The Highlander's Christmas Quest Read online

  "Because ye want company for Christmas?"

  "Dinnae be a fool, Dougal."

  He was still frowning and hardly seemed to hear her. "It wasnae just the islanders who wanted me to woo ye, was it?"

  "Why is that such an astonishing idea?" she snapped, tired of the way he dismissed her as a potential wife.

  "Fair Ellen…"

  Her temper flared. She stepped closer, clenching her hands at her sides. If punching Dougal would beat some sense into that thick, handsome head, she’d gladly knock him to the ground.

  "Who’s on Innish or Canna or Orkney – or in far Cathay, for all I know." She gulped in a shuddering breath. "For all ye know."

  "It’s no’ your right…"

  But she’d fired up her own resentment now and wasn’t about to back down. "She’s no’ here, Dougal. And I am." She struggled to control the bitter despair in her voice, but still a low, wretched tone emerged. "I’m here, Dougal."

  "This is all because of the kiss."

  She winced. "Ye kissed me. I didnae kiss you." At least at first. "You’re no’ as pure as you’d like to think, my fine Highland laddie."

  This time he winced, although he didn’t look away. "Aye. Aye, I did kiss ye. And I curse that I did."

  She made a distressed sound. "That’s cruel."

  Brief remorse flashed across his features before too quickly, his frown returned. "No, it wasnae the kiss, was it? You’ve been drilling holes in the Kestrel since that first night. Ye set up that kiss."

  She flushed with humiliation and chagrin, because that was one thing she was innocent of. Perhaps the only thing. "Dinnae start casting me as some kind of evil seductress in this story, Dougal."

  "What else am I to think?"

  She dared another step nearer. Even more, she dared to reveal the embarrassing truth. "Aye, I want ye to stay. I thought if we had time together, you’d realize how perfect we are together."

  "Perfect?" His snarl indicated his disgust at that concept. "As if I’d wed a deceitful witch whose every word is a falsehood. Ye failed in your attempt to catch yourself a rich husband, Miss Macbain. If I didnae feel so sorry for the poor sod you end up marrying, I’d almost wish ye better hunting next time."

  The awful accusation sliced at her like a razor. She bit back another whimper, although she couldn’t stop her tears from overflowing. "I dinnae care about your money," she muttered. "Surely ye must know that."

  The rage seeped from his eyes. But the chill it left behind was worse. He inspected her as if she was something low and poisonous. An adder. Or a spider. "Why would I know that? It turns out I dinnae know the first thing about ye."

  He was justified in hating her. She knew it. But that didn’t prevent her heart from cramping in agony. "I know you’ll never forgive me."

  "You’ve got that right."

  He was an idealistic idiot to commit himself to the myth of Fair Ellen, but she couldn’t escape the bitter knowledge that what she’d done put him forever out of reach. Even if Fair Ellen had no more reality than fairy dust, he’d never come back to Kirsty Macbain.

  Kirsty wiped roughly at her eyes. He was going to leave. Of course he was.

  She didn’t want him taking away an image of a weak, defeated woman who could only cry her eyes out now she’d been caught in the act. Because the awful truth was that, given the last few days to live all over again, she wouldn’t do anything differently. Fate offered her a chance at love. She couldn’t let it vanish into the mist, because she suffered a few qualms about taking matters into her own hands.

  It took her a little while to realize that he offered her his handkerchief. "Here. I cannae stand to see a lassie cry."

  "Thank ye," she choked out, accepting the square of white linen with shaking hands.

  A prickly silence crashed down. When Dougal next spoke, he sounded more like the man she’d come to know and less like a furious stranger. "Ye couldnae keep drilling holes in my boat until the crack of doom."

  She blew her nose and raised bleary eyes to his face. That wonderful, beautiful face that had stolen her heart the minute she first saw him. "I wanted to give ye a chance to fall in love with me."

  Then had cause to regret her brave confession, when he repeated the word like a curse. "Love?"

  "Aye, love," she said. "I love ye. I think if your head wasnae so full of romantic nonsense, ye could love me back."

