Page 93 of Enchantment of a Highlander

A knot of emotion swelled in her throat, but she swallowed it down. “I can’t be with you.”

“Why?” He shot the question back almost before the words had left her mouth.

Why?

Because the villages are being attacked.

Because you and Duncan and Wynda and the villagers aren’t safe while I’m here.

Because I love you.

Her mind scrambled for purchase on an excuse. A viable excuse, the very thing she was supposed to have spent these past two weeks finding rather than enjoying the life that could never be hers.

“This life is too much for me,” she answered at last.

“Wynda can resume castle duties.” His words were wooden.

“I don’t mean the duties. I mean all of it. The silks and the baths and the soft beds, the fine food. I’m no lady. I’m the abandoned child of a peasant couple. You deserve better than me.” Emotion seeped into her voice and made it waver.

She pulled in a steadying breath.

He stepped closer and though he didn’t touch her, she could feel how badly he wanted to. It pulled at her like the tantalizing heat of standing too close to a flame.

“Ye are better.”

His desperate gaze tore into her heart.

“What about me?” he asked, watching her carefully. “Am I no what ye want?”

If she said yes, he’d never let her leave.

Everyone would still be in danger.

If she said no, she would wound this iron warrior in the one place she’d found to be vulnerable—his heart.

“I’m used to being alone.” She replied with a coward’s response by not answering the question at all. “I need to leave.”

“Ye canna leave. It’s no safe.”

Celia lifted her chin, focusing on her resolution. Her being at Duart put too many people at risk. Too many people she had come to love. “I can handle myself. I’ve lived thus far on my own and survived.”

His face went red. “Damn it, Celia, Laird MacDougall has offered a bag of gold for every witch brought in.”

Celia tried to keep her face impassive beneath his sharp gaze. “And you think he’d want me?”

Though she tried to sound innocent, she knew better. It had snapped together in her mind.

The man with the red ring was Laird MacDougall. He had to be. And he would not stop looking for her until she was captured.

“All healers and midwives are being brought to the flame.” Alec crossed his powerful arms. “I knew I could protect ye if I kept ye here.”

“Is that what the offer of marriage was?” She forced bitterness into her tone, latching onto the words he’d meant for caring and turning them flimsy and cruel. “A means of keeping me here?”

His eyes went cold. “Ye know that isna true. I wouldna ask ye to be my wife if I dinna mean it.”

She knew too well he had meant it. She’d seen his sincerity every time he looked at her. The warmth of his enamored gaze coiled around her heart and pulled her toward him.

No matter how much she tried to fight the truth, it was there in front of her. It dictated her every decision, including the one she made now.