Chapter 3
Here in Heaven’s eye, and all Love’s sacred powers …
I knit this holy hand fast, and with this hand
The Heart that owes this hand, ever binding …
Both heart and hand in love, faith and loyalty.
—FRANCIS BEAUMONT and JOHN FLETCHER,
Wit at Several Weapons, v:i
Isabel knew she was taking too long to get ready. But she was nervous. Needing some time to collect her thoughts, she’d sent Bessie on another frivolous errand as she finished preparing for the ceremony that would bind her to the MacLeod—for a year.
A year to slip under his defenses and discover his secrets. A task made all the more challenging after meeting him.
The MacLeod was a hard man forged of muscled steel.
Clearly, he would not easily be duped. Nor did his authoritative and forbidding temperament bode well for leniency if she were caught.
He possessed a daunting ability to mask his reactions.
Although she’d sensed his attraction to her last night, he covered it up so quickly that she wondered whether she’d only imagined it.
Otherwise, his expression was inscrutable.
Never had she met a man who seemed less inclined to “blindly” do anything—especially fall in love. Getting under his armor was going to be a challenge indeed.
She bit her lip. Though she sensed no animosity, his conversation had been a disappointment of brusque, cool politeness. Clearly, her uncle had misled her. Rory MacLeod was not eager for this match.
At least her fears of brutish barbarity did not seem warranted. She sensed an inherent civility in him. Although not as polished as a Lowlander, he would stand out at court not for his rough manners, but for his impressive size and the raw dignity of his bearing.
Although the MacLeod demonstrated many qualities that she admired, they were nonetheless obstacles to her goal. Earning his trust was going to be that much more difficult.
Gazing in the looking glass, she carefully pinned her hair at the crown and adjusted the diamond-encrusted wreath atop her head. She could not shake the unease, the feeling that she was doing something wrong. But what choice did she have? Without her help, her clan was doomed.
But Isabel knew it wasn’t just the fate of her clan that had brought her here.
For as long as she could remember, she’d shadowed her older brothers, traipsing after them as they hunted, gamed, and practiced their sword skills. Jumping at the opportunity to participate whenever they tolerated her, hiding and spying on them whenever they excluded her.
More often than not, they had ignored her.
Desperate to be included, she’d tried anything to get them to notice her.
But no matter how accomplished she became, neither her challenges nor her feats of bravery brought her any closer to her brothers or father.
Instead, she was treated as an afterthought.
An outsider. Irrelevant and unimportant.
Her chest tightened as the familiar emptiness settled in her stomach.
That unhappy realization had come years ago, but it still pained her.
Her childhood tears had long since dried.
She rarely allowed herself to wallow in such self-pity.
But somehow she realized that these painful memories weren’t really memories at all, they were the fractured remains of her childhood dreams. She still craved their love and respect.
That craving had brought her to Dunvegan.
For the first time in her life, they needed her.
Without this handfast, her uncle refused to support her father in his feud with the Mackenzies over Castle Strome, her childhood home.
Her clan needed the strength of her uncle to survive.
And Sleat needed a beautiful woman. A beautiful woman to entice the MacLeod into sharing the clan secrets.
Secrets that would enable her uncle to destroy the MacLeods for good and further his quest to reclaim the ancient fiefdom of the Lordship of the Isles.
Sleat had charged her with two tasks: to find a secret entrance into the impregnable castle and to steal their precious magical talisman—the Fairy Flag. If the legends were to be believed, it was the mystical source of their strength and had twice previously saved the MacLeods from destruction.
Even now her stomach churned uncomfortably when she thought of what had been left unsaid, but what had definitely been implied.
She must use all her charms to get what they wanted, even seduction.
How could she, who had never allowed any man close enough to steal a simple kiss, seduce a fierce and ruthless Highland chief?
Now, after having met the man, Isabel was even more certain that it would never work. Rory MacLeod was as rock hard as a stone parapet, seemingly impervious to a weakness like emotion.
Bessie bustled into the room. “They’re waiting, poppet.
” She stopped abruptly, putting her hand to her heart with a dramatic exclamation.
“Ah, Isabel, you are a vision. More beautiful than I’ve ever seen you.
