“Och, ye were desperate.” He made a sweeping gesture, as if wiping her theft from the record. “I cannae blame ye anymore, although if you’d trusted me with your story, it would have saved us some time.”
“You don’t owe me your help.”
“Aye, I do. Out of common humanity, if nothing else.”
As she looked at him, brave and determined and most of all, on her side, she wished she’d confided in him earlier. Because Diarmid was a good man, she said what she must. “You’ve taken on a mountain of trouble with this fight. Allan is stubborn and spiteful. Even if I go on without you, he’ll seek to pay you back for helping me to escape.”
“I can handle Allan.” That formidable jaw hardened. Diarmid’s strength was quiet, but she couldn’t doubt its power. “And what’s this about going on alone? Your first plan was insane, surely ye see that. A beautiful woman with nae money and nae friends faces only one fate.”
She twined her hands together on the table. “For my child, I’d sell myself.”
Although the thought of strangers using her body made her skin crawl. It had been bad enough doing…that within the lawful bonds of marriage.
“And who will look after Christina when ye do?”
Diarmid’s harsh assessment of her scheme made her flinch. “I’m not a fool, although I know I must seem like it to you. What choice do I have? I have to get Christina away from the Grants. While they have her, they have power over me and they know it. Once I’ve got her, I can decide what to do and where to go.”
In the firelight, his face was austere. “I have a better idea.”
Her heart sank. She already felt guilty about how she’d disrupted his life. “You’re going to be heroic, aren’t you?”
Bleak humor lengthened his lips. “I dinna ken about that, but I’m certainly going to help ye. We’ll go to Achnasheen tomorrow and talk to Fergus. He’s a clever laddie. He’ll have some ideas about what we can do. Ye can rest there for a couple of days to regain your strength, knowing we’re safe from the Grants. Then we’ll go and get Christina, openly or by stealth.”
“That sounds too good to be true.” Hope, frail, painful, but invincible began to unfurl in her heart. “It is too good to be true. Allan will never let me go. He’ll never leave me in peace. Especially if I turn to a Mactavish for help.”
“But your circumstances have changed.” A purposeful light glittered in Diarmid’s black eyes. She almost believed that if anyone could defeat the Grants, it was this stalwart man. “Ye have powerful friends now. Allan might bully an adolescent girl. He’ll have less success against the combined might of the Lairds of Invertavey and Achnasheen.”
“It’s too much,” she said faintly, wanting to cry, wanting to tell him that she could succeed without putting him at risk, yet knowing that she couldn’t. “I have nothing to give you in return.”
Diarmid made a dismissive gesture. “No gentleman could abandon ye to your distress.”
“You’ll never see the end of this.”
When Diarmid shrugged as if it hardly mattered, she wanted to tell him that he underestimated the Grants. But shameful self-interest kept her quiet.
“We’ll come through. Dinna be afraid anymore, Fiona.”
She bit back a sharp retort. Of course she was afraid. Now not just for herself and her daughter, but for gallant Diarmid Mactavish, too.
“Thank you.” The words were inadequate recompense for what he’d done and even more, what he was about to do.
She was right to fear for the health of her soul. If she was a good woman the way Diarmid was a good man, she’d refuse to drag him any further into her difficulties.
Chapter 13
At the first soft touch of Fiona’s hand on his shoulder, Diarmid woke immediately from where he slept wrapped in his coat and with his head resting against the rough sod wall. The room was dim and shadowy, lit only by the banked peat fire. In the gloom, she was a dark shape kneeling at his side. He couldn’t see her expression, but he read the tension in her body. Behind her, the bed showed traces of her restless sleep. The blanket sagged toward the floor.
“Fiona?” he asked groggily. “What is it, lassie? Is everything all right?”
An unwelcome thought struck him, and he reached out to catch her hand where it hovered above his shoulder. “Is it the Grants? Have they found us?”
Curse his blasted complacency. How could he have gone to sleep instead of sitting up to watch? But he’d been sure Allan and Thomas would never find this isolated bothy. And after all those long hours of riding, he’d been stupid with exhaustion. Not even the hard dirt floor and his raging desire could keep him awake.
He strained to hear some hint from outside that they’d been discovered, but there was only the crackle of the fire and the faint susurration of Fiona’s breath. Even the rain seemed to have stopped.
He struggled to sit up. Hell’s bells, he ached. It was a long time since he’d spent so long in the saddle.
“No,” she said on a whisper of sound. “No, it’s not the Grants.”