Chapter Seventeen
“Pull your weapon,” Keir said, his gaze centered on Normond MacInnes’s eyes. “And Dara won’t be wedding a dead man.”
“Sard off, Keir,” MacInnes said, turning to stride past him away from the riverbank. Keir watched him go and shifted his gaze to Grace. Her face was flushed. “He didn’t touch ye, did he?”
She shook her head. “That is…Normond MacInnes?”
“Aye,” he said and glanced at the wall where she stood. “Ye were spying on me.”
Grace threw up both of her hands as if wishing to freeze time in its place. She glanced behind him at the wall and back at Keir. “Yes, but I need to tell you about that man.”
“What did ye hear?” he asked, much more interested in that than the fool who he was convinced wouldn’t stay loyal to his sister.
“That man is evil. Tor Maclean, the chief of the Macleans, and Cullen Duffie, who is the chief of the MacDonalds of Islay, as well as Mairi’s new husband, the chief of Barra Isle…” She held up a finger for each chief and pointed them in the direction Normond had gone. “They all want him dead for terrorizing and trying to rape Mairi Maclean. She was his stepmother, and he trapped her at Kilchoan when his father died. Is he the one who sent you to find her to heal Lachlan?” She shook her head. “You can’t let him marry your sister. Throw him in Dunakin’s dungeon.”
Keir frowned, stepping closer. He had distrusted Dara’s suitor from the moment he arrived, a lone traveler who’d left his clan to fight for any army. But it was more than that. It was the glint in the man’s eyes and obvious hatred of anyone questioning him. “Stay away from him,” he said. “I will talk with Rab and Dara.”
Grace opened her lovely lips to say something else, but he beat her to it. “What did ye hear through the wall?”
Her mouth shut, and he watched as the lovely flush came back to her cheeks. She tipped her chin higher, but stared directly at him. “A captive must use one’s resources to survive by learning the truth.”
“Sometimes the truth is ugly,” he said, his words low in warning.
She looked heavenward before centering a glare at him. “Or the truth is much less ugly than what is played out before a quaking crowd.” She huffed. “Keir, you are forced to play the part of the Devil, but you aren’t in your heart. You don’t need to follow Rab’s brutal orders to beat a boy or steal away a woman.”
He studied her. “Ye would leave now, then, after seeing how sick Lachlan is?”
They stood in silence, and he watched her gaze rise to the trees.
“I… Blast, Keir.” She shook her head. “I will help him, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m a prisoner here and that you are one big brutal lie.”
Two men walked by, spotted Keir, and changed directions. “Come,” he said and stepped forward, taking Grace’s arm. He didn’t need her to spout secrets here in the open.
“Where are we going?” she asked as he partly dragged her behind him. “To another pretend whipping? Or maybe an authentic head spiking festivity?”
“Keep your words inside ye, lass,” he said and led her to the bailey, steering her to the stable where Cogadh was housed. Once inside, he released her.
“I don’t understand you,” she said and flung her arm toward the closed door. “All those people out there are terrified of you. I met a woman in the crowd who is having the whole town pray for me because she knows you will be raping me sometime soon.” She paused, but he kept moving, throwing a saddle on Cogadh and tightening the girth straps. “Doesn’t that bother you?” Grace asked, her voice demanding.
“They’ve been taught to fear the Devil of Dunakin. It is what has always kept order here, for generations.”
Before she could ask more, he lifted her up in the saddle. “If ye keep your lovely mouth shut until we are away, I will answer questions.”
Grace pinched her lips shut with a humph as he opened the stable door and mounted behind her. He clicked to send Cogadh into a fast walk out of the bailey and into a canter through the streets of the town. Let the staring villagers think he was taking Grace away for dastardly sins. The worse they think of ye, the better. Aonghus Mackinnon’s words threaded through him, words he’d heard from the moment he left his mother’s apron strings.
He stared ahead over the blue hood Grace wore. “Close your eyes,” he said as they drew closer to the ring of heads encircling the moor around Dunakin.
“Perhaps they are only stuffed sacks made to look like heads,” she said. “I don’t know what is real around here.”
