A Highland Sailor: Highland Heartbeats

by Adams, Aileen

  There was the question of his vocation, as well. The memory of Angus McGuiness always stayed in the back of his memory, a reminder of the folly of marrying a woman he would so rarely spend time with.

  It wouldn’t be fair to the lass, either, making it necessary for her to be alone again. Several days from her sister, days of hard travel over rough landscape. The ride from Thrushwood to Silloth had been easy in comparison, even when they’d ridden through the hills.

  It would be too cruel to ask her to make a sacrifice such as that.

  Was he entertaining the idea of wedding the lass?

  By the time he arrived at the inn, he was more mixed up than he’d ever thought possible. So mixed up, he nearly didn’t notice the change in the innkeeper’s demeanor.

  The man was no longer laughing. He wasn’t even smiling when Broc approached him, the gathered bedspread under one arm.

  Broc eyed him up and down, his memory going back to the over-friendly stable owner. He had changed, too, since the last time they’d met. And the man who owned the inn had been his laughing, jovial self when they had arranged Beatrice’s lodging.

  Something was very wrong.

  “Where is she?” he asked, dispensing with the niceties when his instincts warned him his lass was in danger. Because she was his lass, his and his alone, no matter what anyone else believed.

  The man’s eyes cut to the door. “He paid me,” he blubbered, hands near his face as though he feared Broc would strike him. “He said she stole something from him and he was coming to settle accounts. Threatened me when I refused.”

  Broc didn’t need to ask who the man was. “Where did he take her?”

  The man pointed out the door, toward the harbor. “Said something about settling accounts on the ship. I didn’t find out what he meant.”

  “No matter. I know what he meant.” He dashed out into the night, cutting across the busy street and down a narrow alley which led to the harbor.

  Beatrice had stolen from Randall. She had stolen his prize. The man he had waited seven years to kill.

  The man he believed would be onboard the ship by then.

  He must have paid the stable owner, too, after inquiring whether Broc had been in. No wonder he’d been so pleasant.

  There was almost no activity in the harbor, along the docks which stretched out into the water. Broc squinted, looking out across the bay to where the ship was waiting. There was a rowboat which had nearly reached the vessel. He ducked behind a stack of wooden crates when he saw it, wanting to avoid the chance that Randall or the rower caught sight of him.

  They were going to board in hopes that he would be there. Randall would likely try to barter, Beatrice’s life for his.

  Only, in the end, he would kill her, too.

  Broc was certain of it.

  With that in mind, he darted across the dock to the nearest rowboat and jumped inside, taking the oars in both hands and rowing as hard as he ever had.

  The three of them—Randall, his man and Beatrice—were aboard the ship by the time he’d made it halfway there. If the bastard had been smart, he would’ve brought a second man along to keep watch.

  Then again, he expected his victim to be aboard. He believed he was smarter than all of them, that he had the element of surprise on his side.

  How surprised he would be when he found he’d arrived early.

  Rage flowed through Broc’s veins as he worked, the oars cutting through the dark water faster and faster the more enraged he became. If Randall dared harm her…

  He allowed the boat to glide the rest of the way to the ship and its rope ladder which hung over the side, hoping to avoid notice if he moved quietly. With the dirk between his teeth, he climbed hand over hand until he’d nearly reached the deck, waiting with breath held to listen for the sound of footsteps or voices.

  “I said, where is he?”

  Randall sounded nearly frantic, unable to believe he’d been bested. They were on the deck, then, closer to the bow, while he was at the stern.

  He dared raise his head just enough to look through the openings between the rail’s wooden posts. Randall stood with his back to Broc, with Derek in front of him and Hugh to his right.

  Also to his right were the man he’d brought along for the task, and Beatrice, held tight to the man’s chest. The way she stood, frozen, told him there was like as not a blade at her throat.

  The look on Hugh’s face confirmed his fears. Both he and his brother had been taken by surprise, it was clear. Broc wondered if either of them were armed, believing as they likely had, that they were out of harm’s way. They could easily have left all weapons below deck.

