The Highlander's Little Lass Read online

  Now, at least, the king was forcing his, Ina thought as they reached the landing that overlooked the great hall below. There would be no turning back for the willful lass who stood at the railing looking down on the men filing toward the dais where her father sat waiting to receive them.

  Ina almost smirked to see the man at the head of the line. That would be him, Bran McKinnon—Bran the Bull. She almost wished she were going, if for no more reason than to see the arrogant chit try to push this one around. This was no shy, slim Alan McLeod. The man she was watching stood at least 6′2″ and at least fifteen stone. And he was handsome, too, with shoulder-length black hair, skin that was weathered but not worn, a strong, square jaw, and a muscular build. His sexual exploits were legendary, and seeing him in the flesh, Ina could understand why a woman would be hard-pressed to resist him. He may be called ‘the bull’ for what lay beneath his kilt, but he moved with the grace and power of a lion.

  “There’s nothing to be seen here, child.” Ina took hold of Glynis’ arm in one last attempt to keep her from listening.

  “Wheest!” the lass hissed, her eyes fixed on the scene below. Ina could tell that her gaze was trained on the one man, the largest, the man who Glynis did not yet know was her new betrothed.

  “Laird McKinnon.” Kiernan McLeod did not rise from his chair, but did give the larger, younger laird a cordial nod that Bran returned. “I trust your trip here was easy.”

  “Aye,” Bran said. “Fair weather followed us, it seems.”

  “It can change,” Laird McLeod replied. “Like a woman’s mind.” He sighed and sat forward. “You’re here for my Glynis, and no doubt word has reached you that she’s changed hers before. I trust you know the details.”

  “It’s not my habit to listen to gossip,” Bran replied.

  The other man chuckled. “Were everyone so prudent.” He did stand now, and walked over to accept two drams of whiskey from a servant. He handed one to Bran before continuing. “She’s not an easy lass. The young man we’d intended for her to marry was raised rough as any other Highland lad. But he was no match for her.” Laird McLeod downed his dram in one swallow and fixed his eyes on his former rival. “Have you ever encountered one of our native Scottish wildcats?”

  “Aye,” Bran said with a nod. “Small but fierce.”

  “Especially when cornered,” Kiernan McLeod said. He fixed the younger man with a weary-eyed stare. “That’s what you’re taking back with ye, so when she scratches ye, dinna blame me. Blame the king.”

  “Blame the king for what?” A high, angry voice spoke the words.

  At first Bran thought it was a child descending the stairs. The woman flying down the steps wasn’t much bigger than a child, but the curves under her gown indicated someone more mature than her behavior would indicate.

  “Answer me, da!” she said, her waist-length red tresses bouncing as she stomped across the room, just out of reach of a larger woman in a nanny’s dress. Right away Bran realized that this tiny angry woman was the wildcat Laird McLeod had been referring to. Her eyes even flashed green as a cat’s, and she shot Bran a withering, dismissive look before turning to her father. “What are you speaking of?”

  “Your betrothal, Glynis,” her father said quietly. “And I daresay you won’t claw your way out of this one, since it’s been ordered by the king himself.” He nodded toward Bran, whose kinsmen were standing some distance behind him, watching the developments with interest. “This is Laird Bran McKinnon and your marriage to him will be the physical representation of what is set to be a truce between clans McKinnon and McLeod.”

  For a moment, Glynis was shocked into a rare silence. But it was a short one. “You think you’re going to marry me to a foul, unwashed McKinnon?” Her tone was deceptively calm. “You’re going to give me to a man whose cock is still wet from where he last stuck it in a sheep?”

  Ina gasped at this. Even some of the men looked from one to another, perplexed at this language. Her father stomped over to where she stood.

  “Glynis!” He glowered down at her, and Bran watched, noting that the lass not only didn’t move, she didn’t even flinch. This was obviously a female used to getting what she wanted without consequence. He decided it was time to step in.

  “So she’s mine, then?” Bran stepped up to the McLeod, stared down at the man. His expression was not challenging, but it was resolute.

