Highlander Undone (Highland Bound Book 5) (21 page)

“Come inside and get cleaned up. Looks like ye could use a few stitches above the eye. Why’d ye stand there like a fool and let him hit ye?” Logan asked.

“I felt he deserved that much. Would have let him hit me a few more times if he’d not brought up his mother.”
Poor Abi.

Rory started for the keep, intent on seeking Moira’s healing touch. As he topped the stairs, the main door flung open and she was throwing herself into his arms.

“Thank god ye’re all right!” She pressed her tear-stained face to his chest, and Rory held her tight in his embrace.

“I’m all right, I swear it.”

She pulled back, hands clasped to his upper arms. “Ye’re bleeding something fierce. Best let me clean ye up.”

Rory grinned. “How funny we are right back to the beginning.”

“The beginning?” Ewan asked.

Rory ran his finger along her jawline, his gaze locked on hers. “Aye. The first time she met me I was pretty torn up from the battle for which Ranulf wants me dead.”

“So when ye say ye ran, ye ran to the future?”

“I suppose so.”

“And when ye came back?”

“I didna know how long I’d been gone. Felt it best to start anew. Besides, I was trying to figure out a way to get back to Moira when her sister showed up. My duty was to her, to her sister, and I couldna risk going back to my clan.”

“Enough talk, let’s get ye cleaned up.” Moira grabbed his hand and started to lead him into the great hall, but Rory shook his head. “What?”

“Upstairs. I need some quiet to think.”

“All right.” She led him up the stairs to the chamber they’d been given to share, but had yet to do so. “Shona will be back soon with some salve for your wounds.”

She went over to the washbasin and soaked a cloth, bringing it back toward him. “Sit down,” she ordered, shoving him toward a chair.

Rory did as she bade, trying not to wince when the cold cloth touched the searing cuts on his face as she cleaned away the blood. He knew she must have questions, and he wanted to give her answers.

“Moira, when we were on the shore, I told ye I needed to tell ye something.”

“Shh…” she said. “There’s no need to talk about it just yet. Let’s get ye—”

Rory shook his head, pulled both of her hands tenderly from his face. “I need to tell ye now. I’ve put it off long enough. I should have told ye from the beginning.” He kissed her knuckles. “I have a son.”

She nodded, but didn’t say anything, allowing him to finish. He told her the same thing he’d told Logan, about his uncle’s wife, Abi. Their deaths. His guilt.

“I was young, and thought myself in love. It wasn’t until I met ye that I knew what real love was.”

“Rory…” Tears came to her eyes and before she could wipe them away, he cupped her face and leaned forward, kissing away her sorrow.

“I’m sorry, love. I should have told ye.”

“Ye dinna need to be sorry. I could never hold your past against ye, or the fact that ye loved another and had a child. This is your life. Ranulf and Abi are a part of that life. I love ye and I’m sorry it took me so long to tell ye. When I saw ye fighting, and I thought I might lose ye”—He made a disgruntled noise at that notion—“I couldn’t bear it. I wanted to run to ye, to fling open the doors and demand Ranulf stop. I nearly did it, too.”

Rory chuckled. “Ye’re a fierce, lass. One of the many reasons I love ye.” He tugged her forward, pressing his lips to hers, wincing at the pain of his cut.

She gently pulled back and dabbed at his bloody lip. “Don’t make me hurt ye more.”

“But a kiss,
that
hurts
so
good.”

She giggled. “Even with a bloody, cut up face ye think of flirting.”

“And kissing.”

She leaned forward and kissed him gently on the side of his mouth that was not wounded. “Good thing I’ve got the healing touch.”

“Och, love, ye’ll have me undone.”

Chapter Seventeen

“I think ye need to tell her.” Shona rubbed her husband’s shoulders while he took his boots off in their chamber.

After the MacLeod men had given their allegiance to Rory, Ewan had to work with the Grant men to make certain the walls were safe as well as the inside in case it was a hoax of some sort.

Ranulf had yet to reappear. The men sent after him had returned, saying they’d lost his trail fifteen miles north.

Ewan sighed. “I know.”

“Emma will be relieved to know that her beliefs all these years were true.”

“Aye.” He cleared his throat, tossing his boots a few feet away, thudding against the wardrobe. Taking her arms, he tugged her around to sit in his lap. “There is something I need to tell ye.”

Shona stroked the creases on his forehead. “Ye frown too much,” she teased.

“My name is Troy.”

Shona’s smile faded, her belly feeling as though it had flopped somewhere on the floor. “What?”

“I didna remember until we ended up in the present. Until then, I’ve always thought my name was Ewan. I didna know how to tell ye. But if I confess to Emma, she’ll know my name, and I think ye, my wife, should know all. Ewan is not my real name.”

Shona swallowed around the bone-dry lump in her throat. “Is there anything else ye haven’t told me?”

“Nay, love.”

That was a relief at least she tried to reason in her shock at finding out her husband had a completely different name. “Why do ye call yourself Ewan if ’tis not your true name?”

“When I came here the first time, I pulled myself from the loch, fell unconscious beneath a yew tree. The elder crofters that found me and brought me to Gealach called me Ewan because of it. The name stuck.”

“Which do ye prefer, husband?” she whispered. “I shall call ye whatever ye wish.”

“I am Ewan. I might have been Troy as a boy, but I barely remember that life. I’ve forged an existence here, and Ewan is who I am.”

Shona kissed his wrinkled brow, working to smooth the creases with her thumb. “Ye look like an Ewan to me.”

“What exactly does an Ewan look like?”

“Tall. Handsome. Fierce. Sexy as hell.”