  “He isn’t here,” Derek explained, hands held in front of him with palms facing out. “He hasn’t arrived on the ship.”

  “Lies!” Randall barked. “He left this one at the inn and was overheard stating he’d come from the ship in the morning. He was coming here. He must have arrived by now. Why are you concealing him from me?”

  “Search the ship, if you like,” Derek replied, his tone even. “You won’t find him. He never arrived.”

  “Perhaps he stopped in the village for something to eat or drink,” Hugh suggested. As he spoke, his eyes traveled the breadth of the deck and fell on Broc, to his credit, he registered no surprise or recognition.

  He did, however, keep talking. Diversion, Broc realized.

  “There’s no reason for you to hold a knife to the lass’s throat,” he continued. “She’s done nothing to deserve this. She only wished to travel to her sister’s new home so the two of them could be together. Nothing more. She did nothing to harm you.”

  “More lies,” Randall spat. He tossed his cape back over one shoulder to reveal the short sword at his hip, and his hand caressed the hilt.

  The sight of it made Broc’s blood run cold.

  “She helped him escape,” Randall continued. “There were witnesses. The moment I heard of this, I knew there was nothing to do but follow you. Everyone knew you were on your way to Silloth.”

  And he’d managed to reach the harbor village before he and Beatrice because they’d slept so late, Broc realized. A man obsessed might even ride through the night, foregoing sleep in order to get what he wanted.

  Vengeance, in this case.

  He had to end it, and fast, before something terrible happened.

  In a burst of movement, he hauled himself up and over the deck rail, taking the dirk in one hand the moment his feet touched the polished wooden planks.

  Derek’s eyes shifted in his direction, catching Randall’s attention. The man spun, a sick, triumphant smile stretching his lips.

  From the corner of his eye, Broc noticed Hugh throw himself at the man who held Beatrice captive. She screamed and ducked out of the way while the two of them tussled. Hugh fell back, one hand to his shoulder as blood poured between his fingers.

  The attacker raised his arm as if to strike another blow.

  Derek let out a strangled cry and flung himself at the man, the two of them falling to the deck in a flurry of fists and kicking feet. The dirk the man had been holding skittered across the deck.

  Broc returned his focus to Randall, who withdrew the sword from its sheath.

  “No!” Beatrice screamed, moving as though to run toward them.

  “Stay back!” Broc barked, holding up his free hand to signal her to stop. “Do not come any closer, lass.”

  “I’ll do whatever you want!” she shrieked, and he knew she wasn’t speaking to him.

  Instead, she was offering herself to Randall. She’d do anything he wanted, so long as he’d leave the rest alone.

  Randall’s scornful laugh told them what he thought of this. “As though you’re the most important concern now,” he sneered, never taking his eyes from Broc’s. “You need not offer yourself to me, girl. I’ll have you, sure enough, with or without your permission. The satisfaction I get from you will be all the sweeter, knowing I took you from him.”

  Broc
snarled, thrusting the dirk in Randall’s direction, causing him to fall back a step. He advanced on him again, not expecting to make contact but wishing to throw the man off-balance.

  To his right, the fighting continued, with Derek reaching for the dirk which had fallen from the stranger’s hand. Hugh scrambled for it, a little uneven due to loss of blood, but he reached the weapon and tossed it to his brother.

  Broc heard a strangled cry of pain as the blade slid home.

  It was enough to catch Randall’s eye, enough to distract him so Broc could lunge forward.

  But his reflexes were sharper than Broc had imagined, for within the blink of an eye he had recovered and swung the sword in a wide arc.

  Broc felt the sting first, a sharp, burning pain. After that, the rush of warmth as blood pooled over his skin and soaked into his tunic.

  He staggered backward a few steps, his back hitting the railing. Beatrice’s screams and protests rang in his ears as he raised a foot and kicked out, catching an advancing Randall mid-torso and sending him reeling back, arms pinwheeling wildly. It gave him enough time to get his feet under him, though he swayed slightly.

