Highlanders Collection. Ann Lethbridge

and, if she were home, she and Elizabeth thought nothing of walking through the village, talking and sorting out their concerns and making plans.

      Why did things seem to make sense in the dark of the night and then not when day’s light shone on them?

      Unable to figure that out, Ciara climbed back into the bed and finally allowed sleep to claim her.

      The rain suited his mood and kept chatter to a minimum as they left Dunalastair behind and joined up with the old drovers’ path that would take them to the market town of Crieff. All three women rode, cramped, he was certain, in the shelter of the wagon. He and the other men were not bothered by the weather. He’d lived, slept, ate, fought and … did most everything outside at one time or another. As long as the roads did not turn to mud and the wagon kept moving, they travelled.

      Wrapped in the lengths of tightly woven plaid that kept most weather and water at bay, he and the men continued on. The first two days were wet, but the roads passable. On the third day of solid rain, it was as though the fates heard his thoughts; the wagon got mired down and came to an abrupt stop. He heard the startled cries from within and rode back to see if anyone was hurt. Other than a few muffled curses as he drew near, and he knew whose voice they were muttered in, everyone was safe.

      ‘Are we stuck?’ Ciara asked, lifting the canvas tarp that formed their canopy out of the way and peering through the downpour at him.

      ‘Aye, you are that.’ Tavis jumped from his horse and tested the wagon, pushing against one side. Soon a couple of the men were with him, but no amount of strength seemed to loosen its wheels from the quagmire that trapped them.

      ‘Here, Tavis,’ Ciara said as she stood up and tried to get out of the wagon. ‘Take my hand.’

      ‘Ciara, wait a wee while until we figure out if this can be freed,’ he ordered back.

      She jumped, damn her, and landed just next to him, her leather boots sinking into the mud. Without hesitating, she gathered her skirts from behind, pulled them between her legs and secured them to her belt.

      ‘Ciara,’ he began.

      ‘Elizabeth, come out now,’ she called in to her friend. ‘You will not melt in the rain and we need all the help we can get.’

      Was she daft? Did she think he was going to let her …?

      ‘If we all help, we can empty the wagon, move it through these rough patches to flatter ground and be on our way,’ she said, urging the other girl out from the protection of the covered wagon and into the torrents of rain.

      Damn! Did she have to be so sensible? Should she not be sitting inside the cart, moaning and fretting, much like Cora was at this moment, waiting for him and the other men to do what was needed to free the wagon and get them moving again? Instead, with a lack of fear and with a good instinct about how to handle this situation, she took control and gave orders. Within minutes, the other women had secured the long skirts of their gowns as she had and were carrying some of the lighter supplies off to a clearing under the trees.

      Tavis wanted to argue with her, overrule her, but she did exactly what he would have recommended be done and got less resistance from her women than any man would have.

      It took about two hours to complete, but the wagon was emptied, contents moved and the wheels freed from the mud and moved forwards to a smoother part of the path. Through it all, not one of the women had complained. Later, when they’d repacked the wagon, found a place to rest for the night and everyone was settling down, he realised what bothered him so.

      He truly liked Ciara. He liked the woman she’d become. In spite of his declarations to the opposite, he felt more for her than he could ignore. More than would do either of them any good. What he felt and what he wanted did not matter, for she was above him in status and wealth and everything that was important. He had neither the heart nor soul left to offer her marriage and that was the only thing a woman of her class could accept.

      Worse, she was promised to another and any interference in the arrangements, secret at this time or not, would still result in dishonour and possibly a feud between the MacLerie and the Murrays.

      The Robertson laird must have seen signs of this when he issued his warning. If that man could see it, then others could and would. So, Tavis decided he must look at her and the rest of this journey as he would any other task assigned to him by Connor. Just that—a task assigned by his laird.

      He stared across the clearing, from where he stood to where she sat, stirring a pot of simple stew over the fire. As she did so many times before, Ciara lifted her head and met his gaze. Within the depths of those warm, brown eyes he saw everything he felt reflected back at him: confusion, desire, need, wanting and love. Tavis turned away.

      They could not. They would not.

      Despair, ruin and unhappiness lay ahead of them if they followed their desires. For him it would mean the loss of his honour, for he’d sworn allegiance and obedience to the laird. Worse, for her it would be the loss of everyone she held dear. She would face shame unlike any embarrassment she’d suffered before. They would both be exiled from clan and kith and kin with little hope of sharing even that dishonourable life.

      And that was something she would never survive either.

      Tavis drank down the ale in his cup and stood. His stomach rolled and he wanted no food now. How cruel the fates were to allow them both to see the truth of something between them just when they were reconciled to the impossibility of it.

      As he strode off to check with the two men set as guards, he accepted that the only good thing was that both of them would do their duty and hold fast to their honour.

      Ciara thought she knew how her old doll felt the day that she and her younger brother fought over it—twisted, torn and all the stuffing pulled out. As she scooped up the stew and served it to the others, she was certain of what had just passed between them. He’d allowed her to see into his heart and soul and to learn that she was not the only one confused, yet thrilled by the feelings there. Then, as though he’d made a mistake, he left, not even taking the time to eat with them.

      This must be the worst part of growing up and accepting your role as an adult with duties and responsibilities to others. And she hated it even at the same moment that she savoured the brief but honest moment between them. For in that instant after he’d turned away, Ciara had thought of all the possibilities and all the impossibilities as well and none of them were acceptable to her. To them.

      So, she, they, would follow the path they’d chosen, be honourable and true to their families’ expectations. Mayhap the shock of knowing he’d treated her as an adult and accepted what was honest and true in her heart had also caused her to accept the futility of it all?

      After cleaning up from their meal, with Elizabeth’s and Cora’s help, she climbed inside the wagon, under the blankets spread for her use and found that her mind was quiet for the first time in so very long. A certainty filled her now—the unavoidable reality she had never wanted to consider but that now was hers.

      She would not marry the man she had loved her whole life.

      Four days later, after the night of reckoning as she thought of it, they reached Crieff. Tavis had sent men ahead to find them a place to stay and to make arrangements for the final part of the journey. If any in the group noticed a change between them, none mentioned it. Instead, it was as though Ciara had taken all of her feelings, wrapped them in a bundle and put them aside. Easier to ignore all of it than to have it task her mind, heart and soul during every waking hour.

      And sleeping hours, too, for she saw him in her dreams. Except there, he left the stream, walked to her and kissed her with such abandonment that she woke more than once expecting to find him entangled in her blankets next to her. Some primitive urge had been awakened within her and would not cease its demand for satisfaction.

      Crieff was a welcome distraction for all of them, it seemed. A busy market town, filled with all sorts of merchants and goods, it was the first large town they’d seen on their travels. Tavis had sent men ahead to locate