Return of the Highlander Read Free

a pulse.
    He examined the features of her face—the soft freckled complexion, the small upturned nose and full lips. She was a beauty, no doubt about it. Quickly he moved the pads of his fingers from one spot to another on her neck, and there— at last —he found a pulse.
    Darach turned on his knee and looked up the slope to where Logan stood at the top. “She’s alive!” he called out.
    “Look out!” Logan cried.
    Whack! Pain reverberated at the back of his head and down the length of his spine. He saw stars, then fell forward onto his hands and knees.
    Moving swiftly, he rolled onto his back. The woman stood over him holding a large stone over her head. With wild, murderous eyes, she drew her hand back as if she were about to smash his face in.

Chapter Four

    “ Ach! ” he bellowed as he caught her slender wrists and forced the rock from her hands. In a flash of movement, he flipped the crazed hellion onto her back and pinned her hands to the ground above her head.
    “Let me go!” she cried, kicking with her legs and fighting to free herself.
    “I’ll do no such thing, lassie. Not until you apologize.”
    “For what!” Her cat-like green eyes flashed with fire.
    “For thumping me on the head just now. I suspect that’ll leave a mark.”
    She grunted with frustration and continued to struggle, pumping her hips like a bucking filly while Darach straddled her firmly.
    Logan descended the slope and moved to stand over them. Seeming unconcerned by their tussle, he withdrew an apple from his sporran and crunched into it while he watched the woman wiggle and squirm.
    “Who is she?” he casually asked while chewing.
    “None of your damn business!” she yelled, but her accent revealed that she was Scottish.
    Logan bent forward over her face. “You’re on MacDonald lands now, lassie, so that makes it very much our business.” He took another bite of the apple.
    “Get off me!” she ground out, then she let out a frustrated huff and finally relaxed.
    For a few critical seconds, Darach’s brain seemed to stop functioning at the sensation of their joined hips. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a woman, and this one was as comely as any he’d ever met.
    “That’s better, lass,” he said, mentally shaking himself out of any lusty thoughts about the woman who had just tried to bash his head in. “You’re hurt. You shouldn’t be exerting yourself.”
    Chest heaving, she shut her eyes and took a moment to catch her breath, which allowed Darach time to examine her features more closely.
    She was young and small—rather waiflike, in fact, except for a lush bosom that caused his blood to course a little faster through his veins. She wore a blue bodice over a simple white linen chemise and dark skirt. There was no sign of any tartan, which was why, at first glance, he’d thought she was English.
    The lass took a deep steadying breath which drew Darach’s attention again to her bosom, where he lingered a moment. Then his eyes returned to her flushed cheeks, soft open mouth and disheveled, blood-stained hair. Tangled and messy, it reached nearly to her waist, splayed out on the forest floor beneath her.
    “Tell us where you come from lass,” he said, “and why you got into a scuffle with the Redcoats.”
    She frowned up at him, as if she were bewildered by the question, then she blinked a few times. “I don’t feel very well.”
    He stared down at her with some concern as her eyes grew empty and unseeing. Then she bucked again for a few alarming seconds, as if possessed by some sort of demon, and passed out.
    Darach released his hold on her wrists, leaned forward, and tapped her on the cheek. “Lassie, are you all right? Wake up. Wake up !”
    “Is she alive?” Logan asked, kneeling down beside him and tossing the apple core away.
    Darach found the pulse at her neck. “Aye, but she’s in a sorry state. We need to get her back to the castle. Angus will have questions about what happened