For her.
“Her?” The man holding Kinsey turned her toward him, his grip loosening somewhat, becoming far gentler. “I wouldna ever have—”
He put his hand to the base of her helm and, before she could stop him, pulled it off. She glared up at him defiantly.
Let him see she was a woman. Let him see she had the grit to fight a man of his caliber. Let him see what a real Scot did for their country.
“Kinsey?” the man said in horror.
Confusion rattled about in her skull. Her head still ached from the times she had been knocked about.
Had the man said her name? She blinked in surprise. “What did ye say?”
“Kinsey.” The man released her as if she had burned him and pulled off his own helm.
She stared in horror at the man she had been fighting, the man who had been seconds away from ending her life.
She swallowed around her dry throat, and when she said his name, it came out in a quiet exhale. “Drake.”
21
Where had they taken her?
William paced the small cell in the dungeon. Reid sat in the corner with his head resting back against the wall. But William was too restless to join him on the filthy floor.
The last he’d seen of Kinsey was when the English warrior she’d been fighting ripped off her helm and stared at her. He’d then pulled his off as well, and she’d crumpled to the ground, unmoving.
Helplessness knotted in William’s gut. He’d tried to free himself from the man holding him in place, to get to her, to safeguard her. The bastard’s grip had been too tight on him.
Before William could ensure she was safe, the man without his helm hefted her into his arms and carried her away. What did they mean to do? Rape her?
Rage tore through him. If they so much as laid a hand on her, William would rip them limb from limb.
Footsteps sounded. He stopped abruptly and stared outside the cell to the narrow aisle dimly lit with a single torch. “Where have ye taken her?” he demanded. “What do ye mean to do with her, ye filthy bastards?”
His own voice echoed back to him. No reply followed. Though he hadn’t been expecting one, emotion crumpled inside his chest.
“Mayhap they have a healer attending to her?” Reid said.
William cast his friend a hard look. “Aye, and afterward, they’ll invite her to their victory feast.”
Reid shrugged. “I dinna think they took her somewhere to kill her.”
Mayhap she was already—
William slammed the lid on his thoughts, refusing even to let the words enter his mind.
“Did ye lay with her?” Reid asked abruptly.
William frowned at his friend’s question. “’Tis no’ any of yer—”
“They’re going to hang us.” Reid gave a mirthless half-smile of resignation.
It was true. They would be hanged for trying to usurp the castle. William suddenly understood Reid’s point.
Footsteps echoed off the stone walls and thumped louder as the guard came closer. A tall man with dark hair stopped before the cell. The one who had taken Kinsey?
“Where is she?” William asked. “What have ye done with her?”
“She’s no’ any of yer concern,” the man replied.
“A Scot?” William scoffed in disgust at the man’s accent, at the side he’d chosen. “Ye do our people an injustice by siding with the English.”
“Why did ye come here?” the traitor asked in an even tone. “Was it ye who attacked before?”
William glared at him. “This is my land, stolen from us when Balliol decided to yield Scotland’s bounty to the fool English king.” He curled his fingers around the cold bars of his cell. The odor of damp, dirty iron filled his nostrils. “I want it back.”
“That willna happen.” The man squared his shoulders. “Lord Carlyle is no’ pleased about the number of men ye’ve killed in the two attacks. He is a good man and has agreed to hang ye rather than torture ye first, as other lords might have done in his position.”
“How good of him,” William said bitterly. “And what of Kinsey? The lass who was with us. Our archer.”
“She’s no’ yer concern.” The man’s dark eyes narrowed, and a flash of a memory teased at William’s thoughts. Before he could identify it, the recollection was gone.
His head ached from where it had been struck, addling his mind so his only focus remained on Kinsey’s safety.
“She’s every bit my concern.” Panic scrambled in William’s chest. He had to fight to keep it under control. Being irrational would not save her life. “She’s with child.”
It wasn’t true as far as William knew, but it could be. They’d lain together twice. And mayhap it would spare her a few months in which she might somehow manage to escape.
Something flicked in the depths of the man’s gaze. “What did ye say?” he bit out.
“She’s with child,” William repeated with more force. “My child.”
The man’s nostrils flared.
“What of Kinsey?” William demanded. “I can pay for her freedom. Tell yer baron that. Tell him to seek out—”
“Ye hang in the morn.” The calm was gone from the man’s voice, replaced with the chill of malice.
“Tell him to seek out Laird MacLeod,” William finished.
But the man was already walking away, most likely not listening. Anger and helplessness exploded through William. “If ye touch her, I’ll kill ye,” William shouted into the darkness. He slapped an open palm on the bars in a strike that reverberated up the iron and echoed around them.
Kinsey should have stayed outside the castle. She was never meant to join the fight.
Regret soured in William’s stomach. It was his fault.
He should never have taken her on. He’d been selfish, not realizing the risk he’d placed her in when he’d recruited her as his archer. All he’d thought about then was himself and what his army needed to win. To impress his father.
And now she would likely hang.
He sagged to the ground beside Reid.
This would be their last night alive, trapped in a cell with nothing to do but wait
