Highlander's Secret, page 10
His hand lay casually next to hers. “Yes. There is. I know the pain you went through.”
Her breath fled her chest.
“Ye were—”
“Not me.” He met her gaze, and she choked from the pain in his eyes. “Someone very close to me, though.”
She looked down, and her vision blurred. “I dinna need anyone to point out I’m weak,” she whispered. “That I’m nae suited for the role of protector of the castle. That I need to show some courage.”
Konnor reached out and gently lifted her chin, making her look at him. “That’s not at all how I meant it. I think… I think you’re the strongest woman I know.”
Her throat convulsed painfully as she tried to swallow the tears. She shook her head. “How? I’ve trained to be a warrior for years, and yet I havna been in a real battle. Yesterday, if it wasna for ye, I’d have lost my son to the MacDougalls. I proved I couldnae defend him in my own home.”
He removed his hand, and she quickly wiped her eyes and then ran the other side of the sword across the stone. She put the blade against the light and inspected the edge. It ran smooth and was blemish-free, like the first ice on the loch. Perfect. Sharp.
“Trust me, I dinna need an outlander to remind me how little chance we have under my leadership.”
“Look, Marjorie”—he gently took her hands in his and lowered the sword—“you are the best chance the castle has because you care about it like no one else. Because no one else has been through what you’ve been through, and no one will put their heart and body on the line like you will.”
Something released in her chest, and she breathed easier.
“And what you lack in knowledge and experience,” Konnor continued, “that’s what teamwork is for. You have Malcolm, who looks like he’s seen his fair share of battles. And you have Tamhas. You have your warriors. And you have me.”
She sank into the blue sea of his eyes, and everything around her blurred but him.
“If you let me stay and help.”
Jesu, his voice enveloped and caressed her, bringing her soothing relief. His face was so close, she could see every bristle on his square jaw. How would it feel if she touched him? Sharp and raw? Or smooth? She’d like either. His eyes were dark blue, like the loch before rain. Oh, she could sink in them, let them take her into their depths.
“Aye,” she said. “If ye wilna speak to me like that again.”
He nodded, and a playful chuckle slipped past his lips. “I didn’t mean to offend you or to imply you’re incompetent. I should have asked what you had in mind first. I need to learn how you do things…here. So I’ll listen to what you have to say and suggest we work together. Good enough?”
Marjorie smiled. Hope blossomed inside her. “I’m nae master of diplomacy, either.”
Their eyes locked, and Marjorie flew high up into a warm cloud of sunlight.
“And I was thinking, maybe you could teach me to fight with a sword,” Konnor said.
The idea of fighting with him, seeing his big arms swinging a sword, weakened her knees. “Aye, I can do that. And I’d like to hear more of what ye suggested about removing the rubble and building the stakes as a means of defense.”
“Good,” he said. “I’ve already started.”
“But what of yer leg? Can ye train with it?”
He shrugged. “I think so.” He gently took the sword out of her hands. “We can start with you showing me how to sharpen this.”
She became aware of his scent filling her nostrils, that foreign, fresh scent of the sea and heather. And magic.
Her mouth was dry, so she licked her lips. She removed her gloves and gave them to him, and he laid the sword on the anvil so he could put them on.
“Take the sword, pick the part ye want to sharpen. Place yer hands so that they border that part.”
He did, but he picked only a small section of the sword.
“Nae.” She put her hands on his and guided them farther apart. Her arm touched his, and a small lightning bolt of excitement jolted through her. Her breath quickened. Without removing her hands, she helped him place the flat side of the sword against the stone.
“Now slide it forward, nae too strong and nae too gentle, like so.” She made a movement, and her side connected with his. She buzzed from the touch, the feeling unfamiliar and beautiful. She wanted more. She couldn’t let go yet.
They repeated the movement again, and Marjorie’s skin melted against his. She felt him looking at her and glanced up from the blade. He was so close and was watching her with anguish in his eyes. And heat.
