The Hawk: A Highland Guard Novel (45 page)

Erik didn’t appear pleased by her plea on his behalf. “I don’t need you to defend me, Lady Elyne. The king has every cause for his anger.”

Robert ignored him, giving her a long look. “You have not suffered for your … er, loss? I’ll have him marry you right now, if need be.”

Ellie repressed a cringe of mixed horror and embarrassment. Being forced into marriage by an angry, well-meaning relative was even less appealing than Erik’s dutiful offer.

She shook her head. “My betrothed is aware of the situation. As I told Hawk before, I have no wish to marry him.” His noble sacrifice wasn’t necessary.

Robert seemed mollified by her response, and when he glanced at Hawk it seemed to be with marginally less anger. She could tell he was relieved to have the unpleasant conversation over. He smiled. “I’m afraid you’ve damaged my seafarer’s pride. He isn’t much used to women refusing him. But from what my Elizabeth says, you’ve always been a discerning lass.” He laughed at Erik’s furious expression. “See what I mean? He’s been unbearable for weeks.”

Perhaps sensing he’d pushed the warrior as far as he could, Robert sobered. “You’ve risked much to bring me this information. I hope no one discovers what you have done.”

She hoped so, too. “I’ll be fine, but I must get back quickly. The soldiers will be waiting for me, and I don’t want them asking too many questions.”

Robert gave her another kiss on the cheek. “I’ll have one of my men escort you to where you need to go.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Erik said flatly. “I’ll take her.”

Robert looked to her for approval. Her gaze flickered to Erik, seeing the hard, forbidding line of his mouth and jaw. She was tempted to refuse, but she knew that this—he—was part of the reason she’d come. Before she decided to go forward with her plans to marry Ralph, she needed to know that there wasn’t a chance for them.

Hesitantly, she nodded.

    Erik was holding himself by a very thin thread. She was damn lucky she’d agreed to come with him. He’d been one second away from wrapping his hands around that slim waist of hers—as he’d been itching to do since she’d stumbled into that tent—and tossing her over his shoulder like the Viking barbarian she’d first thought him. The infuriating lass seemed to unleash every primitive instinct in him, instincts honed from generations of Norsemen who took what they wanted.

But fortunately, her hesitant nod had prevented him from further damaging the king’s opinion of him—which had already suffered enough.

After her goodbyes to her brother-in-law, she turned on her heel, lifted that imperious chin of hers, and floated out of the tent as if she were the royal sister and he was a lackey who must content himself with carrying the hem of her robes.

He stormed out after her, struggling to keep a rein on the fierce emotions firing through him. The anger he’d felt on seeing her had only gotten worse as he listened to her explain her reasons for coming. He couldn’t breathe when he thought of the danger she’d put herself in.

The adamant reiteration of her refusal to marry him hadn’t improved his mood any, either. If she loved him, why didn’t she want to marry him?

Not that marriage was what he wanted, but damn it, it didn’t make sense.

He stewed in silence, not trusting himself to speak, as the fires and torches of the encampment faded behind them into the moonlight. He picked out a few of Boyd’s sentinels guarding the outer perimeter, but he doubted she knew they were there.

Finally, when they’d reached the narrow path that led to Loch Troon, she must have determined they’d gone far enough. She turned on him, her eyes flashing green spitfire. “Are you just going to glare at me all night or do you have something you wish to say?”

It might have been her tone. Or maybe it was the hands on the hips. Or maybe it was just smelling the sweet perfume of her skin after months of torturous deprivation. Whatever it was, Erik had reached his breaking point. He took her by one of those bent elbows and jerked her up against him. “Damn right I have something to say. What in the hell do you think you are doing involving yourself in this? Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Touching her was a mistake. With her pressed up against him like this, he could feel the softness of her body curve into his. She felt—smelled—incredible, and he realized how much he’d missed this. How much he’d missed her.

Awareness fired through him, heating his blood, his skin, and letting him know that despite recent experience to the contrary, he wasn’t a eunuch.

Any rational woman would quiver in fear at the maelstrom of anger coming toward her. Ellie, of course—never one to act as she should—wrenched her arm away, looked him square in the eye, and met his anger full on.