“And a cock the size—”

Shona cut him off with a bite to his lower lip. “A cock the perfect size to pleasure his
wife
.”

Ewan chuckled. “Still thinking of Hildie, are ye?”

Shona let out an exasperated half-sigh, half-laugh. “Hildie has nothing on me.”

“Never were there truer words spoken.”

Shona was reminded of the ointments aging on her worktable. As soon as they’d returned to Gealach, she had begun her search for herbs and fungi to recreate an antibiotic for Hildie and her ladies. She hoped to have it done within a few months. But for the time being, she’d much rather make love to her husband.

“Take me to bed, Ewan.”

Unable to sleep, Rory snuck from Moira’s room where she’d let him sleep, holding her—and though he’d wanted to desperately, he’d not tried to make love to her, in hopes his restraint would help to further gain her trust.

The night sky was quickly fading with the rising sun. The bailey was empty save for a few guards standing watch. He nodded to them and then trudged toward the stairs that led to the top of the gate tower and the rest of the battlements. The crisp air felt good on his skin, warding off some of the sting of his wounds. He’d refused to drink much of the whisky he’d been offered, as well as the tincture Shona had tried to get him to drink to help him sleep.

He had to keep his wits about him. Everything was happening so fast and if Ranulf returned, his
son
, he had to be able to speak to him without liquor dulling his senses. Over the ramparts, the sun was slowly being revealed. The guards nodded to him and then returned to their duties, gazing out over the loch and marsh beyond.

Rory walked the length of the battlements, and then leaned against the stone. Damn but he had a headache. One eye was half swollen shut. His lip hurt like hell. Moving his jaw sent pain shooting down his neck. Ranulf might not have yet had the strength and skill of Rory, but he was halfway there, and he could land one hell of a punch.

“Couldn’t sleep?” Ewan wandered up beside him.

“Nay.”

“Me either.”

Rory grunted.

They stayed beside each other, quiet, each leaning against the crenellations and watching the world wake up.

“Shite.” Ewan slapped the stone.

Rory jerked his gaze toward the direction Ewan stared. “Ballocks! Where the hell did he find
them
?”

Riding across the marsh was his son and perhaps fifty men wearing MacDonald colors.

The horn sounded, and Ewan disappeared in a blur of plaid as he ran across the battlements issuing orders. They would soon be under attack. It appeared Ranulf’s hatred ran deeper than Rory anticipated. Only a man in desperate need of revenge would bring an army of the enemy to an ally’s door.

Rory had to put a stop to this. He couldn’t allow anyone else to be hurt because his son was holding a grudge. Rory ran for the nearest stairs, took them three at a time and hurried to the stable. He readied his horse in record time and galloped to the gate.

“Let me out. I’m going to settle this now.”

“I canna open the gate,” Taig shouted down.

“Open the bloody gate!”

“Nay, Laird MacLeod, I canna.”

Rory’s blood boiled. “Open the gate or I’ll come up there, chop off your ballocks and make ye swallow them.”

“I mean no offense, my laird, but if I open the gates, my own laird will do worse to me than making me eat my own ballocks.”

Rory let out a frustrated bellow.

“Rory MacLeod!” The roar came from beyond the wall. His son. Calling for him.

“Let me out,” Rory growled at Taig.

“Nay, man, I canna.”

Rory was ready to pummel the man—any man really—to the ground. He jumped from his horse and climbed the stairs to the gate tower, peering down at his son who smirked with righteousness.

“What’s this about, Ranulf?” Rory demanded.

“Getting back what ye stole from me.”

“I’ve stolen nothing.”

Ranulf glanced at MacDonald and whispered something that Rory could not hear.

Logan stepped onto the battlements, placing himself beside Rory—showing they were allies. “MacDonald. Ye’re not welcome here. We warned ye that if ye came back the only way ye’d be leaving was in pieces.”

MacDonald laughed. “I think not.”

“So assured ye are.” Logan grinned, it was malicious, hungry. The man looked ready to do battle and to tear MacDonald to pieces with his bare hands.

MacDonald made a tsking noise. “We’ve come for Rory MacLeod. Toss him down, or let him out the gates and I’ll be on my way.”

“I do not take commands from traitors.” Logan’s voice was steady, not revealing a single emotion.

“Then perhaps ye’d take the order from your young queen.”

Rory raised a brow. An order from the infant queen was laughable.

“Who have ye made an alliance with?” Logan’s brow furrowed. “Did they know they were signing a contract with the devil himself?”

“The regent and I go a long way back.”

“The regent has no use for Rory, and if he wants him, he can come tell me himself.”

MacDonald laughed, low in his throat. “’Tis not only Rory the regent wants. I’m his representative and if ye will not heed his demands, then I am to forcibly take ye to Edinburgh.”

“I was just in Edinburgh. He mentioned no such summons.”

“’Tis new.”

“Lies,” Logan said under his breath. “Prepare the archers,” he demanded.

“Ye’re a dead man,” MacDonald shouted.

“Grant, dinna do this,” Rory said. “Just let me go. I’ll not be responsible for more deaths.”

“MacDonald will try to fight no matter what. If ye went down there, he’d simply demand something else.”

“What is happening?” Emma’s voice reached them both, and standing beside her were Shona and Moira.

“What are ye doing up here, woman? Go back inside, else ye birth the bairn in the middle of a battle.” Logan’s exasperation showed on his face and his stance. He looked ready to nock her in a bow and shoot her back to her chamber.

“Another battle?” Emma asked, disappointment clear. “Why won’t that whoreson just leave us alone?”