Just lean forward, and ye’ll find his lips. How will they feel? Hard or soft? How will they taste?
Someone coughed, and Marjorie jumped back and away from Konnor. Colin stood in the doorway, eyeing Konnor as though the man had just killed someone.
“Ma,” Colin said, scowling at her and Konnor, “Malcolm sent me to tell ye the blacksmith approves of the plan. He can begin forging the spikes.”
Marjorie bit her lip. Her poor boy hadn’t been himself since yesterday. He was anxious and worried, and she was trying to occupy him with different tasks around the castle to distract him.
She’d taken some of Konnor’s suggestions after she’d thought about them. Once she’d cooled off, she’d realized Konnor was right about many things. She needed to tell the blacksmith the edges needed to be sharp enough to prevent the men from holding on to them. “Good. Verra good. I’m coming.”
Disappointed she’d need to separate from Konnor, she took her claymore from Konnor’s hands. “I’ll see ye later. For the training.”
Without waiting for his answer, she marched towards Colin, kissed him on the head, and walked out of the smithy into the fresh air. But even that didn’t cool the fire in her veins.
Konnor had awoken something in her—something she’d thought she’d never get to experience in her life. And it was surprising, and wonderful, and scary. She didn’t know what exactly it was, but it reached to her very soul.
Nae. Best to nae touch him or get closer.
She had a feeling getting close to Konnor would put her in danger of being heartbroken like never before, but she wasn’t sure she’d be able to resist.
Chapter 14
Konnor studied Colin’s wooden sword and shifted his weight uncomfortably. What did one say to an eleven-year-old boy?
“So ye’re the man my mother found in the woods?” Colin said. “And the one who saved me.”
The words “saved me” sounded more accusatory than grateful.
Konnor cleared his throat. “Yeah. I suppose I am.”
“Why did ye come here?”
“I…got hurt.” Konnor gestured at his ankle. “Your mom helped me.”
Colin tapped his foot, still scowling at Konnor. “So why dinna ye leave?”
“Because I want to help. To protect your mother from the bad guys.”
Like I wish someone had protected my mom back then. Like I wish I had.
“She dinna need yer protection. She has me. And she has Tamhas. If anyone will marry my mother, it will be him.”
Colin looked Konnor over with his estimating, smart eyes, and without another word, he left the smithy.
Konnor stared at the empty, sunlit doorway. What was the saying? A bull in a china shop? That was exactly how he felt with kids.
He had no idea what a healthy family looked like. Yeah, it was good he’d decided to never marry. What could he offer as a husband and father after what he’d seen in his childhood?
He remembered his own father vaguely. What did Konnor really know about him? His dad’s last words to Konnor were the brightest memory he had. Most of the time, his father had been deployed, and then he’d died, and it was Konnor and his mom against Jerry.
The taste of ash in his mouth, he limped into the courtyard. Clunk. Clunk. Clunk. Swords clashed against each other as a dozen or so men sparred on the sunlit, dirt-packed courtyard. The walls of the castle loomed in a granite square.
He saw Colin run towards Tamhas, who stopped training with another man and tousled the boy’s hair. Colin, his shoulders sagging, looked up at Tamhas. The two talked, and the man threw his head back, laughing with the boy.
Tamhas bent down, put his sword on the ground, and picked up a sparring stick. He took up a position, bending his knees and holding the sword at his right shoulder. With a chuckle, he nodded to Colin, who took the same position with his wooden sword. The two sparred, Tamhas crying out commands and encouragements to Colin. A perfect picture of a father-son relationship.
Konnor swallowed the bitterness in his mouth. Tamhas should be with Marjorie. He knew her history and clearly cared about her and Colin. He could protect them. He knew the rules of this medieval world.
What was Konnor even doing here? He was in over his head, pretending, lying to himself that he could protect a mother and her son against an army. She clearly had people who could do it much better than him.
