Then again... perhaps that was the sound of her heart throbbing in her ears? Nay, it couldn't be. The tempo of her heart was much swifter and irregular.
Sucking in a deep breath, she turned her attention back to The Black Douglas. In the thick play of darkness and scant moonlight, and in his current sour mood, the nickname seemed forebodingly accurate. Thick raven hair, harshly sculpted cheekbones, forehead, and jaw, gray eyes that gleamed out of the murky shadows, and a gaze that arrowed straight through her very soul...
Perhaps it was a trick of the night, a deception of moonlight and shadow, that made it seem like the rest of her surroundings blurred and drained of color, until Connor Douglas's piercing gray eyes were the only spots of color left in an otherwise pitch-black night.
He was staring at her, and staring at her hard.
Despite Gabrielle's resolve not to let him see how greatly his presence disturbed her, she couldn't hold back the shiver that iced down her spine like a drop of melting snow. His expression was expectant, as though he waited for her to say or do... something. Gabrielle shook her head, not knowing what that something could be. Shouldn't he be the one to make the first overture? After all, it was he who'd hunted her down and waylaid her plans. For that, the man owed her an apology if nothing else.
She waited for one.
It didn't come.
Instead, Connor crossed his arms over his firm, flat belly and asked tightly, "Are all Sassenach women as stupid as ye, lass?"
His tone was low and gritty, as harsh as the gaze boring into her. Gabrielle bristled. "You think it stupid to try to help someone who helped you? How strange. I think it natural."
He took a step toward her. Not a large one, yet it felt huge to Gabrielle. The night seemed to close in around her.
/> She took a counterstep back. By comparison the retreat felt small and feeble. Her heartbeat throbbed in her ears, so loud it blotted out the night sounds. As though from a distance, his voice came again.
"'Tis maun stupid indeed," he growled, "when the helping in question could get ye killed."
Gabrielle retreated another step, even as he took another, more confident stride forward. He was closing the distance between them with alarming quickness. In another step she would be able to smell his musky scent, feel the heat of him seeping through the jack and trews and tunic, caressing the sensitive flesh beneath...
"There was never a chance of that," she countered, hoping her tone rang with indignation, knowing that her too soft, too breathless timbre didn't convey that at all.
"Nay?"
"Nay!"
"And what if ye and Ella had ridden upon a few stray Maxwells, or mayhap some that weren't so stray? What then? How would ye have defended yerself, Gabrielle Carelton? Could ye have defended yerself?"
"I'm not so helpless as you seem to think, nor is court life so sheltered. I've learned my share of tricks to keep myself safe. The Maxwell would not have hurt me."
"Och! is that the way of it?" His laughter—loud, devoid of mirth—cut through the damp night air like a knife. The husky rumble sliced a warm path down Gabrielle's spine. "Nae matter how sternly ye did it, I dinny think that correcting their manners would have stopped a reiver from aught."
Like an expertly aimed arrow, the insult hit its mark. Gabrielle winced. She reacted on one part anger, one part instinct—hand lifting, open palm swinging toward his arrogant cheek—before she even knew she was doing it.
For a big man, Connor moved fast. Frighteningly so... Gabrielle realized this only in retrospect.
Before she could blink, he countered the attack. His powerful fingers shackled her wrist, bringing her up short. Her palm was brought to a bone-jarring halt a mere fraction from blistering contact.
His grip was tight, but not painfully so.
Yet.
The glint in Connor Douglas's cold gray eyes as he glared down into Gabrielle's surprise-widened green ones said his restraint was hard won and, perhaps, temporary. His anger was tethered right now only by the utmost of self-control, a rein that could dissolve at any moment.
A muscle buried deep in the left side of his jaw ticked erratically. Like a magnet, her gaze was drawn to the stubble-dusted flesh there, inches from his sensuously carved mouth.
She sucked in a deep breath, only to find it was filled with the leather-and-spice scent that was Connor Douglas. She released the breath in a rush and watched, unnaturally fascinated, as it turn to a transparent, pale vapor that twisted and mingled with his.
The anger she'd felt only a second ago—she had been angry, hadn't she?—melted away to another, more confusing emotion. Dark and intriguing and mysterious, the sensation wove its way through her, so strong it heated the blood pumping hot and fast through her veins, and made her knees feel weak and watery.
And what, exactly, was she feeling?
It was a grand question, that. Pity she'd no answer.