A Faerie Fated Forever by Mary Anne Graham Read Free Book Online Page A

acceded to her pleas that she was tired. He insisted on escorting her to her room. She was so keyed up and worn out that she reached up and removed her bonnet before the door shut completely. She didn’t see the other man stick a foot in the opening to watch her unwind her bun before she ran her hands through her hair and shook it out. Then she sat at the bureau and started patiently combing the long rainbow.
    He spoke from the doorway long after she thought him gone. "How doesn't Nial see this?"
    Heather jumped to her feet and grabbed her bonnet, intending to jam it on her head. She didn't because she realized it was much too late. It was also much too useless since he'd now seen her freakish hair and seemed to be mesmerized by her cursed eyes.
    "Don't," he said as a command before he altered it. "Please don't. You're exquisite and unique and absolutely breathtaking. Comparing you to all the women downstairs is like comparing a Highland meadow in spring to a Sassannach garden."
    "And yet their laughter is far kinder than your sarcasm, sir."
    "I can't imagine how Nial doesn't see this. Has he been so blinded by rage that he can't see the truth beneath your disguise?"
    Heather twisted the bonnet between anxious fingers. Her heart beat so fast there didn't seem to be a space between thumps. This man was the laird's friend. Had she ruined everything by a moment of carelessness?
    She approached him, nibbling her lower lip anxiously. She laid a hand on his arm and when she spoke her tone was as plaintive as her words. "Calum, I beg you not to tell him. I know you're his friend, but I promise you I mean him no harm. I'd treat him well and I'd make him happy, I really would. This is my chance. I have this one opportunity to make my dreams come true. Please, don't take this away from me. Promise that you won't tell him."
    He took her hand and raised it to his lips. "My dear, I promise you that if my friend proves himself to be too much a swine to discern the pearl before him, I shall not show it to him. Instead, I will work to teach you the merits of discarding an old, outgrown dream in favor of a new, more fitting one."
    "What are you saying?"
    "I've always been particularly fond of pearls. If Nial doesn't see the truth I shall make you mine. He'd see then, when it was too late. Laird Maclee would understand then that he'd lost the only contest that mattered."
    "You're very kind to keep my secret but I fear that he might see my loss as the biggest victory of his life."
    "No," Calum whispered. "But you and I shall keep our silence and we shall see who comes in second this time."
    Heather watched him walk away, wishing she understood why she had a suicidal urge to find Nial and repeat the conversation to him. Perhaps her conscience simply pricked her at the deception she practiced and had just multiplied. Enlisting his friend to conspire against him seemed as wrong as the friend agreeing to do so. How much of her soul would she sacrifice to make her dream come true?
    She was a long way from having a chance to sacrifice her soul for the laird at this point. After all, she was so repellant that Nial happily wandered away with another woman. He must have found her pretty compelling because he hadn't even returned for dinner. Where had they gone?
    Armed with the memory of Nial entranced with the witches' beauty, she was just settling into one of the activities that occupied a lot of her time --staring with loathing at her reflection in the mirror -- when a knock at the door broke her self-absorption. It was Finella, the maid, who rushed in with tears streaming down her face to throw herself at Heather’s feet.
    “Ma'am, it’s me little cousin Fergus. He has come down with a dreadful headache and a fever and he is getting worse. Earlier ye said ye studied herbs and such. I’m so sorry to impose like this, but would ye come?”
    “Of course,” she said, already rising to get the black satchel of supplies she never traveled without.