Page 113 of Enchantment of a Highlander

MacDougall opened his mouth to protest, but Alec spoke again with all the passion he could not hide. “I said nay.”

“Verra well,” the older laird said, and pressed a pair of cold metal shackles into Alec’s hands. “Arrest the witch and let this night be done.” His gaze settled on Celia the way a hungry man eyes a hot meal.

It made the skin along Alec’s neck prickle.

“You hit him,” she whispered, her lips not moving with her words. “You hit Duncan.”

“The lad gave me no choice,” he said.

Her rosemary scent teased the earthy musk in the air. He wanted to brush his hands over her hair, to rub the cold from her chilled arms, to cradle her face in his hands and explain he had to do this to save her.

To save Duncan.

But all the eyes in the forest right now settled on him with the weight of a blacksmith’s anvil.

He moved behind her and shifted her arms against her back. She was so thin and delicate in his large hands.

She did not fight his touch.

“I did not bewitch you,” she said in a voice clogged with carefully fought tears.

Her words jerked at his heart.

He snapped the manacles around her slender wrists, careful to not put them tight enough to hurt, yet not loose enough to arouse suspicion in his enemy.

“Bring her to me,” MacDougall demanded.

Celia stiffened. “Please don’t. Not him.” She looked at Alec over her shoulder, her eyes wide with a fear he’d only ever seen that first night she’d slept at Duart.

“Don’t do this, Alec. I can’t go with him. Not again.” The breath rasped from her and she didn’t stop shaking her head.

He gently nudged her and her feet staggered forward. “There are no other options.”

It was all he could say and even still, it might have been too much.

MacDougall’s breathing grew ragged when they neared.

Alec looked between them. The savage possession in MacDougall’s eye, the raw fear in Celia’s.

I can’t go with him. Celia had said. Not again.

When had she gone with him before?

MacDougall ran his hand down Celia’s hair. Alec squeezed his hand around the hilt of his blade, fighting the urge to cut the man’s hand from his body.

“It’s time to finish what we started now that ye’ve grown, my little witch. But this time no on yer land, but in mine.”

A shard of icy realization shot through Alec.

This man was the one who’d captured Celia when she was young. The one who’d caused her such torment.

Celia turned her eyes toward Alec, her gaze full of hopelessness, hot with accusation, and he knew.

He knew he had just delivered her into the hands of her nightmare.

• • •

Celia sat in front of Laird MacDougall on his horse through the journey back to his castle.