Free Her Wicked Highlander: A Highland Knights Novella by Jennifer Haymore

rangy and thin—he thought too much about his warped notion of becoming a great Scottish leader and not enough about sustenance.
    They returned to the gravesite. At the edge of Aila’s grandfather’s grave, Sutherland handed her the mallet. “Go ahead, then. Get started.”
    She quirked a brow but took the mallet. It seemed manual labor was beneath her future liege lord.
    “But dinna come near me with it, mind.” He withdrew his pistol and pointed it at her. “In case you’ve thoughts of smashing my head in.”
    Holding the mallet with her two bound hands, she stared at her grandfather’s stone. He had died before she was born, but her father had told her what a good, honorable man he’d been. Her father had carved the tombstone himself, telling Aila about the dagger’s location when she was a wee lass.
    “Sorry, grand-da,” she murmured. Then she aimed the mallet at the sandstone and brought it down as hard as she could.
    Pain radiated through her injured left arm, but the surface of the sandstone crumbled under the blow.
    This might not be so difficult.
    She regretted that initial optimism twenty minutes later when her shoulders were screaming, sweat had begun to run down her temples, and she’d hardly made any progress at all. Her injured arm sparked with pain every time she brought the mallet down.
    She looked imploringly at Sutherland, who sat serenely on the bottom edge of the stone, watching her. “At least untie my hands. I dinna think I’ll be able to finish this otherwise.”
    He considered her for a moment, then nodded. He took the mallet from her, laid down his pistol, and untied her hands.
    She thought frantically of escape. But his legs were twice as long as hers, and he’d catch her for certain… if he didn’t shoot her first.
    Swiping the back of her arm over her forehead, she gripped the mallet handle in her right hand and began to hammer on her grandfather’s tombstone again.
    After another fifteen minutes passed, she landed a blow on the rock, then chipped it away with the chisel, revealing a bit of metal.
    “Dear God in heaven,” Sutherland murmured in disbelief. “There it is.”
    “I told you ’twas there, didn’t I?” she muttered.
    “Continue, continue.” He waved his hand wildly, excitement widening his eyes.
    Almost an hour later, she’d chipped away the stone all around the dagger, revealing it inch by dusty inch. Curved steel blade, untouched by rust. Silver pommel, and the giant ruby, its facets dulled by the dust of the sandstone.
    She reached out to pull it away from the broken stone, but Sutherland stayed her hand.
    “Nay. I’ll do it.”
    He took the chisel and mallet from her, laid them down out of her reach, then began to retie her hands. She jerked her arms back, but he gripped both her hands firmly in one of his huge ones. The other one reached for his gun. Damn him. “You said you’d be letting me go,” she gritted out.
    “Not yet.” He tied the twine tighter than last time, and it dug into the already sore skin of her wrist.
    He pressed the chisel to the edge of the pommel and tapped it with the mallet. The dagger came free almost immediately, and he tossed the tools away. They landed—far out of reach—over Aila’s mother’s grave.
    On his knees as if praying, Sutherland reached forward, grasping the pommel and lifting the dagger, then holding it up and out before him, a look of such utter bliss on his face, Aila’s stomach roiled in disgust.
    The seconds ticked by, turning into minutes as he stared at his beloved new possession. Aila waited impatiently, but finally she couldn’t stand another second. “Let me go now,” she ordered him.
    He ignored her.
    “Did you hear me? I said, let me go. You agreed to let me go once you held my dagger in your hands. You promised, damn you.”
    He turned to her, his gaze registering her without recognition, as if it were the first time he’d ever laid eyes on her.
    Then he squinted at her. “I agreed to