Mayhap she could talk the MacKinnon into leaving her unfettered.
Trying to be as inconspicuous as possible, Page gathered her bliaut into her fist, raising her skirt. She glanced about, as nonchalantly as possible, to be certain no one was watching. No one was, and she quickly ripped another fragment from her shift, then released her skirts, letting the hem fall once more. Clutching the scrap within her fist, she tried to gather the nerve once more to drop it.
She made the mistake of peering about then, for she met the MacKinnon’s gaze, and her heart leapt into her throat.
He was watching her over his shoulder...
Had he spied her?
Jesu! But nay... she didn’t think so, for his face was a mask without expression. He held her gaze imprisoned for an eternity, holding her as surely as though in physical bonds, but his expression remained unreadable.
Page’s heart began to pound as she gripped the cloth within her fist.
Drop it, she told herself. He wouldn’t see it, for his gaze was riveted upon her face. With the flurry of movement about them, the rise and fall of so many hooves, there was no way he would spy it.
She couldn’t do it. His gaze held her riveted and paralyzed, while her heart beat like thunder in her ears.
And then he suddenly released her, glancing away, back toward his son. Page felt the withdrawal acutely, and to her shock, found she didn’t want him to go back to ignoring her.
She stared at his back, feeling bereft in a way she didn’t quite comprehend.
He’d ridden the entire day with his son, the two of them talking, laughing, sharing in a way that made Page ache deep down. God’s truth, she didn’t wish to feel this... this... envy. It was deep and black and ugly, but she could scarce help herself. Seeing the MacKinnon smooth the back of his son’s hair with his open palm, the gesture such a loving one, filled her heart with grief like she’d never known. It left her with an emptiness she’d only suspected was there before now.
The undiscovered void.
All her life she’d filled it with indifference and resentment, and in the space of a day these people, the MacKinnon and his son, had revealed it.
Watching the way that he squeezed the boy’s shoulder, the way that he leaned forward to almost embrace him, as though he didn’t wish to embarrass the child, or himself before his men, but couldn’t quite help himself, made her eyes sting with tears.
She’d never known the feel of a hand upon her shoulder, or the tender brush of a palm upon her face...
Her eyes closed and she remembered against her will... the gentle way he’d held her face... the whisper-soft way he’d spoken to her... It made her quiver still... made her yearn for that moment once more.
How piteous, she thought, that she would be reduced to such a shameful longing.
Like some Jezebel who cared not a whit who her lover was, nor even whether she knew his name, only that he was there when the lights were doused, she craved her enemy’s touch.
Even knowing it was contemptible.
Even knowing he had betrayed her father.
Even knowing her father wanted her back.
Long after he’d turned away, Page clutched the cloth within her hand, unaware that she did so.
She was startled from her thoughts by an unfamiliar voice, and turned to find that Broc had somehow maneuvered his way alongside her. He sat his mount beside her, staring as though awaiting a response.
To what? What had he said? Jesu! And where had he come from so quickly? She’d not heard, nor spied his approach. Her heart hammered guiltily as she recalled the cloth in her hand. She tried to conceal the evidence within the folds of her skirt.
Broc glanced about, and then turned narrowed eyes upon her. The spite in his expression gave lie to the sweetness of his youthful face. “I said... ’twill take more than a siren’s voice and a pretty song to woo the rest o’ us, wench.”
For an instant Page didn’t understand what it was that he was speaking of, and then it occurred to her that he must be referring to the lullai bye she’d sung to Malcom the night before. She stiffened in the saddle, offended by the conclusions he’d drawn. “I was trying to woo no one!” she assured him. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
“Guid, then,” he said, leering at her, “because ‘tis no one ye wooed.”
Page resisted the urge to throw the scrap she held into his face. God only knew, she wanted to throw something at him, but the cloth wouldn’t hurt him, she knew—would likely make him laugh with glee, and then she would be left to explain its existence.
“I dinna ken why the laird doesna simply leave ye,” he said nastily, “nor why he seems compelled to save ye from your bastard da—but I’ve no such compunction. ‘Tis your fault poor Ranald is strapped t’ the back o’ Lagan’s mount. Your fault, and no other, d’ ye hear me, wench?”