The stones—now better termed ruins, she supposed—were everywhere. And although some even appeared to be stacked in wall-like formations, it was obvious that anything presently standing on the tiny isle was silent and roofless.
Even so, she slowed the car to a crawl. It was hard to look away from the sharp outlines beginning to take form on Bran’s isle. But she couldn’t stare out across the water as she drove, so she scanned the village instead, each turn of the wheel making her feel farther from civilization. No shadows stirred behind the drawn curtains of the whitewashed cottages along the road. Even the chimneys looked cold, without a trace of smoke rising above them.
A tiny, combined general store and post office was closed at this hour. And the pub, called the Islesman’s Pride, appeared equally battened down for the night.
Only the fish-and-chip shop blazed, but as she drove past the shop’s large, plate glass window, it was easy to see that the counters were bare and there wasn’t anyone standing behind the till.
No one moved on the docks, either.
And if the fishing boats bobbing everywhere were any darker, they’d be invisible.
Mindy drove on, refusing to be daunted.
She did lift her chin, trying to recapture the wonder that had swept her on leaving Hebridean House. It was the same night, after all. So she leaned forward, peering briefly through the windshield, relief flooding her to see the heavens still brilliant with stars.
When she looked back at the road, she was rewarded by the sudden appearance of a small sandy beach. It curved along beside the harbor wall, shining beautifully in the silvery glow of the moon.
Feeling better, she passed the deserted Village Hall without even a twinge of ill ease. Her practical mind told her that all the locals were at Hebridean House, no doubt vying for Wee Hughie’s attention. And—if she was of a whimsical mind, like Margo—she’d have to admit that the stillness, together with the lovely night, lent the village an entrancing, almost ethereal quality.
It was sort of like slipping inside one of those incredibly atmospheric, too-beautiful-to-be-true, cozy cottages-and-landscape paintings one saw in so many mall gift shops in the States.
She couldn’t think of the artist’s name, but his colorful, luminous work was right in front of her.
Come to life in Barra.
Something told her that she, too, would come into her own here.
That brooding gray skies, wild, cold rain, and starry nights like this one would soon have her believing she’d found something she didn’t know she’d been seeking.
But before she let her mind wander down such a fanciful path, she needed to find the Anchor.
When a sloping, broken-stoned jetty at the far end of the beach appeared in her headlights, she knew the self-catering cottage had to be near. Especially as the road seemed to dead-end against a fast-approaching cliffside that reared up just ahead, its sheer, wet-gleaming heights effectively signaling that she could go no farther.
Sure enough, when she pulled over beside the jetty, she immediately spotted a small, thick-walled cottage across the road. A handmade sign propped in a window assured her in large, carefully printed black letters that the one-story dollhouse, with its corrugated iron roof and blue painted door, was indeed the Anchor.
She climbed out of the car, sure she’d never seen anything sweeter.
Her pulse quickened as she gathered her bags and crossed the road. But when she let herself inside—just as the woman at Hebridean House had said, the door wasn’t locked—she found the cottage cold and smelling of damp. She shivered, but doubted the chill would last long. Someone, likely Jock, the owner, had lit a fire and even turned on a tiny heating unit that stood in a corner.
Better yet, a kitchen niche opened off the main room and she could see the makings for tea set out on the counter. A very modern electric kettle promised she wouldn’t have to wait long for boiled water. And packets of Scottish Breakfast Tea and Earl Grey Cream gave her a choice, while a generously sized box of locally made shortbread reminded her of how long it’d been since she’d eaten.
There was also a large jar of hot chocolate, its thoughtful inclusion going a long way in impressing her.
In all her years of flying and sleeping in different hotel rooms every night, she couldn’t recall ever finding a jar of finest hot chocolate waiting to tempt her.
Digital alarms she couldn’t figure out, too-thin walls, and televisions that seemed to show only hotel information or pay movies without going fuzzy, yes.
Elevator noise, rattling air conditioners that could flash-freeze you within seconds, and—her personal favorite—the madness of landing too close to an ice machine.
But chocolate?
Never.
The Anchor was also spotlessly clean.
It might not have been aired for a while, but it was charming. The well-scrubbed stone floor reminded her of the cozy, old- fashioned kitchen in the farmhouse where her grandmother had grown up in White Horse, Pennsylvania. And the hearth fireplace at one end of the small, all-in-one lounge and dining area, though tiny, made her feel snug as the proverbial bug in a rug.
Not to mention what a treat it was to smell actual woodsmoke at the same time she could stare out the deep-set windows at the bay, even hear the slapping of surf against the jetty by the road.
The effect was magical.
Mindy sank onto a tiny sofa, beginning to understand why her sister and others like her went all moony-eyed at the first flash of plaid or glimpse of purple heather splashed across a hillside.
Scotland was special.
And there was something about the Anchor that made her heart pound. Skepticism insisted the strange sense of peace and rightness had to do with the cottage’s lack of a television and phone. It followed that, in today’s crazy world, a place without what Margo called modern inconveniences would hold a certain attraction.
Even so . . .
She glanced about, trying to pinpoint why the neat but humble cottage made her pulse race and even left her feeling rather breathless.
She couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
Across from her, a door opened onto a shadowy bedroom. She could make out an old-timey wardrobe and a double bed, spread with the same red tartan as the sofa and an armchair by the fireplace.
Only when she returned her attention to the kitchen, drawn, perhaps, by the promise of a cup of hot chocolate to sip as she stared into the fire, did she see why she’d been swept by such tingly awareness.
It wasn’t the Anchor.
It was Bran of Barra.
He stood watching her from the kitchen, his hands clasped behind his back and Gibbie at his side. Still wearing his modern-day outfit of worn cords and an Aran sweater, he was the personification of everything irresistible to women who loved rugged, manly men.
And as always, his blue gaze scorched her. When he started forward, his long strides bringing him straight toward her, his lips quirking in that oh-so-sexy smile, Mindy leapt to her feet, her heart flipping.
“Aggggh . . . !” she spluttered like one possessed. “It’s you!”
“Aye.” He kept coming. “I am myself, last I looked, anyway.”
Mindy clapped a hand to her breast. She was sure the floor was dipping beneath her. She knew that his appearance, just the sight of him, made the rest of the world go away. There was only him, the thundering of her heart, and her inability to focus on anything else.
He affected her that badly.
The slow burn in his eyes said he knew it.
“We were interrupted.” His burr was soft and rich, deeper than usual, and—she swallowed—so damned sexy that it made his three simple words sound like a declaration of undying love and devotion.
“You don’t need to kiss me again.” Mindy scooted behind the couch. If he so much as touched her, she’d be lost.
“Kiss you?” His broad shoulders blocked out the kitchen doorway. The pure-sin smile playing about his lips disproved the note of
astonishment in his voice.
He wasn’t surprised at all.
He was amused.
“Mindy-lass . . .” He lifted his hands, palms outward. “I’ll no’ kiss you unless you desire it, but”—he glanced at the plaid-covered sofa, his eyes twinkling—“dinnae tell me you’ve forgotten that a mere bit o’ wood and stuffing willnae keep me from you if I wish to be at your side?”
Mindy gulped.
She had forgotten.
But she remembered very well when she found him towering but a handbreadth away from her. Gibbie had moved like lightning, too. The dog now lay sprawled across the sofa, his shaggy gray bulk taking up every inch and looking as if he meant to stay put for a good long while.
The beast’s master looped his arms around Mindy’s hips.
She stiffened, heated tingles racing through her. “You said you weren’t going to kiss me!” She glared at him, seeing at once that he knew he made her absolutely feverish with desire, as he called it.
Why was she thinking like that?
. . . Unless she did desire him?
She drew in a tight breath. He made her feel as if they were acting out a scene from a romance novel. She was the resisting but soon-to-be-ravished-and-loving-it heroine and he was the dashing, impossibly sexy hero about to ride off into the sunset with her. Or, in his case, toss her over his shoulder and carry her up the winding, turnpike stair to the great four-poster bed in his castle turret.
And, heaven help her, she almost wished he would!
Instead, she lifted her chin. “About this kissing business, you said—”
“Nothing about no’ touching you.” He tightened his arms around her, grinning. “I said I’d no’ kiss you. A kiss isn’t touching.”
“Touching leads to kisses!” Mindy tried to break free.
He laughed. “I could touch you into deepest pleasure. Were I of a mind to do so.”
“O-o-oh!” His arrogance gave her the strength to pull away.
She dashed to the hearth, just managing to bite back a curse when she nearly tripped over the colorful scatter rug on the slick stone floor.
She whirled to face him. “You are insufferable! A great, swellheaded, domineering—”
“I am Barra.” He folded his arms, looking more amused than ever. “And as such, I’ll no’ be arguing the great part. As for the rest—”
“Why are you here?”
“I was telling you before you told me no’ to kiss you.”
“Then tell me now.”
To her surprise, his face turned serious and he went to stand at the window, looking out at the bay and—she knew—his own little islet and the stones that had once been the very substance of his home.
His life.
That it was so, that his tiny spit of rock in the bay and the jumble of stones she’d returned meant everything to him, stood etched on every inch of his powerful, brawny body. It was there in the proud set of his shoulders as he stared into the darkness.
She saw it in the way he clenched his hands at his sides. How his knuckles whitened and even the air around him seemed to take note.
He cleared his throat, fisted his hands even tighter.
“I came here for the same reason I went to Hebridean House. I want to thank you for returning my tower’s stones.” He glanced at her and she could see the passion thrumming inside him. “For truth, lass, I am”—his beautiful voice caught, the sound squeezing her heart—“a bit at a loss to put words to my gratitude.
“A friend has been out there”—he flashed another look at the bay—“and he tells me the stones haven’t just been brought back, but that you’re having my home restored. Building it anew as if it’d ne’er been torn down?”
Mindy nodded, unable to speak.
She did swallow hard.
She hadn’t expected him to thank her. And—her head was beginning to throb—he had it wrong. She didn’t deserve his gratitude. She wasn’t the one responsible for the restoration of his tower.
She was only the instrument.
The three ghosties from the Folly and their fellow ancestrals were behind it all. They were the ones who should be thanked.
