Traitor or Temptress. Helen Dickson

exciting thought he had entertained in many months.

      ‘If you were hoping for a turn of fate, then perhaps I have inadvertently brought it about,’ he said, his iron-thewed arms tightening slightly about her slender waist and a slumberous expression appearing in his heavy-lidded eyes.

      ‘Oh? In what way?’ Lorne asked, becoming much too conscious of being held too close, and the magnetism of his powerful frame, that made her heart leap into her throat.

      ‘The way I see it, I may have done you a favour by kidnapping you. I may be saving you from a fate worse than death. Perhaps Galbraith will not be so eager to wed you when he knows I—his sworn enemy—am keeping you, since I am the one responsible for bringing his father to the gallows. He may even find someone else to marry.’

      Lorne sighed, shaking her head slowly. ‘No, he won’t. Duncan and I were friends once. He was fiercely protective of me and always there. I was grateful to him—in fact, if it hadn’t been for Duncan and Rory, his younger brother, I don’t know how I would have survived when my mother died. But I remember him as an arrogant, possessive youth, and when he made up his mind about something, he would not let go easily.’

      Iain looked down at her, his gaze attentive. ‘You have an interesting past, Lorne McBryde.’

      ‘I’m glad you think so, my lord. I would call it extraordinary.’ She focused her attention on the few remaining hairs around the cut on Iain’s cheek, eager to complete her task so she could break free of his hold, for she was aware of a gnawing disquiet settling on her at being held too close for too long. Somewhere deep within her a spark flickered and flared, setting her skin ablaze and filling her body with liquid fire. Despite her rioting nerves, outwardly she remained calm.

      ‘Now, hold still,’ she breathed. ‘Apart from the hairs around the wound I’m almost finished.’

      A slow smile curved his lips. ‘Are you sure you have the stomach for it?’

      A rueful smile brought up the corners of her lips. ‘I have a cast-iron stomach, my lord—although I must warn you that if you do not hold yourself still, it will hurt more before I’m through with you. I might even be tempted to mar your features permanently and make you look like Lucifer, as recompense for kidnapping me—which would certainly put paid to your handsome looks and amours with the ladies.’

      ‘Or enhance them,’ Iain countered softly, his eyes capturing hers with an intimacy that made Lorne’s blood run warm. ‘To be so disfigured might intrigue them—and make them wonder what it would be like to bed with the devil.’

      As Lorne gazed at his proud aristocratic face, unable to conceal her naïveté, visions of such a thing happening brought two bright flags of scarlet to her cheeks and an uneasiness coursing through her. He was speaking to her as if he had ceased to think of her as his enemy, but as a lover, almost, and she was at a loss to know how to react. Deciding it was best to make light of the situation, which she always did when she was presented with an awkward moment, she gave him a beguiling smile.

      ‘And it will be their hell to pay if they do. Still—I’m sure you know what’s what.’

      He gazed at her, eyes amused, a smile curving on his lower lip. ‘I’ve never had any complaints.’

      ‘I’m sure you’ve had a lot of practice. Maybe you and the devil aren’t so very different after all—and I must consider myself fortunate that our relationship is already established.’

      ‘And what is our relationship?’

      She cocked her head to one side and looked at him squarely. ‘We are enemies, of course. What else?’

      His eyes glowed wickedly. ‘What else indeed. I do not claim to hold your family in any esteem—but you—you are a different matter, Lorne McBryde. You intrigue me and I have a yearning to get to know you better. For the time we are together, can we not, in common agreement, strive to be as gracious and mannerly as it is possible for enemies to be towards each other?’