Claiming the Highlander's Heart

by Lily Maxton

  These bonds could form in a thousand different ways, and they were beautiful, for all their subtle differences.

  “And if we’re still on the question of your worth—I could kneel at your feet and offer you my heart and my soul and my body and all the riches in all of the castles in Scotland and it still wouldn’t equal your worth. You are immeasurable. You, alone.”

  Georgina might have lost sight of her path for a while, might have been so caught up in staying strong that she didn’t stop to take a good look at herself, but she knew her worth didn’t really have anything to do with who she married or how many children she had, even if someone else might judge it that way.

  Still, Mal’s devotion eased some aching, worried part of her that she hadn’t quite been aware of until now. And she did have a soft spot for his romantic side.

  She laughed gently, which she found startling considering she’d been sobbing only a few moments ago. But she didn’t feel worn down or weak.

  No, she felt like herself again. Only, perhaps, a little more pliant, and a little less breakable.

  “You have a way with hyperbole, Malcolm Stewart.”

  “Aye,” he agreed. “It’s a gift.”

  She pressed up on her toes to kiss him in the dark. “But if you ever call me an idiot again, I’ll shoot you in the foot.”

  His voice was husky with laughter when he spoke. “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

  …

  The door creaked open, flooding soft morning light into the cell. Sometime in the night, Georgina had fallen asleep against Mal, with her head on his shoulder, and she lifted it now, wincing at the crick in her neck.

  These paper-thin straw pallets weren’t the best for comfort. And she was almost positive she’d heard something rustling around inside it.

  “Georgina.”

  “Theo!” She sat up quickly. Her brother’s face was as dark as a thundercloud.

  The gaoler was standing about twenty feet back, making sure he didn’t fix his gaze on the woman who’d slipped into his cell without him even realizing it. In his defense, when Georgina and Mal had heard him return after attempting to help Andrew, who’d delayed him time and time again by slumping back to the ground, until he’d finally just left the sodden, drunken man, he’d shone the torch in to check on his prisoner.

  It wasn’t the gaoler’s fault that Mal had stepped right up to the door to block Georgina from view.

  “Come with me.”

  “No.”

  Mal woke slowly, shifting behind her.

  “What?” Theo’s voice was low.

  “I’m not leaving until you agree to at least talk to Mr. Rochester.”

  “Even if I drag you out?”

  Georgina took the bluff. “You wouldn’t.”

  They stared at each other for a long moment, neither one conceding.

  “I can see the family resemblance,” Mal noted, unhelpfully.

  “You—shut up,” Theo said.

  “Don’t tell him to shut up.”

  Theo grabbed at his hair with both hands. “I will speak to Mr. Rochester,” he finally said.

  “Thank you,” she nodded. “Now that you’re being reasonable, we can discuss some things.”

  “Away from him.”

  She glanced at Mal. When he nodded, she squeezed his hand, and, hating to leave him there but knowing she didn’t have much choice, followed her brother out.

  The gaoler locked the door behind them.

  Theo began to walk and Georgina kept pace.

  “I cannot believe you would do something like this.” He paused. “No, actually, this is exactly the sort of thing you would do. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t make me livid.”

  “Mal isn’t dangerous. He was only protecting someone,” she said.

  Theo glared at her. “Mal, is it?”

  “Yes,” she said. She met his gaze, unflinching.

  “You are, by far, the most difficult sibling.”

  “I know.”

  Theo exhaled sharply. “I wish you didn’t sound so pleased about the fact.”

  “I don’t…” She pressed her lips together. She supposed now was the time for honesty if there ever was one. “I don’t wish to worry you, Theo. I truly don’t.”

  “But?”

  “Once, you would have kept me safe by wrapping me up and keeping me away from everything that might possibly hurt me, and I don’t want that, either.”

  She wasn’t sure if he was going to respond, but eventually, he sighed. “I know he was protecting someone.”

  “You do?”

  “I was confronted this morning by a man who told me that he was the one who’d held up Rochester’s carriage, and that he was the one who should be punished, not Mal.”

  “Lachlan said that?”

  “You know him, too? Georgina…what in God’s name have you been getting up to lately?”

  She looked at him, and she could tell that for as aggravated as he might be, he was softening a bit. She smiled slightly. “I’ve been…finding…myself.”

  “And do you like what you’ve found?”

  “I do.”

  They were both silent for a moment. “He certainly knows how to inspire loyalty, your Mal.”

  She felt her pulse quicken. “My?”

  He looked at her, at the hope that was probably clear on her face, the longing, and looked away again. “I made a love match,” he said gruffly. “And so did Eleanor and Robert, regardless of how suitable their matches were. Really, we’ve been doomed to be on the far edge of respectable since Mama disobeyed her father and ran off with a doctor. She was happy, though. We were all happy. What I’m saying is, after everything we’ve been through, it would be hypocritical of me to stand in your way. And you already spent the night with him. I didn’t tell the gaoler my name, but if he knew somehow…well, it’s not like you’d make a society match if word got out, anyway. And I suspect you realized that.”

  The exasperation in his tone made her smile. Theo’s bark had always been worse than his bite, and he’d softened, too, in the years he’d been home.

