Unwanted (14 page)

His eyes.
 
They were that of a Demon.
 
Of the Devil himself.
 
As black and hellish as the starless, storm-swept night that had blown Finn to her door.
 

Rhona
shrank back with a gasp, unable to believe what she was seeing.
 

The moment as all Finn needed.
 
He turned his body and took a wild swing at Roderick’s middle with his axe.
 

Roderick dodged, but the axe blade sliced through thick, ebony leather.
 
It came away clean, though, claiming no blood.
 
Lips pulled back into a vicious snarl, revealing teeth sharpened to an unnatural point, the Highlander lunged at Finn.
 

But the Northman was ready.
 

Their weapons met.
 
Thrust free.
 
And collided again.
 
All of it happening with such impossible speed and agility that
Rhona
barely had time for her mind to process what her eyes had seen before the monolithic warriors produced another assault.
 
 

Their growls and cries could surely be heard throughout the hall, and
Rhona
was dimly aware of a commotion in the square behind her.
 
But she paid it no heed.
 
She was too frightened to even blink, afraid if she did she’d open her eyes to find someone dead at her feet.

Finn leapt back from a strong slash of Roderick’s sword.
 
It seemed to take all he had to keep up with the frightening, feral speed of the dark warrior.
 
He collected himself, drawing his weapons back and preparing another strong, devastating, overhead two-handed attack.
 

As she watched the death arc of Finn’s weapons,
Rhona
screamed as she was seized from behind by cold, iron-clad hands.
 

Chaos commandeered the moment.
 

Iain let out a screeching wail.

Frigid metal in the form of a dirk pressed against
Rhona’s
throat, immobilizing her.
 

A second black warrior emerged from the shadows of the keep, his sword intent on running Finn through.

Roderick took the flat of his blade in his off-hand and lifted it to shield his head from the dual attack.
 

Their weapons caught on each other, effectively locking them together with their combined strength.

Blades bound between them, each man surged forward in an attempt to drive the other back.
 
Neither gained any ground.
 
Muscles bulged and growls erupted from the effort of the stalemate.
 
Facing each other thus, they looked like conflicting, legendary Titans.
 
One the color of a golden day, using the power and strength of the Sun as his influence.
 
The other claiming the artifice and obfuscation of night to fuel his command.
 

The sight was breathtaking.
 

Finn drew his head back as though to ram it into Roderick’s, but everything about the dark Highlander changed in the space of an instant and what he said next saved Finn from being skewered by the Laird of the castle.

“Father?”

At first, Finn didn’t think that he’d heard the Gael Berserker correctly through the cacophony.
 

Had the man called him father?
 
Was he daft?

Suddenly he wasn’t glaring into the fathomless black eyes of the Berserker beast, but instead a clear, alarmingly familiar green gaze inspected him as though he were the rarest of oddities.
 

What did this mean?

Iain’s angry wails and a frightened whimper from
Rhona
snapped his attention to the doorway.
 

Beneath the arch, the armored guard had her hair in his clutches, a dirk pressing against her delicate, exposed throat.
 
She clutched the squalling baby to her and mouthed his name, her eyes wild with fear.
 

Finn lunged for the guard, knowing he could relieve the fucker of his head before he even processed the intention to move the dirk across
Rhona’s
precious skin.
 

A different pair of strong hands cut Finn’s action short and he found himself shoved back against the stone wall and imprisoned by a sword to his throat.
 

An older, fiercer copy of the man he’d just been fighting glowered at him from identical eyes.
 
If not for his black hair almost shorn to the scalp, lending him a leaner, more vicious cast, Finn would have a hard time telling the Highlanders apart.
 
 
A flare of shocked recognition shadowed the man’s harsh features before they locked down into a promise of certain, lethal wrath.
 

“He unhands the woman or he dies,” Finn promised, lunging forward to break the hold.
 
His life meant nothing, but his innocent
Rhona
couldn’t be harmed because of this.
 

He found himself divested of his weapons and his prison reinforced by the long-haired Berserker.
 
“Connor, this is impossible,” he remarked, never taking his eyes from Finn’s face.

“I know.” Connor’s voice was hard as the ice caps over the fjords in winter.
 
“Take those two to the dungeon,” he ordered over his shoulder to the guard.
 
“We’ll deal with them later.”

“Aye, Laird.”
 

Rhona’s
pained gasp ripped at Finn as she was roughly shoved forward.
 

Finn growled and struggled with all his might, but the strength of the two mated Gael Berserkers held him fast.
 

“Of course they’re not going to the dungeon,” a feminine voice decreed.
 
“Connor, really!”
 

All eyes focused to the grand stone staircase that flanked the entryway.
 
At the top stood a stunning, raven-haired beauty with a bearing as regal as any queen.
 
