“That’s where you’re wrong, m’lady,” Wolf said, tilting up her chin so she was forced to look into his eyes. “What he doesn’t have is a future.”
“Because of you?”
“Aye.” A muscle jumped in his jaw. “Now, before we meet my men, I think you should know that we have a rule that there are to be no women in the camp.”
“Then what of me?” she asked, eyes narrowing.
“You will dress, think, and act like a man. You will do nothing to distract them. They are to think of you as one of them.”
She tossed her glorious mane of hair. “Well, I certainly have the clothes for the part.”
“But ’tis not enough.” Was there regret in his voice?
She turned to look ahead. “What more could you want from me?”
“Only this, m’lady,” he said. “Forgive me.” She felt him grab her hair in one hand and then, quick as a starving dog on a shank of meat, he withdrew his knife as if intending to slice the long tresses in one swift swipe.
“Nay!” she cried, her hands flying to her head. He hesitated, his weapon upraised. “You black-hearted beast!” she cried, trying to slide out of the saddle while his arms, strong as new steel, held her against him. Tears of fury burned behind her eyes but she would not give him the satisfaction of letting them spill. “You have no right to treat me this way. No right!”
“ ’Tis only hair,” he said.
“My hair. You have no right.… Please do not cut it.”
“But ’twill grow.”
True, it would grow, but the humiliation, the idea of him taking a part of her without so much as asking, burned hot in her soul. “If you do this, I hope you roast in hell!”
“No doubt I will, m’lady,” he said, sheathing his weapon and sighing as he let her long hair fall free. Clucking the horse forward, his eyes dark with self-loathing as they approached the camp, he said again, “No doubt I will.”
Three
egan bit her tongue. She wanted to rant and rave at the devil who’d captured her, to kick and scream at him, but she didn’t say a word as they rode into the camp. ’Twas better if he thought she was meek and frightened.
A sharp whistle broke the morning stillness as Wolf’s horse emerged from the forest. The outlaw’s camp was little more than a clearing by a small stream with several dirty tents and a few wagons scattered around a fire pit.
“I was beginnin’ to think ye’d been caught,” a thin, short man with a shock of gray hair grumbled. “About time ye decided to return.”
“Were ye worried for me, Odell?” Wolf said with a mocking grin that caused the shorter man to blush.
“Me? Worry?” Odell spit on the ground as Wolf swung from the saddle. Before he could help Megan to the ground, she hopped off the stallion’s back and stood a distance away from him, her hands still bound, her hair wild about her face. “ ’ell’s bells, I never worry!”
“Then why were ye askin’ about him every time there was a noise in the woods?” another man, with only one good eye and a patch over the other, teased.
“For the love of—” The thin little man eyed Megan curiously as he changed the subject and said to Wolf, “So this is yer prize,” narrowing his eyes as he scratched his head and studied her with a frown of distaste. “Ye gods, what are we going to do with ’er?”
Most of the men edged closer, forming a half-ring about them, and Megan managed to meet each set of curious eyes with her own stare. A sorrier group of outlaws she never wished to see!
“This is Megan of Dwyrain,” he said as the men gaped at her. “She is our guest and—”
“Guest?” she repeated, stung and unable to quiet her tongue. “You call me a guest? Was I invited? Did I have a choice of whether I would come with you?”
“Shh—” he said, his blue eyes glinting as the morning mist began to rise.
“Was I treated as a guest or as a prisoner? Were my clothes not taken from me? Was I not forced to ride into the forest?” Rage seethed through her and though she knew she should clamp her lips together to appear meek and frightened, she couldn’t stop the tirade that came from deep in her soul. “Were not my hands bound and my horse whipped so that it would run off?”
“Ye let a good ’orse get away?” Odell asked, his voice edged with concern.
“I had no choice.”