Page 1 of The Dragon Laird’s Obsession

CHAPTER ONE

“Ye are to marry Gordon MacLaren…”

Ailis had just lifted the cup to her lips when Sorcha’s words struck and couldn’t hear anything she said afterwards.

The tea went down the wrong way. She spluttered, lurched forward, and slapped one hand to her breast as if she had been pierced clean through by an English arrow. A hot tear sprang to one eye. The cup rattled dangerously in her grip, but she held onto it with determination.

Her eyes finally landed on her sister’s. Sorcha kept rocking her son Lachlan on her lap while she slept, and she wore a smile. A smile that made Ailis’ insides coil and recoil even tighter till she felt a little ache.

A laugh breezed past her lips, and she cleared her throat, straightened, then placed her cup gently on the table next to her.

Ailis rose to her feet. “Forgive me,” she began as she walked toward Sorcha with another little laugh. “For a second there, I believed ye said I would marry.”

Sorcha remained calm, her lips still holding her smile, her eyes on Ailis. “I did, sister,” she answered.

Ailis paused in her next stride, the words hitting her nerves again. She spun quickly to look at Sorcha as the first pinch of panic rose through her. “I shall marry Gordon ?” she blurted, her cheeks burning with the fierce heat that sliced through her just from the absurd thought of marriage.

“Ye did say he was pleasant to ye when ye met two years ago,” Sorcha answered now.

“Aye,” Ailis breathed with an exhale. “But that was merely in passin’. He was pleasant when he found me after I ran away and brought me home, but that was it. I havenae said two words to the man since then even though he is yer husband’s brother, and I…”

Her head spun as her words rambled past her lips in a rush.

Breathe, Ailis… Take a deep breath.

Her attempts to reach for calm failed miserably as her sister rose with Lachlan in her arms and said to her again, “It is time, Ailis. Two years ago, ye fled at the mention of marriage, but this time ye cannae do so. I promised Rowan I would say nothin’ of this to ye yet, but I daenae want ye to be blindsided,” Sorcha continued. “I believed tellin’ ye about it before the day of the betrothal would be better.”

Ailis stared at nothing in particular for the moments that followed. She always knew the day would come when she would have to do the one thing she fled from two years ago.

Take a husband.

But she did not think it would be so soon. “But I daenae wish to marry Laird MacLaren,” she protested when she could speak again, her panic rising through her as she gestured with a hand. “I daenae wish to marry anyone.”

Her throat tightened with a lump that she forcefully swallowed.

Sorcha walked to her adopted daughter Elspeth, who had been poised on the floor with one of her dolls, and gently tapped her shoulder. “Elspeth, me sweet lass, take yer brother to the nurse for me, aye? Tell Mairi he is ready for his rest,” she said in a soft tone as she stroked Elspeth’s hair.

The lass had been living with Sorcha and Rowan for a few years now, and Ailis admired her sister who loved her stepdaughter like her own.

Ailis watched, her own heart tingling as she saw Elspeth’s green eyes brighten with pride. “Can I carry his horse too?” the girl asked.

“Aye, of course, me love,” Sorcha said, smiling. “And mind yer steps on the stairs, so ye daenae fall.”

“I will,” Elspeth promised, already reaching for Lachlan.

Sorcha kissed her daughter’s forehead and smoothed a hand over her hair before waiting for her to walk out of the solar.

Once alone with Sorcha now, Ailis continued, “Gordon ‘the dragon’ is a man that is rumored to be unfeelin’, and…” She trailed off with a sigh then spun around to reach for her sister’s hand. “Surely ye and Callan cannae make me wed him.”

Sorcha sighed, and her eyes stayed soft as she said. “Our brother has decided.”

“Our brother.” Ailis turned away then turned back again because standing still felt impossible. Her skirts snapped around her ankles as she crossed the solar. “How grand of him to make this decision for me. How simple men make the world when they are nae the ones being handed over like a bolt of cloth.”

“Ye arenae being handed over, Ailis. Marriage is important.”

“To make heirs,” Ailis argued, her tone sharper now as she spun around in a rush. “And to do his biddin’. That is what marriage is good for, aye?”

Sorcha’s expression tightened, but she did not scold her. “It is nay all. It is also for love, for companionship… Surely Ailis, ye daenae think that all I am to Rowan is somethin’ to make heirs?”