Page 45
Euphemia turned to him. “Angus,” she said in a voice that one uses with an unreasonable child who is about to hurt himself.
Angus drew his claymore and heard the swoosh of nearly a dozen swords being drawn from their sheaths. Laomann gaped at him. Euphemia paled and stared at him with her mouth open, then she grew livid. He’d never seen anyone with quite the same expression of pure menace on their face.
Pointing his sword at Euphemia, he cried, “Lady Rogene, come out of the chamber.”
“Ye’re nae serious,” Euphemia said as she watched Rogene pass by her and stand by Angus’s side.
He looked at Laomann. “I had already talked to her. She was looking for an example of a letter to find a good wording for the contract.”
He drew his sword back, acutely aware of the ten blade tips still pointed at him.
“A misunderstanding. Lady Euphemia didn’t believe her, but I do. I drop all charges and demand that ye do the same, Laomann.” He looked straight at Euphemia, who had bared her teeth. “’Tis nae yer business, Lady Euphemia, because ye were nae affected. It was my bedchamber and my belongings, so ’tis nae up to ye to demand any sort of punishment. Am I clear?”
She drew her head back and sucked in a breath. When she didn’t say anything, Angus put his hand on Rogene’s shoulder and led her out of the dungeon and up the stairs. He felt her shaking under his palm and ached to take her into his arms and calm her down.
While they climbed the stairs towards his bedchamber, his mind raced. What had he gotten himself into by so openly defying his future wife and his laird? He’d lied to them. He’d lied for her, for a madwoman who’d assured him she was from the future.
What was wrong with him? He should have just let Laomann do whatever Euphemia was insisting. But he knew he couldn’t live with himself if he let them harm Rogene. Shutting the door to his chamber behind him, he looked at her standing in the middle of his room.
Her eyes were wide and shining from fear, no doubt, and yet she still held her head high as she met his eyes.
“Angus, you’re going to be in big trouble,” she said. “You shouldn’t have done that. You shouldn’t have lied for me.”
He chuckled and walked farther into the room. He put more wood on the dying fire in the fireplace and warmed his hands. Looking over his shoulder, he studied her. Her hair was in disarray, her skin translucent, and dark circles shadowed her eyes. He couldn’t see her wound, which was under his cloak.
“’Tis done now. Ye didna do what she’s accusing ye of, so I couldna let her harm ye.”
Her eyes warmed and glistened.
“Thank you,” she said. “I know I didn’t particularly deserve it, given that I broke your trust.”
He stood up. “Let me take a look at yer wound.”
She watched him approach, and their eyes locked. Desire stirred in him, deep and hot and urgent. They were alone, and he was about to touch her. And he saw in the way her eyes darkened that she’d just realized that, too.
* * *
Angus stood before her, as big as a mountain. He brought his hands to the base of her neck and slowly undid the brooch that fastened the sides of his cloak together. Her breath caught as the warmth of his fingers reached her chin. The cloak fell on the floor with a soft thud, and the chill of the cool air grasped her bare back. The wound on her chest throbbed and ached, although right now, she wasn’t aware of much else besides the ragged beating of her heart against her ribs.
The night she’d spent in the dungeon had left her freezing cold and aching all over. Catrìona had brought her water and porridge last night, and another portion this morning. She hadn’t slept last night at all, too anxious and worried and regretting she’d said a word to Angus about time travel. Of course he didn’t believe her. He was a rational man.
She’d spent the night on a cold, hard bench—her only luxury being a night pot for her to relieve herself—thinking of how different the medieval reality was compared to what she’d read in the books. Or rather, it was one thing to read about flogging, and torture, and beheading in books. It was quite another to know they were a possibility in her own life.
What was so romantic about the Middle Ages? All her life she spent dreaming of the past, wishing she’d experienced it. And now that she had, she wished she hadn’t.
Except for one thing.
Angus.
The man who made her heart ache and her body feel as if she were next to an electric field.
She met his gaze. His eyes were dark and penetrating, and he was looking at her the way a bomb disposal officer might look at an explosive device wrapped in the most beautiful packaging he’d ever seen.
“Why are you helping me?” she asked. “Do you believe me?”
“Mayhap,” he said.
He lowered his gaze to her mouth and swallowed. Heat rushed through her, and she felt like her body swayed towards him once, as though he were a giant magnet and she were made of iron.
