The MacKinnon's Bride (The Highland Brides, #1)

by Tanya Anne Crosby

If he had been at his post to begin with, she might not be in this predicament—she mightn’t have left the castle so effortlessly. And yet she knew the fault was not his, but hers. She should have known better—curse

It mattered not what she’d said, or what she secretly hoped, she wouldn’t delude herself into thinking otherwise. They were stuck with her, didn’t they know.

Then, too, his actions only served to stress that her own father had lied yet again. The man before her no more beat his son than he would beat her. The thought both relieved and aggrieved her at once.

“Weel,” he said, twisting his little lips as he considered. “I suppose ye can,” he yielded, and started to fiddle with something beneath his tunic. Page smiled in triumph, and then to her horror, watched as he began to pee upon the ground. “See,” he said, with some pride, lifting a finger to point at the wet dirt before him. It was then Page noticed that part of the ground was damp already.

What sort of man went so far as not to name his own daughter? Page was no name at all, but a mere role to be played.

“So d’ ye think we can keep her?” Malcom ventured. Iain found himself grinning down at his son, and soon to be coconspirator. “D’ ye wish to keep her, Malcom?”

“Guid, then. Let us both woo her together. You work on her heart,” he charged his son. “And what part o’ her will you work to woo?” Malcom asked innocently. “Her brain, da? Will ye work to woo her brain?”

All those years she’d pretended she didn’t care... he’d made them all a terrible lie. Aye, for she cared with every fiber of her being—hurt with every last drop of blood that was wrung from her heart. And it was Iain MacKinnon’s fault, because before him, she had been blissfully numb.

we canna take the world upon our shoulders, lass.”

“Aye, da,” his son declared with a certainty. “I been without a woman too long, too,” he revealed somewhat dejectedly.

“Aw, yeah, da,” Malcom answered resolutely. “Ach, but I been thinkin’ it would be a guid thing to have a lassie aboot to croon me to sleep now and again.” Iain chuckled at his son’s waggish admission. Struggling to contain his mirth, he whacked his son’s leg affectionately, and smiled as he walked.

occurred to her suddenly that her name was simply that, a name. In a sense, it was a badge of honor for all she’d suffered at her father’s hands. But no more did she feel shamed by it. To the contrary, she felt pride—because she had endured. Because she was unbroken still. What greater revenge could she have over her misbegotten father than to live, and to live well, to walk with pride? Who could dare pity her when her heart was filled with gladness? “I’ve decided,” she told them both, a slight smile crooking her lips, “that I like my name, after all.”

Leave her alone

with them for five bloody minutes, and he returns to find them undressed every damned time.