“What do you mean Carissa and my mother can’t be found?” Ronan demanded of Dykar.
“We don’t have time to explain it all,” Septimus said. “We need to find their trail and follow.”
“They wouldn’t leave the camp,” Ronan argued.
“My brother’s right,” Lachlan said, Alyce standing beside him.
“They didn’t,” Septimus said. “They were abducted.”
Ronan felt his heart pound mercilessly in his chest, and it took him a moment to speak. “What do you mean? Who would abduct them?”
Dykar gave him a quick explanation about Cregan, finishing with, “Carissa was going to speak with Cavan right away and see that you were informed about the situation.”
“We need to leave now,” Septimus said.
Lachlan agreed fast enough.
Hagen stood beside Septimus. “We can’t let them get too far from us.”
While Ronan agreed, there were also other things to consider, and though he wished Cavan hadn’t kept this from him, there was no time to waste being angry at him.
“Lachlan, you and Alyce return to the keep and tell Cavan. He will have our warriors ready in no time. Dykar, Septimus, Hagen, and I will take some men and find and follow the trail.”
“Evan and Piper are already on it,” Septimus said. “If they can’t pick up the trail, no one can.”
“We’ll leave men along the way so you know where to follow,” Ronan said.
Lachlan nodded and stepped up to his brother. He put his hand out and their hands locked on the other’s arm.
“See mother and Carissa safe,” Lachlan said.
“You have my word on it,” Ronan said.
Lachlan and Alyce rode off, and Ronan joined the other men.
There was no way he would lose the woman he loved now that he had just found her, and there was no chance he would allow any harm to befall his mother.
This Cregan would pay for abducting the two women who meant the most to him. He might look a Highlander, wearing his clan plaid, but at the moment he felt more a barbarian, ready to kill without thought or reason. And he would do just that to save the ones he loved.
Chapter 35
Carissa and Addie put as much distance between them and the men as possible, but two riders slowed the horse down, and the men caught up with them in no time. Not that she and Addie gave up. They maneuvered their way through the men until the thin-faced one called Sully struck out, hitting Addie and knocking her off the horse. Carissa went with her, having no intention of leaving Addie alone to face Sully’s anger.
When he jumped off his horse and rushed toward the women, Carissa scrambled to her feet as Addie confirmed she was all right and stood protectively in front of the woman, her feet braced, her head high, and her hands fisted in front of her.
“Touch her, and I’ll kill you,” Carissa said through gritted teeth.
Sully wisely halted and glared at her. “Try that again, and I will kill her.”
Carissa marched right up to the man and rapped him in the chest. “Do that, and I’ll see that Cregan doesn’t get what he wants.”
“What do you mean?”
Carissa snatched the dirk so fast from the scabbard at Sully’s waist that he had no time to respond, especially when she placed the blade at her throat.
“Do Addie harm in any way, and you’ll not have me to hand over to Cregan.”
Sully quickly tried to take the dirk from her, but he could not budge her hand, and he paled.
Carissa was wise in the ways of men like him and knew he did not pale simply because she threatened to take her life. He paled because he feared something more than her threat.
“Tell him, Cregan,” she called out. “Tell him I will do it, and he will have failed you.”
“I knew you would grow to be your father’s daughter,” the deep voice boomed.
Carissa threw the dirk to the ground, the point sticking deep into the soil. Then she turned and looked upon the man she had not seen in some time.
He sat astride his stallion. He was sizeable in girth and height, with thick black hair braided at each side and falling past his shoulders. He was not a man of good features, with a nose that had been broken in several spots and scars that ran down one cheek and his neck. He had thick hands that she remembered recoiling from.
She had just turned fifteen, and he had run his hand up the sleeve of her dress in a way that had disturbed her, grinning in a way that had turned her stomach.
And his words that day, she had pushed from her mind. “One day, Carissa, you will be mine.”
“Let the woman be,” Cregan ordered.
Carissa leaned down and helped Addie to stand. Her chin was darkening from Sully’s blow.