The Highlander's Lost Lady (The Lairds Most Likely 3)

“For heaven’s sake, stop lying to me,” he said in frustration, running one hand through his still-damp hair. The crossing from the lean-to to the bothy had been dreich in the extreme. “Ye cannae trust me even now?”

After nearly a week of her deceit, he should be proof against the palpable innocence in her expression. But despite knowing that every second word out of that rose-pink mouth had been false, he still wanted to believe her.

As he’d grown up, a reluctant hint of contempt had tinged his sympathy for his father. When it came to forgiving his faithless wife, the man’s gullibility had begun to seem like willful stupidity. After a few days with Fiona Grant, Diarmid understood his father much better.

“I’m not lying.” She must have read the way his expression closed against her, and she went on more urgently. “Not now. I know I’ve lied to you in the past, and I’m sorry. I had no choice in what I did. I hope you’ll see that when I explain. But I truly don’t understand what you mean when you talk about breaking the law. I…stole from you, but that’s me, not you. And while it’s no excuse for taking your money, I can’t tell you how much I loathed doing it.”

That he believed. When the purloined coins had hit the floor, she’d looked sick with shame.

“That’s no’ what I mean,” he said, although he’d been appalled to discover that she was a thief as well as a liar, and probably an adulteress as well. Why else did a woman leave her marriage, if not to run to a lover? His mother had never had any other reason. “The Grants could bring a case against me for kidnapping.”

“Kidnapping?” she echoed, as if the word made no sense.

He got up. He was rarely angry. In the week since meeting Fiona Grant, he’d been angry more often than he’d been in the previous ten years. Now he was too furious to sit still. He stalked across to the fire and stoked it until its heat rivaled the blaze inside him. Although he kept his back turned, Diarmid felt her watching as the poker stabbed at the burning peat.

Impatience sharpened his voice. “You’re a man’s wife, and I’ve stolen ye away.”

When he turned to face her, shock had made those already wide eyes impossibly wider. “Mr. Mactavish—Diarmid—I’m nobody’s wife.”

A flush marked her slanted cheekbones, but her eyes didn’t waver. She was so beautiful. Why did she have to be so bloody beautiful? If anyone should be proof against a pretty face that concealed a false heart, it should be him. But each time he looked at Fiona, every muscle clenched with helpless longing.

“Your finger shows the mark where ye wore a wedding ring.” Stinging bitterness edged his answer. He still didn’t like a liar, even if it seemed he’d thrown in his lot with one. “John says you’ve borne a child. Ye answer to Mrs. Grant. Allan Grant says you’re Thomas’s wife.”

The cynicism hardening her expression sat oddly with her elegant prettiness. “And you believed him without question?”

“I had nae reason no’ to.”

“No, I suppose you didn’t,” she said grimly.

Diarmid made an irritated sound in his throat. How the devil did she manage to make him feel like he was in the wrong?

“I always knew ye were lying. Right from the first. When the Grants turned up looking for their lost kinswoman, at least I knew why. You’re a wife on the run from a husband she doesnae overmuch like.”

She stood to face him. “No, that’s one thing I’m not. I was married for nine years to Allan and Thomas’s brother. Ian Grant died a year ago, and I’m his widow.”

A widow…

Although she’d spoken softly, the words resounded in his ears like the toll of a huge bell. Diarmid stared at her in shock and sagged as his self-righteousness flowed away, taking all his breath with it.

It was the obvious answer. Why didn’t he think of it before? More proof that this girl turned his usually reliable brain to porridge.

“I…see.”

That clear blue gaze sliced at his heart like a razor. “If you believed I was an adulteress on top of all my other sins, why on earth did you come to get me?”

“Devil if I ken,” he snapped, suffering a shame of his own. He wanted her, he always had. While he had no intention of doing anything about it, he was still uncomfortably aware that he wasn’t as white as snow when it came to mixed motives. “I didnae trust the Grants.”

A crooked smile twisted that lush mouth. “That speaks well of your instincts.”

“And Allan and Thomas werenae kind.”

Her slender throat moved as she swallowed. “No, they’re not.”

“And on top of all that, I’m a blasted fool.”

She shook her head. “No, a good man, but one who perhaps suffers from an excess of chivalry.” She paused. “I’d think after what your mother did, you’d have no sympathy for a woman who abandoned her family.”

Shock clouted him on the head, hard as a lump of wood. “You ken about that?” Before she could answer, he went on, his voice heavy with weariness. “Why would ye no’? My mother’s adventures were the most exciting things to happen at Invertavey until…well, until you arrived, frankly. I assume Mags told ye.”