Not her.
“I had nothing to do with it.” She blurted the truth before shame made it impossible to speak.
And it did pain her that, until very recently, she’d burned to sell the castle to the highest bidder and never see a stone of the place again. Not a single stick of furniture or even a whirling dust mote.
Now . . .
She felt like a callous, shallow fool.
And as much as the truth seared her, she felt compelled to make sure Bran of Barra understood. Only then could she look in the mirror again. And, at the end of the day, despite her years in a very modern profession, she still remained an old-fashioned girl at heart.
To her, honor was everything.
Bran of Barra defined honor.
She wouldn’t have believed there were such men left in the world and—her heart clenched on the admission—she suspected there weren’t. Leastways, not in the modern-day world she called her own.
She swallowed a sudden lump in her throat and glanced aside, certain that when she flew home, she could look far and wide and not find a man like him.
She steeled herself and looked the sexy Hebridean ghost in the eye. “Your castle stones are out there”—she, too, shot a quick glance at the bay—“because three ghostly cousins of yours threatened that they’d haunt me forever if I didn’t return them.”
Bran of Barra blinked. “Three ghostly cousins?”
Mindy nodded. “Cousins, kin, or whatever you wish to call them. Fact is, they’re Barra MacNeil chieftains who—I don’t know how else to say this—lived several centuries after your time.”
“I see.”
“You do?” Mindy placed her hands on the back of the sofa, glad for its support.
Bran of Barra started pacing, his sword—he was still wearing it—clacking softly against his hip as he strode back and forth in the Anchor’s tiny lounge.
“I believe I know the three chieftains you mean.” He glanced at her as he passed the fireplace. “They visited my home some while ago. Their arrival was unexpected and startled a guest because, rather than coming to enjoy the revelries of my hall as most are wont to do, they were seen stomping about in an abovestairs passageway, fussing amongst themselves.”
Mindy smiled. “That sounds like them. They do like to grumble. But”—her heart caught again—“I think they’re happy now. I saw them just as my ferry approached Barra. They were in a medieval-looking galley and racing back and forth near the opening to the bay, making a ruckus and—”
“Aye, they will be Barra MacNeils!” Bran sounded himself again. “ ’Tis a flourish they were giving you.” He beamed, pride glowing in his eyes. “Like as not, they were welcoming you to our bonny isle!”
“That’s what I thought.” The idea warmed Mindy.
She would never have believed it, but she’d slowly grown fond of the Long Gallery Threesome.
“There is something I don’t understand.” Bran halted suddenly, stood rubbing his beard. “Where was my tower? And why did my chiefly cousins press you to return it?”
Mindy hesitated. Not because she wasn’t willing to answer those two questions, but she knew they’d lead to more. And she wasn’t keen on telling Bran about Hunter.
So she resorted to her airline training and posed a question of her own. “You said that the three other ghosts were at your hall. How can that be if”—the implication made her uncomfortable—“at the time, your tower wasn’t standing?”
“No’ standing?” His brows lifted. “Sweet lass, my tower has always stood as e’er. Nary a stone is changed nor a blade o’ grass—”
“But how—”
“Because”—his crooked smile flashed—“I will it so.”
“You mean in your ghostly realm.”
“Aye, just.” He nodded, looking pleased.
Apparent
ly tired of pacing, he dropped onto the sofa next to Gibbie, slinging an arm around the beast’s shoulders. “Now that you know, I’m for hearing where my home has been in your world. That it hasn’t been where it should be, I already know. So speak true. I’ll know if you’re trying to cozen me.”
Mindy’s first instinct was to do just that. Instead, she took a deep breath. “Your tower was in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Near a town called New Hope. Wealthy MacNeils of a past century—”
“Penn-seal-landia?” He jumped to his feet, his eyes round. “Sakes! ’Tis worse than I thought.”
Gibbie barked, sharing his distress.
Bran of Barra shoved a hand through his hair, looking almost wild-eyed. “So I was right! I’d suspected you hailed from that wicked place. But I ne’er dreamed my tower would be—”
“In Pennsylvania?” Mindy didn’t understand his concern. “It’s a very beautiful place. Bucks County, where I’m from, is especially nice. Not the same as here, but lovely. It’s sort of like the kind of rolling countryside you see in England—”
“England?” He looked even more horrified.
Mindy could have kicked herself.
Not being a big fan of Braveheart, she’d forgotten that Scots of Bran of Barra’s day wouldn’t be too enamored of the English.
Her gaffe was making the back of her neck hot.
He looked so upset.
“I’m sorry.” She took several calming breaths. “I fully agree with you that your home should never have been dismantled and—”
“So my tower was taken apart?” Bran’s eyes narrowed. “And done deliberately?”
Mindy nodded. “Some of your descendants went to America and settled in New Hope. They did very well. One of them”—she took another deep breath, wishing she could skip this part—“made a fortune in steel and railroads.
“It’s believed that he never forgot his Scottish roots, and so when he became rich, he traveled here. He went to Barra and ordered your castle taken apart and transported to Pennsylvania, where he had it rebuilt, stone for stone.”
Some Like It Kilted Page 18
