The Condemned Highlander (Highland Intrigue Trilogy 2)

“Where?” he asked, looking over her cloak, worried he had missed a spot.

“I was thinking about it,” she said.

“Do not think about it,” he ordered. “And why were you thinking about it?”

She didn’t mind her thoughts or words. “I worried you would bleed if I kissed you.”

4

“I can oblige you with that, mo ghràdh,” Brogan said, as she took quick steps away from him.

Annis attempted to find a good excuse for the remark she’d let slip. “The mist is disorienting as you said.”

“Or it could be that the memory of our last kiss, you enjoyed so much, lingers in your mind and you hunger for that enjoyment again,” Brogan said, thinking how accurately he described how he felt—hungry to taste her lips once again.

Annis laughed. “Hunger? I don’t believe so. Your kiss was not that memorable.”

Brogan laughed briefly, then grinned. “A lying tongue can come back to haunt you, leannan.”

“You truly think highly of your way with women, don’t you,” she accused, frustrated that he caught her in a lie, not that she’d admit it.

“I love putting a smile on a woman’s face, bring her joy, see her satisfied,” he said with a playful wink.

“Women,” she snapped. “Not one woman, but multiple women. What of love and being faithful to one woman?”

His playfulness faded. “How fair would that be when I will live on, and she will die. My heart would break a thousand times over to lose the woman I love. I would want to join her in death and would be deprived of it and we both would be deprived of ever seeing each other again.”

“You would love that strongly?” Annis asked, the thought of being loved that passionately left her thinking about such an enduring love. Was it truly possible?

“There is no other way to love. Once I give my heart to a woman, I belong to her and her alone, and she to me. We become one. How then do I ever live without the other half of me?”

Her heart suffered a stinging pain at the thought of losing someone who loved you that much and who you loved with the same passion.

“You truly believe you cannot die?” Annis asked and the sadness in his soft blue eyes answered for him.

“I know I cannot die. I have suffered wounds that would kill most anyone. I have taken falls that should have broken bones. I bled so much once that I thought for sure it was the end, but I survived. People tried to hang me, and the rope broke.” He turned his head away for a moment. “My father ordered the village destroyed for that. I tried to stop him, explain to him that fear drove them to it. He told me fear of his reprisal would have no others trying it again. He was right, though it only instilled more fear. Some believe it a gift not a curse, but I look to the future when all who I love are gone, never to see them again and my heart aches.”

“I will end the curse,” Annis said, the sudden need to help him overwhelming her.

Brogan smiled. “I will forever be in your debt if you do.”

“Besides saving Bliss, having you in my debt forever is something I cannot resist,” she said with a soft chuckle.

“So, you admit you like me,” he said and bumped his arm against hers.

“Who said anything about like? Where did you hear that?” she argued. “Nothing, not a word was mentioned about like.”

Brogan’s laughter echoed through the trees. “Now I know you like me since you protest so vehemently.”

Annis groaned in frustration. “You are completely and utterly impossible.”

“Another lie, Annis. You mean I’m completely and utterly loveable,” he said, continuing to laugh.

She groaned again since he was right. She did like him, though she didn’t understand why she liked him, and it annoyed her even more that she did like him.

Una was one woman Brogan couldn’t melt with a smile. Her glare and pursed lips made it clear that she was not pleased with his presence. Annis was relieved that Iver felt differently or at least made an effort to appear that he did.

“You are welcome here, Lord Brogan,” Iver said. “We don’t have much, but we will share what we have.”

Brogan cast a lingering glance on his surroundings and his eyes said much, at least to Annis. What he saw disturbed him and his remark that followed proved it so.

“Your generosity is appreciated and must be repaid. Who hunts here?” Brogan asked.

“We are no longer allowed to hunt the land, my lord,” Iver said.

“If you hunt with me, you are,” Brogan said. “Two men would be better than one to hunt with me. More game caught, more meat to eat, since I am famished.”

Iver stared at Brogan bewildered.

“We must hurry since light will be lost soon enough,” Brogan said.