Her eyes narrowed. “Foolish me, I thought you might be grateful”—she poked his chest for emphasis—“that I just saved your thankless, over-muscled, too-handsome-for-your-own-good hide.”

“Grateful,” he spewed angrily, “for putting yourself in danger?” He took a step toward her, which she wisely avoided by taking a step back. Fortunately for him, a tree blocked her movement. With a hand on either side of her shoulders so she couldn’t escape, he leaned in threateningly. “I want to strangle you for coming here.”

Or kiss her until the pressure pounding through his chest stopped.

The air sparked between them. The magnetic pull of desire drew him in. The urge to kiss her was almost overwhelming. His jaw, his mouth, his entire body clenched with restraint.

Her eyes darted like those of a hare caught in a trap. “You need to relax,” she said uneasily. “You’re being ridiculous. Let me go.”

Relax? Him? He was always relaxed, damn her. He leaned closer, as if he could force her to realize the magnitude of the danger she’d put herself in and experience a hint of what he was feeling. “No.”

He knew he shouldn’t be getting such a thrill out of this, but damn, it felt good to have her right where he wanted her. At his mercy. Bending to his will.

He should have known better.

She lifted her knee sharply, causing enough damage for him to fall back in pain, but not enough to put their future progeny in jeopardy.

When he was able to unfold himself from the bent position and breathe again, he realized his unconscious slip. He drew back, stunned.
Their
progeny.

Something tightened in his chest as he stared at her in astonishment. It was so clear—so obvious—that he wondered how he could not have realized it before. A knee in the bollocks had forced him to acknowledge the truth that had been staring him in the face for a long time. He couldn’t picture anyone else but her as the mother of his children because he loved her.

He loved her
.

Christ, what a blind fool he’d been! The tangle and intensity of emotions, the fierce attraction, the overwhelming urge to protect—to possess. The reason he couldn’t forget her. The reason that despite his anger he’d been drinking in the mere sight of her since she stepped through the flap of the tent. He’d wanted to marry her not because he thought he was doing her a favor, but because he loved her.

How could he have let this happen?

Better to ask how could it
not
have happened. They were a perfect complement for each other. She brought out his serious side and he made her laugh. They shared the same love of adventure. Ellie had been the first woman to ever care about what he thought. To dig beneath the jesting and the flirting to get to know him. It had probably been there from the first eye roll or the first time she gave him that decidedly unimpressed nursemaid look of hers. Or maybe it all came down to something as simple as Domnall’s profound observation: she didn’t take his shite.

Mistaking the source of his surprise, she said, “Don’t try to intimidate me with all those muscles. It won’t work. Do you honestly believe I think you’d hurt me?” She gave him a long look in the moonlit darkness. “Not that you don’t look the part of a dangerous ruffian.”

Still reeling from his discovery, Erik dragged his fingers through his unkempt hair. Did he look so horrible? “There hasn’t been much opportunity to shave of late.”

“I’m not saying I don’t like it,” she hastened to correct. Despite the darkness, he swore he could see her cheeks pinken. “Just that it makes you look more dangerous.”

He frowned, puzzled by the comment. She almost made it sound as if that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” she said, biting her lip. “But you made me angry.”

“I know the feeling,” he said wryly. He raked his hair back with his fingers. “God, Ellie, when I saw you in that tent and thought of the danger you were in by being here, I got scared, I …” He shrugged. “I guess I lost my temper.”

She made a sharp harrumphing sound. “Yes, well, I would have rather not come out here like this myself. But there wasn’t anyone else. I did what I thought I had to do.”

Because she loved him. The knowledge that she’d put herself in danger for him humbled him.

She stared him in the eye, daring him to disagree.

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you’ve done,” he said. “God knows, you’ve saved many lives tonight and maybe even a crown, but I don’t want you anywhere near this.”

He could see her face fall in the semidarkness. “You have not forgiven me for what I did.”

