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I wanted him to kiss me.

The thought was loud, undeniable, and terrifying. She could still feel the immense, suffocating heat of Caelan’s chest pressed against her shoulder. She could still see the feral, dilated darkness in his piercing gray eyes when he looked down at her mouth.

“Ma’am?” Mabel jumped, her head snapping up. Morag was standing near the hearth, a pair of iron tongs suspended over the peat fire. The maid’s brown eyes were wide with immediate concern.

“Ye are flushed,” Morag said, setting the tongs down and rushing across the room.

“And shivering. Did ye catch a chill in the gardens?”

“Nae,” Mabel managed to say, her voice barely a whisper. She cleared her throat, forcing herself to stand straight and step away from the door.

“I am fine, Morag. It is just the wind.” Morag did not look convinced. She bent down, retrieving Mabel’s discarded cloak.

“I told ye the Laird wouldnae be pleased if ye went wandering. Did he catch ye?”

“Aye, he caught me,” Mabel muttered, walking toward the copper washbasin to splash freezing water onto her face. The shock of the cold did nothing to erase the lingering phantom pressure of Caelan’s proximity.

Before Morag could ask another question, a sudden commotion erupted from the courtyard below.

Mabel froze, the linen towel gripped tightly in her hands.

Loud shouting echoed through the thick glass of the arched window, followed by the harsh, unmistakable clash of iron against stone.

Mabel dropped the towel and rushed to the window, pressing her palms against the freezing pane. Down in the misty yard, half a dozen MacCarron guards were dragging a man through the gates. The man was kicking and thrashing wildly, his clothes torn and caked in black mud. Duncan Fraser walked behind them, his broadsword drawn, his face twisted into a fierce, lethal scowl.

“What is happening?” Isla gasped, crowding in beside Mabel to look down. “That isnae one of ours.”

“They found someone in the glens,” Mabel said, a cold spike of dread piercing through the lingering heat in her veins.

The guards dragged the struggling man directly toward the heavy wooden doors of the central keep, disappearing from view beneath the gallery overhang.

Ten minutes later, heavy, rapid footsteps echoed down the stone corridor outside Mabel’s chamber.

A sharp, authoritative knock rattled the door.

“Miss Mabel.” Duncan’s gruff voice filtered through the oak.

Mabel stepped away from the window, smoothing the heavy skirts of her dark blue gown. She took a deep breath, forcing the MacAllister steel back into her spine. “Enter.”

The door swung open. Duncan stood on the threshold, his breathing slightly elevated, a smudge of fresh dirt across his iron-gray beard. He did not step into the room.

“The Laird requires yer presence in his solar,” Duncan announced flatly. “Immediately.”

“Has something happened?” Mabel asked, keeping her chin high.

“Aye,” Duncan grunted, stepping aside and gesturing down the hall. “I will let him explain it to ye.”

Mabel walked past the captain, ignoring the two guards stationed outside her door. She followed Duncan down the winding stairs and through the dim corridors, her soft leather slippers making almost no sound. Her stomach tied itself into tight, uncomfortable knots.

Duncan pushed open the door to the solar and stepped aside to let her pass.

The room was suffocatingly hot. Caelan was standing behind his large oak desk, his hands resting flat against the battered wood. Rowan MacLarren, the charming laird’s son she had met briefly at dinner the other evening, was leaning against the stone hearth, his arms crossed and his usual easy smile absent.

Caelan looked up the second she crossed the threshold.

The feral, heated hunger that had consumed him on the cliffside was gone. His gray eyes were cold, locked firmly behind the impenetrable, terrifying mask of the Black Laird. He looked at her not as a woman he had nearly pushed against a wall but as a strategic piece on a wartime map.

The stark, immediate shift stung far worse than Mabel cared to admit.