  Her tactless description of his quest made his jaw tighten in resentment, but he didn’t go back to being angry. "And I’d marry ye, and we’d set up home as happy as could be on Askaval for the rest of our days?"

  Dougal’s sarcasm stabbed at her, although she wasn’t fool enough to expect her declaration to elicit a similar declaration from him. "Why no’? It would be a good life."

  "I’ve only known ye for a few days."

  Her voice hardened as she fumbled to hold onto a rope. "Love at first sight is possible. It’s no’ so different from what ye think will happen if you ever find Fair Ellen. You imagine you’re Perseus, and she’s Andromeda, and the two of ye will fall in love the second you’ve killed the dragon and unchained her from her rock."

  It was his turn to look uncomfortable. "She suffers a huge injustice, and any man of principle…"

  "If she was just Ellen of the Isles or even worse, Ugly Ellen of the Isles, ye would never have budged a foot from Bruard Castle to release her from captivity."

  "Maybe," he admitted with a reluctance she could hear. "But that’s nae excuse for what you’ve done."

  Which she finally admitted with bitter honesty was true. She had no say in what Dougal Drummond did. She was nothing to him. Not even a friend, thanks to her scheming. Her heart felt like a stone in her chest.

  "No, it doesnae," she said in a ghost of a tone. Her admission surprised him, silenced him briefly, as if he’d been preparing for another argument.

  "I’m going at first light."

  Kirsty couldn’t help it. She started to cry again, even as her anger surged anew. Anger and frustration, although neither would do her any good. "And you’ll leave hating me."

  He shook his head. "I dinnae hate ye."

  As she stared into that chiseled, implacable face, she recognized it would be better for her if he did hate her. Because hatred wasn’t the opposite of love, indifference was. And she could see that once he left Askaval, he’d never think of her again.

  But it wasn’t in her nature to give up. "Do ye no’ care for me at all?"

  Tears edged the pathetic question, but she was too wretched to blush at the picture she made. As the boat rocked, she fought to keep her feet.

  That flickering muscle kept dancing in his lean cheek. "Kirsty…"

  She shook her head as despair froze her blood. "Ye dinnae."

  Dougal spread his hands. "After what you’ve done…"

  She straightened, while tears poured unheeded down her face. "Ye dinnae even see me. All ye can see is some fantasy in your mind."

  "Fair Ellen isnae…"

  "Isnae here," she burst out. "She isnae here, Dougal. And I’m right under your noble nose. Yet ye willnae even look at me."

  The light of the erratically swinging lantern revealed his flush. For the first time, he avoided her eyes. "I looked."

  About to burst into a tirade about his imbecilic stubbornness, she stopped. "Ye…looked?"

  He stepped back, then had to stop before he tumbled into the water. "Aye, you’re a bonny girl. I’m no’ bloody blind."

  She took no joy in the compliment. He made it sound like an insult. "I didnae know."

  "Well, damn it, ye should have. At least when I kissed you."

  Kirsty should find some satisfaction in hearing him admit that he’d kissed her, but again she found no comfort in the confession. He sounded like he hated himself.

  "Is it so bad that ye looked at me?" she asked in a shaking voice and raised his handkerchief to dash the tears from her eyes.

  The gale was worsening. He spread his legs to balance himself an
d placed one large hand on the mast. "Aye. I pledged myself to Fair Ellen. I shouldnae be looking at another lassie with desire."

  Shock shuddered through her. "Ye desired me?"

  "Aye." The admission emerged as if it hurt him.

  She released the rope and spread her hands in incomprehension. "If ye want me, and I want ye…"

  "I dinnae want to want ye," he snapped.

  "Dougal…" She took a step closer, until only inches separated them. For one sizzling instant, his eyes met hers and she suffered the insane notion that perhaps despite everything, she’d get what she longed for.

  She’d been wrong to think him indifferent. The gaze that he leveled on her betrayed anger and self-loathing and confusion and anguish. But it also glittered with the desire he’d just so unwillingly confessed.

  "Stay back," he growled.

  She didn’t move. "But we could…"

  Dougal shook his head. "No, we couldnae. Ye lied to me."