The sense of helplessness he knew and hated took over his body. The helplessness he’d been fighting against his whole life. The helplessness he’d thought had disappeared when Jerry died.
No. Konnor wouldn’t let himself be like that. He was a Marine. He fought terrorists and pirates and took bullets and fought for his country. The whole reason he’d joined the military was to protect others like he wished he could’ve shielded himself and his mother. Could he keep a woman and her son safe?
He didn’t know. But seeing Colin brought out the roaring, sucking darkness within him that he had locked away. Every day that he’d served in the Marines had put lock after lock and bolt after bolt over it.
All he knew was he’d rather die than let harm come to Marjorie or Colin. And that meant he needed to put his self-doubt aside and get to work.
Chapter 15
The next morning, Konnor’s ankle felt even better as he went down to the great hall for porridge. Isbeil had looked at it last night and said it was healing better than she’d expected. Because his cargo pants were dusty and dirty, and his T-shirt reeked of sweat, he asked for some fresh clothes before he went for a swim in the loch, hoping it would be a good enough replacement for a shower.
Dressed in breeches and a long, belted linen tunic that reached to his knees, he felt like he’d put on a costume for a historical movie set, except there were no cameras and no director. He kept his comfortable hiking shoes on. He was the only one who didn’t wear pointy medieval shoes. Thank God for small favors.
Two pairs of men sparred with swords in one corner of the courtyard. A rhythmic tong-tong-tong came from the smithy, which was in another corner of the courtyard. A donkey pulled a cart full of rocks through the open gates, its large, wooden wheels squeaking lamentably. In another corner, men were constructing what looked like a sawbuck: a simple wooden construction with planks hammered in the form of an X at each end and joined by a large log at the intersections. They’d use it to hold wood while it was cut into pieces.
As he approached the great hall, Marjorie came through the doors. He shouldn’t be surprised she could make such a simple act of walking look sexy, but she did. Her hips moved under her tunic in a graceful, catlike motion. Unlike female servants he’d seen walking about, Marjorie wore men’s clothes: a tunic and breeches similar to those that hugged his muscled legs. But on Marjorie, they hung like harem pants. Unlike any women he’d seen, she also had a sword on her belt. Her hair was up in a braid that lay over her shoulder and chest. Dark locks framed her face and waved in the wind.
When their eyes met, her red lips parted, and a small expression of joy flashed across her face. She came to stop a step or so in front of him, and her herbal, berry scent reached him. Was she blushing? The thought spread warmth in his chest. He itched to brush her flushed cheek with his knuckles. In the dim light of a cloudy day, her skin glowed like polished stone against her dark hair. If Snow White existed, she’d look like Marjorie. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.
They stared at each other for a moment or so, and he felt a stupid grin spread on his face.
“Hey,” he said.
“Good day to ye, Konnor.” She nodded a little and bit her lip, as though to stop a smile from blossoming on her face. She looked him over. “Are ye feeling better?”
He lifted his ankle and moved his foot. There was pain, but he’d had much worse than that. He chuckled. “I’ll live.”
“Good. Do ye think ye can manage a sword-fighting lesson today?”
“Sure.”
She beamed. “Then please break yer fast and then come join me here when ye’re ready.” She walked away from him towards the sparring men.
“I’ll see you in a bit.”
She looked back. “Ye keep saying that, but ye must tell me what ye mean by this one of these days.”
Konnor didn’t think he’d ever wolfed down a meal this fast. He shoved spoonfuls of tasteless porridge into his mouth. The hall was quite empty, but the men who were eating threw curious glances at him. A servant girl he hadn’t seen in the castle before stopped to chat with him, but he managed to get out of her curious questions with one-word answers. He just wanted to be done with food and go to wherever Marjorie was.
He went out into the cloudy day and made his way straight to Marjorie. She stood talking to Tamhas with two long, round sticks in her hands that she put against the ground like ski poles.
