Page 58 of The Finest Scottish Fate

“You shouldn’t shout.” Evie eyed the higher elevation that resembled a cake layered with entirely too much heavy white frosting. “You could start an avalanche and bury us.”

He bowed his head and remained silent for so long that she decided he must be saying a really intense prayer.

“Drummond.” She nudged Mercury closer, guiding the unicorn to sidle up next to her unhappy Highlander. She stretched, caught hold of his sleeve, and tugged. “I’m not doing this to defy you. I’m doing it to protect you.”

He lifted his head and locked eyes with her. The pure, unadulterated anger in them shocked her. “It is not yer place to protect me. It is I who protects ye.”

“We should protect each other. Not fight about who protects whom.” She didn’t much like this side of his world or him. She was neither a pet nor a possession to be placed in a cage or on a high shelf out of everyone’s reach. “I know I have a lot to learn about this time, but you have a lot to learn about me. I’m independent, able to think for myself, and when I want to be coddled, I’ll let you know.” She tugged on the reins and backed Mercury away, placing more space between them again. “I’m coming to realize that this fated mate bond might not necessarily guarantee compatibility. We have a lot to learn about getting along. How are we supposed to do that if I’m cowering in my bedroom?” She sat taller, lifting her chin and bracing herself for his rebuttal. “Just because I was a bit cowardly about this place at first, doesn’t mean I haven’t found my strength now. I’m not going to run and hide.”

“No, ye intend to freeze to death and allow yer feckin’ stubbornness to be the end of us both!”

So, it was going to be that way? Fine. She’d seen Grandmama educate Granddaddy enough times to know how to handle this. “When you’re ready to stop being an intractable ass and actually consider what I’ve said, let me know. Until then, you would do well to be quiet.”

Noticing several dark forms moving slowly through the glen below, she turned Mercury in that direction. “Are we going to help them move the herd to a more sheltered area or just give them supplies?” she asked Murdoch.

The man’s eyes flared wide open. He glanced at Drummond, then looked at her, then eyed Drummond again, all the while working his mouth and wetting his lips as though his voice had left him.

Drummond scowled at him. “If ye answer her, I shall banish ye from the clan.”

“And now you’re bullying your best friend,” Evie said, “the man you said you trusted more than anyone. Have you no shame?”

Glowering at her as if ready to wring her neck, Drummond dismounted and thundered toward her.

Before she realized what was happening, Mercury reeled about, lowered his head, and set his horn aglow, which was aimed directly at Drummond’s heart. The unicorn pawed at the ground, snorting and blowing a final warning.

Drummond didn’t slow. He simply adjusted his stance, accepting the beast’s challenge, and kept charging toward her.

“Don’t kill him!” Evie shouted to the unicorn. “Don’t hurt him!” She pulled on the reins, but the animal ignored her. “Mercury, please!”

It was too late. With a strategic toss of his powerful head, the unicorn sent Drummond tumbling down the hillside through the snow.

“Not good, Mercury.” Evie hurried to dismount, and ran after Drummond. “Are you hurt?” She knelt beside him where he’d landed up against a pile of boulders.

Without opening his eyes, Drummond bared his teeth, then unleashed a roaring bellow. “I’m going to kill that feckin’ beast!”

“No, you’re not.” She rose to her feet and dusted the snow off her furry robes. “Mercury is very protective of me. When you charged at us, he took that as aggression and could’ve gored you, but didn’t. He’s kind of like a guard dog, only he’s a guard unicorn.”

Drummond stared up at her in disbelief. “Why will ye not listen to me?”

“Why won’t you listen to me?”

With a heavy sigh, he shook his head and pushed himself upright to a sitting position. “Because I know best.”

“Not necessarily.” She drew her cloak tighter around her. “You might know this century better than I do, but I know my instincts. Did it ever occur to you that if we combined our superpowers, we could overcome the enemy more easily?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her, looking impossibly more handsome and softening her irritation with him. “Superpowers?”

“Yes. Superpowers. Your knowledge about this century plus my instincts…and guard unicorn.”

After a long moment of glaring up at her, he scrubbed his face with both hands, then dropped them into his lap. “I want ye safe,” he said quietly, his tone defeated. “If anything were to happen to ye…”

She knelt beside him once again. His chivalry touched her heart and made it hard to imagine a life without him. “I feel the same about you. Isn’t that a good thing?”

He reached out and grazed his fingertips across her cheek with a tenderness that almost made her gasp. “Aye, m’love. ’Tis a good thing indeed until it rips ye from me.”

“Wasn’t it you who told me we can’t live in fear?”

His eyes narrowed.