Page 7 of The Laird’s Lost Wife

“Come on!” he laughed, wiping foam from his lips. “Everybody loves the Leanan Festival. There’s been talk of little else in the keep for weeks now.”

Hunter chuckled. “It didnae say it wasnae a good festival. I said that I hated it.”

“Fair’s fair. If ye smiled a wee more, though, folks might talk to ye more.”

“And why would I want that?”

“Ye might get a chance at a dance.”

“I daenae dance.”

Magnus didn’t bother to argue with that, and they fell silent for a while.

It was raining, a light drizzle that pattered down on the tent Hunter and Magnus sat under. Several of the lairds and important men and women of the Highlands set up little open-fronted coverings like that, although of course they all wore masks and no tartan, so nobody knew who was who.

Still, a person might guess. For example, the hunched-over, grizzled old man with a dragon mask, surrounded by beautiful, much younger women, was almost certainly Leo Hazzard, a Welsh merchant with enough money to buy himself whatever he wanted.

Not youth or health, but most other things. The young women at his elbow, for example.

The rain had put some people off dancing, but not all. Laughing and shrieking in the downpour, couples skipped around and around in the center of the field, their boots slipping on the slick wooden boards. After a few minutes out in the open, even the sturdiest cloak was soaked.

Hunter tightened his jaw, looking from face to face.

One of them has to be her.

It was ridiculous, truly, that he was still looking for her. Five years. Five more Leanan Festivals, and still she wasn’t here.

Enough is enough.

He remembered her name, though. He remembered her face, and he remembered how she’d kissed him back, how she’d tightened her arms around him.

He’d gone back to the willow tree once or twice, but of course she wasn’t there.

Still, he scanned faces, trying to see if any of them were her under their masks.

“Ye should try a wee bit harder, ye ken,” Magnus said. “I daenae mean to lecture ye, but ye are Laird MacCrimmon. Folks expect a wee bit more of ye. And with Skye gone, ye⁠—”

“I scarcely need a wife with the way ye nag me, man.”

Magnus huffed, annoyed. “I am just saying.”

Hunter didn’t respond. His eyes were fixed on a woman. She was dancing, weaving in and out of the crowd. The rain didn’t seem to bother her. In fact, she looked as though she was enjoying it, laughing and throwing back her head.

She wore an owl-shaped mask, and long, loose chestnut-brown hair streamed down her back, damp and curling. Most of her face was covered, of course, but that smile… there was something familiar about that smile.

His heart jolted in his chest. Leaning forward, he held his breath, watching.

The woman turned, rising onto her tiptoes, and he saw a flash of green eyes.

It’s her, he thought, thrilled and terrified at the same time.

At once, he strode out from under the tent’s covering and across the wet ground. Magnus shouted something, but Hunter barely heard it.

He barreled through the dancing couples, not caring how many outraged shouts or glares he got. The woman hadn’t noticed and was spinning away, her arms above her head.

“Daphne!” he called.

She stopped dead.