Seduced by a Highlander Read Online Free PDF

mind off Archie Fergusson’s daughter.
    He’d intended to put her out of his mind forever, but for the past six hours since he had left her, she had remained constantly present in his thoughts. Why? Why her? He had never had any trouble in the past forgetting a lass the moment he left her. Even the ones he’d bedded never plagued him the way Miss Fergusson did. Her delicate smiles, the calluses on her hands, all her damned talk about gallantry and her difficult home life that made him want to charge into it and rescue her from it all.
    What the hell had he been thinking?
    He was no knight plucked from the books his mother and uncle used to read to him. He’d given up ever trying to be one, and even if he hadn’t, how could he save Iseult from the hatred of his own kin? For while he did not blame her father for what had happened, the rest of the MacGregors did.
    “And that is the Union of England and Scotland,” Oxford droned on, pointing upward and to the left.
    Tristan downed his wine and motioned for a server to bring more. It was going to be a long night with this dullard sitting between him and his sister. Briefly, he thought of escaping to Lady Eleanor Hartley’s table. He could delight for a bit in her lovely breasts, but she was about as sharp as the edge of a bedsheet. Before he could stop it, his gaze swept the crowded Hall seeking another face. One without powder and without guile.
    “That is most interesting, m’lord.”
    Fortunately, his sister’s voice dragged his thoughts away from his kin’s worst enemy.
    “I am astounded by yer vast knowledge of Whitehall’s history,” she practically sang. “I would love to hear more.”
    Tristan looked heavenward and shifted restlessly in his seat, readying himself for another hour-long discourse on the history of Whitehall. Just when he thought he might have to leave before he insulted Oxford and every other Englishman present, the tedious nobleman rose from his chair.
    “And hear more you shall, dear lady,” Oxford crooned. “But first, I must have a word with Lord Huntington, whom I see has just arrived for supper.”
    He excused himself. Tristan barely looked up. “Tell methe truth, Mairi,” he said, turning to his sister. “Ye dinna’ find his lecture on the history of this place as uninspiring as the scar running from his eye to his jaw?”
    “I find his scar rather intriguing.” Mairi crooked her mouth into an elusive smile as she brought her cup to her lips. “And if ye had any sense in that pretty head of yers, ye would know that one can learn much from a man with a flapping tongue.”
    “Sister,” Tristan sighed, knowing full well what she meant, “yer bloodlust to find Covenanters is beginnin’ to worry me. No’ to mention the gray hairs ye’ve added to our faither’s head over the past year. He’s still no’ convinced ye had nothin’ to do with the rebel militia that killed those four known Cameronians beyond the shores of Skye last spring.”
    “Ye know I cannot abide traitors to Scotland,” she told him as softly as a purring kitten. “But I would never wield a sword against a man.”
    Tristan cast her a look as sly as her own, knowing that somewhere hidden within the folds of her kirtle were at least five daggers she could wield almost as well as the one in her mouth.
    He was about to tell her to be cautious in her endeavors to save Scotland from its political and religious enemies when he saw Miss Fergusson standing at the entrance with a man on either side of her, waiting to be announced. She looked nervous and out of place among the statelier, more proper ladies of the court. Hell, he was a fool to think her not as beautiful as the rest. She was as fine as any. Finer, in fact, than most, with her long ginger curls falling loose about her shoulders, her eyes taking in the finery before her. She wore no adornment around her fingers or throat. She didn’t need any. Theflawless alabaster of her cleavage above the emerald