  She felt like he hit her in the stomach, punching all the air out of her. Because she’d forgotten just what they were doing here in the middle of the night in this restless boat. The argument had moved so far past her useless schemes to keep him here on her island.

  "I lied to ye because I love you," she mumbled, grabbing at the rope again.

  "If that’s true, I’m sorry."

  As she looked at that determined jaw and those steady eyes, her fragile hope died. If they’d ever had a chance – and right now, she was convinced they hadn’t – his discovery of her deceit had destroyed it.

  "Will ye no’ stay?" she asked, even now unprepared to accept that she’d never see him again.

  "Ye must see I cannae."

  She couldn’t, but that was her misery to bear.

  "What about Papa?"

  Dougal frowned, and she saw that the question came from a thousand miles away from his immediate concerns. "Gus?"

  Kirsty stepped back, taking a moment to find her balance. "Ye should say goodbye to him. It’s no’ his fault that ye and I have fallen out."

  "He knows I’m leaving on the first tide."

  "Nonetheless he expects ye for breakfast."

  His shoulders slumped. "He’ll try to get me to stay for Christmas."

  If her heart wasn’t breaking, she might have smiled. "Given that the weather is worsening, that might be the sensible thing to do."

  He shook his head. "After what I’ve learned tonight, I must go."

  "Aye," she said, even as her foolish heart cried out that he didn’t have to go at all. That he should stay on Askaval and never leave her.

  Chapter 9

  Dougal was still fuming as he sailed the Kestrel out of Askaval’s neat wee harbor the next morning. But beneath his anger lurked disbelief, and an even more powerful hurt. How had he been so deceived in Kirsty? He’d thought she was the most marvelous girl, and she’d turned out to be a snake in human form. Even worse, he’d wanted her. If truth be told, he kept on wanting her, in spite of everything he now knew. What did that say about his powers of judgment?

  He gave a last wave to the people lined up on the quay and realized that he’d miss Askaval. Bill, Jock and Johnny had protested at his going. Gus had, as expected, insisted that Dougal couldn’t sail away on Christmas Eve, especially with squalls in the offing. The servants in the house had come down to farewell him, and so had the other islanders he’d met during his short stay here.

  He hadn’t realized quite what a place he’d found for himself on this isolated island. It shouldn’t feel like he was leaving home forever. After all, he’d only been on Askaval a few days. But, by God, it did.

  One other person stood on the quay to watch him set off. He’d struggled not to look at Kirsty, just as he’d struggled not to look at her when he joined the Macbains for breakfast and told Gus that he meant to leave within the hour. He kept reliving that dreadful scene between them in the middle of the night. When they both said things they shouldn’t.

  When she’d told him she loved him.

  He wanted to dismiss that declaration as just a passing female fancy. But her gallant misery as she spoke the words smacked of something deeper than a silly whim.

  She’d cried when he caught her in the midst of her duplicity. Her betrayal bit deep, made every dealing they’d had together false.

  Except he couldn’t dismiss every word she said as a lie, just as he couldn’t dismiss their kiss as anything but an explosion of the lust that had gnawed at him since he first saw her.

  She’d told him it was her first kiss. Last night, he wanted to believe he’d fallen foul of feminine machinations. But much as he’d like to paint himself as blameless in that conflagration of delight, he knew he couldn’t. As Kirsty had pointed out, he’d kissed her, not the other way around. And he’d tasted innocence on her lips.

  She’d lied about so much else, but she hadn’t lied about him being the first man to kiss those lush, red lips.

  Dougal steered his boat out of the harbor and struggled not to remember the sweetness of her kiss, the broken sounds of pleasure she’d made as his lips explored hers, the way her surprise had melted into sizzling surrender.

  No, by God, he wouldn’t think of that.

  Which meant he went back to stewing about what happened on the Kestrel last night. How Kirsty had cried when she realized the game was up. His sisters used tears as a bargaining tool, and over the years, he’d become inured to fits of girlish hysterics.

  Until last night. The sheer extravagant sorrow in Kirsty’s crying had tied his gut into tangled knots. She’d made him feel sick with guilt, when the good Lord knew, he was the injured party, not her.

