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From the Back Cover
A WOMAN ON A QUEST TO SAVE HER CLAN
Moira Darroch is struggling to keep her clan together after her brother's death—or murder. Her uncle Hamish Pitcairn is looking to usurp her clan and is doing his worst to undermine the Darroch's balance. Alone, Moira is barely managing to keep it all together. She needs a powerful match to neutralise Hamish's ambitions. The only man she can think of is Lachlan McKendrick. But how do you persuade an inveterate bachelor to marry you? By abducting him, of course! Even if marrying a womanizer is the dumbest mistake on Earth, she cannot deny that she's wanted him for years.
A LAIRD SET ON KEEPING HIS FREEDOM
Lachlan, from the mighty McKendrick clan, has no worries. A third son, he lives his life as he pleases. And women please him. A lot! When the infernal Darroch abducts him, he's livid. But, as he involves himself in her clan's predicaments, he experiences a sense of purpose he has never felt before. Yet the fierce lass also sets fire to his blood like no other. Working by her side is threatening to take him out of control--problem being--he wants to throw control to the Highland's winds, or throw the impossible lass on the nearest bed!
AND A PASSION THAT THREATENS TO BURST LIKE TINDER ON GUNPOWDER
Heat level: hot, sizzling
CHAPTER ONE
The Highlands, 1813
Moira Darroch hid behind a tree by the dusty road, heart thrashing so frantic in her ribcage that the fast air she gulped did not satisfy her lungs.
She was about to commit a crime.
A smirk came to her full lips as she looked down at the rifle in her hands. She was already committing a crime. Scots must not carry guns, a prohibition put down by the English after Culloden.
She was about to commit her second crime, then.
Considering both would happen in the same breath, her outlaw status would be quick to draw.
The second one would be triple serious because it involved a McKendrick, one of the most powerful clans in Scotland. But what choice did she have? Perhaps this is true, everyone did have a choice. But for Moira? Her other choice was to let her clan fall into a usurper’s hand.
As choices went, she did not think the latter worth contemplating.
A late April’s cool breeze blew one riotous chestnut curl, and she wiped it from her brow impatiently. The movement reminded her of her brother, who used to tease her, calling her Lamb because of her curls.
She grieved at the memory of her poor, deceased brother, Malcom. Dead for a year, the certainty of his poisoning and murder still engraved in her chest.
Moira must do this. She found no other solution to the predicament Clan Darroch faced. Her uncle—by marriage—manoeuvred to take over the clan’s leadership. She must not allow it to happen.
Which meant she needed a husband, one from a clan important enough to tilt the scales, and strengthen her position to thwart Hamish’s ambitions.
The only candidate she could think of had been Lachlan McKendrick, the very useless and very womanising youngest brother of the four siblings in the family. That was how she regarded him, at least.
A movement in the distance made her freeze. With a catch of insufficient air, she turned to peek through the foliage. Two hundred yards ahead, a horseman appeared. Lachlan McKendrick used to ride by this road in Darroch lands to reach one of his favourite lochs for fishing. How she knew it? Not that she would confess to any soul dead or alive, but she would steal a glance at him when he rode by, the path cutting right below the study window. The same where she learned to update the ledgers in this past year.