  “I don’t want a society match, anyway,” she said, neither confirming nor denying his suspicions. “But what if Mal was a criminal, not so long ago…just in a different way?”

  Theo stopped, turned to face her. “I have never known you to be a poor judge of character. Is he a good sort of man?”

  She nodded. “He’s the best sort. At least I think so,” she said, with a self-effacing smile.

  “I suppose it would also be hypocritical of me to balk because of illegal activities.”

  “Yes, I do remember that business from a few years ago.”

  He shot her a stern look. They did not openly discuss the fact that Theo had once aided in a criminal’s escape because of his wife. But they all understood that the world wasn’t black-and-white, that good people did bad things and bad people did good things, and sometimes you just did what you had to do to survive and you didn’t think too much about whether it was wrong or right.

  The Townsends were well acquainted with the gray areas of life.

  Finally, he said, “I’ll talk to Mr. Rochester. I can’t guarantee anything, but I’ll try.”

  “Thank you, Theo. You know…a bit of financial incentive can often go a long way in cases like these. And it’s not really underhanded…no one was actually harmed, and I’m positive Lachlan won’t try something like that again.”

  He snorted. “You all really are going to kill me. But yes, I’m well aware of the power of financial incentives. Before I attempt to pay off Rochester, though, I do have a stipulation.”

  She felt a thrill of unease. “What is that?”

  “Annabel wants Mr. Stewart to stay in his position as schoolmaster.” He glared at her. “She was quite dismayed after you questioned Rochester.”

  “Oh,” Georgina said wisely. “So this is as much about pleasing your wife as it is about me.”

  He glowered at her. “It’s
a little of both. Do you think he’ll say yes?”

  “I think he will.”

  They looked at each other.

  “Good,” Theo said gruffly. “I suppose we can consider everything settled, then, provided Rochester isn’t too stubborn.”

  But she wasn’t letting him off so easily. She tugged at his arm and pulled her brother into a tight hug. They didn’t touch often, she realized, but this wasn’t so bad. Her head came to just under his chin, and he smelled like coffee and tobacco smoke. It was a familiar smell, and comforting.

  “Thank you, Theo,” she said again. “I’m happy.”

  At first, he patted her head awkwardly, like she was a too-affectionate pet, but then he stopped. Just rested his hand against the top of her head. It was a warm, gentle weight.

  “Then I’m happy, too,” he said.

  “Liar.”

  He huffed out a laugh. “I’m not thrilled. But I suppose I’m not dreadfully unhappy, either.”

  “That sounds more like you,” she said.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Mal suffered through another day and night in the dark gaol, listening to the scratch, scratch, scratch of some kind of rodent, either trying to get in or trying to get out. He hoped he didn’t wake up with a half-eaten face.

  The next day, sometime in the late morning—Mal had been watching the way the sky turned bluer through the small sliver of open space—the door was flung wide. Mal threw up his arm to block the sudden rush of blinding light.

  “You’re free to go,” the gaoler said.

  Mal squinted at him. “I am?”

  The man nodded.

  Mal pushed himself up unsteadily and walked out into the world.

  He didn’t have to go far before he saw Georgina waiting for him, in a white dress dotted with little flowers, looking like a breath of fresh air after every stifling hour he’d been locked away. Lachlan, Ewan, and Andrew were beside her.

  His heart lifted as he walked toward them.

  “I’m sorry it took so long,” Georgina said. “We couldn’t find the sheriff until this morning.”

  “Rochester changed his mind?”

  “He decided he could not accurately determine that you were the one who’d attempted to rob the carriage. A hundred pounds seemed to affect his memory.”

  “You paid him?”

  “My brother paid him,” she said. She watched him carefully, and he knew she was seeing what his reaction would be.

  Truthfully, it made him a little uneasy, but Georgina loved her brother, and she trusted him, and he supposed, until he felt the same way, that would have to be enough. Because Mal wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was Arden. They would have to learn to coexist.

  Maybe, as Georgina hoped, they could find common ground.

  “I’ll have to thank him, then.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not entirely given from the goodness of his heart.”

  “Oh?”

  “They want you to stay on as the schoolmaster.”

  Mal blinked. “But they think I robbed a carriage—they shouldn’t let someone like that teach their—”

  “Actually,” Lachlan cut in sheepishly, “I told them that I was the one who did it.” When Mal started to protest, he said, “I couldna let you take the blame for me! What kind of friend would I be?”

  “I was trying to protect you.”

  “You’re not responsible for us, Mal. We protect each other,” Lachlan said.

  Mal turned to Georgina. “What will happen to them if I take the position?”

  “There’s an open spot at the quarry, and there’s an older couple whose son just left and they need help farming their land. No one will get left behind—we’ll make sure of it.”

  Her words struck a chord, and his chest ached fiercely. “Well, Mal…” Georgina said. “Is it all right?”

  He stepped up, so they were toe to toe, and then slid his hands to her waist, resting them there lightly.

  For a long time, he’d thought he’d found his purpose. Stealing sheep. Defying the landlords. He’d thought he’d found his path, no matter what end it brought him to. But there was more than one way to bring change—it wasn’t all fire and explosions and blood and revolution. Each small drop caused a ripple, even in the vastest ocean.

