpose?” he asked her, leaning his rump on her windowsill and keeping his careful eyes on her, as if he were watching for any telltale signs of deceit.
Her kin’s safety was at stake. No one could ever know about her mother. She slowed her inhalations and, leaving the door open, faced her uninvited host full on without re-entering the room completely. “Fer peace with the Jacobites.”
He smiled, revealing a silver tooth that sparked as brightly as the moonlit gleam in his eyes. “Ah, then ye are one of us.”
She nodded, unsure if it was wise to tell him even that.
“Ye’ll be close on the inside,” he pointed out, his gaze darkening. “Will ye try to kill her?”
“The queen?” She gaped at him like his nose had just melted off his face. “Are ye mad? She wants peace. Why would I jeopardize that?”
“Lass.” He drew out a long sigh, as if having to point out the obvious to her was the low point of his day. “If the queen truly wanted peace, she would have come to me fer a deal. I am her greatest enemy. Instead, she sends her fiercest soldier to escort a Highlander’s adopted daughter to England.” His smile grew into a grin and he shrugged his shoulders. “Ye see why I find ye a wee bit humorous? Ye think I would believe such a tale.”
Abby had to admit he was correct. To a world that didn’t know about Davina Stuart MacGregor, Cameron MacPherson would be considered the queen’s greatest enemy. If Anne wanted to ensure peace with the Jacobites, she would have taken Nora in as her handmaiden.
“Now,” he said, pushing himself off the window and coming closer to her, “why dinna’ we not cease this pretense. Who are ye?”
Her heart pounded against her ribs. Was her story that flimsy, or was he that clever? She wasn’t sure which was worse. She only knew that she wanted to kick him in the kneecaps. “I told ye who I am, Mr. MacPherson. I willna be called a liar, so if ye will, please leave.”
He eyed the door when she stepped aside to clear a path for his departure, then he looked at her. “Fergive me fer insulting ye,” he amended, moving to leave. When he reached the door, he grasped her hand and brought it to his lips. “Accept my apology by sitting at my side tonight at the table.”
“Nae, I—”
“I insist.” His eyes dug into hers over her knuckles, dark, piercing, reminding Abby of a predator. “I willna take no for an answer.” He smiled, but there was nothing humorous or soft in it.
Cameron MacPherson was a striking man, but he frightened Abby. What would he do if she refused him? Would he have his physician cease helping Hubert? Would he have his men try to kill her and Daniel while they slept? How far away were her kin? She wasn’t worried about the MacGregors and Grants taking on MacPherson’s men. Even though her kin were outnumbered by at least ten to one, depending on who rode with her father, she had no doubt of her kin’s victory—and with Daniel fighting on their side… Hell, he could likely take down twenty men on his own.
“Ye’ll honor me then, Miss Campbell.”
It wasn’t a question, and a sinuous curl of his lips accompanied the pause before he spoke her name, just to let her know he was indulging her.
She succeeded in keeping her breath even and in hiding the effect he had on her. She didn’t care who he thought she was. She was a MacGregor—from a great line of MacGregors—and she’d be damned if he saw fear in her.
With a bow of her head that dropped tendrils of her hair over her face, she offered him a gracious smile. “How can I refuse?”
MacPherson’s voice, along with his gaze, went helplessly soft. “My wish would be that ye refuse me nothing, lass. I would give ye the world in return.”
“MacPherson.”
Abby’s heart nearly stopped altogether at the sound of Daniel’s low snarl behind her. She whirled around to look at him, torn between being so relieved by his presence that she thought she might faint and wishing he’d stayed away. They called him the Jacobite killer, but he couldn’t fight them all.
“General Marlow,” the Jacobite warrior said, stepping around her to meet Daniel at the entrance of her room. “Look at her and tell me ye dinna’ want to tell her the same thing.”
As if he couldn’t stop himself, Daniel shifted his eyes to her.
The touch of his gaze felt like a physical caress as it traversed over her unkempt braid and the contours of her face. Here was the man who made her feel flush, not with fear, but with something else entirely. She suspected she was gazing at him the same way MacPherson was gazing at her when Daniel arrived.
Would he ever kiss her again? Could she stop him if he tried? Did she want to? Lord help her, to be in his arms again, to feel the rhythm of his breath on her face, her mouth, her throat… just one more time.
His expression hardened, along with his gaze when he returned it to MacPherson.
“Perhaps you misunderstood me at the campsite, Jacobite. This lady is in my care. If you should ever want my favor, and trust me, you should want it, then you will not enter her room unchaperoned again. Trying to seduce her will gain you nothing but my anger.”
“My lord.” MacPherson laughed and held up his hands. “I’ll do as ye ask. I dinna’ deny yer charges. I simply ask that ye understand my reasons. She is glorious, is she not?”
Both men looked at her again, but both men did so very differently. It wasn’t MacPherson’s dark, mysterious edge that attracted her, but Daniel’s inability to keep his heart out of his eyes.
“Dinna’ hold me in contempt fer being a man who can see,” their host said with a half bow. “I meant nae harm to the lass and nae dishonor to yer duty.”
Abby watched Cameron MacPherson transform from a mysterious and dangerous leader to a cautious and humble ally.
But he wasn’t Daniel’s ally, and the knight wasn’t moved by the Jacobite’s attempt to share a common bond between men.
“Put away your desires,” Daniel warned him. “Or you will find the eyes that offend removed from your head. Do you understand me clearly?”
MacPherson grinned and moved his fingers to the hilt of his claymore. “Ye do realize what ye come against if ye come against me.”
Abby’s heart smashed against her chest. She thought she might collapse with worry about a war breaking out against them.
When Daniel smiled back, she closed her eyes to keep from losing feeling in her knees.
“How many do you think I can take down before I’m killed?” Daniel’s silky voice cut through the air like a sharpened blade. “If I’m killed? And who do you think will die by my blade first?”
MacPherson thought about it for a moment, then bowed. “I value my eyes, and my men. Consider yer request done, General.”
With nothing else to say, Daniel nodded, then stepped aside to let MacPherson leave the room.
“Don’t trust him, Abigail,” he said when they were alone.
There was something in the intimacy of his command, in the way he spoke her name, that made her want to hear him speak it forever.
“Why did ye come back?” she asked him softly.
“I forgot to tell you earlier that I will be sleeping in here tonight.”
She blinked, certain that she should say something other than, “Ye will?”
“I will.” Finally, his gaze slid to hers. “And now I know it is the only thing I can do.”
She should refuse. It was foolish to spend the night with him with a locked door between them and the rest of the keep… and a bed in the room. She didn’t trust herself spending another night with him.
“I’ll sleep on the floor,” he continued. “By the door.”
She should have refused him. But she nodded her head and smiled like a witless milkmaid. Damnation, how could she not be attracted to him? He was everything she’d ever dreamed about in a man. “By the door.” She cast him a teasing smile. She couldn’t help it. “To protect me.”
“Yes.” His green eyes glittered at her. “And what, may I ask, is objectionable about that?”
Her smile remained. There were many women in Camlochlin who would resent his resolute chivalry. She wasn’t one of them. She needed protection from a hundred men and she didn’t mind admitting it.
“Nothing,” she told him. “I make nae objection at all, knight.”