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Her foot slipped on a smooth rock. Her ankle twisted in an unnatural angle, and there was a painful snap in her muscle. She cried in pain as she fell, the hit against the hard ground knocking all the air out of her. She could almost touch the stone. She reached out to it, ignoring the pain and the discomfort.

Strong arms picked her up and pressed her against a hard chest. “We must run, lass,” he said as he moved. “There’s nae time. Ye’re hurt, and I wilna leave ye behind.”

“Let me go, damn you!” She wriggled and beat against his chest, but he held her so tight, it was like fighting against a tree. “Let me go! I was almost home!”

“Nae.”

He ran down the slope like a madman. Jenny bounced and rocked as he moved. When they reached the beach, Tagradh was ready to go. The sail was unfurled, and the anchors were pulled up. The men were at the oars and signaled with their arms for Aulay to hurry to the ship. “Come on, Laird! Make haste!”

But the English were already coming from behind the cliff. Arrows flew from their ships, hitting one of Aulay’s men. He cried out as he broke the arrow that pierced his shoulder. Another man replaced him at the oar.

“Go!” Aulay yelled. “Leave! Hurry!”

His men started moving the oars and Colum yelled quick commands as he steered the ship.

“They wilna survive if the English catch up with them,” Aulay muttered. “Now we must go and hide before the enemy sees us.”

As Aulay climbed up the slope, Jenny thanked the lord for small mercies. Even though she was in his captivity again, she was still on the island and still had a chance to return home.

CHAPTER 27

The cave smelled like algae and fish. The carcass of the English ship was like a beached whale, dark and disemboweled. The torn sail hung flapping in the wind. There were still English coins glistening in the sand, as well as swords and armor dug into the ground like stones.

A large cliff shielded the cave from the sea, and somehow, the ship had gotten through the opening between the cliff and the island. All this time, both the English and Aulay had sailed around searching for the ship, never realizing there was a hidden cave here.

Aulay didn’t care about the remnants of the English treasure for a moment. Jenny sat on a large boulder before him as he kneeled in wet sand. Her injured leg lay on his knee. There was a gash along her ankle that needed treatment, probably from when she’d fallen. He was barely able to keep his fury down. No, that wasn’t even right. He was beyond furious.

She’d defied him once again. She’d sneaked out and fooled him. And he hadn’t even known how close he was to losing her forever and never seeing her again. Having held her in his arms, and now holding her ankle in his hands, he felt like she was an extension of him, the second half of him, the lost part of his soul.

“How could ye have put yerself in such danger, Jenny?” he murmured a restrained beratement as he slowly moved her foot in a circle. “Ye betrayed me once again.”

“How did I betray you exactly? I told you right from the beginning I wanted to leave and asked you to take me with you. You forbade me, and I never agreed to obey you.”

She pulled her leg away from his touch. “I’ll look after my own ankle, thank you very much.”

He sat and looked at her, furious and beautiful in the semidarkness of the cave. Waves rustled gently against the sand, and the sea was loud on the other side of the cliff.

“Ye probably sprained it a wee bit,” said Aulay, looking at her ankle. Not long ago, he’d kissed it as he made his way with his tongue and mouth up her inner leg and thigh and right to her sex. Back then, she’d craved his touch, begged him for more, all hot and wet and his. Now, she was pulling away. “But yer cut is what worries me. I dinna have a thing to stitch it.”

He pulled his tunic up and over his shoulders and handed it to her. His wound hurt as he moved. “Use it to stop the bleeding,” he said.

Even if they were angry at each other, her eyes grazed over his naked torso, and he knew she liked what she saw. Mayhap, just like he, she thought of the moments when they were united and connected, moving as one, breathing as one. He didn’t remember sex being so good ever before.

“I don’t need the whole tunic,” she said. “If you tear a little bit, that would be enough.”

He nodded and tore a rag from the lower part and handed it to her. She pressed it tightly against the cut.

He put his tunic back on and gave her the pouch of drinking water that he always had on his belt.

“We canna make a fire yet. I dinna want to attract their attention.” He looked around. “There’s some dry driftwood from the shipwreck, though. We can light it once the English are far enough off. I always have my fire-steel with me. Even if we’re stranded,” he said, “we will survive.”

She rolled her eyes. “Great. I don’t need to survive. No fire or driftwood. I need to get up that hill and touch that rock and go back home.”

He swallowed hard. He knew the moment he’d seen her face and that rock that she was telling the truth. And then she was reaching out, trying to touch it…

“So ’tis true?” he asked, not recognizing his own voice. The chill from the sand seeped into his blood and traveled to his soul. “Did ye really travel in time? Was I wrong to have accused ye of being the enemy?”

She looked under the cloth. The bleeding had stopped. She wrapped the rag around her ankle and tied it well. “I did travel in time, Aulay.”