Beyond the Highland Mist

Page 99

“Enough, Beauty.” Adam captured her hand in his. “The universe awaits us and your pleasure is my command.”
Hawk’s heart wrenched and twisted. The damned Ever-hard. Her first love, whether he’d ever made love to her or not. He turned away before he could make a bloody massacre of the ridge singlehandedly.
When he finally returned his gaze to her, it was too late—she was gone.
The mass of hundreds on the ridge at Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea stood numbly as both horses and riders simply vanished into the night air. One moment they were there. The next—nothing.
But a soft voice floated on the breeze. You were right about your falcons, Sidheach, came the strange last words of the woman he’d loved and who had effectively destroyed the once proud laird of Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea.
Lydia clutched at his sleeve limply.
Rushka cursed harshly in a language no one had ever heard before.
Hawk only stared blindly into the night.
CHAPTER 30
“WHERE ARE WE?” ADRIENNE ASKED ADAM WOODENLY.
He was leading her mount by the reins down a dark path through a strange forest. Twisted branches wove a gnarled canopy above her head. Occasionally a ray of faint light would pierce the dense gloom and the creaking branches would glimmer like bleached bones.
No crickets. No normal noises, only the screech of flying creatures. The bracken rustled, revealing brief glimpses of dwarfed gnomes with wild faces. She shivered violently and hugged her arms around herself.
“You are in my realm.”
“Who are you really, Adam Black?” Her voice broke on the simple sentence, raw and full of anguish.
For an answer, she received a mocking smile. Nothing more.
“Tell me,” she demanded dully. But the dark man at her side rode in silence.
“At least tell me why.”
“Why what?” He cocked a curious brow at her.
“Why did you do this to me? What did I do? Why did you send me back in time and take me away again?” And break my heart and leave me dying inside?
Adam stopped their mounts, amusement lighting his dark visage. He reached out a hand to stroke her pale cheek and she shuddered beneath his hand. “Oh, Beauty, is that what you think? How very self-engrossed and utterly charming you are.” His laughter rolled. But it was his next words that shafted through her soul like a knife. “It had nothing to do with you, my winsome beauty. Any beautiful woman would have sufficed. But I thought you hated beautiful men. I heard you, there in your library, swearing off men, all men. Yet, it would seem I was mistaken. Or you lied, which is more likely.”
“What are you saying?” she breathed faintly. Any woman would have sufficed? Her heart was laid bare and cleaved through by this man’s twisted game, and he dared say so baldly that it hadn’t mattered one whit who she was? A pawn? Again? Her jaw locked temporarily. I will not scream. I will not. When she was certain she could speak without raging she said coolly, “You got what you wanted. Why won’t you just tell me who you are?” She had to find out more about this man to avenge herself. To avenge her husband.
“True. I did get what I wanted. The Hawk looked utterly destroyed, wouldn’t you say? Crushed.” Adam flicked his hand lightly over hers. “You did very well tonight, Beauty. But tell me”—his eyes searched hers intently, and she stiffened when it seemed they might penetrate into her very soul—“what did you mean about his falcons?”
Adrienne’s breath hitched. “He told me once that all his falcons had flown him,” she lied evenly. “You told me I had to be utterly convincing or you would kill him, so I chose that reminder to drive the point home. That’s all.”
“That had better be all.” His face was cold and unforgiving. Just as it had been in the broch before the Hawk had come looking for her. Before what should have been the wedding of her dreams. Icily, he’d explained to her in exact and excruciating detail precisely how he would destroy the Hawk and everyone at Dalkeith if she failed his will. Then he’d shown her things he could do. Things her mind still couldn’t quite comprehend. But she’d understood that he was perfectly capable of carrying out the mass destruction he’d threatened. Two choices he’d given her—either lie to the Hawk and break his heart, not to mention her own, or stand by while Adam used his unnatural powers to kill him. Then Lydia. Followed by every man, woman, and child at Dalkeith.
No, there had been no choice at all. The hellish decision had given her an intimate understanding of what a man called the king’s whore might once have suffered.