Page 102 of Enchantment of a Highlander

A man she couldn’t save.

And she’d paid the price.

The woman stalked toward her, hissing the word as if it were a vile chant.

Witch.

Celia was forced backward until she found herself in a patch of warm sunlight and realized she’d stepped outside.

She turned the way she’d come and ran as quickly as the slick ground would allow her. Where she had been cautious before, now she ran with abandon, paying no mind to her surroundings.

Something hard slammed into her throat and suddenly she stared up at the sky with the ground pressed to her back.

Confusion reeled through her mind.

Pain.

Crushing pain squeezed her throat and kept air from getting to her lungs.

A flicker of panic ran through her, insisting she get up, insisting she run.

Before she could move, someone hauled her upright and something warm and firm clamped over her mouth.

She was too late.

Chapter Thirty

Alec sat opposite MacDougall with an ale in front of him, the appearance of friends who were no longer so given the hard stare MacDougall held him with. Though they might appear as allied friends, Alec knew by MacDougall’s hard stare, they were not.

A chill eased in through the partially closed shutters and ruffled MacDougall’s white hair against his cheek.

“Ye’re taking too long to find the witch,” MacDougall said.

“My men search day and night without success. Perhaps she has left MacLean lands.” Alec regarded his opponent with careful observation.

MacDougall curled his hands around a goblet, but did not lift it. “Yer men are no looking hard enough.”

Alec offered the other man a sympathetic look. “They are.”

MacDougall lifted the goblet and slammed it on the table so hard liquid sloshed out. “They could look harder.” His voice rang out against the stone walls.

He pulled in a deep breath and smoothed a shaking hand over his hair. “She needs to be found. Let me put more men on yer land to help.”

Alec lifted his head with a note of authority he knew the older man wouldn’t miss. “I willna allow ye to have so many of yer men on my land. The outlaw attacks have lessened and most have moved on to different territories. My people are finally settled and I willna have them disturbed by the sight of so many warriors.”

MacDougall’s fingers danced with ceaseless motion against one another, sliding, picking, grinding. “She has to still be here.” He closed his eyes and his red eyelids glistened. “I can feel her.”

The hair on Alec’s arms rose and it had little to do with the black, empty hearth.

The man was crazy.

Crazy and dangerous, an imposing combination.

MacDougall’s eyes opened, sharp and determined. “I’ll find her, and when I do, she’ll pay for all the years she’s tormented me, all the pain she’s inflicted.”

A rap sounded at the door and reverberated off the naked stone walls.

MacDougall paused a moment and his face relaxed into pleasant composure. “What is it?” he asked.