Highland Crown
Royal
Highlander #1
Author:
May McGoldrick
Synopsis
Scottish pride, persuasion, and passion—this is Highland romance at its breathtaking best.
Scottish pride, persuasion, and passion—this is Highland romance at its breathtaking best.
Inverness, 1820
Perched on
the North Sea, this port town—by turns legendary and mythological—is a place
where Highland rebels and English authorities clash in a mortal struggle for
survival and dominance. Among the fray is a lovely young widow who possesses
rare and special gifts.
WANTED:
Isabella Drummond
A true beauty
and trained physician, Isabella has inspired longing and mystery—and fury—in a
great many men. Hunted by both the British government and Scottish rebels, she
came to the Highlands in search of survival. But a dying ship’s captain will
steer her fate into even stormier waters. . .and her heart into flames.
FOUND: Cinaed
Mackintosh
Cast from his
home as a child, Cinaed is a fierce soul whose allegiance is only to himself …
until Isabella saved his life—and added more risk to her own. Now, the only way
Cinaed can keep her safe to seek refuge at Dalmigavie Castle, the Mackintosh
family seat. But when the scandalous truth of his past comes out, any chance of
Cinaed having a bright future with Isabella is thrown into complete darkness.
What will these two ill-fated lovers have to sacrifice to be together…for
eternity?
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MY REVIEW
Highland Crown is full
of adventure and history. The story unfolds in Scotland where there is unrest;
the Scottish looking for their independence and the English looking to squash
it.
Amidst these times, we
have Isabella, a female doctor who must flee for her life and Cinaed a man who
was sent away by his people. Both are trying to help their people in the only
way they know how.
When they meet the
attraction is immediately apparent but can anything more become of it during
such tumultuous times?
The story started off
slow but I was intrigued nonetheless.
The story is ripe with
historical detail but has more history and action than romance. When the
romance did come out, so did the sparks, angst and passion.
I loved both the main
characters and they were both compelling in their own right.
Cinaed is a man without
a real home yet he fights to help those in need. He is just and understanding.
Cinaed is a also a warrior and yet he is romantic and kind.
Isabella is a doctor
during a time where female doctors are scarce. She is passionate about her
calling and it shows in everything she does. She has so much courage and
empathy.
I wanted more of these
characters though. More from their pasts and more of their relationship since
the romance aspect of this book took second fiddle to everything else that was
going on.
With that being said,
this is the beginning of their story and there will be more to come. I am
excited and intrigued to delve more into Cinaed’s past, to see where Isabella
will fit in and of course where their love will take them.
I received an ARC via
NetGalley of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
EXCERPT
Highland Crown
May McGoldrick
Cinaed looked
up into a woman’s face. Fine black eye- brows arched over brown eyes that were
focused on his chest. Thick dark hair was pulled back in a braid and pinned up
at the back of her head. Intent on what she was doing, she was unaware that he
was awake.
Her brow was
furrowed, and lines of concentration framed the corners of her mouth. The grey
travel dress she wore was plain and practical. She was not old, but not young
either. Not fat, not thin. From where he lay, he guessed she was neither tall
nor short. She was beautiful, but not in the flashy way of the women who
generally greeted sailors in the port towns. Nor was she like the
eyelash-fluttering lasses in Halifax who never stopped trying to get his
attention after a Sunday service. He didn’t bother to assess the pleasant
symmetry of her face, however. The “brook no nonsense” expression warned that
she wasn’t one to care what others thought of her looks, anyway.
But who was
she?
The last
clear memory he had was seeing a flash from the shore. The next moment his
chest had been punched with what felt like a fiery poker. Everything after that
floated in a jumbled haze. He recalled being in the water, trying to swim
toward some distant shore. Or was he struggling to reach the longboat again?
Cinaed didn’t
know what part of his body hurt more, the fearsome pounding in his head or the
burning piece of that poker still lodged in his chest.
“Where am I?”
he demanded. “Who the deuce are you?”
Startled, she
sat up straight, pulling away and scowl- ing down at him. In one blood-covered
hand, she held a needle and thread. In the other, a surgeon’s knife that she
now pointed directly at his throat.
“Try to choke
me again and I’ll kill You.” “Choke you? For the love of God, woman!”
His ship. The
reef. The explosion. He closed
his eyes for a moment and tried to clear away the fog. Everything he’d
been through struck him like a broad- side.
The Highland
Crown was gone. He’d detonated the powder himself. Where were his men? He’d
climbed into the last longboat. They’d been fired at from the beach. He’d been
shot.
Cinaed
grabbed the knife-wielding wrist before she could pull it away. “Where are my
men?”
An ancient
woman in Highland garb slid into his line of sight behind the younger one. She
was making sure he saw the cudgel she had over one shoulder.
