In Bed with a Highlander Read Online Free PDF

safe, but he’s not here so you have to do it. You
have
to.”
    Alaric sighed. There was no reasoning with the boy, and right now he was so glad he was alive, he’d cede to his ridiculous demands. Later he’d bend the brat’s ear about not questioning authority.
    “I want to ride with you, too,” Crispen said, his gaze nervously going to the woman.
    He inched closer to her as if he couldn’t stand the idea of being separated from her.
    Alaric looked skyward. Ewan hadn’t taken a firm enough hand with the boy. That was all there was to it.
    And so Alaric found himself astride his horse with thewoman draped across the saddle in front of him, her body shielded in the crook of one arm, while Crispen sat on his other leg, his head nestled against her bosom.
    He glared at his men, daring even one of them to laugh. Hell, he had to relinquish his sword for the duty of carrying the two extra persons, never mind their weight didn’t equal that of a single warrior.
    Ewan just better be damn grateful. He could decide what was to be done with the woman just as soon as Alaric dumped her into Ewan’s lap.

C HAPTER 3

    As soon as they crossed over the border onto McCabe land, a shout went up that echoed through the hills, and in the distance, Mairin heard the cry taken up and relayed. Soon, the laird would know of his son’s return.
    She twisted the reins nervously in her fingers as Crispen all but bounced off the saddle in his excitement.
    “If you keep gathering those reins, lass, you and the horse are going to end up back where you came from.”
    She glanced guiltily up at Alaric McCabe, who rode to her right. His admonishment had come out as a tease, but God’s truth, the man scared her. He looked savage with his unkempt, long dark hair and the braids dangling on each side of his temples.
    When she’d awakened in his arms, she’d nearly tossed them both out of the saddle in her haste to escape. He’d been forced to pry both her and Crispen from their perch against him, and he’d put them both on the ground until the entire thing could be sorted out.
    He hadn’t been pleased by her stubbornness, but she had Crispen solidly on her side, and having extracted a promise from Crispen to tell no one her name, they’d both stood mute when Alaric demanded answers.
    Oh, he’d blustered and waved his arms. Even threatened to choke the both of them, and in the end he’dmuttered blasphemies against women
and
children before resuming their journey to bring Crispen home.
    Alaric had then insisted she ride with him at least another day, because he said, in no uncertain terms, the likelihood of her sitting a horse by herself in her condition was nil, and it was a sin to abuse a good horse with an inept mount.
    The journey that would normally last two days took them three, thanks to Alaric’s consideration of her condition and their stopping frequently to rest. She knew Alaric was considerate because he
told
her. Numerous times.
    After the first day, she was determined to ride without Alaric’s assistance, if for no other reason than to wipe the smugness from his expression. He obviously had no patience for women, and, she suspected, with the exception of his nephew, whom he obviously loved, he had even less patience with children.
    Still, given the fact that he knew nothing about her, only that Crispen championed her, he had treated her well, and his men had been politely respectful.
    Now that they neared Laird McCabe’s stronghold, fear fluttered in her throat. She would no longer be able to keep silent. The laird would demand answers, and she would be obligated to give them.
    She leaned down to whisper close to Crispen’s ear. “Do you remember your promise to me, Crispen?”
    “Aye,” he whispered back. “I’m not to tell anyone your name.”
    She nodded, feeling guilty for asking such a thing from the boy, but if she could pretend to be of no importance, just someone who happened upon Crispen and saw him safely back to