He leaned closer to her ear, trying to ignore the scent of flowers that had grown stronger since she’d bathed. “I have no wish to hold ye unconscious throughout the rest of the ride. Inhale the taint on the breeze to know they are real, and shut your eyes.”
In case she spitefully ignored his prediction, he kept his arms snug around her waist, pressing the softness of her curves into him. They flew through the grotesque barrier, and he slowed Cogadh to enter the sparse stand of trees where he followed a thin path. Grace remained silent, and they broke out of the small woods to canter up a snow-covered hill. Spindly tufts of dead grass shot up from the white, and Cogadh’s hooves churned as they rose upward to ride between two jutting boulders. He felt Grace shiver in his arms and opened the sash from his kilt to drape before her, blocking the wind.
Up ahead, a few low myrtle trees flanked a stream. Cogadh followed it, picking his way around the edges of ice cut away by the flow of clear water. The breeze blew fresh air in, free of woodsmoke and the tang of death that ringed Dunakin.
Farther up, where the stream turned to the north, he spotted the edge of the cabin. Squat and secure, the thatching was still fresh from the fall when he’d climbed above to mend the few leaks. The walls still looked clean, swept by wind and snow. He pulled Cogadh to a stop before the small barn and jumped down.
His hands grasped Grace around the waist, pulling her toward him, guiding her down to the ground. She didn’t look at him but stepped away, crossing her arms. “Ye can go inside. I’ll stable Cogadh and be right in.”
Grace walked to the porch and tentatively pushed against the door. It swung inward, and she stood there trying to see into the dimness. Keir exhaled long, his breath fogging in the cold. Why had he brought her here? Brodie was the only other person alive who knew of this place, hidden on the border between Mackinnon and Macleod land. He walked Cogadh into the stable and took off his saddle. Grabbing a bucket, he strode out to get some water from the stream and saw Grace leaning against the open cabin door. Her gaze followed him to the stream and back, but she didn’t say a word. She was angry, probably hated him enough not to talk. Bloody hell.
He filled the small trough inside and stuffed some hay into the iron feeding grate. “If she slits my throat,” he said, drawing his horse’s gaze, “she’s your new master.” Cogadh snorted.
Keir washed his hands and trudged to the door. “It’s safe,” he said.
“I no longer enter places when I don’t know what is inside. I learned my lesson from the wolves.”
The old door creaked as Keir pushed it to walk in. There was a table and two chairs, a large bed, a swept hearth, cupboard and trunk, a willow broom in the corner, and dry kindling. Exactly how he’d left it. He went straight to the hearth and pulled flint and steel from his leather pouch. He snapped them together while holding a charred piece of fabric, which caught the spark. He added a small piece of milkweed fleece to it, blowing on it softly until the flames caught. Laying it in the cold hearth, he fed it twigs and then larger pieces of kindling until the fire grew strong enough to leave.
Grace stood inside the door. “Your country home?” she asked.
He gave a small, cold smile. “’Tis a place we can be alone.”
She moved forward, circling the room to stop before the fire. Splaying out her fingers, she warmed her hands. “It’s kept up. Who lives here?”
“No one. It belonged to Graham MacLeod at one time, but only I come here now.” He grabbed a chair to sit.
“You keep it up?” She waved her hand at the floor and the roof overhead.
“Aye.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“It’s the only place on the Isle of Skye where I do not need to be the Devil of Dunakin.”
Grace took a big breath and let it out. She sat in the other chair, facing him. “What is going on here? This whole farce where you must act cruel and vicious?”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “It has been done within our clan for generations. I was raised to be nothing but cruel and vicious and warlike like every other Devil of Dunakin. Aonghus Mackinnon was the chief, and I was his second son. Therefore, I was instructed on ways to make men quake, women cross themselves, and children hide. The Devil’s reputation can often be enough to prevent attack.”
“Why then are there heads around Dunakin?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Sometimes we still get attacked. We win, and Rab orders the show of strength as a warning to others. Like your good King Henry on London Bridge.”
