Read The Striker for Free Online Page B

known he was young, but . . .
    Quickly covering any disappointment she might be feeling—so what if he didn’t look much older than her sixteen-year-old brother, Uchtred? He was a fine-looking young man, and more important, the son of one of Scotland’s greatest lords!—she took the seat that had been set out for her between the young lordling and her father, and spent most of the first course of the meal trying to make him relax.
    He was shy, and seemed perhaps a little in awe of her, but Margaret was good at drawing people out. She asked him about his family. He had two sisters, Elizabeth and Joan, both of whom were here, and he’d served as a squire for his great-uncle King John Balliol before he’d been exiled to France, but now was with his father at Dalswinton Castle. She discovered that they shared a love of horses, and when he described the prized jennet that’d been his eighteenth saint’s day gift (she hid her surprise at that), she found herself genuinely interested and enjoying herself.
    It wasn’t until the platters of roasted fowl were brought out for the second course that she felt the weight of a gaze upon her. Turning to the table directly opposite theirs—just below the dais to the right—she found herself looking into the penetrating blue-eyed gaze of Eoin MacLean.
    She felt a jolt as if something had just taken hold of her. It raced up her spine and spread over her skin in a prickling heat.
    It wasn’t the first time Margaret had caught a man staring at her, but it was the first time she’d found herself flushing in response.
    It wasn’t embarrassment for what had happened earlier . . . exactly. At Garthland there was nothing wrong with a woman asking a man to teach her how to play a game. Lud, it wasn’t as if she’d asked him to teach her how to swim naked! Yet that’s how every man in the room had looked at her.
    Although maybe naked wasn’t something she should be thinking about when she was looking at Eoin MacLean, because she couldn’t help wondering what his chest would look like when it wasn’t covered in velvet and linen. He had such broad shoulders and his arms were very large. He must be exceedingly muscular.
    The warmth in her cheeks intensified. She suspected it was wicked thoughts like that that had made her blush in the first place. It wasn’t embarrassment, it was something more akin to awareness. Aye, definitely awareness.
    And if the intensity of his gaze was any indication, he felt it, too.
    The connection was so strong it seemed they did not need to talk to communicate. She smiled cheekily, lifted her brow, and shrugged her shoulders as if to say she didn’t understand it either.
    Unfortunately, Margaret had forgotten they were not the only two people in the room.

    Eoin noticed her the moment she entered the Hall. He wasn’t alone. It seemed as if the entire room held its collective breath as the two young women appeared at the entrance. But it was the indecently sensual redhead to whom all eyes were turned. The pretty, pale blonde beside her seemed to fade into the background; she was just like every other woman in the Hall.
    But Margaret MacDowell was different. Like a wildflower in a rose garden, she did not belong. And it wasn’t just because of the soft tumble of hair that was streaming down her back rather than being covered by a veil, or because in a room full of ladies dressed in velvets and jewels she managed to look more regal in a simple wool gown and brightly colored plaid. Nay, it was far more elemental. She was carefree and unabashedly happy in a room of modesty and reserve. She was wild and untamed in a sea of constraint and conformity.
    But either she was unaware of the attention or she did not care about it. She met the silence—half of which was admiring and half of which was condemning—not with a dropped gaze and maidenly blush of shyness at being