Chapter 28
F iona woke by degrees: first to warmth, then to weight, then to the soft, steady rumble of someone breathing against her spine.
For the space of a single disoriented heartbeat, she didn’t know where she was.
Then everything slammed back into her.
Skye.
Flora MacDonald.
The gold hidden in the saddle.
Her own jealousy sparking like flint.
Harris kissing her like a man who’d been dying for years.
Kissing her like she was the first breath he’d taken since Culloden.
Kissing her until she forgot fear, forgot fury, forgot her own damn name.
—And the way she had pulled him into the bed without a second thought.
Fiona shifted.
An arm tightened immediately around her waist.
Her heart skipped a beat.
Harris Mackenzie was wrapped around her like the Highlands themselves—broad, immovable, radiating heat.
His leg tangled with hers, his chest molded to her back, his breath warm against the side of her neck.
His hand, dear God, was splayed over her stomach like he had meant to anchor her even in sleep.
And worst of all—
He was still asleep.
Fiona swallowed hard. “Saints preserve me,” she whispered.
A low voice rumbled at her ear:
“Already tried,” Harris murmured, rough with sleep. “They were useless.”
She elbowed him, mortified. “You’re awake.”
“Aye.” He didn’t move. Didn’t loosen. “Have been for a wee while.”
“And you didn’t think to let go?”
His arm tightened by a breath. “Didn’t want to wake ye.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“No,” he agreed, voice soft but unguarded. “It’s not.”
Heat flared up her neck. Saints, she was in trouble.
“If Flora walks in—”
“We’ll never hear the end of it,” he finished, maddeningly calm. “So best we rise before she does.”
Fiona tried to sit, but then she realized how small the bed truly was.
Their noses nearly brushed when she turned.
Harris huffed a quiet laugh. “We barely fit.”
“Barely?” she scoffed, shoving at his chest. “I’ve been smothered by your—your everything.”
He arched a brow. “High praise, lass.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she snapped, though her pulse betrayed her.
He rolled onto his back, giving her space. But before she could escape, his fingers curled gently around her ankle.
“Fiona.”
She went still.
His voice had changed. Lower. Dangerous in its sincerity.
“Did I… push ye into somethin’ ye didnae want?”
Her breath wrenched tight.
Not regret.
Not shame.
Just a man terrified he’d taken too much.
She turned, letting the early light brush her cheek. “No,” she said, quiet but sure. “You didn’t push me. And I don’t regret a moment of it.”
Silence followed, thick and charged.
Harris exhaled a breath he had clearly been holding for years. His shoulders eased, jaw unclenching for the first time since she’d met him.
“Good,” he murmured. “Because I’ve wanted ye for longer than I’d ever admit out loud.”
Her pulse stuttered violently. “Mackenzie—”
He sat up, but she caught the tremor in his hands. He wasn’t unaffected. He wasn’t even remotely composed. He was a man standing at the edge of something dangerous.
“We should get ready,” he said, voice shifting back toward duty—but not all the way. “Flora expects us before first light.”
Us.
Her heart made a reckless, traitorous leap.
“You’re… taking me with you?”
A pause.
Not long.
But long enough to carve something open in her chest.
Then—
“Aye,” he said. “I am.”
“Why?”
His answer was blunt, soft, devastating.
“Because every time I try tae send ye away… ye end up right where I bloody need ye.”
Fiona’s breath shivered.
“So you finally decided I’m not a burden?”
He looked at her then. And what she saw there surprised her. It wasn’t annoyance, but rather gratefulness.
“Fiona Cameron,” he said, voice low enough to tremble, “ye’re one of the only souls in Scotland I trust at my back.”
The words settled deep inside her, heavy as fate.
“Then let’s go meet your Prince,” she whispered.
“Aye.” He stood, gathering himself like armor slipping back into place. “The place he chose for the meetin’ is… strange.”
“Strange how?”
He glanced toward the door.
“You’ll see.”
Mist clung to the heather in thin, shining ribbons as Fiona and Harris followed Flora toward the glen.
Dawn had barely broken—only a pale wash of light skimming the sky.
Everything else felt suspended: the wind held its breath, the birds stayed silent, even the pools ahead whispered more than they spoke.
Fiona glanced sidelong at Harris.
Last night’s heat still clung to her skin: his hands, his mouth, the way he’d said her name like it cost him.
Now, he walked like nothing inside him had shattered open.
Typical.
They rounded a bend and the faerie pools came into view, falls tumbling into basins clear as glass, mist spiraling like smoke from some ancient altar. Stones ringed the largest pool in deliberate circles, shaped by intention, not accident.
And at the far edge stood a man.
Not crowned.
Not flanked by guards.
Not regal.
A young man with a travel-worn cloak and sorrow carved deep beneath his eyes.
Too young to bear so much ruin.
Too tired to pretend.
Fiona’s chest tightened.