” She dabbed at her eyes with a square of linen.
“Oh, how your mother would have loved to see you on your wedding day.”
A wave of emotion swept over Isabel. Hot tears gathered at the back of her throat. Bessie’s joy only made Isabel feel worse for deceiving her—and the mention of her mother nearly undid her completely. She took a deep breath.
“Then we best not keep them waiting any longer.” Alighting into the corridor, Isabel took her first step down a path that could only lead to betrayal.
Rory faced the day with a much clearer head, once again in control of his errant—and lustful—thoughts.
Visions of his bride had haunted his dreams—erotic fantasies of a wedding night that was not to be.
Vivid images of candlelight and silk. He pictured her standing before him, looking up at him with those seductive eyes full of invitation.
He’d taken his time in undressing her, running his hands over the soft velvet of her skin, slipping the wispy night rail down her shoulders, revealing her tantalizing nakedness one lush inch at a time.
The dream had been so vivid, so real, he’d awakened hard and throbbing, needing release.
He attributed his unusual reaction to the MacDonald lass to the disquiet brought on by Sleat’s presence in his keep and the girl’s undeniably rare beauty.
Today, Rory was prepared to be awed by her beauty.
He would admire her as one would admire a beautiful piece of art—an object to put on display.
But that was all. Admiration need not breed intimacy.
It was enough that she was a MacDonald and not a suitable alliance for his clan. He need know nothing else.
As was custom, the handfast ceremony would take place outside.
Given the circumstances, Rory had decided on a small, private ceremony to be followed by a larger celebratory feast. Notwithstanding the enmity between the clans and the unwanted alliance, the clan would be disappointed with anything else.
Feasting was an integral part of Highland life, and Highlanders welcomed any excuse to celebrate.
Thus, as the morning sun gathered intensity on the eastern horizon, Rory, Alex, Sleat, Glengarry, and Isabel’s brothers gathered around the barmkin awaiting his bride.
His very late bride, the ten o’clock hour having come and gone some time ago. Perhaps she was having second thoughts? Oddly, the notion didn’t relieve him as much as it should have.
Glengarry had glanced up at her chamber enough times for Rory to know that he was growing impatient and annoyed. Finally, Glengarry smiled with relief. “Ah, here she is now.”
Rory turned, and all of his newfound clarity vanished.
He felt that same forceful blow to the chest, the same physical intensity of attraction. He was as overwhelmed as when he’d first beheld her last night, perhaps more so. In the clear light of day, Isabel MacDonald was breathtaking.
Her thick copper gold tresses blazed a fiery red in the bright sunlight.
The long wavy strands were swept from the sides of her face and held in place with a silver-wired wreath heavily decorated with diamonds and tiny pearls.
Her features were at once both delicate and vivid.
The snowy whiteness of her skin contrasted with the dark brows and lashes that framed her lovely violet eyes and the bloodred pout of her sensual lips.
His gaze traveled down her face and halted at her breasts. He sucked in his breath and tried not to stare, feeling the hot blood flow to his loins as his cock thickened in appreciation.
Once again her dress bordered on indecent, something more suitable for one of King James’s masques than a wedding.
Most Scotswomen would choose to wear a brightly colored gown or arisaidh to their handfasting.
But not Isabel. She had chosen an unadorned ivory damask gown that in its simplicity was anything but simple.
The shimmering fabric draped provocatively across her shapely figure, tantalizing the senses with the glory of her lush body as the gown clung to her narrow hips and gently rounded bottom.
The bodice was daringly low, cut in a deep square down the front of her chest. Her firm round breasts were barely covered, threatening to spill out at the slightest provocation.
Rory thought, or just imagined, he could discern pale pink tips below the lacy edge of her bodice.
Even as his body hardened with desire from all that bare skin, he had to acknowledge that there was something innocent and virginal about her dress.
The unconventional bridal color suited her perfectly.
The realization hit him: Without a doubt, the next year was going to be the longest of his seven and twenty years.
Suddenly aware that her family was watching his reaction with unconcealed interest, he plastered a blank expression on his face. “Mistress MacDonald, I hope you have found your room to your liking.”