Page 81 of Deception of a Highlander

Kieran leapt to his feet and paced the length of his room.

If she were a man, she would already be dead by his own hands.

With the right words and well-placed moments of intimacy, she’d had him exactly where she wanted him. What a fool he had been.

And still, she begged an audience. Did she think he was daft?

Even Alec was not immune to her charms and had pleaded her case. Alec—the coldest warrior in Kieran’s army.

Kieran paused his pacing and sat heavily in his chair before the cold hearth. Moonlight spilled into the room with a pearl-like luminescence and fell across his arm. The raised flesh of a vicious scar cast a slight shadow across the crook of his elbow, and forbidden memories rushed to the forefront of his mind of the way she had fingered the healed wounds. For the briefest of moments, his bitter anger swept aside. How could an event that transpired weeks before be so vivid as if it had happened days ago?

A scar is the result of an event borne upon your flesh.

His fingertip traced the pale line across his elbow and recalled the image of Mariel’s mangled back. There was much she had not yet told him.

He rose from his chair with a steely determination. She had secrets, and he would uncover every last one of them.

He made his way to the cellar without the aid of light. Below, Hamish stood before Mariel’s cell with his sword outstretched in his hand. He straightened when Kieran approached and let his sword drop into the scabbard at his side.

“Practicing,” the lad murmured.

Kieran gave him a hard look. “Leave.”

Hamish nodded and scrambled up the stairs. Kieran waited for the door to slam shut overhead before he approached the cell. Energy flared through him the way it oftentimes did before a battle.

The key grated against the ancient lock, and he pushed the door open. Mariel was on the other side, standing with her back to him. She did not flinch at the noise, nor did she turn as he entered.

“Ye wanted to see me. Here I am.” He kept his voice monotone and devoid of his anger, his pain.

Mariel faced him. Exhaustion lined her delicate features. She looked fragile as if one hard look might break her. A powerful surge of longing swelled within him, unexpected and unwanted.

Their meeting would have to be quick.

He crossed his arms over his chest. He would offer her no comfort that night.

“You are still in danger.” Her soft voice interrupted his thoughts.

“How am I in danger? Are ye no’ the English assassin sent to kill me?” He could not keep the fury from seeping into his voice.

“I have information to share with you, but you must agree to two conditions before I agree to help you.”

He stared at her in disbelief. Perhaps she was not so fragile as she appeared. “What are yer conditions?”

Her gaze was sharp beneath her fatigue. “When you exact vengeance upon those who have threatened you, there is one person who must be left alive.”

“Ye assume I will retaliate.”

Her fingers worried the fabric of her black trews. “Catching me will not solve the problem, only prolong it. If you do not kill those who seek you harm, the threat to your life and your family will not cease.”

He hated the searing burn tightening like a fist in his gut. “Ye want Jack left alive.”

Her gaze softened, but she did not break eye contact. “Yes,” she whispered.

“I have a condition of my own,” Kieran said. “I want to know who Jack is. What is the man to ye if no’ a lover?”

She bit her lip and regarded him with a worried expression he had come to know too well. The look that indicated she was wary of trusting him. After weeks of frustrated half-truths, he would know who Jack was.

“Jack isn’t a man at all.” She swallowed thickly. “He’s a boy of ten. He’s my brother, and he is in danger because of me.”