The Highlander's Triumph (The Stolen Bride Series) by Eliza Knight

Author:Eliza Knight
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Eliza Knight
Published: 2013-06-12T12:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

Brandon’s heart pounded a staccato beat rivaling that of a hundred warhorses drumming a path upon the battlefield.

The English king’s mistress? Though he was certain he’d not heard wrong, Brandon wished he had. Longshanks had laid a path between her thighs before himself? He’d never given thought to the previous lovers of women he bedded, but Mariana was different. She wasn’t simply a woman he’d lain with. Their coupling had not been about gaining pleasure, but a mutual give and receive. A transferring of something deeper within their souls. The fact that his enemy had been inside her body, kissed her skin, smelled her essence, disturbed him immensely.

He loathed King Edward with a passion that threatened to overwhelm him. Inside, rage clashed with jealousy. If the man stood before him now, there was nothing that would stop Brandon from running him through with his sword. Slitting his throat from ear to ear. Burning his insides as the man still breathed, then scattering his body in pieces from the north, south, east and west.

Before he returned to his seat in the northern Highlands, he wanted to see the bastard hanging from a noose he made himself—but now even more so for having laid claim to a woman that for a few brief moments, Brandon had thought could be his.

His hands clenched at his sides, jaw throbbed from grinding his teeth.

Mariana’s eyes were wide as she stared at him. But that was the only discerning set to her face. Her lips were flat, no curve up or down, and her brows were neither furrowed nor raised. She tried hard to hide how she felt, but Brandon could see the regret within her eyes. He just couldn’t figure out if she regretted sleeping with him or telling him her secret.

“Say something,” she said, her voice husky with held in emotion.

Brandon swallowed and forced himself to speak. “Your horse awaits ye in the courtyard.” Not the words he wanted to say. Not the reaction he wanted to have. But what could he do?

She belonged to another man—his enemy.

The words he both longed for and dreaded did not leave her lips. There was no declaration of her loyalty to him. She’d not said she had been the king’s mistress, but that she was.

“I see.” Mariana lost face for a single second.

Brandon would have missed it if he blinked. Her lower lip quivered, and she rapidly blinked back tears. Then, as though she’d suddenly recovered, she lifted her skirts with dainty hands and turned away from him. Head held high, she marched to the archway, and disappeared down the stairwell that led toward the courtyard.

His feet remained rooted in place and he was unable to move, unable to speak. He’d watched, disbelieving, until her skirts swished and vanished around a corner. The lass wouldn’t get far since they were on an island and the men waiting outside wouldn’t leave without Brandon. Even still, the fear that she’d walked out of his life forever made his chest burn.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.