She should not have drawn his attention to it again. The gown was of the French style worn at court, with a tight-fitting, square-cut bodice that revealed the tops of her high, creamy breasts. From there, it fit snugly to her tiny waist, which he could span with his hands, and then flowed gracefully over her hips and down to the floor.
"No, it doesn't look right at all," he murmured to himself. This was not how Ilysa was supposed to look. The sight of her should make him feel comfortable and easy, like a pair of old boots, not send his pulse racing and muddle his thoughts.
Connor was vaguely aware that he had stared at her beguiling shape for far too long and dragged his attention upward, helplessly pausing at each appealing curve. Her shining braid had fallen forward over her breast. He followed it upward over flawless skin until he reached her face, which somehow was both familiar and unexpected.
Her lips looked soft. Her slightly upturned nose was fetching. But her best feature was her dark and luminous eyes, which were set off by her red-gold hair and matching threads of her headdress.
"Ye look exquisite," he said on an exhale, but she was already gone.
* * *
Ilysa ran down the steps and along the side of the keep. When she reached the corner, she ducked into a narrow gap between the buildings. She did not stop until she reached the castle wall at the very end, where she was certain she would be out of sight.
With her chest heaving, she leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. The cold from the stone seeped through her back, but it did nothing to cool her burning cheeks.
She was mortified. At first, when Connor stared at her, she thought he was admiring how she looked, as the other men had. How wrong she was.
What happened to ye? No, it doesn't look right at all.
Taking slow, deep breaths, she attempted to calm herself. She had survived worse humiliation with her husband, and she would survive this as well. The disappointment was harder to bear. Ilysa squeezed her eyes shut tighter to force back the tears that threatened.
She had deceived herself. Only now could she admit why she had let Moira and S矛leas persuade her to change her appearance and come to the gathering. She had not done it to gain a marriage offer from a stranger. No, in her secret heart of hearts, she had hoped to make Connor look at her and for once see a desirable woman. Was that too much to ask?
Her pleasure in the attention from the other men evaporated like the mist on a hot day. They had only flocked around her because there were so few women here. Besides, what did it matter if they all thought she was pretty, when the one man she cared about did not find her so?
Ilysa felt someone's presence and snapped her eyes open. O shluagh! None other than Alastair MacLeod stood not two feet away, staring down at her. He was huge.
Though she had never seen the famed chieftain of her enemy clan before, she had heard stories about him all her life. She recognized him by his maimed shoulder, which was caused by a MacDonald axe and figured in the tales as often as the slaughters of her clan.
Sweat broke out on her palms. The MacLeod chieftain towered over her, and she could not get by him in the narrow gap between buildings. She was trapped.
"I am Alastair MacLeod," he said in a voice so deep she could feel it through her feet. "No matter what you've heard, I don't eat captured MacDonald children for breakfast."
Ilysa was caught off guard by his jest and assumed, or at least hoped, it meant he did not intend to harm her. Despite his age and disfigured shoulder, he was unexpectedly handsome. None of the stories had mentioned that.
"I'm honored to meet ye," she said to be courteous, though she could not quite believe she was conversing with the MacLeod chieftain. "How do ye know I'm a MacDonald?"
"I saw ye come into the hall with your clansmen," he said. "What's your name, lass?"
"Ilysa," she said, her voice unnaturally high.
"A lovely name," he said. "It suits ye."
She did not know what to say to that. She was still reeling from his admission that he had watched her enter the hall.