Free My Highland Prisoner: A Highlander Erotic Romance by Kate Lawrence Page B

couldn’t understand hit her, as a warm heat settled low in her stomach. The man before her looked weather-beaten and worn. His clothes were tattered around his muscular frame and there were large holes in the leather boots he wore. Rain fell off his too long hair and sluiced off his tanned skin.
     
    Ailsa sucked in a breath when the man raised his head, as his intelligent, brown eyes met hers through curly, matted, sand-colored hair. The impact from his eyes was dangerous. Ailsa’s arms began to shake, though she wasn't sure if that was from the impact of his eyes or the broad sword she strived to keep up.
     
    “Hello, lass,” the stranger said in a thick accent. The cultured notes when he spoke reminded her of a warm fire on a stormy night or of peace in the middle of chaos.
     
    She heard something hard and metal hit the floor. It took her a moment to realize that the sword slipped completely from her grip and landed on the floor, making a thunderous sound that caused her to jump.
     
    Whatever spell the stranger had on her was broken. Ailsa clamored to grab the sword and lift it again, but the thing was far too heavy to hold a second time. The best she could do was hold it against her side.
     
    “Who are ye, and what are ye doing at Castle Dunn?” Ailsa demanded in her most authoritative voice.
     
    The scurrying of feet and hushed whispers behind her, let her know that the entire house was now awake. Plus, most, if not all, its residents were crowded behind her.
     
    “Yer father sent me.”
     
    Ailsa snorted before she could catch the unladylike sound. Her father had always chastised her, wanting her to be more womanly and to act like others of her sex. Gently bred ladies did not curse, did not snort, and, most certainly, did not brandish swords at suspected intruders. But, her father was no longer around to chastise her on her behavior or lecture her on what women could and could not do.
     
    Crossing her arms over her chest, Ailsa glared at the haggard man. “Nay, ye lie. My father is in irons. He could no’ send a whisper on the wind much less a man.”
     
    The pitter-patter of little feet superseded her brothers’ arrival, as they pushed at her skirts to see the man at the door. Ailsa turned and shot a meaningful look at Glenda, as she tried to disentangle her little brothers from her skirts.
     
    “But he said Da sent him!” Erroll cried, as Glenda banded an arm under the seven-year old and hauled him off. At the same time, she had a claw-like vise around the arm of his twin brother, Bryson, who was staring over his shoulder at the wet, dirty-looking highlander.
     
    “Och, wee Erroll and Bryson. Yer father told me much about them, Ailsa.”
     
    Ailsa snapped her head back to the man. She narrowed her eyes even further, as her slender brows knitted together in frustration. “How do ye know our names?”
     
    “I told ye. Yer father sent me,” the man said gruffly, as he reached into the bag he’d flung over his shoulder. Ailsa mentally chastised herself for not seeing the bag before. For all she knew, the stranger could have had a dagger or something worse in the sack.
     
    Instead of a weapon, the man pulled out a crumpled sheet of paper and passed it to her. For a brief second, Ailsa felt bad about keeping the man waiting outside the walls of her home in the wet and cold, especially since he was barely wearing any clothes. Still, another part of her knew that kindness and blind trust came at a terrible price. She’d trusted her father and now their family could barely afford to keep the home that had been in their family for generations. It was now a home that might never again have a laird with the last name Dunn.
     
    Ailsa was quick to take the missive and open it. The words were scribbled in her father’s writing, but Ailsa knew that they were not written in ink. Fear clawed up her throat, but she forced it down and began to read the letter.
     
    Dearest daughter,
     
    I know ye can