She knelt down behind a tree and waited. Her prey was a Highlander, a giant of a man and a fearsome warrior. Rachel wasn't all that big at seventeen, but she was quick, cunning and rarely missed her mark with a bow and arrow. She always carried at least one dagger and she wasn't afraid to use it, but today she planned to topple the giant with her bare hands. If she succeeded, her joy would be complete.
Waiting was something she was not good at. Where was he? Quite some time ago, she watched him head to the loch to bathe and it never took this long. She didn't watch him bathe. She hadn't done that since she was nine and her mother told her not to. Now, she knew exactly how close she could get to the loch without accidentally seeing anything.
Rachel smiled and her blue eyes sparkled. She didn't think any of the men knew she used to watch them bathe; they never once caught her. If they had, her brother-in-law, Kevin, would have frowned at her for hours and then asked all sorts of embarrassing questions. She didn't mind the questions so much, but she had much better ways to spend her time. Kevin never lost his temper with her, not even once, but he could frown the spots off her dapple-gray horse.
The men in the MacGreagor Clan paid far more attention to keeping themselves clean than men in the other clans, and Rachel had been close enough to unfamiliar men to know the reason why. She could sometimes smell them long before she could hear or feel their nearness.
"Rachel."
She spun around, lost her balance and landed on her bottom at the base of the tree. Chagrinned, she flipped her long, dark curls behind her shoulders with both hands and looked up at the giant. She was caught. Rachel slowly closed her eyes and let the breath she'd been holding escape from her lips. Then she stood up, glared and folded her arms defiantly.
"I will have a word with you."
"Of course ,you will." She sighed and followed Laird Kevin MacGreagor away from the loch to a big rock she sometimes hid behind. Then she sat down and waited for what she knew was coming.
Kevin's shoes had the long leather straps the men customarily laced up to their knees. She was grateful the women didn't have to go to so much trouble to dress. They wore matching pleated plaids held in place by leather belts. The women spread one length over their hearts and one shoulder, just like the men, but their plaids hung down to their ankles and they didn't have to wear those cumbersome shoes.