  The children who sat in that classroom today were the future of the Highlands. And they needed someone who believed in them.

  And maybe some part of Mal needed them, too. Just as he needed Andrew, Lachlan, and Ewan.

  His brothers.

  Just as he needed Georgina.

  The woman he loved.

  He understood, in that moment, the true state of his shattered heart. He’d given a broken sliver to each one of them, Andrew and Ewan and Lachlan, and a sliver to each child who’d reminded him of himself, and he’d given the rest of the jagged pieces to Georgina, for her to keep safe for him, until there was nothing left for him.

  But that was the way it should be.

  What was the point of loving if you didn’t do it with everything you had?

  “Aye, lass. It’s all right.”

  He leaned down to kiss her, getting lost, for a moment, in her taste, in the softness of her lips.

  And then he was interrupted, quite cruelly, by Georgina pushing him back, her nose wrinkled. “Perhaps you should bathe first.”

  “It’s not me,” he said. “It’s the gaol.”

  “Regardless,” she responded drily.

  And he laughed, his heart feeling lighter than it had in months.

  “I’ll go home”—Home! It was a word he would have to get used to again—“and bathe right away. As long as you agree to marry me.”

  “Mal!” Ewan said, like he couldn’t believe he would ask such an important question in such an informal manner.

  But Georgina was biting her lower lip, trying to keep from smiling and not quite managing it. “Oh, very well,” she said. She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, a rosy blush slowly suffusing her face, and Mal felt like he could laugh and laugh and never run out of joy.

  Mal wanted to kiss her again, as soon as possible, but he was going to respect her wishes and bathe, when they were pressed together anyway by the unstoppable force of Ewan throwing his arms around both of them.

  Mal was surprised when Andrew silently, stoically, joined in the awkward embrace.

  And then they all glanced at Lachlan, who scowled at them fiercely.

  “You’re an embarrassment. All of ye.”

  But Georgina grabbed his wrist and yanked him into the hug, too. And they were in the midst of the most unwieldy group embrace Mal had ever been a part of when Lachlan grimaced and said, “You smell like a dead cat, Mal.”

  “Fine. Fine,” he said. “Get off of me, then.”

  “You ruined it!” Ewan complained to Lachlan as they turned onto the road.

  “You ruined it first,” Lachlan said. “You interrupted their moment.”

  Andrew trailed after them.

  Mal watched them for a moment, both fond and exasperated—a combination of emotions that wasn’t so unusual where the other men were concerned—and then faced Georgina. She slipped her hand into his. Warmth radiated from the spot they touched, all through his body.

  “Shall we go?” she asked.

  His future, at some point, had shifted, had changed shape, until it was barely recognizable. It looked so different from how he’d once imagined it.

  But different wasn’t a bad thing.

  Sometimes, different was even better.

  “Aye,” he said.

  Together, they walked away from the shadows, and into the light.

  Epilogue

  One Year Later

  The Stewart family’s cottage no longer stood. Now, there was only a small bit of gray rubble that vaguely took the shape of a house—the only physical reminder of five lives, and the love between them.

  Everything else was stored in Mal’s mind and his heart.

  He ga
zed at the rubble and then out across the rest of the green valley. It was a familiar view to him, though it was changed inexorably. He wondered what it would look like in another hundred years. Would the Highlanders ever come back to this land, or was the force of change too great to conquer?

  Either way, it was almost too beautiful to fathom, and perhaps this place of moors and peaks and valleys, sky and earth and sea, could never really be owned by any man. It simply existed, ancient and unmoving, a place of both myth and hard-bitten reality. A place undefined and undefinable.

  Clouds drifted in front of the sun, and shadow and light chased their way across the valley as Georgina knelt to place a bundle of yellow gorse in the center of where his home had once been. Where his heart had once been.

  An aching tenderness filled his chest as Mal watched his wife tuck a wild lock of hair behind her ear. It was the feeling, he knew, of his soul being outside himself, housed within someone else. She caught his gaze and smiled, though it was a little sad.

  Between the men he thought of as brothers, and Georgina’s tightly knit relations, Mal had more family than he knew what to do with. And sometimes he would wake up and wonder at his good fortune. Sometimes he would wake up and feel like he didn’t deserve it. But then Georgina would laugh at something he’d said, or wrap her arms tightly around him, and he thought maybe he wasn’t so undeserving, after all, if he could make this incredible woman happy.

  But he would never, ever forget the family he’d lost.

  He’d set his mother’s fiddle by his feet. Now, he lifted it carefully, placed bow against string and tucked the smooth, hard wood underneath his chin. The motions were as familiar to him as breathing.

  He drew cool air into his lungs. When he spoke his voice was rusty. It was a question he’d asked before. It was one he would ask again, though this was the only time he would ask it here.

  “Will you sing for me, lass?”

  Georgina met his gaze with her clear blue-gray eyes, and a calmness filled him, a sense of perfect, unshakable peace.

  As he drew the bow across the strings, her voice rose to meet the melody.

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