  She hadn’t cried this morning. She’d been subdued and heartbreakingly dignified at breakfast when he told Gus he was leaving for Innish, no matter that it was Christmas Eve. On the quay when he left, she’d been worse than subdued. She’d stood apart and stayed utterly silent, but even across the distance, Dougal had sensed her proud suffering and hated that he caused it.

  Last night, he’d decided that any unhappiness she endured was her own fault, until his sleepless vigil on the Kestrel after she left gave him time to regret her wretchedness. While he should let the hellcat stew in her own deceit, ruthlessness was impossible to maintain. Especially when he saw her this morning. The crackling energy was absent, the silvery eyes were dull as unpolished pewter, and that full, kissable mouth was tight with unspoken grief.

  When he left the shelter of the harbor, the wind caught his sails and the wee boat flew across the choppy waves. With luck, he’d make Islay this afternoon, then on to Innish and his appointment with a great destiny. If he managed to keep the boat going, this wind would blow him all the way to Fair Ellen.

  Tomorrow was Christmas. What a perfect day to claim his fate.

  Once he did, he’d never have to think about Kirsty Macbain again.

  ***

  Kirsty woke to a thunderous pounding on the front door of Tigh na Mara. When she opened eyes scratchy with crying and too little sleep, light edged the curtains of her bedroom windows. The clock on her mantelpiece told her it was past nine. Grief and a wild storm had kept her awake until after five, when she’d tumbled into a restless doze, tormented with dreams of Dougal glaring at her as if he hated her before he turned his back and walked away. Those dreams weren’t fantasy. They just played out his actions in the real world.

  She was up flinging a shawl over her flannel nightdress and sliding her feet into slippers before she was fully alert. Most mornings, especially after a storm, she was out well before this, checking her island. Foreboding formed an uneasy mixture with misery in her belly. Blast Dougal. He turned everything in her life upside down. Now this could be an islander reporting some injury or serious damage that required the laird’s attention.

  It was only as she darted down the oak staircase to the hall that she realized that an islander was unlikely to knock at the front door. Everyone who lived on Askaval came in through Tigh na Mara’s kitchens, a
s she’d blithely told Dougal that first day when she’d still harbored hopes of winning his heart.

  She rounded the landing just as Betsy, Ruth’s daughter, scrambled up from the kitchens and crossed the black and white tiled floor to open the door. She looked exasperated, and she was wiping floury hands on her apron. Kirsty might have slept in, but the servants had been up before dawn, preparing Christmas dinner and refreshments for tonight’s ceilidh.

  The banging on the door ceased as Betsy pulled back the bolt. "All right, all right, I’m coming. Nae need to wake the dead."

  Kirsty was halfway down the last flight of steps before she realized who stood in the open doorway with a windswept Scottish sky behind him. "Dougal…"

  "Mr. Drummond, have ye had trouble with your boat again, sir?" Betsy asked after an awkward curtsy.

  Because the light was behind him, Kirsty couldn’t see his face, but his voice was kind as he answered the maid. "No, Betsy. The Kestrel came through the storm like a champion."

  The maid stepped back to allow him into the hall. "We thought you’d gone."

  "Aye, so did I." He strode forward to stand at the bottom of the steps, staring up at Kirsty. "But I realized I’d left something behind, and I had to come back for it."

  Perhaps she was still dreaming. He didn’t look angry. Instead, the ardent emotion glowing in those deep blue eyes made her battered heart stir to life.

  Her hand curled hard around the banister as she forced out the question that would determine the rest of her life. "What did ye leave behind, Dougal?"

  That radiant smile curved his lips. She’d never seen him look more beautiful. "You, Kirsty Macbain."

  The answer struck her like a blow, stole her breath, stopped her heart, deprived her of the ability to speak. She gazed lost into that wonderful face as her sleep-deprived brain struggled to make sense of events.

  "Me?" To her shame, the question emerged as a pathetic squeak. She raised a shaking hand to her throat, where her pulse pounded like a metronome set on presto.

  "Aye, you." A hint of uncertainty crept into his expression, dimmed the bright smile. "That is if you’re willing to give me a fair hearing after the things I said to ye last time we were alone."