Page 41 of The Laird's Masked Passion

When she was ready, Colin offered his arm. Elspeth looked at it.

“Must I?”

“Aye.”

Elspeth sighed, then placed her hand upon his arm.

“There,” she said. “Dae try nae tae become unbearable from triumph.”

“I was unbearable long before ye came.”

She almost smirked. “At last, a confession.”

They left the chamber and entered the corridor. The castle seemed different by daylight. At night it was all shadow, fire, and stone. Now, pale morning spread through narrow windows, touching tapestries faded by age and carved doors darkened by generations of hands. Servants dipped their heads as they passed. Some glanced at Elspeth with curiosity, some with suspicion.

Elspeth lifted her chin. They should.

They turned into a broader passage hung with portraits. Men and women of the MacKenzie line watched from the walls, stern-faced and richly dressed, each one looking as though they had been painted while displeased by the artist’s very breathing.

Elspeth slowed despite herself. One portrait in particular caught her eye. It was larger than the others and set in a heavy dark frame. The man within it stood with one hand resting upon the hilt of a sword. He had black hair, hard eyes, and amouth shaped for command rather than kindness. His face was older than Colin’s, rougher at the edges, but the likeness was unmistakable.

Elspeth glanced from the painting to the man beside her.

“Oh,” she said before sense could stop her. “Ye look exactly like him.”

The change was instant. Colin’s arm hardened beneath her fingers, as if flesh had become stone by force of will. The air around him seemed to close. The little warmth that existed between them, if it could be called warmth and not simply the remains of last night’s strange truce, vanished.

“Dae I?” he asked.

The words were quiet.

Elspeth’s fingers loosened against his sleeve. “I only meant?—”

“I ken what ye meant.”

There was no anger in his voice, and that made it worse. Anger she could answer. Anger she could meet with her own and feel armed. This was a door being shut while she still stood on the threshold.

She looked again at the portrait.

“Is he yer faither?”

Colin’s jaw moved once. “Aye.”

Something in that single word warned her away. She heard it as clearly as if he had drawn a blade and laid it between them.

But because she was Elspeth Fraser, and because warnings never suited her well, she added more softly. “I didnae mean insult.”

His gaze turned on her then. For a heartbeat she saw something beneath the coldness, something buried so deeply it had grown teeth in the dark. Then, it was gone.

“Come,” he urged.

The word was not rough, but it carried no patience. He began walking, and because her hand still rested upon his arm, Elspeth had to follow or be dragged like an unruly child. Pride made her keep pace.

Ahead, the noise of the hall grew louder: voices, dishes, benches shifting, the ordinary sounds of people beginning a day. But Elspeth barely heard them.

She glanced once over her shoulder. The painted man watched from his frame, dark-eyed and severe.

Colin’s father.