  Kiernan McLeod’s eyes filled with sadness, knowing his years of weak indulgence would now cost his cherished daughter more than just her freedom. He nodded. “She’s yours, if ye can handle her.”

  At the McLeod’s affirmation, Bran McKinnon grabbed Glynis by both arms and turned her around, ignoring her string of curses as he pulled her back up against his chest.

  “You’re the foul one,” he said. “And the ugliness of your words has shamed your father’s house. Apologize.”

  Glynis was struggling, and while she was unusually strong for her size, she was no match for the muscular man holding her. She offered no apologies, only more curses.

  “Unhand me, ye filthy sheep-shagging cur!”

  “You’ll make an apology to your father and all assembled, or you’ll be sorry,” Bran warned, ignoring her barbs.

  “I’ll nae apologize to my betraying bastard of a father or you and your worthless kin! You can all go to Old Nick, if he’ll have the sorry lot of ye!”

  “Very well, then,” Bran said, walking over to the raised platform and brazenly taking his place in the chair the other laird had vacated. “Since we’re to be married, it’s best that ye learn from the jump what happens when ye disobey!”

  Glynis was pulled so abruptly across Bran’s broad lap that the breath was momentarily knocked out of her. When she next exhaled, it was in a cry of outrage at the feeling of cool air hitting her bottom. The beast had bared her! He’d bared her in front of everyone! She tried desperately to pull herself off his lap, and when she couldn’t, she looked up to fix her shocked and panicked eyes on the first person she saw.

  Her nanny stared back with a cool look of satisfaction that chilled her, and Glynis knew the woman was taking enormous gratification from what was shaping up to be her charge’s first and well-deserved public humiliation.

  The next sound Glynis heard was a smack! that echoed off the stone walls of the room. The sound was punctuated by a scream—her own scream. How long had it been since she’d been spanked? She’d not exaggerated on the stairs when she’d reminded Ina that her last correction had occurred when she was still in nappies.

  The blows seemed to be falling everywhere. She tried to look back, but the cloud of hair obscured her view and all she could feel was that huge hand falling and falling, the expanse of it nearly covering the whole of a bottom that was getting hotter and more tender with each passing blow.

  “Stop! Stop! Stop!” Glynis wailed, abandoning the stream of curses she’d planned to employ. Her bottom felt like it was on fire—as if it were swelling into a hot, painful blister. And—oh, god!—if she was facing Ina, then it meant her bottom was facing…

  Her head was hanging down and she looked past Bran’s bare, broad leg for an upside-down view of a group of smiling McKinnons. She hated them—hated each and every one—but could not tell them; all she could do was cry.

  And then suddenly, it was over. The blows had stopped, even though the steady agonizing throb continued. Glynis swayed as Bran righted her to her feet. The big hand that had just spanked her now pushed aside tendrils of hair that tears had plastered to her face. The touch was surprisingly gentle.

  Someone produced a kerchief and now he was mopping her splotched face and tear-swollen eyes.

  “Blow,” he said, putting the cloth to her nose, and she obeyed, too distracted by her sore nates to offer any resistance.

  “Now there’s a good lass,” Bran said, pressing the cloth to her nose once more. When he’d finished wiping her tears, he leaned back for a better look at the young woman he’d just spanked. He knew to the asse
mbled onlookers she was the image of a little harridan who’d gotten just what she deserved. But he saw something else, and couldn’t believe his good fortune. Here in his grasp, by unwitting grace of the king, stood the mate he’d always dreamed of—a childlike woman, undisciplined and willful. She had a father, but if her behavior was any indicator, she’d never had a father’s guidance. He’d not spanked her gently, but she’d taken it in a hail of tears that satisfied the part of him that liked to hear a woman cry, and when he’d looked between her kicking legs, it had not escaped his notice that the fleecy curls covering her mons were slick with her virgin arousal. He’d stood her up before the men had gotten their eyes too full. He knew for her it felt as if she’d spent weeks over his lap, but in fact the whole thing had taken less than a minute. Any more and her adorable pert arse would have been purple instead of the nice dark pink his hand had painted it.