This was the man her brother had followed to his death.
Harris bowed his head: soldier to commander, grief to grief.
“Ye sent for me,” he said. “We came as soon as we could.”
The Prince’s gaze slid to Fiona. Sharp, assessing. “And who is this?”
Harris’s jaw ticked. “Mistress Fiona Cameron. Trusted.”
Fiona stepped forward into a deep curtsy and lowered her gaze in reverence. “Your Highness.”
The Prince’s eyes softened with recognition as he beckoned her to rise. “Cameron. I knew many of your kin.”
“Aye,” she said quietly. “And many died for you.”
A ripple of silence passed across the water.
“I carry every one of them,” he murmured.
Flora gestured toward a smooth stone near the pool. “Best hurry. The morning willna stay empty long.”
Harris knelt beside Dubh’s saddle and flipped it open, not to reveal the gold, but to show the Prince the state of it. The way one would show a commander a weapon after battle.
Fiona already knew what lay inside.
She had touched the metal.
Had cursed him for carrying it like a fool.
Had held the weight of history in her hands.
But seeing Harris present it to the Prince—steady, solemn—hit her differently.
The Prince crouched, fingertips brushing the lining. “Still intact?”
“Aye,” Harris confirmed. “Held better than men did.”
Fiona’s throat tightened at that.
Flora folded her arms. “The English came close more than once. One patrol nearly took his head.”
“Aye,” Fiona muttered. “He nearly lost it again in that damned loch.”
The Prince blinked. “Loch?”
Harris glared. “We’re no’ tellin’ that story.”
“Oh, I am,” Fiona said. “Walked straight into Arkaig like he meant to baptize himself. Would’ve drowned if I hadn’t—”
“You dragged him out?” Flora hissed, half-impressed.
“How else?” Fiona shrugged. “He’s half stubborn mule and half martyr.”
The Prince stared between them, something resembling astonishment dawning.
“So this is the partnership,” he said softly.
“Wasn’t my idea,” Harris muttered.
“Wasn’t askin’,” Fiona shot back.
Flora smirked behind her hand.
The Prince straightened slowly, eyes turning toward the ridge as if measuring the weight of the future, as Fiona told them all the tale of how their unlikely partnership began—pub and foul redcoats included.
“Interesting… A man alone,” he said, “draws suspicion. Soldiers track him. Spies whisper his name. He does not last long in these isles.”
His gaze moved to Fiona.
“But a man traveling with his wife…”
Harris froze.
Fiona’s pulse jolted.
“…passes unnoticed,” the Prince finished. “A couple is forgettable. Ordinary. Safe. And everyone knows that the infamous Mackenzie of Glenoran is… unattached…”
“You want us tae keep up the ruse,” Fiona breathed.
“For Scotland’s sake,” the Prince said quietly. “Hide the gold. Hide yourselves. Let the clans remember only that a young pair settled somewhere quiet near Glen Sligachan.”
Harris swallowed. “You’re askin’ us tae run.”
“No,” the Prince said. “I’m asking you to live.”
Something inside Fiona twisted.
Something she didn’t dare name.
The Prince looked directly at her. “You walked half the Highlands to reach him. Faced soldiers. Saved his life. If Harris Mackenzie is to survive what comes next…”
Harris’s gaze snapped to the Prince, exposed.
“…he will need you.”
The world narrowed to breath and heartbeat.
Fiona felt Harris’s hand graze her back—light, cautious, but undeniably there.
A choice.
A beginning neither of them had been ready for.
“Aye,” Harris said hoarsely. “We’ll go together.”
Fiona believed him.
The storm rolled in after sunset.
Not a loud storm; no thunder, no roaring wind.
Just a steady curtain of rain whispering against the moss and stone, soft enough that Fiona almost mistook it for breathing.
Flora had offered them the cottage loft.
Together.
“Newlyweds share a bed,” she’d said dryly, handing Harris the ladder. “Try not tae make it obvious you’re lyin’ about that part.”
Fiona had nearly choked.
Harris climbed first, jaw tight, ears pink, every inch of him radiating the kind of tension she could feel from below.
Fiona followed.
The loft was small, low-ceilinged, lit by one lantern hung from a beam. The bed was wider than the one they’d used earlier… but not by much. She could see where Flora kept blankets folded, an old shawl, a book of psalms.
Everything looked lived-in.
Loved.
Safe.
Fiona wasn’t sure she’d ever shared a room that felt safe.
Harris stood near the single narrow window, rainlight tracing the shape of his shoulders. His hair was darker wet, curling a little at the edges of his neck. He looked… younger.
Or perhaps just tired.
He didn’t turn when she approached.
“You’re quiet,” she said softly.
Still no movement. Only his voice—low, raw. “The Prince shouldnae have said that.”
“What? That we make a convincing couple?” she teased lightly, though her voice wavered.
Now he turned.