“There is nothing to forgive. I was to blame for what happened.” She looked as if she didn’t believe him, and he explained. “I was angry at first that you didn’t tell me, but once my temper cooled, I realized you had every reason not to tell me. I’d given you no reason to trust me, nor had I asked for your trust. What happened in that cave … I wanted you so much, you could have told me you were the Queen of bloody England, and I wouldn’t have cared.”

She smiled wryly. “I hope it hasn’t caused too many problems with Robert. I couldn’t help but notice the tension between you two.”

“It’s nothing,” he dismissed.

“Of course it is.” She knew how much loyalty meant to him. “I should have told you. I did trust you, I just wanted to know …” Her voice ebbed off.

“Know what?”

She looked away, embarrassed. He didn’t think she was going to answer, but finally she said, “I wanted to know if you could care about me for myself. Not because of who I am or because you felt honor-bound to marry me.”

His chest squeezed, suddenly understanding. “That’s why you refused me.” Not because she didn’t love him, but because she wanted him to love her. That’s what she’d been offering him. That’s what he hadn’t seen. He’d offered for her out of honor and duty, but she’d wanted emotion and love.

“My mother loved my father with all her heart,” she said. “And trying for years and years to make him love her back ended up killing her. The fever took her life, but she’d been dead inside for many years before that.”

He swept an errant strand of hair from her cheek and tucked it behind her ear. “I’m sorry, lass.”

She stiffened, mistaking the source of his apology. “I’m not telling you this to make you feel sorry for me or because I want something from you. I just thought it might help you understand why I did what I did.”

“Ellie …” He could put an end to both their agony right now. It would be so easy to pull her into his arms and tell her how much he loved her. How he couldn’t imagine a future without her.

Selfishly, he wanted that. More than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. For a man who was used to getting what he wanted, who was used to happiness falling into his lap, it was a bitter draught to swallow.

But he couldn’t.

    There was something in his eyes as he looked at her that made Ellie do something she’d vowed not to do again. “Ask me to stay,” she whispered.

For a moment, he hesitated. Or at least she told herself he did. She wanted to believe her request caused him some kind of inner struggle, because outwardly his expression betrayed nothing.

But then he smiled, and the sympathy there, as if he could imagine her heartbreak but was blissfully immune to its agony, cured any thought of inner turmoil.

“I’m sorry, lass. I can’t do that.”

Ellie felt the white-hot lash of pain sear through her. Why did she do this to herself? Why did she open her heart up, lay herself bare, to have him cleave it with a smile? Was she a glutton for pain and humiliation? It was just that for a moment, he’d been looking at her so tenderly, she thought …

Fool
. He didn’t love her. He felt sorry for her. She could see that now. Women threw themselves at his feet all the time. To her great shame, it seemed she was no different.

Twice she’d offered him her heart and twice he’d refused. It was enough.

She stepped away from him, snapping the connection.

It was strange. After the initial stab of pain, she felt nothing. Only an eagerness to be gone from here as soon as possible. “I should go.”

“Ellie,” he said softly, reaching for her arm. “I’m sorry.”

She stiffened and pulled away from him. “You have nothing to apologize for. I was being foolish. Of course you don’t want me to stay.” She laughed, but it was a harsh sound. “You already have someone waiting for you.”

He frowned, as if he had no idea what she was talking about.

“The woman,” she said.
On your lap. Kissing you
. “In the tent?”

She thought he winced, but then he said, “Oh, yes. Of course.”

Her chest throbbed. “Well then, I guess this is goodbye.” She ventured one more look up at him, wondering how long it would take the details of his face to fade from her memory. The arch of his brow. The hard line of his jaw. The white lines etched at the corners of his eyes. The devilish turn of his mouth. The high cheekbones and noble nose. That irresistibly handsome face.

She dropped her gaze. “The soldiers will be waiting for me on the other side of the ridge.”

“You are sure you know what you are doing? What if they suspect something?”

“They won’t. I can be very convincing.”

His gaze hardened. “I don’t like it. I’ll take you back to Ayr myself.”

“No,” she said vehemently. “I must stick with the plan or they will become suspicious. Do you think they’d believe I found my way back myself? It has to be this way. I know what I am doing.” She held his gaze. “Besides, I am not your responsibility.”