“This one is
worth less than auld fish bait, mistress,” she taunted. The crone was ready and
obviously eager to use that club. “And thankless, too, I’m bound. I was right
when I said ye should never have saved him.”
Should never
have saved him. He released the wrist, and the hand retreated. But the
dark-haired woman didn’t move away. As if nothing had happened, she dropped the
knife on the cot, out of his reach. The brown eyes again focused on his chest,
and she put her needle back to work.
He winced but
kept his hands off the woman.
By all
rights, he should be dead. A musket ball had cut him down and knocked him into
the water. He should in- deed be finished.
Someone on
shore had tried to kill him.
But he was
alive, and apparently he owed his life to this one. Gratitude flowed through
him.
“Want me to
give him another knock in the head?” the old witch asked.
“Last stitch.
Let me finish,” she said in a voice lacking the heavier burr of the northern
accent. “You can kill him when I’m done.”
A sense of
humor, Cinaed thought. At least, he hoped she was joking. She tied off the
knot, cut the thread, and straightened her back, inspecting her handiwork. He
lifted his head to see what kind of quilt pattern she’d made of him. A puckered
line of flesh, topped by a row of neat stitches, now adorned the area just
below his collarbone. He’d been sewn up by surgeons before, and they’d never
done such a fine job of it. He started to sit up to thank her.
That was a
grave mistake. For an instant, he thought the old woman had used her cudgel,
after all. When he pushed himself up, his brain exploded, and he had no doubt
it was now oozing out of his ears and eye sockets. The taste of bilge water
bubbled up in his throat.
“A bucket,”
he groaned desperately.
The woman was
surprisingly strong. She rolled him and held a bucket as his stomach emptied.
She’d been ex- pecting this, it appeared. However horrible he was feeling
before, it was worse now as the room twisted and rocked and spun. Long
stretches of dry heaves wracked his body. “Blood I can deal with,” the old
woman grouched from somewhere in the grey haze filling the room.
He heaved
again. “By all the saints!”
“I’ll clean
up later. Don’t worry about any of this. Go sit by the fire, Jean. You’ve had a
long night.”
Cinaed felt a
wet cloth swab the back of his neck and his face.
Jean mumbled
something unintelligible about “weak- bellied” and “not to be trusted” and “a
misery.” When he hazarded a glance at her, she was glaring at him like some
demon guarding the gates of hell.
“Does my
nephew know that yer a doctor?” she asked, not taking her eyes off of him as
she snatched up the knife and handed it to the younger woman.
A doctor! He
lifted his head to look at her again. She was definitely a woman. And a
fine-looking one, at that. He was still breathing, and she’d done an excellent
job on whatever damage had been done to his chest by the bullet. But the
possibility of any trained physician, or even a surgeon, being here in this
remote corner of the High- lands was so implausible. Male or female.
“John knows.”
“But ye say
yer not a midwife,” Jean persisted, a note of disbelief evident in her tone.
“And not just a surgeon, in spite of all them fine, shiny instruments in that
bag of yers.”
“I trained as
a physician at a university. But I’m find- ing that my abilities as a surgeon
have more practical uses wherever I go.”
University
trained. Cinaed stole another look at her. She had an air of confidence in the
way she spoke and acted that convinced him that she was telling the truth. And
for the first time since the Highland Crown struck that reef, he wondered if
his good fortune was still hold- ing, if only by thread. Lady Luck, apparently,
had sent him Airmid, his own goddess of healing.
Long-forgotten
words, chanted over some injury, came back to him from childhood. Bone to bone.
Vein to vein. Skin to skin. Blood to blood. Sinew to sinew. Marrow to marrow.
Flesh to flesh . . .
From the
floor, she retrieved a bowl containing bloody cloths. A musket ball lay nestled
like a robin’s egg on the soaked rags. By the devil, he thought, his admiration
nearly overflowing. She’d not only stitched him together, she’d dug the bullet
out of him.
The deuce!
He’d never seen anyone like her. Frankly, he didn’t care if she came from the
moon to practice medicine here. He owed his life to her.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Authors Nikoo and Jim
McGoldrick (writing as May McGoldrick) weave emotionally satisfying tales of
love and danger. Under the names of May McGoldrick and Jan Coffey, these
authors have written more than thirty novels and works of nonfiction. Nikoo, an
engineer, also conducts frequent workshops on writing and publishing and serves
as a Resident Author. Jim holds a Ph.D. in Medieval and Renaissance literature
and teaches English in northwestern Connecticut. They are the authors of Much
ado about Highlanders, Taming the Highlander, and Tempest in the Highlands.
CONNECT WITH THE AUTHORS
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