The Mackintosh Bride

Her heart was still thrumming in her chest when Iain stood and let go her hand. Why, she hadn’t even realized he’d been holding it!

From the other end of the room, Duncan related in a loud and very drunken voice how she had tamed the wild stallion and saved Conall from certain death. The old stablemaster embellished the facts to the point Alena was embarrassed. But the warriors echoed Duncan’s pleasure, and she accepted their praise with as much grace as she could muster.

She glanced at Conall, who was fair beaming, and then at Hamish and Will, who lifted their ale cups to her. The room settled back into its normal state of chaos and she turned her attention to Iain, who promptly took his seat.

He fidgeted in his chair and would not look at her. Finally he said, “I didna thank ye, Lady, for saving my brother today.”

She felt a tightening in her chest. Never once when they were children had he thanked her for anything. “’Twas nothing, Laird, I assure you. I am well skilled with horses.”

“So ’twould seem. But ye must promise me you’ll ne’er take such a fool’s chance again.”

“Truly, Iain, there was no danger to me.”

His eyes clouded and she watched him swallow hard. He grasped her hand and squeezed it tight. Her heart was in her throat and, had she willed it, she couldn’t have spoken a word at that moment to save her life.

“Ye…ye could have been killed.” He squeezed her hand tighter, and she thought surely she would swoon from the tenderness in his eyes.

He did care. He did!

The realization was a bolt of white heat that shook her to the mettle. Her expression, she feared, betrayed her raw emotion, her desire, her love. All that she felt for him.

“Iain, I…” She leaned closer, then felt his hand slip away.

He drew back abruptly. His eyes, which only a moment ago brimmed with tenderness, grew cold. He fisted his hands and pressed them, white-knuckled, into the table.

A well-practiced scowl, the one she was beginning to think he reserved solely for her, etched his face. “Ye will no’ go near that stallion again, d’ye understand? ’Tis a valuable animal.”

It took a full second for his words to sink in.

“D’ye hear me, woman?”

Her anger rose faster than the galloping chestnut who’d thrown her into Iain Mackintosh’s cursed path. “A valuable animal? Is that all you care—”

“Enough! I’ll hear no more on it.”

The hall went deadly quiet. All eyes were on the laird. Iain stood, shoved back his chair hard enough to send it sprawling, and stormed from the hall.

She sat there wondering what on earth had just happened. His disposition was more changeable than the weather! One minute he was concerned for her safety, and the next…

Her head spinning, she turned to Gilchrist and shot him a questioning look.

A stupefying grin bloomed on the young warrior’s face. “I’ll be damned. He’s in love.”

Chapter Five

’Twas time to find out just how much he knew.

At dawn Alena splashed some water on her face, quickly dressed, and went to the stable in search of Duncan. She found him repairing a bridle in one of the connecting buildings that housed the Davidson livery.

“Good morrow, Duncan,” she said brightly.

The old man looked up and smiled. “Ah, Alena, lass. Ye’re about early. Did ye sleep well?”

“Aye, I did. And you?” she asked mischievously, recalling his drunken state the previous evening.

“Weel, it’s no’ the lack o’ sleep, but the bluidy headache the next day that can do an old man in.”

She laughed at that, then turned her thoughts to more serious matters. “You are stablemaster here, Duncan?”

“I am,” he said, his eyes on his work.

He’d worn the Mackintosh plaid the day they’d arrived at Braedûn, but today he was dressed in leather breeches and a russet shirt. She studied the clan badge pinned to his bonnet: a cat reared up on hind legs. “But you are a Mackintosh.”

Duncan looked up from his work. “Aye, that, too.” He stared at her for a few moments, then said, “I came here with Lady Ellen and the lads—after Iain’s da was killed.”

“So you’ve known Iain since he was a boy.”

Duncan sheathed his dirk and tossed the bridle over a post. He gestured to a stool next to the one on which he was perched. “Sit here, lass.”

She obeyed and Duncan settled in, resting his leathered forearms on his thighs. “Ye see, Colum Mackintosh and I grew up together. My own da was stablemaster to his da. And when Colum and Ellen had those boys, weel, they were like my own sons.”

“I see.”

“And after…the trouble, the Davidsons took us in. I’ve been stablemaster here since. And I watch over the laddies,” he added, smiling.

’Twas now or never. She leaned forward and met his gaze. “Duncan, when we arrived, what made you call me by that name? Alena…Todd?”

He chuckled. “Are ye tellin’ me, lass, that ye are no’ Alena Todd, Rob and Maddy’s daughter?”

She nearly fell off the stool.”

You know my father? And my—”

“Aye, that I do. Rob and I raised trouble together before ye were e’en a twinklin’ in his eye.” Duncan laughed. His bright blue eyes seemed focused on things far away.

He continued in a soothing voice, as if he were telling a bedtime story to a child too anxious to sleep. “Back before ye were born, when the old lairds, the Mackintosh and the Grant, were allies, yer da and I traveled together in search o’ breedin’ stock. Och, we was green as sticks, but what a time we had. England, Spain, France…”

“France was where he met my mother!”

“Aye, and a bonnier lass there ne’er was—until now.” He looked her over with a sort of paternal approval.

“Oh,” she said, and felt her cheeks warm. “I’m afraid I was not blessed with my mother’s fair looks. She is small and delicate, and I’m…well, I’m—” She shrugged her shoulders.

“Ye are like a sorrel filly in high summer. A beauty, ye are, and many a man’s took notice.” A mischievous grin creased his wrinkled face. “Some more than others, I’d say.”

She felt her blush deepen, then remembered why she’d come. “But, Duncan, how did you know it was me? We’ve never met.”

“Och, I used to see ye in the forest playin’ with the lad.”