know what you feel now, to have some idea of how you will react to what must occur next. Sithee, there is one thing that I must be sure is clear to you before we leave this chamber.”
Catriona stared at Fin as a flurry of thoughts danced through her mind, including the last thing that her father had said to her, that Fin would make clear what Shaw’s position was, and that of the Mackintosh.
Abruptly, the truth dawned.
“God-a-mercy, they mean to make you marry me!”
“The Mackintosh and your father have discussed it,” he said. “That is to say, they have discussed us and they have discussed Rothesay. Your grandfather has decreed, and Shaw agrees with him, that nowt shall happen to cause ructions between the house of Mackintosh and that of Stewart. So they do suggest—”
“They insist, more like! But I never meant—”
“Whatever you meant, you have wreaked havoc, lass. Try to imagine, if you will, what Rothesay’s reaction will be if he learns that you lied to him to evade his attentions. He is young and gey proud, and such a tale would spread fast.”
Wincing at the image he’d created in her mind, she said, “I do know that others were nearby. Ivor said that most of them would delight in telling the tale.”
He nodded.
With a sigh, knowing that she could not defy them all and knowing, too, that she did not want to defy them if it meant never seeing Fin again, she said, “Very well. They may give it out that we will marry. Then we’ll see. But there is one thing that you should understand clearly about me before we do this, sir.”
As she spoke, he had moved closer, much too close. He looked into her eyes. “What is it that I must understand?” he asked.
Striving to keep her emotions out of her voice, she said, “I do not like it when men assume that I cannot look after myself. Because I can, sir, and I do.”
“Ah, lassie, come here,” he said, pulling her into his arms. “I have seen that you can. You are intrepid. By my troth, though, that worries me more than any weakness you may have, because no woman is always capable of looking after herself—or any man, either, come to that.”
“It is something, I expect, that you will admit that,” she murmured, leaning into him and welcoming his embrace. As she did, she realized something else. “You have not said what you think of all this. You must be vexed with me and hate as much as I do that they are forcing you to do this. Also, if what I’ve done puts you in bad odor with Rothesay, whom you do serve…”
She sounded sincerely worried, so when she paused, Fin hugged her and said, “Davy will recover from his displeasure the first time he needs me, lass. And I am not vexed with you or even opposed to your father’s plan for us, although it may complicate my life for a time. Especially with my family.”
She nodded. “I expect it will. I doubt they will like our marrying.”
“Whether they do or not, they seem to be honoring the truce,” he said. “In any event, after we marry, they will want to meet you.” He did not add that his brother Ewan would say that they ought to have met her long before then. What Ewan would say about Fin’s marrying a Mackintosh, Fin did not want to imagine.
Catriona said quietly, “My feelings about leaving Loch an Eilein have not changed, sir. I have seen, with Morag, how hard it is to live amongst strangers even when their clans have never been enemies. We have nearly always been at odds with the Camerons. Also, if you have not seen your kinsmen for some time…”
“Not since the battle at Perth,” he said.
“God-a-mercy, they must think that you died there!”
“I don’t know what they think,” Fin admitted. “I doubt that anyone but Ivor knew who I was when I left the field. So folks in Lochaber likely do believe that all thirty of the Camerons at Perth died there. But I like to think that my family will be glad to learn that I did not and will likewise welcome the woman who so recently kept another rogue from killing me. But if they are not glad about the first—”
“Why would they not be?”
He had not meant to raise that subject. But he said honestly, “The men of my family number amongst those