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“Let him try,” Caelan said. He looked at the fire and not at Duncan.
7
His jaw was locked so tightly that a sharp, echoing ache radiated straight up into his temples. He could still see the elegant, polished script burned into the back of his eyelids.
I formally request your permission to court Miss Mabel MacAllister...
“Ignore it,” Caelan commanded, his voice dropping into a harsh, vibrating gravel that scraped against the stone walls of the solar. He watched the letter burning. “Let his inquiry disappear in ashes.”
The captain of the guard stood with his thick boots planted firmly on the flagstones, his arms crossed over his leather-clad chest. He looked at the burning parchment then looked up at Caelan’s rigid face.
“I willnae do that, Caelan,” Duncan said flatly.
Caelan’s gray eyes snapped up, flashing with a sudden, volatile heat. “It wasnae a request, Duncan. I gave ye an order. Forget about the damn letter.”
“And I am telling ye that ignoring it is a tactical mistake,” Duncan fired back, stepping closer to the desk. He placed his large hands flat on the wood, refusing to back down. “Refusing to answer a formal proposal from a sitting laird will only insult Clan Comyn. Ye will be handing Fergus the exact excuse he needs to escalate this.”
“Let him escalate,” Caelan snarled. “Let him march his men to me gates. I will gut him on the cobblestones.”
“Aye, ye would,” Duncan agreed, his voice rising in volume. “And half yer men would die on those same cobblestones in the process! Are ye eager to bury more of our own? Is that the strategy now?”
Caelan flinched, the words striking him with the brutal force of a physical blow. The crushing weight of his past failures pressed heavily against his ribs. He turned away from the desk, pacing a tight, restless line in front of the roaring hearth. The heat of the flames washed over his heavy leather coat, but he felt cold.
“He wants her lands, Duncan,” Caelan growled, keeping his back to the captain. “He is an opportunistic coward. He builds his strength by feeding on vulnerable clans. I promised William, I would protect her. I will nae hand her over to a snake like Fergus Comyn.”
“Every neighboring laird is thinking the exact same thing Fergus simply dared to put into writing!” Duncan argued, his heavy boots scraping against the floor as he followed Caelan’s pacing. “They all want her lands. They all see a vulnerable heiress. And they all ken that she cannae remain under Blackthorn Keep’s protection forever.”
Caelan stopped pacing. He stared blindly into the fire, watching the peat crackle and spit.
She cannae remain here forever.
He knew it was true. It was a cold, indisputable fact. But the mere thought of another man standing beside her, claiming her, touching her golden-blonde hair, sent a violent, sickening twist of pure unease straight through his gut. It was a feral, territorial instinct that defied every logical rule he lived by.
“Eventually,” Duncan continued, his voice dropping into a quieter, more insistent tone, “someone will have to marry her, Caelan. If Clan MacAllister is to survive the winter, she needs a husband. She needs a banner.”
“It will nae be Comyn,” Caelan stated with ruthless finality.
“Fine. Nae Comyn,” Duncan conceded smoothly, leaning against the edge of the desk. “And ye already shot down Gregor MacNab. So, who will it be? Ye keep rejecting every suit that crosses the threshold. Ye bark like a rabid hound the second a man even looks in her direction.”
Caelan’s shoulders tensed. “I am vetting them. None of them are suitable.”
Duncan let out a long, slow exhale. The sound was incredibly heavy in the quiet room. The captain studied Caelan’s rigid back for several long moments, his gray-streaked eyebrows pulling together in a sharp, calculating squint.
“Tell me truthfully,” Duncan asked, his voice stripped of any sarcasm or banter. “Would any man ever be good enough for Miss Mabel?”
The question hit Caelan directly in the center of his chest.
He closed his eyes. The image of Mabel standing in the courtyard earlier that afternoon flashed immediately into his mind. The rare sunlight catching in her hair. The bright, genuine smile she had aimed straight at him. The sheer, overwhelming magnetic pull that had nearly dragged him off the upper gallery and into the mud just to reach her.
Nay, Caelan thought, the bitter, agonizing truth echoing loudly in his own mind. Nay man is good enough because I want her for meself.
He forced his eyes open, shoving the selfish, blood-soaked monster back down into the dark.
“Me only concern is honoring the promise I made to her father,” Caelan declared coldly. He turned around, his face locked behind the impenetrable, terrifying mask of the Black Laird. “William trusted me with her. I will see her secured. Nothing more.”
“Ye are lying to yerself, Caelan,” Duncan muttered, walking toward the door. “But ye cannae lie to the entire Highlands forever. I will hold the Comyn rider in the gatehouse until ye draft a response.”
The door clicked shut, leaving Caelan alone in the suffocating heat of the solar.
