Jane may be done with her Irish lads, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t getting more sexy boys from her. This time, with Leith, we’re moving a bit north and higher up in altitude, into the Scottish Highlands and the Men of the North.
So, we start with Leith. His father has stood down as the Captain of the Clan, which has let Leith move up to the Captaincy. Technically, it shouldn’t have been him. It should’ve been his older brother, Tavish, but Tavish recently died, and as the second born, Leith stepped up. As the Captain, he’s had to make some really tough decisions, which includes basically shutting down his siblings’ lives, especially his youngest sister, Paisley. On this particular day, his father has told him that they have to go down to town, Inverness, and kick some ass because some enemies are going to go after the priest that is the Cowen Clan priest.
Then we have Cairstina. She lives in Inverness with her abusive mother and her even more abusive alcoholic brother. Due to something done to her as a young child, she lost her voice and is now mute. It’s incredibly isolating, especially since no one has ever really made the choice to try to communicate with her. She writes notes and uses her phone to tell people things, but the only people she has to say anything to are her mother, brother, and the priest at the cathedral, and the first two people don’t give a flying fuck. They refer to Cairstina as several very not nice names, and frankly, her mother enables her brother to abuse her and doesn’t protect her.
Cairstina has been carefully stealing money from her brother to supplement the meager amount of money that she manages to get. The goal is for her to save enough money to get the hell away from these people. Usually, no one knows that she stole the money, but this time, she took more than normal, and her brother found out. She wasn’t able to get away before he came home, but she was able to escape and she ran to the cathedral, and to her only friend. She got there, but then the bad guys came, and were going to beat down the priest. Luckily, some other guys came and dragged the bad guys out. Cairstina, who had hidden, wasn’t going to let things happen to her only friend, so she follows them out with her phone and is going to take pictures. Only, that isn’t quite what happened. Leith sees her and takes her home with him.
I like Cairstina. First of all, can we just talk about her name? Isn’t that just an awesome name? She is smart, creative, and imaginative. She has this whole rich interior fantasy life, and I’m there for it. I understand why she has it, because she has no one to talk to, no friends, and no one really makes the effort to communicate with her, so why not pull into herself and find this fantasy life. I would totally do it in her place. Cairstina is also very caring and loyal. You can see that in the way that she treats Leith’s grandmother and mother. You would think that having been abused, she wouldn’t have this real strength, but she really does. She’s not going to let anyone walk over her. I mean, yeah, Leith does spank her, but she also stands up to him.
I like Leith. I get the reasoning behind him doing what he was doing when it came to his family. The pressure put on him from his father, and don’t get me started on that man, and the loss of Tavish had to really do a job on him. I do think that he could let up on his sisters a little. He needs to learn that shutting down people that hard leads to rebellion and not good things happening. I think that he is very caring though, he really does care for his family and does want the best for them. He will do everything that he can to take care of them, whether they like it or not. He is a little stupid sometimes, especially since it took him so long to catch on to the fact that Cairstina couldn’t speak.
I love the idea of the romance novels based on the clan. Of course, the clan probably doesn’t, but I think it’s funny. I think I know who is writing them too.
OK, that’s all for this one. Happy reading!
In Between the Pages 