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

“Oh, Diarmid, what have you done?” she cried, as she dropped onto the cold, wet stones at his side.

Her frantic gaze struggled to work out what his injuries were. Under the dark coat, it was hard to see exactly where the bullet had hit him.

At the sound of her voice, Diarmid’s dark eyelashes fluttered on his ashen cheeks. He slowly opened his eyes to focus with difficulty on her face.

“Fiona?” he asked groggily, reaching out for her with his uninjured arm. “What the devil are ye doing here?”

“Rescuing you, you gallant fool.” Catching his hand in a crushing grip, she tried to use her touch to instill every ounce of strength into him that she could.

She wouldn’t let him die. She wouldn’t. Everything he’d done since he’d found her on Canmara Beach had led to this appalling moment, and she wished she’d never been born. Her voice lowered to a cracked whisper. “Please, please stay alive. Please. I can’t bear it if I lose you…”

“I’m pretty sure the bullet missed any vital organs,” Hamish said. The misty rain plastered his blond hair to his head, and he looked serious but not frantic. “If we can stop the bleeding, he should be fine.”

For what felt like the first time since she’d seen Diarmid in his cousin’s arms, Fiona gulped in a full breath of cold, damp air. Uncaring of her audience, she bent to cover his face with kisses. She felt almost unhinged with relief that he wasn’t dead. “Thank God, you’re alive.”

“It seems so.” Diarmid moved his bad arm and groaned. “I certainly hurt enough. What in God’s name happened?”

“Allan pulled a gun out of his pocket and shot you,” Hamish said. “Don’t you remember?”

“Aye, that’s right.” Diarmid’s eyes sharpened on Fiona’s face as she leaned over him. “What in hell are ye doing here, lassie? I left ye safe in the trees. I remember turning when ye called out…”

“That saved your life,” Hamish said. “Otherwise, at that distance Grant could never have missed your heart.”

Awareness of lingering danger pierced Fiona’s panic over Diarmid’s welfare, and she glanced around her. “Where on earth is Allan?”

“He’s dead. I shot him,” Hamish said in a voice that conveyed deep satisfaction. “Bugger deserved it.”

That must have been the second gunshot she’d heard. She’d dreaded that Allan might have shot Diarmid twice to ensure his enemy really was dead.

“Good for ye, cuz,” Diarmid said in an unsteady whisper.

“He’s over there.” Hamish jerked his chin in the direction of an unmoving figure spread-eagled on the grass a few feet away. In death, the man who had tormented her for so long looked strangely small, almost insignificant. Thomas was on his knees beside his brother, his shoulders heaving as he cried in ugly, gasping sobs.

“What about Thomas?” Fiona asked. “Is he armed?”

“Not anymore.” This time, Hamish’s chin indicated an old-fashioned pistol lying on the bridge beside him. “Don’t worry, I emptied it.”

There was renewed shouting and scuffling over near the trees where the Grants offered what looked to be half-hearted resistance to the Douglases under Sir Quentin’s command. Even in her distraction, she noticed that without Allan to spur them on, his kin weren’t putting up much of a fight.

With a shiver, she whipped her plaid shawl from her shoulders. The bridge was cold and wet under her knees, and the wind had a bite to it. They needed to get Diarmid to somewhere dry and warm. “This might work better to stanch the blood.”

“Good idea.” Hamish lifted his red-stained hand away from

the wound.

Fiona pushed the coat to the side to reveal the pool of blood blooming over Diarmid’s shirt, turning the white linen a vivid scarlet. She sucked in a shuddering, horrified breath and fought dizziness.

It took her a few seconds to gather enough composure to notice that Hamish was right about the location of the wound. The blood seemed to be oozing from Diarmid’s shoulder, not his chest.

Steeling herself, she forced clumsy hands to bunch up the thick woolen shawl and press it hard to the wound. “Don’t you dare die, Diarmid. I’ll never forgive you if you die.”

“Willnae…die,” he whispered, his eyelids flickering as he struggled to stay conscious.

She’d known there would be treachery. Curse Diarmid and his honorable heart that he hadn’t taken her warnings seriously. She shifted against the paralyzing cold seeping up through her skirts from the bridge.

“Is yon bastard dead, then?”

Startled Fiona looked up from Diarmid’s dear, haggard features to see Thomas standing over her. He looked like he’d aged twenty years since they last met.