Page 10 of Devil Black

“Aye, you keep saying that. Yet you are here, are you not, Lady Catherine?”

“You mean to hold me for ransom, is that it?” Isobel asked, calming a bit. Ransom was reasonable, at least in this environment, and Lord Randal would pay. She could be out of here inside a day.

His gaze played over her again, slowly, and something that might be a smile quirked one corner of his mouth. “And, what of the King’s decree? If I am a good and obedient subject, I must wed you myself.” Wed, and bed, his tone implied—possibly not in that order.

“I doubt very much you are a ‘good and obedient’ subject,” Isobel remarked.

“You have barely made my acquaintance, yet you judge me so harshly?”

“I have not made your acquaintance at all. You abduct me from my carriage at sword point on a dark road and send my maid and attendants to their possible deaths. At least tell me your name.”

He smiled, a real smile this time, and it was not pretty. “They call me Devil,” he told her. “Devil Black.”

Isobel shivered. Standing there in the leaping firelight and with the wind gusting outside, her superstitious Celtic side surged to the fore, leaving the practical Yorkshire half of her nature in the lurch.

“I requested your true name,” she said. “Or are you too much the coward to give it to me?”

He frowned, and at that moment the chamber door flew open and a woman rushed in, a raw, avid look on her face.

“I do no’ believe it, Dougal!” Her eyes raked Isobel where she stood. “Have you gone mad entirely?”

Dougal, Isobel thought, Dougal the Devil. Oh, how it suited! Yet hope leaped in Isobel’s heart. Here was a woman, surely a merciful, gentling influence…the man’s lover, perhaps? But no, the resemblance between them was uncanny, and she looked as wild as he.

Black hair, worn loose, spun in a glossy curtain down her back, and she carried the energy of a western gale. Her face—undeniably beautiful—held an element of cruelty, as well, and when her eyes met Isobel’s, the hope in Isobel’s heart abruptly died.

“Who is she, and how did you come by her?”

“Calm yourself, Meg. This has naught to do with you.”

“You can say that?” The woman’s eyes flashed what looked like hatred. “Do no’ tell me this is MacNab’s bride?”

“He snatched me from the road,” Isobel said quickly. “He endangered my attendants. It is a violation of every rule of decency.”

The woman—Meg—laughed. The sound carried real humor and a hint of mockery. “If you expect decency from him, miss, you are sorely mistaken.”

“And yourself, mistress?” Isobel returned swiftly. “Have you no proper feeling either? Is this Scotland, or wild America?”

The woman smiled, and her resemblance to Isobel’s captor became rampant. “You might be safer in America just now,” she pronounced, and turned on the man.

“’Tis a mad stunt, Dougal. Do you want MacNab and his army at the door?”

Dougal walked to a side table, where he poured himself a drink of amber liquor—whisky, perhaps.

“I welcome a visit from our erstwhile neighbor at any time; I and my men will meet him with drawn swords. But MacNab will have no way of knowing who has snatched his fine son’s bride till he finds and interviews her servants, and no proof I have her even then.”

Scathingly, Meg said, “The man may be stupid, but not an utter fool.”

Dougal drank deeply. “They saw little—not enough to identify me. ’Twas dark and, suspect what he may, he will not dare accuse.”

Isobel’s blood chilled in her veins. No one had seen this man’s face, nor that of his now vanished accomplice—no one, save herself. But she had seen both him and his presumed sister. He seemed a ruthless man; would he prevent her from telling? Was she fated to die here, in this unknown place?

“You think not?” Meg demanded, with another look at Isobel. “You think the abduction of a virgin bride insufficient to rouse all MacNab’s boldest instincts? I think you may have overstepped yourself this time.”

Dougal shrugged, displaying no apparent concern. He too eyed Isobel—with speculation. “I may have other plans for her.”

“Rape?” Meg asked. “Surely not.”

Isobel’s heart leaped into her throat. What sort of folk were these, who could discuss such an abomination so calmly?