The Guardian

“The MacKinnons and her step-da,” Niall said, and Ian could see that his brother was near tears. “Angus was with them.”

Ian slammed his fist against the boat. God, no!

As soon as they had lugged the boat above the tide line, Niall told him in a rush of words what had happened.

The MacKinnon devils had taken Ian’s wife—and almost killed his brother.

“I tried to save her,” Niall said in a choked voice.

Ian clenched his jaws against the rage surging inside him and squeezed his brother’s shoulders. “I know ye did.”

“Ian! Niall!”

At the shouts, Ian looked up to see Gordan running toward them along the path above the shore.

“Tell me the MacKinnons did not take her,” Gordan called out, as he scrambled down the bank to them.

How did Gordan know it was the MacKinnons? Murder pulsed through Ian’s veins. He pulled his dirk and started toward Gordan. “What do ye know of this?”

Niall held Ian’s arm. “Gordan wouldn’t harm Sileas. Let him talk.”

Gordan had the wild eyes of a distraught man, and he had come to find them. Ian lowered his dirk, but he did not put it away.

“When Sileas came to talk to me last night, my mother thought she was making plans to leave ye—to marry me,” Gordan said, looking pained. “She sent the boy who works for me out in the night to Knock Castle. She gave him a message for Murdoc, telling him that the four of ye had brought Sileas back from Stirling and were here at your folks’ house. The boy just told me about it now.”

After Niall told Gordan what happened, Gordan sank to the wet sand and held his head. Ian left him on the beach without a backward glance. Damn Gordan and his mother.

“Murdoc will have Sileas inside Knock Castle by now,” he said to Niall, as they headed up to the house. “I’ve got to get her out.”

Ian clenched his fists, remembering the scars Murdoc put on her back. He was going to kill him, regardless. But if Murdoc had laid a hand on her, he would tear him limb from limb.

“Ian,” his brother said, turning worried eyes on him. “She let Murdoc believe that ye don’t care for her and that ye never… well, that your marriage was not completed.”

Ian waited for the rest.

“He intends to wed her to Angus.”

The thought of Angus’s meaty hands on Sileas’s delicate skin made his own hands shake with fury. He had to rescue her—and quickly. If he did not save her before Angus raped her, he would never forgive himself. Never.

He could not allow his rage to cloud his thinking. He forced himself to focus his thoughts on the problems before him. The first thing he had to do was make a plan to get Sileas out of Knock Castle. Then, once he had her safe, he needed to save his clan from Hugh. With the others injured, there was no one else to do it.

He took what comfort he could from her whispered message to Niall. Tell Ian I’ll be waiting for him. She believed he could not fail her.

He’d always had Connor, Duncan, and Alex at his side. As bairns, they played together. As lads, they learned to sail and to swing their first claymores together. As men, they fought side by side. Through the years, they had taken countless foolish risks together and saved each others’ lives. They watched each others’ backs.

Now, when Ian needed them more than ever before, he was on his own.

“Ye have me and da,” his brother said, as if reading his thoughts.

Ian almost laughed. If he added Father Brian, he’d have a new foursome. But a one-legged man, a fifteen- year-old lad, and a priest were poor substitutes for experienced Highland warriors in their prime.

“Should I gather what men I can?” Niall asked.

“Men were willing to fight with us because they believed Connor could be our new chieftain,” Ian said, shaking his head. “Hugh will be spreading the word that Connor is dead or gone. Until Connor is on his feet again, it would put him in danger for us to let it be known he survived the attack.”

“Then what will we do?” Niall asked.

“We’ll do what Highlanders always do when our enemy is stronger,” Ian said, meeting his brother’s eyes.

“What’s that?” Niall asked.

“We’ll use deceit and trickery, of course.”

CHAPTER 35

Mice skittered out of the rushes as Murdoc dragged Sileas down the length of the room. The castle’s hall was even filthier than she remembered.

“Get some food on this table!” Murdoc shouted at a woman cowering in the corner. He kicked at two dogs fighting over a bone and turned to Sileas. “We’ll have the wedding after we eat.”

“Ye can’t do this,” Sileas said. “I am already wed. And it was no trial marriage—a priest wed Ian and me.”

Murdoc’s lips curled into a sneer. “So ye believed that drunk your chieftain found was a priest?”

Sileas was stunned. “Of course he was.”

Even as she said it, she remembered how the priest fumbled through the words and the threat in the chieftain’s