Malcolm wiped his blade on the dead man’s breacan and sheathed it as he turned and ran to Catriona. She was on all fours, struggling to get to her feet, her hair hanging in her eyes. Her body would not obey her commands, she felt so terribly weak, like a ragdoll with the stuffing knocked out of her.
“Och, Malcolm, thank God,” she murmured, trying and failing to push herself up.
“Are ye all right. Did he hurt ye?” Malcolm exclaimed urgently, falling to his knees next to her and scooping her onto his lap, cradling her in his arms against him. Relief flowed through her like a calming river.
“Nay, I’m all right, I’m nae hurt,” she sobbed, dissolving into tears, looking up into his melting, dark-brown eyes, the eyes of the man she knew she loved with every fiber of her being.
Her heart clenched in her chest to see his beloved features—still spattered with the dead man’s blood—contorted with what looked like fear.
She clung to him, wrapping her arms around his neck, taking strength and comfort from the wall of hard muscle protectingher. Her rock. She felt his heart beating fast against her ear, just as hers was racing in her chest.
“I was so afraid, Malcolm, so afraid.”
“’Tis all right, ye’re safe, he cannae hurt ye now,” his large, calloused hand brushed with exquisite tenderness over her forehead, pushing her tousled hair back from her face, stroking it as his dark gaze raked keenly over her. In search of injuries, she knew. She almost smiled, grateful for once for his overprotectiveness.
“I’m sorry for takin’ off like that. It was stupid of me. Thank ye fer comin’ after me, thank God ye got here in time,” her sobs finally starting to subside as she nestled against with the mighty wall of muscle surrounding her. She had never felt so safe.
But she suddenly remembered his wound. “Ye’re injured,” she told him, distressed by the sight of the blood welling from his ripped sleeve. “Yer arm’s cut, look. ’Tis bleedin’!”
He did not even glance at it, his eyes never leaving hers as he murmured, “’Tis but a scratch, of nay import.”
Before she could argue, he scooped her up and rose to his feet in one fluid motion, striding back towards the horses. He held her effortlessly, as though she weighed no more than a fallen leaf.
“We need tae get home fast. ’Tis dangerous out here,” he said.
“Aye, home,” she murmured before realizing what she had said. Strange as it was, Malcolm’s keep did indeed feel like home. Because he was there.
The dead man’s horse, a stout-limbed pony, had joined Warrior and Matilda. The three beasts were pulling at the tufts of grass beneath the willows, oblivious to the human drama playing out around them.
With the greatest of care, Malcolm lifted Catriona onto Warrior’s broad back and settled her there before swinging himself up behind her. He caught up the reins of the other two beasts and gathered them in his fists. Then, he clicked his tongue and Warrior moved off, the other two following, one at each side.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Yer coat’s ruined,” Catriona said, helping Malcolm off with his ripped, bloodstained coat and then dropping it on the floor of his chamber. “And yer shirt,” she added as he pulled the garment over his head and tossed it down alongside the coat.
She caught her breath, the sight of his powerful naked chest, with its dusting of dark hairs, taut, dark nipples, and symmetrical ridges of muscle, sent a spear of heat through her insides. Though she had seen his naked chest before, her desire to touch it, stroke it, to run her fingers through the hairs, only seemed to grow stronger each time.
“I’ve plenty more,” he said with a shrug, resting his injured forearm on the table and looking at her from his chair. “Ye’re safe, Cat, that’s all that matters.”
Smiling at the sound of the diminutive on his tongue, the informality of which warmed her even more, she made herself focus on the important task ahead—tending to the wound. Shedipped a cloth in the bowl of hot water and wrung it out before bending over his arm to clean the blood away from the long, horizontal slash.
“Thank ye again fer comin’ tae me rescue,” she said, dabbing gently at the wound, taking care not to hurt him. “Ye saved me life.”
“That dog wouldnae have killed ye, Cat, but taken ye tae Sinclair,” he said, his eyes never leaving her.
She flicked him a meaningful glance. “Aye, that’s what I said, ye saved me life.”
His eyes darkened as he nodded his understanding—to her, death was preferable to life as Sinclair’s wife.
He laid his hand on her wrist, making her pause in her work and look up to meet his eyes. They burned with a fierce intensity as he said in a low, earnest voice, “As long as I live, he’ll never have ye, never. I swear it.”
His sincerity moved her almost to tears. “I ken,” she whispered softly, dipping her head to continue her task, swallowing the lump in her throat.
They fell silent for a while, though she knew he was watching her every move. Not that she minded. Not at all.
“There, that’s better. Now I’ll bind it up fer ye,” she said, dumping the bloody cloth in the water and dabbing around the wound with a dry one. Taking up a clean pad of gauze, she pressed it to the wound and then began bandaging it neatly, using one of the several hundred she herself had rolled in the infirmary.
As she was finishing up, she asked, “Malcolm, can I ask ye somethin’?”
