Page 62 of A Highland Rogue to Ruin

Tormund was well aware. He should have disbanded the ambush the moment he’d felt contention. The moment he’d realized the fire goddess who’d wrapped him around her finger was James’s sister. If the weapons resurfaced, the truth would come out and Brighde would know. He’d lose her, right after he’d committed to finding a way to keep her.

He rolled out his shoulders. He’d slept like hell after tracking late into the night with Reaper, finding no trace of the stolen supplies or who might have taken them. Didn’t like the inkling settling into his gut that if only his men had been guarding them, then it was one of his men who’d taken them.

He’d dreamed of his mother last night, too. Memories long ago drowned in the ocean had flashed for the first time in years—unwelcome. Since he’d held Brighde by the fire, listening to her damning comments about the book that had hit too close to home—for he was guilty of retaliations, too— Fok, he was buried in a mess of his own making right now, because of the need for revenge.

Summer Provence nights.

The scent of lavender drifting through the window.

A hearth fire crackling. Owen surrounded by his brushes and palettes and easel overflowing with sketches. Their mother humming softly, smiling as she twirled a lock of her hair girlishly, reading the latest letter from their father who wrote diligently…

Clank.

A breeze ruffled Tormund’s hair as he lay on his pillows, writing furiously in the moonlight streaking through the window tracery. His inkwell precariously perched atop a portfolio upon his blankets as the bells tolled Compline prayers and cassocks swished like ghosts through the darkened, fragrant fruit groves.

Clank. Clang.

“My only wish for you, my beautiful garçons, isn’t that you gain riches or fame,” his mother said, lifting the letter she held so reverently in reference. “It’s that you become as honorable as your sire, that you meet a fille someday who makes you smile as much as your sire does me. When you find her, be bold in your love, for our time on earth is fleeting. Reach out and seize it, nay be a coward—

He’d thrashed awake. Her voice had been so vivid. A lass was making him smile, and now it could all go to shite.

Clank.

“What’s really ailing ye, lad?” Niall huffed, meeting his high guard and pushing back.

Tormund stepped aside, let his uncle fall through, and spun to meet Niall’s retaliatory parry.

Clank. Scrape. Clank.

“Ye need the training.” Tormund whipped loose his sgian dubh from his boot, twirling it in his left grip.

“Bullshite. Ye’re working through something. Ye always punish yer men with training when ye’ve got a scheme on yer mind.”

“Ye’re growing lazy on rich foods and idle pastimes.”

“Says the man who’s vanished the past several nights and was gone all afternoon yesterday. Doing what, if no’ idly passing the time?” Niall arched a brow. He’d known damn well what Tormund had been doing.

“Taking care of needs.”

“I thought ye called it a tryst.”

Clank. Their claymores scraped to the hilt and locked.

Niall sweated, bare muscles torqued but skin showing his age, silver peppering his temples and beard. They both wedged their stances into the ground, pushing back upon each other, as sweat rolled in rivulets over their chests.

“Do these needs include a bonny blonde with sky-blue eyes and an enemy surname?”

Tormund said nothing. Grunted as he pushed his uncle back.

“Ah, I’ve struck a nerve. How serious has this need become?”

“What the hell does that mean?” Tormund unleashed a torrent of strikes until Niall stepped back and tossed his sword down, forfeiting, while their men laughed. No one liked being on the receiving end of Tormund’s rare but precise fury when he let it fly.

“Ye’ve returned to her every day. Brought her with ye on clan business. Dallied with her every night.”

“Have ye nay learned from Owen’s mistakes, getting so distracted?” Reaper called, as Ghost rode up, without the men he’d left with this morn.

“Says the man who’s also found himself a bonny skirt and has passed more time with her than with us,” Tormund quipped to Reaper, for the outlaw Comyn also seemed to be growing fond of a secret lass’s company.