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Mabel arched her neck, a tiny, breathless whimper escaping her throat. She buried her face against the crook of his neck, her lips brushing the pulse point beating frantically beneath his skin.

“I…” Mabel began against his throat then stopped. Whatever she had almost said, she swallowed it and kissed the pulse beneath his jaw instead. Caelan went still, like a man who had heard something he was not ready to survive yet.

“Say it or dinnae,” he murmured.

“I will wait.” She laughed, unsteady, and did not say it. Not yet. He pulled back just enough to look at her face. Her eyes were shining, free of doubt and hesitation.

25

The messenger shifted his weight from one booted foot to the other, the floorboards of Comyn Keep creaking beneath him.

Fergus kept his dark eyes fixed on the small, hastily scribbled parchment in his hands. The fire crackling in the massive stone hearth cast long, flickering shadows across his face. He read the ink twice, his breathing perfectly steady, betraying the sudden, violent spike of his pulse.

“Within the week,” Fergus repeated softly, the words sliding off his tongue like venom.

“Aye, Me Laird,” the messenger stammered, pulling at the collar of his tunic. “The riders left Blackthorn Keep at dawn. They are shouting it across the glens. Caelan MacCarron claims Miss Mabel as his bride.”

Fergus slowly folded the parchment precisely in half. Then in quarters.

He had misjudged the Black Laird.

“Leave me,” Fergus commanded, his voice barely above a whisper.

The messenger did not need to be told twice. He bowed quickly and scrambled out of the doors, pulling them shut with a heavy thud.

Fergus turned his back to the fire. He walked slowly across the thick, woven rugs of his solar toward the narrow glass window overlooking the muddy courtyard. Below him, his men were sharpening blades and hauling grain sacks. They were preparing for a siege, for a hostile takeover of the MacAllister lands that now seemed impossible.

With that single decision, MacCarron had shattered everything Fergus had spent the last five months meticulously preparing. Once Mabel MacAllister swore her vows in front of a priest and became Caelan MacCarron’s wife, the MacAllister and MacCarron clans would unite beneath a single, impenetrable banner.

The legitimate claim Fergus had so carefully constructed through bribery, intimidation, and false promises would vanish overnight. Gregor MacNab would not risk open war against a united northern front. The surrounding clans would fall into line behind the Black Laird.

Fergus’ fingers tightened instinctively. He squeezed the folded parchment in his fist, the thick paper crumpling and tearing against his heavy silver rings. His knuckles turned stark white.

He stared down at the courtyard, his eyes narrowing into cold, black slits. The frustration burned hot in his throat, but he swallowed it down, forcing his mind to pivot. He was not a man who surrendered to bad odds. He was a man who changed the game.

He lifted his hand, pressing the crushed ball of parchment against the cold glass of the window.

“Very well,” Fergus murmured to himself, the sound devoid of emotion. “If I cannae marry Miss Mabel… nay one will.”

“Ouch!”

Mabel jerked her arm back instinctively.

“Stand still, lass, or ye’ll bleed on the silk,” Morag snapped, waving a vicious-looking silver needle in the air. “If ye keep twitching like a startled rabbit, I am going to pin this sleeve directly to yer shoulder.”

“I am nae twitching,” Mabel argued, blowing a stray lock of blonde hair out of her eyes.

“Ye are practically vibrating,” Isla corrected cheerfully from her spot on the edge of the large mattress. She kicked her bare feet back and forth, grinning around the sweet apple she was eating. “She cannae help it, Morag. Every time she blinks, she is picturing the Laird’s face.”

Mabel felt the immediate, betraying heat flood her cheeks. She glared at Isla over her shoulder. “I am doing nay such thing. I am merely trying to breathe. Morag has pulled this corset so tight, I can barely feel me ribs.”

“It is a wedding gown, nae a sleeping shift,” Morag muttered, dropping to her knees to adjust the sweeping hem of the pale ivory wool. “It is supposed to hold ye up. Now turn to the left.”

Mabel obeyed, turning slowly so the heavy fabric shifted around her legs. The large chamber in the western wing was a complete disaster of spilled sewing boxes, discarded velvet ribbons, and woolen tartans. The three women had been at this since shortly after dawn.

Isla took another loud bite of her apple. “Ye should have seen the way he looked at her in the Great Hall, Rhea. I thought he was going to snap Fergus Comyn’s neck with his bare hands right over the roasted pheasant.”

Rhea smiled softly from her chair near the hearth. She held a polishing cloth in one hand and a heavy, tarnished silver brooch in the other. “I heard about it, Isla. The entire keep heard about it. I imagine the blacksmith two villages over felt it.”