Page 94 of Enchantment of a Highlander

“I don’t want your protection.” She stepped back.

“I protect what’s mine,” he said solemnly.

She needed to do it now. Strike while the iron was hot. “I’m not yours.”

His face hardened but it didn’t stop the hurt from shining in his light eyes. “Ye dinna want me.” He didn’t reach for her again, not this time.

Her heart crumpled against the sucking pain in her chest.

She did want him.

She wanted the comfort of his arms around her at night and his steady beating heart against her ear. She wanted to bathe in the warmth of his rare smiles and revel in the way he made her body sing.

She did not want the life awaiting her.

A life alone in an empty cottage without the warm light of love. Without the villagers’ smiles and Duncan’s questions and Wynda’s hugs.

Without Alec’s love.

Her decision wavered for one small moment, but then Fiona’s burning body flashed in her mind, slumped and covered in wild, licking flames.

“I do not want you.” Celia met his stare head on.

“Celia.” Alec’s voice was hoarse. “Dinna leave me again. Stay. Let me protect ye.” His hand reached for her, hovered a moment, then gently caressed her cheek. “Let me love ye.”

Every part of her body cried for her to turn toward the heat of his palm.

She jerked away from his touch before she could break. “If you make me stay, you’ll be forcing me against my will. Let me go and do not follow.”

She did not wait for him to reply and brushed past him.

He did not follow her.

Not to her room where she pulled on the rough homespun dress and left the silk laid out across the bed she had never slept on, not when she gathered her bag of herbs from the kitchens, and not when she rushed through the gates.

Ruadh broke through a patch of brush and darted toward her with an exuberance that only served to feed her pain. Together they raced over the coastline and Celia realized, for the first time in her life, she did not run from danger.

She ran toward it.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Branches tugged at Celia’s skirts and tangles of roots and vines underfoot tripped her, but she did not stop running. Ruadh darted beside her with his usual grace, weaving effortlessly around obstacles.

Thoughts of her home ran through her mind, the comfort of her bed, the silence of the shuttered cottage, the gentle hiss of the fire on cold days such as this.

Familiar surroundings would make being alone bearable.

The face of her cottage came into view. The door gaped open.

Her heart dropped to her stomach and she skidded to a halt in front of the small home.

Shards of wood littered the threshold and the gray skies cast a shadowy light within where chunks of broken furniture lay in ruin. She pulled her dagger from the leather belt at her hip and approached the entrance on shaky legs.

The red fox treaded carefully into the cottage on dainty paws, his tail lowering but never touching the floor. After several seconds he emerged and sat beside the doorway.

Whoever had gone through her cottage was long gone.

That knowledge did nothing to loosen the tension in Celia’s shoulders. The wind moaned against the open door and scattered a wave of leaves across her dying garden. Everything she’d toiled over and owned now lay dead and destroyed.