She shook her head. “But your own people are afraid of you, like you are some murdering, raping monster. Even though you aren’t.”
“Ye’ve seen all the men I’ve killed etched on my skin. I am a killer, Grace. It is all I’ve been taught to be.”
“In battle, to protect yourself and your clan. That is different. The fact that you honor those killed by placing their cross on your skin shows your heart doesn’t ignore cruelty and human loss.” She leaned forward. “You saved that boy today, planning for Brodie to stop you, meeting Brodie with bread for the boy and his mother, instructing him to invite Niall to train with the young warriors. A cold-hearted monster wouldn’t do that. Why must you play the Devil?”
“It is who I am, what I’ve been trained to be.” How many times did he have to say that before it sank in to her? “I know nothing else.”
“Maybe you’ve been taught nothing else, but you surely know something else or that boy would be bleeding or dead.” She leaned forward. “You mention your father teaching you to fight and scare people, but what of your mother?”
Margaret Mackinnon. The thought of his kind mother brought both shame and a sweet comfort. She had smelled of freshly baked bread from spending time in the bakehouse, kneading and braiding her beautiful creations. Aonghus would ridicule her for working with the servants, but Keir’s mother had been kind and looked beyond simple status among people. And…she had been hiding. Her rough, loud husband didn’t enter the kitchens where the warmth and delicious aroma embraced her all day.
He realized he was staring at the swirls of wood grain on the table when Grace bent her head low to reach his gaze. “Keir, what did your mother teach you about?” she asked.
“Secrets,” he said, pushing away the dark memories that crept in whenever he thought of Margaret Mackinnon. “She taught me to keep secrets.”
Grace stared at him for a long moment. She shook her head. “About being kind? How to trick people into thinking you’re horrid when your heart is good. Those secrets?”
Anger and dishonor curdled in his stomach. He shoved back his chair, scraping the wood floor, and stood. He leaned his knuckles on the table to peer down at Grace. “My heart is not good. Ye need to know that.”
She narrowed her eyes back up at him, unafraid. “If you are trying to convince me of your cruelty, why didn’t you want me to see you beat that boy today?” Her fingers curled into the edge of the table. “Why, Keir?” She stood up, to lean forward. “You even whispered to me that the boy would be fine before you headed out. Why bother to give me comfort when you want me to believe you to be a vicious, murdering monster?”
“Dammit! I don’t know.” He pulled back, walking around to grab her upper arms, holding her there where he knew she couldn’t disappear, leaving him alone like he’d been his whole life. And yet she should stay away from him and his black soul.
Grace, her lovely angel face, tipped up so her eyes could pierce him. But the anger that had narrowed them, softened. A gentle smile touched her lips as one eyebrow arched delicately. “Well,” she said. “I don’t believe any of your devil act, Keir Mackinnon. It is all lies. You are honorable and kind. Traits that were born to you, innate parts of you like your wavy hair and deeply dark brown eyes. You were taught to be a devil, but you are not one in your soul.” Her words finished soft like a breath of a whisper, words that pulled at his heart, a heart that he had thought died years ago in Aonghus Mackinnon’s bloodstained room.
He should turn away from her, have Brodie take her home before Rab could order the Devil to harm her, but no one had ever looked past his mask before. No one had dared. Only Brodie knew the secret, his trusted friend from boyhood, who’d sworn to help him. Keir stood still, frozen on a precipice, unsure whether to walk away or…
Grace lifted her fingers to his face, running one along his hairline and down his temple, past his ear to his jaw. “You were born a man, not a devil. Remember, I have excellent instincts when it comes to people, and I’m a coward. If your heart was as dark as you say, I’d be running away.”
She lifted her hands to his shoulders, sliding them up until he could feel her fingers behind his neck. Standing on her toes, Grace brought her face to his and pressed her lips to his mouth. He didn’t move, didn’t breathe; the feel of her softness was like a chisel against the brittle shield he held around himself. As she backed up, she tugged softly at her bottom lip, her lashes opening as she focused in on his gaze.
And Keir’s discipline snapped.