Desiring the Highlander by Michele Sinclair Read Free Book Online Page B

about the scar on your chin. I was wondering how a man could get that close to the end of a sword and live?”
    Ellenor had never seen a face deaden quite as quickly or as thoroughly. Her comment had inadvertently triggered a horrific memory. She knew. She recognized the icy hollowness evading every part of him. It happened to her each time someone said or did anything that yanked her back to the night her life changed. Her body went numb, her emotions dissolved until there was nothing left.
    If she didn’t do something quick, the Scot would shut down and resurrect impenetrable walls made of nightmares. Then, she would have no chance of convincing him to cut her bonds. She needed to snap him back to the present, now.
    “So, McTiernay, you’ve made it quite clear you did not wish me to come with you. You had the chance to leave me behind and yet you didn’t. You could even now drop me off and be on your way. I assure you I won’t return to my sister’s home. The baron would never know.”
    “If I were going to ‘leave you behind’ as you put it, I would have done so.”
    Ellenor chewed on his answer and realized his reason for getting her was not complicated, but simple. He had been sent to get her, and that was what he had done. Why she had been pretending to be mad or why Ainsley had desired her immediate departure mattered nothing to the overgrown beast. She would be sitting exactly where she was even if she had been mentally unbalanced.
    “What about…” Ellenor choked out, grabbing Cole’s leine as his horse suddenly slowed its gait. “Hey, Scot! Make up your mind! Either keep me alive or take me back, but don’t kill me on this monster of yours!”
    She let go of his shirt and Cole flicked his tongue out across his lips, smothering an instinctive smile. Any other woman would have undoubtedly required saving. Then again, they wouldn’t have been sitting backward perched on his mount’s neck. But not this Englishwoman. Her reflexes were immediate and accurate. Her snipe didn’t come from fear; it came from lack of control.
    Ellenor Howell was just as disturbed by him as he was by her.
    The woman had practically probed him with her eyes a few minutes ago, and he sensed she glimpsed something…something he didn’t want her or anyone else to see. So, he had teased her, and her comeback, while innocent, had revived emotions he had long ago suppressed.
    Indifference , Cole whispered to himself. That was the only way he was going to survive the next few days. “Steud is not a monster. He’s a horse. And you would not have been in danger if you had been sitting properly and not jumping around all the time.”
    Ignoring his comment, Ellenor asked, “Did you say Steud?”
    “Aye.”
    Ellenor muffled a laugh but could not keep from rolling her eyes. What kind of man named his horse… horse ? “Why did you slow down? I thought you were in a rush to get back to your precious Scotland.”
    “I was.”
    “But then…” Ellenor halted in midsentence as she answered her own question. They had just crested Windy Gyle. England was now behind them. “Well,” she began with a huff, “I suppose you are pleased with yourself, Scot, but I could care less where we are just as long as it’s not Durchent Hall.”
    “Then we are finally of accord, babag. ”
    “We are most certainly not in accord, Elmer . My hands are tied. I am incredibly uncomfortable and I am finding it harder and harder to remain atop your monstrous horse.”
    “I suggest you try harder,” Cole returned, refusing to react to her latest nickname for him.
    Ellenor’s jaw dropped open. The man was actually smiling. Not a large one that spanned from cheek to cheek, but the sides of his face were definitely crinkling and Ellenor was positive it qualified as a grin for the hulking brute. Probably a large one.
    Laugh while you can, Scot, for it will be I who will be laughing last , Ellenor vowed. “I have tried,” she replied with mocking