  He didn’t dare look down to see how severe the wound was, but judging from Beatrice’s broken cries, it was hideous and perhaps even mortal.

  “Come at me!” he roared, dirk at the ready, feet planted at shoulder width.

  “I’ll split you in half!” Randall threatened, holding the bloodied sword high as he rushed ahead.

  Broc knew he had one thing on his side, a sense of calm. In contrast, Randall was nearly frantic, blood lust overtaking his good sense.

  Everything before him seemed to sharpen and slow down, every moment stretching into eternity. The way the moon glinted off the sword, off Randall’s golden hair. The crazed look in his eyes as he rushed ahead, his gait wide and unsteady, skill and grace tossed aside in favor of brute violence.

  He brought the sword down, arcing sideways as though he wished to remove Broc’s head from his shoulders. His mouth opened in a scream of crazed rage as he swung, wide and unbalanced.

  Broc ducked, avoiding the blade by mere inches, he felt the rush of air above his head, and thrust the dirk forward and up, into Randall’s undefended side. It slid between the ribs, like a warm knife sliding into butter.

  The man gasped, his back arching, his head falling back. Broc forced the dirk upward, further into the lung, and blood bubbled from Randall’s mouth along with a faint cry.

  He collapsed at Broc’s feet, the sword clattering beside him, his eyes already glazing over.

  The last thing Broc heard before darkness overtook him was the sound of Beatrice calling his name.

  27

  Beatrice turned her head to the side, but she still heard the sound of the bodies hitting the water when Hugh and Derek worked together to throw them overboard.

  They’d both been injured, and similarly. Hugh’s shoulder was slashed, but she’d helped him clean the wound and had heeded his instructions in treating it. He had clearly learned a lot from Sarah. She’d bandaged it, feeling clumsy in spite of his assurances to the contrary.

  Derek had shed no blood, but there was bruising all along his shoulder and upper arm. “I wrenched it pretty well,” he chuckled in an attempt to hide his pain. He could move it, meaning there was no break, but the muscles were all torn. He fashioned a sling which Beatrice helped him slide around the arm, holding it steady.

  It had taken a dose of one of Sarah’s pain-relieving tinctures to even allow that slight amount of motion.

  They were lucky to have two young men aboard who could manage the heavy labor necessary to man the ship, young men who’d come in with them and were dedicated to the men who paid their wages. “We can trust them to remain silent,” Derek assured her. “They’re no strangers to the rougher side of life.”

  It was cold comfort to Beatrice, who couldn’t seem to shake off the shock and horror of what she’d witnessed. Two men were dead, had died before her very eyes.

  Men who’d intended to hurt her. To kill her, even. Who had roughly, callously pulled her from her room at the inn and all but dragged her to the rowboat, then onto the ship. No one had come to her aid, though she had been certain of witnesses all along the way.

  Randall was a nobleman, after all. He’d dressed like one, too. None of them would have dared defy him or even question the way he’d treated her.

  Things might have ended far differently.

  She went below deck after watching the clumsy, makeshift burial at sea, having satisfied the need to watch Randall slip beneath the waves. Though she’d witnessed his death, had watched him breathe his last, there had still been the desire to make certain he’d never come back to hurt her.

  What did that mean? What did it say about her? Would she go to hell for being glad he was dead and gone?

  Did it matter?

  She wasn’t certain of anything anymore.

  No, that wasn’t true. As she descended the ladder which led to the lower decks, she reflected on the one thing she knew for certain.

  The man she loved waited for her, his eyes slightly glassy, she knew it was a result of the tincture she’d given him earlier, in the hopes of relieving his pain.

  “It isn’t that bad, really,” he’d insisted. “A scratch.”

  Yes, a scratch. One which extended from just below his left shoulder to the center of his chest, then curved down to his navel. A scratch which had caused him to lose enough blood that he’d lost consciousness moments after Randall died.

