The Highlander's Forbidden Bride(25)

“You would think that since you and Cavan are so much alike, that Artair and Lachlan would be similar.” Carissa shook her head. “But they seem nothing alike.”

That brought a grin to Ronan’s face. “That’s for certain. Artair relies on his pragmatic nature, while Lachlan on his charm.” He laughed. “And Cavan always knew exactly how to handle each of them.”

“Just like you.”

“That’s because I watched my big brother and learned.”

“As Cavan does with people,” she said. “He watches, studies them. You can see it in the way his dark eyes survey everything around him. By the way, I noticed that your three brothers have brown eyes while you have green.”

“I get the distinguishing color from my mother,” he said.

“If her eyes are anything like yours, they must be beautiful.”

“My mother is beautiful, but she taught me that true beauty comes from a loving nature. And I discovered how true her words were.”

“Are you telling me I’m not beautiful?” she asked with a sharp tongue.

“If beauty were judged solely on features, you would certainly be claimed a beauty. But if you believe as I do, that beauty comes from a good, decent soul, then I’m afraid it would be hard to look upon you.”

Carissa simply shrugged. “It’s what I expected to hear from you though talking about surface beauty, I’d have to say that your brother Artair is the handsomest of the lot of you Sinclare men.”

“So say all the women, though Lachlan would disagree,” Ronan said. “But what of you? Not one sibling to torment or tease or rescue you?”

“I always believed that, with my father’s salacious appetite, he had to have sired many bastards, though he laid claim to none. I was the only legitimate child born of his loins, though…”

Ronan watched as if a mask slipped off her face, her eyes softening and her tongue along with it.

“There was a young boy…we grew close like siblings.”

“What happened to him?

The mask returned so swiftly that Ronan wondered if he had seen the change in her at all.

“He was sent away.”

“Why?”

She shrugged again. “He was no longer of any use to my father.”

Ronan noticed that Carissa often shrugged as if indifferent to the matter, but for a moment he thought he had caught a glint of hurt in her eyes when she spoke of the young boy. Could it be possible that she wasn’t as coldhearted as he believed?

“You must have missed him?”

“I got over it fast enough,” she said.

Her dismissive response convinced Ronan that her heart was as cold as ever.

Conversation dwindled after that, Ronan lost in his thoughts and Carissa in hers. He wished the storm would abate so that they could depart. It was difficult sharing close quarters with his enemy, especially finding her in his arms each morning when he woke.

He had thought with the bed in front of the hearth there would be sufficient heat to keep them apart. But not so, they seemed to drift together, heat or no heat, and that troubled him. He tried logic as Artair would do, telling himself that the bed was narrow and therefore it would seem only reasonable that they would sleep close. But it wasn’t closely they slept. They slept wrapped in each other’s arms, almost as if they feared being parted.

Every morning he woke and found his arms wrapped tightly around her and her snuggled close against him, he grew more annoyed. And his agitation continued to grow when he felt a punch to his gut as if warning him not to let her go.

He was going mad, completely insane with the thought that he would have any desire at all for a woman who had caused him so much suffering.

Tonight, he told himself, tonight he would keep his distance from her, no matter what it took.



Carissa hugged the edge of the bed, facing the hearth and watching the steady yet awkward dance of the flames. It was one of those moments she knew that tears could normally fall, but not a drop slipped from her eyes.

She had trained herself too well not to shed a tear, though she often wished that old Ula’s words would come true. That one day she would cry tears of joy. She would love not only to cry, but to feel joy without the sense of impending doom.

But why hope? It had never done her any good. Actually, anytime she had hoped, it seemed she suffered the consequences.

Her father had warned her time and again never to trust, especially anyone who claimed himself a friend. But her heart had thought differently, and she had dared to make friends with a slave boy when she was young. Dykar became like a brother to her and she a sister to him. They had made certain no one knew of their friendship, for her father would certainly have punished her, and in all likelihood he would have killed Dykar. They played in the woods, sturdy branches being trusty swords and imaginary games helping them to learn to track and plot against an enemy.