Across a Dark Highland Shore (Hot Highlands Romance Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

feeling weak, she collected her breath and steadied herself. She looked unflinchingly into the eyes of the black-haired one. “I am well pleased to meet ye, my lord, even if ye are the devil himself.”
    He arched a dark eyebrow and looked surprised but quickly masked it. Isobel saw that he smiled slightly, but his eyes did not. She had the thought then that if he truly smiled, it would be both brutal and mesmerizing.
    “Ranulph, the grubby witch-child rides with ye.”
    The warrior named Ranulph handed his bow and arrow to the giant, red-bearded man on the horse beside him, dismounted, and strode over to Isobel, his boots kicking up swirls of snow. He helped her up and then onto his horse, and grumbling, swung up behind her, wrapping her in his long plaid against the cold so she was settled inside it, against his broad chest.
    “No’ my favorite way of keepin’ warm, nestled against a MacKinnon witch, but it’ll have to do,” Ranulph said. “I’ll no’ harm ye, little lass,” he added. “So dunna cast any wicked spells my way. If ye feel the need to change someone into an ugly, pimpled toad, change Dugald there. He’s shaggy as a Highland bull but beneath all that hair he looks like a toad anyhow.”
    The red-bearded man named Dugald who sat the horse next to Ranulph guffawed. “Ranulph, yer mouth talks and shit falls out.”
    Isobel shivered violently and Ranulph wrapped the plaid tighter. “Och, but why can’t she ride with Dugald?”
    Dugald handed the bow and arrow back to Ranulph and shook his head, a warning in his eyes for Ranulph to stop talking.
    The grim, black-haired warrior ignored both Ranulph and Dugald and spoke again to the muddled crowd. “Dunna follow us unless ye want Maclean arrows in yer backs or broad-axes in yer skulls. The news of yer unprovoked attack against the MacAlisters has spread far and wide. Though enemies to Maclean, what ye did to them was despicable. Ye slept among them as peaceful guests, rose up, and raped, killed, and butchered them. Ye showed no mercy. And now ye’ve taken to witch burning? Yer clan is a sarding disgrace.”
    He nodded to his men, and the half circle of towering, prancing war horses—their muscled, glossy flanks glistening in the cold—swung around. As they galloped back into the snowy mists, the dark swallowing them up as if they were ghosts, Isobel overheard one of the women exclaim, “Leith Maclean! So, the witch meets the devil himself!”
    After Leith Maclean and his men had ridden away, someone had thought to light the fire. But as there was now no witch to burn, only a handful stayed to watch the flames dance and rise toward darkened skies.
    Sunrise was late on winter mornings. With the MacKinnon clan long scattered back to the recesses of their keep and the villagers to their tiny crofts, the first pale light of dawn brushed the horizon. In the soft, harsh glow of the winter sun, the hissing, burning barrel finally crumbled to the ground in charred pieces, signaling the start of the New Year. But no one was there to snatch up the embers for good luck.
     
     
     
     

 
     
     
     
     
     
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    Isobel was not certain how long they rode on in the snowstorm. The horses were strong and sure-footed despite the hilly, sometimes treacherous terrain and piling drifts of snow, but time seemed to blur and slow.
    They stopped to rest only once, in a cave that provided shelter from the icy wind, and she was given ale, barley cakes, and stringy, roasted rabbit. The men did not talk to her. She was hungry, thankful they thought to feed her at all. The black-haired warrior stared at her, his eyes curious and more heated than the fire they now sat round, but he said nothing.
    When they gathered their things to get moving again, the men brushed their plaids with water so the wool would swell and provide better protection against the wind and cold air. The thin glaze of ice on the surface of the plaids insulated the wearers. Wrapped up like that, with