  She’d believed Broc to be dead, too. And in that instant, she’d wanted to die with him.

  She loved him. It was as simple as that, if such a thing could be simple.

  “It’s done,” she announced in a quiet voice, sitting beside his cot.

  He looked at the ceiling, sighing. “Good riddance.”

  “I feel so much guilt for believing the same thing,” she confessed. “But I can’t help myself.”

  “Nor should you,” he murmured.

  The hand closest to her slid across the straw-filled tick mattress and onto her lap, where her hands rested. She turned one hand over to clasp his.

  “You did nothing wrong,” she whispered. “Killing him, I mean. It was necessary.”

  “Aye,” he replied. “I didn’t feel that way about the first one, of course. I wasn’t protecting myself that night.”

  “You were trying to protect another,” she reminded him. “Which is noble.”

  “Would you feel that way if I were a stranger? A brutish Scot?”

  Her cheeks colored as she remembered her original impression of him. “If I knew the truth of what happened, yes. I would.”

  “What if I told ye I enjoyed it at the time?” he asked. “I didn’t need to beat the man as I did. I could’ve stopped. Should have stopped. He was no longer a threat to the lass. But I simply couldn’t help myself. I’ve never been able to help myself when it comes to men who harm women. What sort of man is that? And yet, what sort of man beats another man to death?”

  She drew a long, shaky breath. “You did what you felt had to be done. When I look at the man Randall was and think of how his nephew might have been—knowing what he was, really, seeing what he did to that girl—I can understand it. And so could Deacon Eddard. He told me so.”

  Broc chuckled. “I wondered why he was so keen to help me. And how you found out about it.”

  “He thought I should know. I’m glad he told me.”

  “The knowing of it…” He looked out the small, round porthole above the cot, where stars seemed to choke the sky. “Knowing it didn’t make you hate me?”

  “Hate you? How could I ever hate you?”

  “I know how you were raised. With religion and such.”

  “Does it seem as though I hate you?” She tightened her hold on his hand. “Do you think I would’ve raced out to the Randall house on horseback to free you from that barn if I hated you? Or that I would’ve traveled alone with yo
u if I hated you, or was frightened of you?”

  His eyes met hers, and she thought she’d never seen him look so glad, even when they escaped detection, in that straw-filled cart. “I don’t know that I could’ve borne your hating me, lass.”

  Suddenly, it was as if all the air left the room. She could no longer breathe. Did he notice how her palm grew slick with perspiration? He had to, for he released it.

  Only to reach for her, to stroke her cheek with the backs of his fingers.

  Her eyes drifted down to his torso, which was bare except for the bandages which she’d wrapped around it. In spite of the injury he’d suffered, in spite of its ugliness, she had thrilled at the feeling of him beneath her hands. She rested one palm on his chest, careful of the wound beneath the bandage.

  “I believe I know your heart,” she whispered, wishing she could think of something better to say. Something which would suit the strength of emotion which seemed to boil in her core. “I know how good it is, how true. I’ve known it since the first, since you came to the house and were so kind to me.”

  “Though you held a sword,” he whispered, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I remember thinking how magnificent you were.”

  “You did?” she asked, giggling softly as her heart beat faster than ever.

  “Aye, lass. The most beautiful, wonderful thing I’d ever seen. I believe…” He held her chin in his hand, letting his fingers run over the curve of her jaw. “I believe I loved you then. That very day.”

  “You love me?” she breathed, a lump in her throat.

  “Aye. I love ye most terribly. I know I’m not the sort of man you want to hear speaking those words, but—”

  “I love you.” The words poured out without her thinking them, as though it was her heart speaking for her.

  Using the hand cupping her chin, he drew her face closer. She leaned down, as he was unable to come to her, and allowed him to pull her in for a soft, gentle kiss.

  She had never been kissed before, had nothing to compare it to. But what could be compared to the burst of sensation which raced through her, until she tingled to the tips of her toes and fingers? What could be better than the warmth coming from him, the firm smoothness of his lips against hers?