Page 77 of Highlander’s Protector

“But for three years, I’ve been making it here. I learned sword fighting. I traveled through Scotland. I survived medieval battles. And, most importantly, I always did the right thing by my sister and her clan.

“So I don’t need to return to my own time to find proof of my value. If my parents looked down at me from heaven, I think they’d be proud of me.”

Sìneag’s eyes were wet, and she wiped away a tear and looked at it, puzzled. “Oh… See, ye made me cry. If it makes a difference, I am proud of ye, too, David.”

He grinned and looked back at the Islay landscape below. “She pushed me away to free me. But I can only be free when I’m with her. And the home I’ve always looked for is here”—as though an oven had been lit inside his chest, heat spread through him—“inside me. But it will only be complete with Anna.”

He turned to Sìneag.

He didn’t need to fight against this land, against the feudal laws and wars he couldn’t change. It was his—good, bad, and ugly. His to love and cherish, his to live and breathe, like Anna.

Love pulsed through him, pure and hot. He leaned down and kissed Sìneag on the cheek, feeling her cold tears on his face. She touched her skin and blushed.

“I won’t need the passage, Sìneag. I’m in the place and time where I belong. I just need to tell the person I belong with, as well.”

He turned around and walked down the hill. Halfway down, a figure appeared from behind a boulder, and he stopped breathing.

Anna.

Her eyes were round, her hands shaking.

With the heat in his chest pulsing, he scooped her into his arms and whirled her around. Her feminine scent was in his nostrils, her weight light in his arms. He put her on the ground to kiss her.

But he caught empty air instead of her lips.

She bent over to her side and vomited.

Astonished, David watched her retch. A moment later, he came to his senses and held her hair back as she emptied her stomach.

“Are you all right, sweetheart?” he asked.

Breathing heavily, she straightened and wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve. Her cheeks were flushed, and her forehead misted with sweat. “I’m all right… I heard everything. Are ye really staying?”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said, cupping her heated face. “I’m staying because all I’ve been looking for is you.”

Her sweet face spread in a happy smile that tightened his chest. But she bent over and retched once more, heaving.

When she was done, she put her hands on her knees, breathing heavily. David studied her. “You vomited because I whirled you?” Realization flashed in his head like a light bulb. “Wait…are you still pregnant?”

She sighed and smiled shyly. “I think I am.”

“Christ!” David pulled her into his arms and kissed the top of her head. He wanted to shield her from everything. Be her and their baby’s protector. Be her home and her world, just like she was his. “You just made me the happiest man in the world.”

She giggled into his chest and sagged against him.

“I found my home with you, Anna. I built a life for myself in this time that is richer than any life I could have imagined in modern times. This is where I belong. There’s just one thing to clarify. Without your father insisting and your uncle threatening to cut off my balls, this is me, asking you, the girl I love. Will you marry me?”

She looked up at him, joy sparkling in her dark eyes. “Aye, David. What a happy woman I am. Marrying my protector from the future, the love of my life.”

EPILOGUE

One week later…

“Do ye, David, take Anna to be yer wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, for fairer or for fouler, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death you depart, according to God’s holy ordinance?” asked the priest.

David held Anna’s hands in his, standing before the priest by the entrance of the church in Dunyvaig village. The day had been a bit cool for July, with north winds blowing strongly, but the sun shone brightly in the cloudless sky. Anna’s hair flared in the wind, her dark eyes glistening with joy, her lips spread in that smile he could never get tired of.

This was it. The moment he’d remember for the rest of his life.