Tamhas loomed over her, a wry smile on his face that Konnor knew right away was the smile of a man who was attracted to the woman he was talking to. He didn’t like that one bit. A stab of jealousy in his gut made him want to punch the man in the face. But he had no right to do that. She wasn’t his. He’d be gone soon anyway. She’d be better off with a man from her time.
As Konnor walked, her sweet voice reached his ears, resonating straight in his chest like the vibration of a tuning fork. She caught his gaze, and everything in his life began making sense again.
Tamhas stared at him with open animosity. “Konnor,” he said when Konnor came to stand by Marjorie’s side. “Ye’re nae gone yet.”
“I have no intention of leaving until I’m sure Marjorie and Colin are safe,” he said.
“There are other people who can make sure of that,” he said.
“All right.” Marjorie raised her hands with the sticks. “All right. Are ye ready to train, Konnor?”
“Ready is my middle name, Snow White,” he said.
Tamhas walked to stand next to the wall with his arms folded over his chest and scowled at Konnor.
Marjorie handed him one of the sticks. “Who is Snow White, and why did ye call me that?”
“Because you remind me of Snow White.”
Konnor weighed the stick in his right hand, then in his left.
She came to stand next to him. “Bend yer knees like so, and always keep them bent. This will give ye flexibility.”
How hard could this be? He thought of Star Wars and every historical action movie he’d seen. Copying the heroes from those movies, he held the stick vertically with both hands by his right shoulder and bent his knees a little, the standard fighting position from judo. Marjorie watched him with an amused look on her face.
She moved his hands to hold the handle of the stick higher than his shoulder. Her touch sent a sweet wave of tingling through his arms. Their eyes locked, and he forgot how to breathe as he sank into the pale jade of her irises.
“And who’s Snow White?” She stepped back from him, though her eyes were still on him.
Konnor remembered the original Brothers Grimm fairy tale. His mom had told him she’d discussed it in her book club. “She’s a princess from a fairy tale. She was chased away from her castle and taken in by seven dwarfs, who protected her and sheltered her from the evil that chased her.”
She swallowed. “Oh, aye?”
“But the evil found her.”
She blinked. “And then what?”
“She bit into a poisoned apple and fell into a deep sleep. Thinking she was dead, the dwarfs put her in a crystal coffin.”
Her face was unreadable. “Huh.”
“And then a prince came.” Konnor lowered the sword, his arms suddenly refusing to cooperate, and rasped, “And the prince found her in the crystal coffin.”
She didn’t say anything, but her cheeks flushed.
“And he woke her up.”
She sighed and shook her head once. “What about the evil?”
“The prince dealt with the evil for her.”
Marjorie arched one brow. “Right. Well, I dinna see why I remind ye of this Snow White. Take yer position, Konnor. Time to spar.”
He chuckled and did as she asked.
“And by the way”—she grasped the stick with both her hands and took the position—“I dinna think a prince can wake someone who’s been poisoned by evil. And the prince shouldn’t fight Snow White’s battles.”
Konnor tilted his head, studying her, fascinated. She bent her knees, assuming a fighting stance, and looked at him from under her brows. “Aim to cut my neck off. Attack.”
Her voice sounded like it were made of steel. Christ, how pretty she looked, this warrior queen, with her back straight, and her arms holding the stick at her shoulder. Konnor bounced on his heels up and down, still careful not to put too much weight on the ankle.
He’d be careful not to hurt her, of course. The thought of accidentally hitting her or pushing her lay uncomfortably at the back of his mind. Though he’d sparred many times with female partners in his judo classes and served with women in the military, the thought of harming Marjorie in any way was disturbing.
He moved forward, bringing the stick down, mindful not to use all his strength, and aimed for her neck, as she’d directed. But she deflected his stick with surprising strength and a loud knock. She made a circular movement he didn’t see coming until it was too late, and his stick lay on the ground.
Whoa. He’d seen her spar with other warriors, and she was incredible. But it was one thing to see it, and quite another to experience that this gorgeous female could kick his ass.