  “So, will ye be makin’ your apologies, little wildcat, or do I need to upend you once more?”

  Glynis turned to him, her expression a mixture of bewilderment, humiliation, and disbelief. Her full lower lip trembled prettily. It was all Bran could do not to catch it in his teeth and worry it until he felt her breath exhale in yet another pretty whimper. But all that could come later. For now he had one goal in mind—to establish his complete dominance from the start. He turned her toward Laird McLeod, who’d taken another chair and appeared to be both stunned and impressed.

  “Yer father, first,” he said.

  “I-I-I’m sorry, da,” she said.

  “Now this lady.” He turned her toward Ina.

  “I’m sorry, nanny…”

  He turned her toward her father’s men, some of whom were trying to hide smiles. The smiles disappeared when he glared over Glynis’ shoulder as she apologized. Then he turned her to his men. “Now to the McKinnons.”

  At this Glynis gave a horrified sob of humiliation. Like everyone else in her father’s clan, the last few years had conditioned her to hate those who lived across the border. Now she was being given to the largest among them, their laird and leader, and she had no choice in the matter. And what’s worse, her first act under his control was to debase herself to his team of ragged, rugged companions.

  “What’s it to be, lass?” Bran squeezed her already sore bottom hard enough to make her cry out, an obvious reminder that he’d happily spank it again should she refuse.

  She forced herself to meet their gazes, to study the mockery in their eyes. It fueled her own hatred, and at that moment her hatred was her only defense, the only wall she could build.

  “I’m forced to apologize,” she said. “And so I do.”

  Bran threw back his leonine head and laughed at this.

  “You’ve got a spirit about you, you do.” Then his face turned serious as he looked down at her. “I’ll stay here tonight. Tomorrow we’ll wed. But I’ll come talk to ye this eve so you’ll know well what I expect of ye before we take vows.” When he caught Ina’s concerned look, he took a reassuring tone. “Dinna fret. I can tell she’s had no mother besides you. I’ll not take her virtue before we’ve said vows. My talk to her will be in your company. For now, I want her in her room, with both a McKinnon and a McLeod by her door so she’ll nae escape.”

  “Come along, Glynis,” Ina said, and began to lead the still-shocked daughter of Kiernan McLeod away.

  “You’re quite the brash one, comin’ into another man’s castle, skelping his daughter and then barking orders like it’s your home and not his.” Laird McLeod’s eyes were narrowed. But then suddenly he stood, clapped Bran McKinnon on the back, and laughed. “I wish we’d met sooner. I’m thinkin’ this feud would have settled sooner had I’d know how much I’d like ye! We’ve always heard that Bran the Bull has a mighty cock! Seems he has balls to match!”

  The men—McLeods and McKinnons alike—were laughing heartily now. It was that mirthful sound that followed a humiliated Glynis to her room to wonder how her life could have changed so abruptly.

  Chapter Three: The First Comeuppance

  “’Tis nae the end of the world, lass.”

  Glynis was lying on her stomach, her face turned to the wall as Ina rubbed her red bottom with a soothing ointment. The young woman had spoken not a word since the encounter in the hall. A few months earlier, she’d fallen from her horse and bruised her right buttock on a rock. It had taken hours of coaxing before she’d allow the nanny to inspect her injured bottom. This time she’d offered no resistance when Ina had offered to ease the sting with some herbal liniment. It wasn’t that Glynis had suddenly become immodest; she just couldn’t imagine anything being more embarrassing than what she’d just experienced.

  “I know he’s a McKinnon, and you’ve been raised to hate the lot of them. But this is your chance to rise above that, for everyone’s sake. And he’s a laird, with lands and wealth.” Ina pulled the hem of her charge’s dress down over her bottom and put the lid back on the pot of ointment. “You could do worse given your past, and your age.”

  “I’m twenty—hardly a hag,” Glynis said flatly.

  “Not a hag, no.” Ina stood. “But your sister is but a year older and already with three bairns of her own.”

