Page 105 of Hold Fast

He said as if it were a death sentence. Ewan understood. Sometimes it felt like his life had ended when he’d become laird and he’d become a mere occupation. Until Una, that is. Una, who had breathed life and hope and peace back into his days.

He needed to get her away from here as quickly as possible. No matter that Blair was her friend. No matter that she seemed to trust him. Ewan didn’t trust anyone with her safety right now when he barely trusted himself.

“We shall be on our way then,” Ewan said.

Blair took a step forward and gripped the hilt of his sword. “I cannae let you do that.”

“What is it that you want?” Ewan asked, drawing Una closer to his side.

Blair sighed. “That is the question now, aye? The clan will want retribution. They will want the laird avenged.”

Ewan’s hand tightened around the hilt of his claymore. “I have hundreds of men in the woods. What’s to stop us from leaving right now?”

“I wouldnae need to stop all of them. Just the two of you.” His rough voice was quiet. He almost sounded sad. Regretful. Ewan’s jaw tightened, and he felt the hilt of his sword warming in his palm.

“Blair,” Una whispered, her voice thick with tears. “Please. Dinnae do this. We are friends.”

“Aye,” Blair said. “We are friends. Which is why I willnae allow you to come to harm. But I must have something to show them, something in return to settle the debt.”

Ewan knew that they could fight, he and Blair. They could settle the score now on this riverbed. But he also knew that there was a very strong possibility that neither of them would survive such a fight. And then what?

“What if…” Una said, stepping out of Ewan’s hold. “I was meant to marry Laird Cameron. That’s what he wanted. He wanted to claim my child as his heir. What if… what if I give you half? I will stay with you if you let the bairn go to her father when she’s weaned.”

Ewan dropped his sword in shock, something he had never done in his entire adult life. What had she said?What the hell had she said?

“Goddamnit! Why, Una? Why would ye offer such a thing?” Ewan shouted, feeling his helplessness and anger and fear coursing through his veins like a flood. He cupped her face in his hands.

She brought her own hands to his cheeks. “Because if I dinnae stay, you might die. Cannae you see that? I would rather live my life without you knowing that you’re alive and well than live my life without you because you died for my crimes.”

“Una, dinnae do this to me,” Ewan whispered. He felt that old, familiar sensation, that caged animal in his chest that strained and threw itself against its confinement.

“’Tis a fair suggestion,” Blair replied, and Ewan bit back a roar. “But I dinnae want you for a wife, Una. Nae offense. Neither do I particularly want to kill your man here.”

“You could try,” Ewan said, picking up his sword even as Una shoved against his chest.

Blair didn’t flinch. He raised one large, dark eyebrow and crossed his arms.

Perhaps they could settle in trade. An alliance. Ewan would ask the utmost of his brothers. Perhaps there were two Cameron ladies in need of husbands. Such alliances were formed all the time. Angus would do it. Kenneth, too. And there was the MacDonald wool. They could arrange something in commerce.

Ewan’s mind was racing, calculating what they could spare and trying to remember the Cameron family tree when a voice rang out from the crowd of men gathered. “I’ll settle the debt. I’ll be kept prisoner in Una’s stead.”

CHAPTER49

Una would know that voice anywhere. What in God’s name was Joan doing here? She scanned the shadowed crowd and saw a hooded figure threading through the men. She pushed back her hood with a brilliant smile, and Una choked on a startled laugh. Joan always had loved a dramatic entrance.

“Joan?” Blair and Ewan said in unison, their eyes wide, looking at one another as if surprised that the other knew her name.

“Dinnae look quite so shocked,” Joan said with a smirk.

“You say that like finding my sister’s lady-in-waiting among a fighting force is to be expected,” Ewan said dryly, and Joan smiled beatifically at him.

“I’ve always had a knack for finding trouble.”

“Trouble is an understatement, Joan,” Blair growled. “You could have been killed.”

“You could have been killed also, Blair, but you werenae killed and neither was I and so it doesnae matter,” Joan said with a dismissive flick of her hand.

Una was confused. When had Joan met Blair? Una hadn’t met him until her handfast to his brother, and Joan had been her very best friend until they were both sixteen. How didsheknow him? How did she know him well enough to be so forward, toteasehim?