The Thistle & The Rose

Chapter One

The mist arrived first.

It rolled low across the moor in pale ribbons, swallowing hedgerows, stone walls, and the road ahead until the world beyond Lady Claire Ashford’s carriage window became a shifting sea of gray.

The day had dawned bright when she left her father’s estate.

Now autumn had turned strange and hushed, as though the land itself waited.

Claire pressed her gloved fingertips to the fogged glass and wiped away a crescent.

Nothing.

No inn. No village. No glimpse of Alewick Castle, where her future waited in the shape of a husband she had never met.

Only mist.

“Is something amiss, my lady?” Beth asked softly from across the carriage.

The maid’s sewing had gone still in her lap. Even Beth, who could prattle cheerfully through rain, mud, and the most boring sermon in England, sounded uneasy.

Claire forced a smile. “Merely the weather. England has decided subtle drizzle is no longer dramatic enough.”

Beth tried to smile back, but her fingers tightened on the linen square she had been hemming.

Claire leaned closer to the window again.

The mounted escort was a murky silhouette. She could make out only blurred shapes moving beside the carriage and the occasional glint of steel. Even the clatter of hooves sounded muffled, as if the mist swallowed sound along with sight.

Too quiet.

Her unease sharpened.

“Beth,” she whispered.

“Yes, my lady?”

“Do you hear that?”

Beth tilted her head. “Hear what?”

Claire’s gaze remained fixed on the fog beyond the window. “Nothing at all.”

A shout split the silence.

Steel rang against steel.

The carriage jolted. Beth screamed as the wheels struck uneven ground, and Claire was thrown hard against the squab. Men shouted outside. Horses screamed. The clash of blades came sharp and sudden through the wet air.

Claire seized the leather strap beside the window. “What is happening?”

Before Beth could answer, the carriage door was flung open.

Cold rushed in, along with the scent of peat, wet wool, and distant heather.

And with it came a Highlander.

He filled the doorway like something the mist had made and then regretted setting loose.

Tall. Broad-shouldered. Wrapped in plaid darkened by damp. His hair was the color of copper struck by firelight, and it fell loose around a face, all hard lines and controlled force.

But it was his gaze that pinned her.

Pale green.

Steady. Fierce. Unreadable.

“Out,” he said.

The low burr of his voice slid through her like smoke.

Claire lifted her chin. “Sir, you will remove yourself at once. Do you know who I am?”

“Aye.” The corner of his mouth shifted, though not quite into a smile. “’Tis why I’m here.”

He reached in and grasped her wrist.

Heat flashed through her glove at the contact.

“I am Laird Lachlan Cameron,” he said. “And ye’re coming with me.”

Beth gave a shrill cry. Claire twisted, trying to wrench her hand free.

“You cannot simply take me. My father will—”

“Your father kens exactly who I am.” His tone lowered, turning rougher rather than gentler. “And he’ll ken why ye’re gone.”

Outside, the battle sounds faded as quickly as they had begun. Silence followed, broken only by the restless stamp of horses.

Claire stared at him, trying to find the words to form the questions in her mind. “Are my guards dead?”

“Nay. Disarmed.” His grip remained firm but not cruel. “I’ve no quarrel with them.”

“Then you have a quarrel with me?”

His gaze held hers for one charged heartbeat.

“Aye,” he said softly. “I suppose I do.”

Before she could strike him, curse him, or demand better answers, he lifted her clear out of the carriage as though she weighed no more than a fur cloak.

She twisted and kicked. “Put me down this instant.”

“Nay.”

“That is not a civil answer,” she demanded as she pounded his back.

“Grand. I’ve little use for civil today.”

The infuriating calm of his statement sent fresh heat through her.

He carried her through the mist holding tight as she struggled. Highland warriors surrounded them—silent, watchful, swift in their movements. One held the reins of a massive black stallion whose breath streamed white in the damp air.

The man mounted in one fluid movement and set Claire before him. His arm banded around her waist, steady and unyielding.

“This is madness,” she snapped, trying to calm the tremor of her voice and limbs. Dear God, what was to happen to her? To Beth?

“Aye.” His breath stirred the hair near her ear. “But necessary.”

He clicked his tongue, and the stallion lunged forward.

Fear gripped her as the road disappeared. As England disappeared.

None of her father’s men followed. In fact, none seemed to have tried to save her. She will have words with them when she returned.

And Claire, daughter of an English lord, was carried into the mist by a Highland laird whose eyes suggested storms and secrets in equal measure.

Somewhere beneath the fear clawing at her ribs, beneath the humiliation of being carried off like spoils from a battlefield, something bright and treacherous flickered to life.

# # #

He had expected tears and screams, perhaps, or frightened silence.

He had not expected the daughter of Lord Ashford to sit straight-backed before him in the saddle like a queen carried unwillingly to her own coronation.

The lady did not tremble. She simmered. He felt it beneath the weight of her woolen cloak, the set of her jaw, the fact she remained silent.

Lachlan kept his gaze on the land ahead as the road gave way to rougher ground. Behind them, his men would scatter the trail. By nightfall, no one would be certain whether he had taken the English lady north, east, or clear into the sea.

It had to be done quickly.

It had to be done cleanly.

And it had to be done before Ashford’s allies realized how desperate matters had become.

The English Rose shifted against his arm. “You are holding me too tightly.”

“If I loosen my grip, ye’ll leap.”

She grunted. “You say that as though it is unreasonable.”

His grip tightened. “’Tis from a moving horse.”

She huffed. “Then perhaps you ought to have stolen a carriage instead.”

Against all instinct, Lachlan nearly smiled.

The lass had spirit. More than spirit. She had wit sharpened like a blade and aimed directly at his ribs.

Dangerous woman. Even more so because she had no notion how much he had already risked getting her out before the noose about her life drew tight.

He looked down once, briefly, catching the profile of her cheek, the stubborn set of her mouth, the intelligence in her eyes even now.

Too lovely. Too proud. Too English.

And yet not at all what he had expected.

God help him.

He did not want to admire her.

Lachlan rubbed the back of his neck. He especially did not want to wonder how her cool voice would sound if it spoke his name without anger.

He tightened his hold a fraction more.

Because the truth was simple and deeply inconvenient.

Taking Lady Claire Ashford had been necessary.

Wanting to keep her safe was something else entirely.