Page 8 of Claimed By a Ruthless Scot
The motion was so swift Elaina scarcely registered it as such. The man from the tavern caught the wrist mid-strike with a precision that suggested long habit. There was a sharp twist, a wet crack of bone, and the dagger fell uselessly to the stones. Before the attacker could even cry out, he drove an elbow into his throat and sent him crashing backward into the wall. He slid down it bonelessly, unconscious before he reached the ground.
It was over. He didn’t even look at him again.
Elaina stared, stunned, her mind struggling to catch up with what her eyes had seen. There had been no wasted motion, no fury… only control, as though the man had never been a threat at all.
The one holding her swore and dragged her tighter against him, the dagger biting enough to draw a thin line of fire along her skin.
“Stay back!” he shouted, panic finally cracking his voice.
He turned his full attention to them, moving slowly toward them, one step at a time. He did not look like a man in the midst of violence. He looked like a man dealing with an inconvenience he had already solved.
“Ye’re shaking,” he observed calmly, with his eyes on the man’s hand, not Elaina’s face. “That makes ye dangerous. And mistakes tend tae follow.”
“Dinnae come any closer!” the man barked.
Elaina’s heart pounded so fiercely she thought she might faint, yet she could not tear her gaze from him. This was not the charming stranger from the tavern. This was something far colder and far more capable.
“Let her go,” he said again, softly now. “Ye still have a chance tae walk away.”
The man laughed, but it sounded shrill and desperate. “Ye think I fear ye?”
His mouth curved not in humor, but in something infinitely worse.
“Nay,” he said. “But I think yeshould.”
The enemy hesitated. That was all it took.
He struck the man’s wrist with brutal precision, disarming him in a blur of motion and freeing Elaina. The dagger flew from the enemy’s grasp as her savior twisted, hooked an arm around his neck, and wrenched him backward. Elaina stumbled free just as he drove the man face-first into the stone wall.
Elaina stood frozen, her pulse roaring in her ears, staring at the three men sprawled helplessly at their feet. He turned to her at last.
“Are ye hurt?” he asked quietly.
She swallowed hard, acutely aware that her legs were trembling and that she could not quite remember how to speak.
“Nay,” she managed. “I… nae.”
His gaze flicked briefly to her throat, to the faint line where the blade had pressed, and something dark flashed through his eyes, but it was gone almost as soon as it appeared.
“Good,” he said.
Only then did Elaina fully grasp what unsettled her most. He had not broken a sweat. And she knew that if there had been ten men instead of three, the outcome would have been exactly the same.
Then, he caught her by the arm in a firm and unyielding grip, pulling her away from the alley before she could do so much as draw a full breath. Elaina stumbled after him, feeling the world tilting as the narrow passage fell away behind them.
“Wait,” she said breathlessly. “Where are ye taking me?”
“Somewhere with fewer knives,” he replied without slowing.
“And tae whom,” she demanded, struggling to keep pace, “dae I owe me life?”
He glanced back at her then, a corner of his mouth lifting in a faint, infuriating smirk. “Mostly tae me curiosity.”
She yanked her arm slightly, though she did not pull free. “That is nae an answer.”
“It is the most honest one I have,” he said simply. “I am taking ye tae the inn where I am staying. Ye may decide what tae dae after that.”
They turned onto a broader street, lantern light spilling over the stones. Only then did he loosen his grip, though he did not release her entirely.
