"Aye, God willing, Brock, God willing. Dinnae look for me until the morning. Now I leave ye all to drink to my bonny bride’s health."
The room erupted into more cheers as he swaggered across the hall and began to mount the stairs. His every sense remained attuned to the woman flung across his shoulder. She shook with fear. She'd hate that she betrayed such weakness, he knew.
Once they were out of sight of the crowd, she began to squirm and hit his back, but the arm he’d lashed across her bum held her in place.
"Lie still, mistress. Do ye want me to drop you on the stairs? It's a long tumble back to the hall."
Her scent made his head spin. She was more intoxicating than the fine wine she'd wasted splashing over him. The body he carried was slim and graceful, and hid soft, delicious secrets. He realized he’d started to caress that luscious curve of rump.
"Better I break my neck now than suffer what you've got planned for me," Mhairi snapped back.
Her voice sounded choked. Perhaps her position hoisted over his shoulder restricted her breathing. Or perhaps she fought tears. She hadn't cried once so far, although she’d had plenty of cause. Her strength was something he’d learned to respect. But by God, she needed to learn to respect him in turn.
Callum didn't reply. What he meant to say was no conversation for the stairwell, where anyone could follow him and listen. He shoulde
red his way into the empty tower room and kicked the door shut behind him. The slam of the thick oak sounded like the crash of doom.
He set her on her feet in the center of the room and stepped back so he blocked the entrance, although the only place the steps led was back to the hall. She must know she'd receive no aid there.
"Ye filthy, vile, lying, damned Mackinnon," she spat, backing away and putting her hands out to keep him at a distance. "A pox on ye."
"Stop it," he bit out in the voice of authority that made his will law in this glen.
"I willnae let ye rape me."
Wearily he sighed and ran his hand through hair sticky with wine. "I'm no’ going to rape ye."
She straightened, back to looking like an outraged queen. "I dinnae believe ye."
He shrugged and unknotted his sodden neck cloth. The smell of fine French wine filled his nostrils. Another shirt ruined. "Ye will."
Her eyes burned with a fury that barely masked her alarm. As he dropped the stained length of linen to the floor, her gaze clung to his every movement. "Then why the devil have ye brought me up here? Everyone downstairs is convinced you're forcing yourself on me this very second."
He dragged his coat off and dropped it next to the neck cloth. "Aye, I ken."
"And why are ye undressing?" She retreated closer to the big bed where he hoped to join her before too long. But not like this. And not tonight.
An unamused smile lengthened his lips. "Because some headstrong lassie took her life in her hands and upended a gallon of wine all over me."
"It was only a cup."
"It was more than enough."
She eyed him uncertainly. "So kill me."
He wrenched his ruined shirt over his head and dropped it on top of his other clothes. "Ye offered me that option downstairs."
"It would be better than…the other."
Callum arched an eyebrow and crossed to the washstand. "Is that right?"
She didn't answer his question. "Do ye really mean to kill me?"
The girl didn't sound nearly so brash. Instead she sounded young and lost. He was so used to her indomitable spirit that this hint of vulnerability made his heart turn over like a pancake on a hot griddle.
He kept his voice stern. What she'd done tonight was dangerous for him—and for her. She hadn’t worked it out yet, but in Achnasheen, he was her protection as well as her persecutor. His kinsmen had no reason to treat her kindly. "Perhaps no’ immediately."
Something in his voice must have conveyed that she was safe for the moment, and she slumped with relief. "If ye aren’t going to do…that, do ye mean to beat me?"