  “You let him hit me.” Glynis gingerly sat up. “You stood there and let him hit me.”

  Ina had moved to a cabinet to put away the salve. Now she turned back with her hands on her hips. “He didn’t hit you. He spanked you. And you deserved it, for all you’ve put your da through.” She paused. “For all you’ve put everyone through.”

  Glynis knew in her heart that Ina spoke the truth, but the childish, selfish part that ruled her personality and thoughts would not consider the feelings of others.

  “You’re not the wounded party,” she insisted. “I am.”

  Ina shrugged. “Suit yourself,” she said, turning away as she spoke. “Come the morrow, you’ll get what you want—me without a roof over my head. With you gone I’ll have no one to care for. And I’ll have what I want.”

  “And what is that?”

  “Knowledge that the obstinate, entitled, spoiled chit I raised from the time she slipped from her dying mama has met her match with a man who will save her from herself.” When she turned back, there were tears in her eyes. “If only your father been stronger. He was always so swayed by his pretty Glynis. He could never see your faults. He thought them folly. If only he’d have let me take you in hand, then what happened out there would nae have been necessary. If I had but my time to go over again, I’d have defied the McLeod, even if it had meant taking up the lash myself. I’d have defied him and spanked you daily until you were the perfect little lass in all respects. I’d have slippered you, birched you, and more—and all from love.” She studied Glynis’ shocked face. “But the opportunity to raise you is over.”

  “Is it?” A deep voice spoke from the doorway, and both women gasped to see Bran McKinnon standing there. As he walked over to Glynis, she froze, only her eyes betraying the dual emotions of fear and loathing.

  Once level with her, Bran took the chin of her heart-shaped face in his hand and looked down into her green eyes.

  “The way I see it, while you may be a woman in body, you’re but a wee bairn up here.” He tapped her temple gently with his finger. “It’s become quickly apparent that you’ve had no proper upbringing, at least not the kind needed to shape a willful lass. Your da says your ma died birthing ye, and because ye were such a bonny thing, he spoiled you.” He nodded toward Ina. “And the only one who could have straightened ye out was nae allowed to do the job. I intend to remedy that.”

  Ina stood. “What are you saying, Laird McKinnon?”

  Bran continued to keep his gaze locked on Glynis as he spoke. “I’m saying that after we are wed on the morrow, fair Glynis here will return with me to Castle McKinnon, where she will live not just as my wife, but as my bairn. You, Ina, will come with me as her nanny, and will be given free rein in whatever methods you need to employ to help me raise Glynis to be
the proper lady she was born to be. An important part of her upbringing has been neglected. Once across the border, that will be remedied.”

  Despite her best efforts, Glynis began to shake from anger and fear. A tear rolled down her face and over the fingers clutching it.

  “How can I be both bairn and wife?”

  Bran chuckled. His handsome face split into a smile that was patient and not at all unkind. “Trust me, I’ve given this a lot of thought.”

  “My da…”

  “Will do nothing to save you from this,” Bran said. “He loves you to the moon and back, but he’s a decent man and will nae sacrifice his clan nor his holdings for the sake of a willful daughter, especially when he knows she’s going to a man who will give her just what she needs.”

  “You don’t want me,” Glynis said. “Choose another.”

  “Ach, lass. You don’t know me well enough to know that you are exactly what I want. In fact, I nae thought I’d find anyone like you.” He let go of her face and ruffled her hair, as one might a child’s. “Until tomorrow, little Glynis.”

  Glynis watched him go, noting how the top of his head nearly grazed the doorframe above. He was the biggest man she’d ever seen, and the only person she’d encountered whose intent she could not thwart. Even though she stood a mere five feet in height, her strong presence had always made her feel so much larger. This was the first time in her life that anyone had made her feel small and helpless. She was feeling a sudden riot of emotions: anger, indignation, but something else, too. She shifted on the bed. Had her fear of him caused her to wet herself? There was an odd clenching between her legs she could not explain, and moisture. She closed her eyes against the odd feeling. A moment later she opened them, but continued to sit on the bed, still staring toward the door.