Page 2 of Her Forbidden Highlander Husband

“That is all.” Her father dismissed her with a casual wave of his hand.

This hurt her the most. The way he cast her aside as nothing. Gone was the father who shared stories of his youth and planned a great future for her. The man had loved Evelyn’s mother to distraction and often spoke of Evelyn finding a man who would worship her as he had his wife. That dream had died at the hands of five monsters.

“Yes, Father.” She left his study feeling weighed down by her impending fate. But it was only just early May and the Morgans wouldn’t arrive until September at the earliest.

She had time to come up with a way out of this. She’d spend every waking moment focused on that task. One thing was certain, though.

She wouldn’t be marrying anyone.

Chapter Two

Liam MacKinlay stepped into his chamber and smiled widely, just as he had for the past year. It was a silly thing to be so happy to have his own room.

It wasn’t grand in any way, but it had a large, soft bed long enough for his tall frame. A stand with a washbasin stood next to the door, and in the corner there was a trunk that still remained mostly empty, since he didn’t have many things to fill it.

He’d hung his few articles of clothing and his weapons on the pegs in the wall. It wasn’t much, but it was his.

Growing up an orphan, he’d slept wherever it was convenient. Davinna MacKinlay, the current laird’s late mother, had given him a bed in her solar when he was small. Later, when he’d joined the ranks of warriors, he simply bedded down in the hall with the rest of the bachelor soldiers of the clan.

However, for the last year Liam had been the war chief, and the war chief was given his own quarters that he could share with a wife.

Visions of a lass with golden-red hair and dark brown eyes came to him. Evelyn Stewart. The only woman he’d ever wanted for a wife.

Liam had already asked her father twice for her hand. Once, a few years ago, when Liam had escorted her home to her clan after she’d been found on MacKinlay lands as a prisoner to a group of beastly men. She’d not spoken much at all as Liam rode next to her during their weekslong journey.

He took up most of their time telling her stories to help keep her mind off what had happened to her. He’d earned a few smiles and fewer laughs, but he felt they’d bonded in a way. There was a night he’d had to wake her from a terror and she’d cried. She’d allowed him to hold her while she wept, and his heart was hers from that point on.

He’d offered for her on the spot when he’d delivered her to her father and wasn’t surprised the man was too stunned to answer with more than a curt, “Go away.”

Last year when Liam had been sent to secure the Stewarts’ assistance, he saw it as an opportunity to ask again. He waited as they traveled closer to Dunardry. The night before they were to join the rest of his clan, Liam took a chance and was rejected once again.

Liam flopped onto his bed and reached out across the empty space, smiling despite the emptiness beside him. He now had a bed and a position that might help change the man’s mind, for he’d already given Evelyn Stewart his heart. He wanted to give her his name. Rather the name he’d taken, since he didn’t have one of his own.

It was time to take fate into his own hands. He got up and went to the laird’s study. He hovered by the open door, appraising the man’s mood. Lachlan MacKinlay was playing with his newest son, Andrew. The boy had been born hours after they’d returned from defeating the McCurdys. The babe stared up at his father adoringly.

Not wanting to intrude on the moment, Liam made to step out but bumped into Kenna in the doorway as she came up behind him and entered the room.

“Are you coming or going?” the laird’s wife asked with a smile as she went to her husband and took the lad.

Liam bowed. “I can come back another time.”

“Come in. What’s on your mind?” The laird of the MacKinlay clan waved him closer.

Lachlan was like a brother to him, though much older. Liam remembered following him and his cousins around.

Kenna gave Liam’s arm a squeeze as she walked by. He remembered when her hand would have circled his forearm, but now at twenty, he was much too large. Still tall and lanky, he’d filled out to the point he was nearly as wide as the laird.

Liam cleared his throat and stepped closer. “As you know, my laird, we approach a year since we took Baehaven and I became your war chief.”

“And as you know, I’ve asked you many times since to call me Lach.”

“Yes. Lachlan—I mean, Lach,” he corrected quickly as the other man frowned. He was making a hash of it. “Very well. And a good day to you.” Liam turned to leave.

“Liam?”

“Aye, my laird?” He squeezed his eyes closed but didn’t attempt to correct his blunder yet again.

“I believe ye forgot to tell me the purpose of your visit.”