‘You taste good. Now I have had a taste, I want to gorge on you.’
‘Stop it,’ she cried. There was no air in her lungs to scream, and would anyone hear her? Just as she thought she might faint with distress, a rough curse sounded.
‘What the hell is going on?’
Hew pushed her away and turned with a snarl.
‘Oh, it’s you, Ross. Be gone, and leave us be.’
Callum’s bulk seemed to fill the chamber as he barged in. Hew took a hasty step back, and Callum pierced Tara with a glare that held utter contempt and raw fury.
‘Whatever you are about here, the lady does not seem willing,’ he snarled.
‘She is willing enough, or she soon will be, if only you would make yourself scarce.’
‘I am not willing,’ squeaked Tara struggling to speak and wiping off the slimy feel of Hew’s lips with the back of her hand.
Hew rounded on her. ‘You came here with me alone, with your uncle’s blessing, so of course, you were willing. What did you think was going to happen, you little tease? You have been promised to me?’
Callum shoved Hew so hard he staggered backwards and ended up on his bottom. He sprang to his feet as Callum took Tara’s hand in a crushing grip.
‘You cannot take her,’ wailed Hew. ‘She is mine. It is all arranged.’
‘The lass is coming with me,’ growled Callum.
‘If you mean to have her, you need to get in line behind better men, you wretch. I am sure she will get around to you eventually.’
‘Wretch, is it?’ said Callum, unleashing a punch which sent Hew reeling to the floor, gushing blood from his nose. Callum stood over him, fist clenched. ‘Better men indeed. You will never be one of those.’
As Callum dragged Tara away, Hew’s moans echoed down the corridor behind them.
‘I think you have injured him most grievously,’ cried Tara.
‘Good.’
‘Are we going to find my uncle?’
‘No. He is the last person who would protect you.’
‘But I must go to my uncle. Stop. Please, Callum.’
He paused in his headlong rush, shoulders heaving. He would not look at her. ‘Do not speak, Tara, if you know what’s good for you. Now hurry. We are leaving.’
‘But we cannot.’
‘Oh aye, we can, and I told you not to speak, else I will lose the last shreds of my restraint.’ He glared at her like an enraged bull, his bulk suddenly intimidating, not protective.
‘But….’
‘Do not speak,’ he shouted into her face, and after that, Tara said no more.
If restraint was punching Hew Gordon in the face, then God knows what Callum was capable of if he really lost his temper, so Tara stayed silent and let him lead her from Machrie Castle.
Chapter Ten
It was a dark and treacherous ride back to Braecaple and the cottage. After bundling her up onto his horse and clutching her to him with one oak-hard arm, Callum had set off at a hard gallop, and he did not slow down until they were well away from the castle. Glancing back from a high hill, they looked down on Machrie Castle in the distance, light spilling from its windows into the night. She had admired it as a place of comfort and beauty, but now, Tara shuddered at the thought of what might have happened had Callum not interrupted Hew’s advances. Machrie had become heartless and dangerous.
‘Are you cold?’ Callum growled, and it was the first time he had spoken since setting off. Without waiting for an answer, he wrapped his plaid about Tara and kicked the horse onward at a slower pace.