Beside her, a shorter, honey-colored woman with the largest doe eyes Finn had ever seen laid a hand to her obviously pregnant stomach.
 

“Roderick?” the latter’s pretty face drew into a disappointed frown but held none of the amethyst fire snapping from the taller woman’s eyes.
 
“You’re fighting in front of a baby?”

“Uh, he attacked me.”
 
The long-haired Berserker, obviously Roderick, had the sense to look ashamed, though he put more strength into his hold on Finn.

“Lindsay, get back to
yer
chambers and
doona
come out until I say it’s safe,” Connor ordered.

“My God,” Lindsay remarked, picking up her skirts and descending the stairs, ignoring the command of her mate.
 
“He looks just like—”

“Lindsay,” the Laird warned with a fierce growl.

“We’re collecting Evelyn’s appointment, Connor.”
 
Finn watched, dumbstruck, as Lindsay and Evelyn crossed in front of the men, who remained locked together at a physical impasse, as though strolling through a country garden.
 
“Then you gentlemen can return to your business.
 
Though if you’re going to insist on murdering each other, you’ll take it to the courtyard.
 
I’ll not have you getting blood inside the house.”
 
Approaching
Rhona
, she laid a hand on her arm, causing Finn to tense.
 
“You are the nurse,
Rhona
McEwan
, are you not?”

Having been released by the guard,
Rhona
nodded.
 
“Aye, my lady,” she answered in a trembling voice, barely audible over Iain’s wails.

“Let me help you.”
 
Evelyn plucked an angry Iain out of
Rhona’s
hands and bounced him against her considerable bosom.
 

The babe’s cries began to subside.

“
Goddammit
, Lindsay, she brought this enemy into our home,” the Laird boomed.
 

Evelyn cut in with a soft, reasonable tone.
 
“Anyone can see that man is family.”
 
She gestured with her chin to a depiction of an imposing, golden-haired man mounted to the right of the entry.
 
“I suggest you ask his purpose before you call him an enemy.”

Finn found that he suddenly couldn’t draw in a breath.
 
 
In front of him, in this foreign castle, innumerable leagues from his homeland, was an exact likeness of himself.
 
The similar white-gold hair wasn’t as long as
Finn’s,
and Gaelic war braids dangled from the temples.
 
The garb was a sporran and tartan in the MacLauchlan green and blue, adorned with a chieftain’s badge instead of his own leathers, seal skins, and furs.

But the face.
 
Finn couldn’t take his eyes from it.
 
It was
impossibly like his own
.
 
The same strong angles.
 
The same sharp lines.
 
 
Only the green eyes burned from the likeness, too bright with a cruel fire.
 
Beside him, in memoriam, hung the likeness of a beautiful, dark-haired woman.
 

Evelyn’s words had silenced everyone as they each studied the implausible resemblance.

Family?

Heart pounding in his ears, Finn stared at Roderick, then Connor, their faces close to his as they held him captive.
 
The same strong angles.
 
The same sharp lines.
 

The same green eyes filled with similar suspicions, doubts, and boundless questions.
 

“Holy Christ,” Roderick whispered.
 

Connor let out a breath, his jaw clenching and working on a decision.
 
“Where do ye
hie
from, Northman?”

“Kirk Eden-by-the-Sea,” Finn answered honestly, seeing no reason to do otherwise.
 
“The temple of Freya.”

“How old are ye?”

“Nine and fifty.”

The women gasped.
 

“Nay,” Lindsay argued.
 
“Nay, you must mean nine and twenty.”

Connor shook his head.
 
“The years make sense, as I am two and sixty and Roderick is only four and fifty.”

“Fifty and…Upon my word,” Evelyn breathed, one hand leaving the baby to clutch at her belly.
 
“I just assumed you were—well— younger.
 
I never really thought to ask.”

“Jamie, take the women to the hall,” Roderick ordered, his concern for his mate obviously warring with his need to keep her safe should Finn take it in his mind to attack.
 
“See that my wife rests and puts her feet up by the fire.”

Finn’s eyes sought
Rhona
.
 
She stood ashen-faced, with her arms at her sides, hands fisted in her kirtle.
 
Though her garb was certainly dowdy and threadbare, and her one unruly braid couldn’t compete with the splendid coifs of the noble ladies, neither of them could hold a candle to her beauty.
 

A longing to be back in her cramped, cold stable, held into her soft body, gripped him with such ferocity it felt like one of the brothers had punched him in the gut.
 
His soul felt as though it wanted to rip from his body and reach out to her.
 
To touch her face and soothe the uncertainty lurking in the shadows of her eyes.

Family?
 
What did that word mean to him?
 
Was it blood?
 
Was it duty?
 

Or love?