The Scotsman Who Saved Me

by Hannah Howell

  And it had been so quick, she thought. For something that could change so much between a man and a woman she would have thought it would last longer. He had not even gotten completely undressed. For some strange reason she found that the most upsetting of all. She tried to comfort herself with the reminder that they could not have any idea of how long they would be alone.

  Iain decided it was too close to dusk to ride anywhere. Going out would be fine but coming back could get dangerous. So he just walked her around the compound and pointed out all the things he thought he would do. Since he seemed to be looking at her for some response, she agreed with each idea and added a few opinions.

  They were behind the stables looking over the area he thought might be good for some kind of chicken coop when he backed her up against the outside wall of the barn. Emily looked at him in question but he just kissed her. She held on to him as the kiss grew hungry and stirred her need for him again. When he pulled away he rested his forehead against her as he caught his breath and then grinned at her.

  “Maybe we could sneak back upstairs,” he said.

  “You no longer fear someone is due home?”

  At that moment they both heard the approach of the buggy. Iain swore and Emily felt a little calmer about what they had done. A few of the older women had said that once a man got what he wanted out of a woman he did not return. It was obvious Iain wanted to return so perhaps the things she fretted about were all in her imagination.

  Mrs. O’Neal already had the buggy in the stable when they came around the corner and Iain hurried in to lend her a hand. She was concerned that she was too late to make any supper and Emily was pleased to tell her about the stew. As Neddy ran up to Emily to tell her everything he had done and seen, Mrs. O’Neal rushed off to the kitchen to prepare anything that might be needed to feed the other brothers when they arrived.

  It was late when Emily finally made her way up to her bed. She was surprised to find Iain waiting outside her door. “Is something wrong with Neddy?”

  “Nay.” He pulled her into his arms and kissed her then held her close and rested his chin on the top of her head. “I just wished to see ye before I had to crawl off to bed. Alone.”

  Emily blushed, her doubts and fears receding a bit more. “Oh. Well, I must do the same.”

  “And strangely enough, that gives me great comfort.” He kissed her again and walked to his room.

  Emily shook her head and went into her room. She undressed behind the screen, checked on Neddy, and then crawled into bed. It felt oddly empty to her, which she decided was silly. It was not as if she had spent many nights with Iain, had barely passed part of a long afternoon, yet some part of her felt he should be there with her.

  Stupid, she told herself, and closed her eyes. She had given the man her virginity and that had not prompted him to hold her in his bed. Nor had it brought her any sweet words or vows of love. He was good with flattery but not anything more serious.

  Emily feared she had been a complete fool. She had given herself too quickly, too easily. Although she did wonder how a woman could resist a man when his kisses made her body burn. Yet she could hear all the warnings whispered by the older women, warnings of how a man expected innocence in his wife and the ever-present chance of conceiving a child from a man her family would never accept. It would not be just her family that would scorn any child she bore, but all of society.

  And none of those lecturing people had ever envisioned a situation like the one she found herself in. She had spent more time with Iain than many of her class spent with the man they were to marry and all of it unchaperoned. Even if she and Iain had not made love everyone would believe they had. In fact, she began to understand the insistence upon chaperons. If there was any true feeling between two people, the temptation to get as close as possible could be overwhelming. Her own mother was a perfect example of such a situation.

  The question she needed to answer, for her own peace of mind, was if she loved Iain. Love might not be reason enough to please those who gossiped and condemned but it would ease her sense of guilt tinged with a hint of shame. Emily closed her eyes and decided to stop fretting over it all. She had wanted him and the why of that would come to her eventually.

  She was sure she had not let herself be seduced because he had saved her and Neddy. Nor because he was such a handsome, strong man. She had seen such men before and had had no inclination to bed them. There was so much more to what she felt for Iain, a more that made her burn and ache with need. She wanted to slip over to his room and crawl into his bed, wanted to sleep with his arms around her.

  “Oh, damn,” Emily muttered as she opened her eyes and stared at the wall. She was in love with him.

  Chapter Eleven

  Iain stretched and breathed deep. It had been a week since he had been able to make love to Emily and he began to think it could be months before he got another chance. The next chance he got to make love to her he wanted to take his time, to show her all the pleasure they could share. He blamed his long spell without a woman for his speed the last time. The fact that she had been ready and found her own pleasure had been more luck than skill and that embarrassed him.

  Taking another deep breath, he could now smell fall’s approach in the air. There were apples to pick and he tried to sort through his plans to find the best time for that harvest. It could be a good idea to set the women and children on that detail, he decided as he started to open the gates. Iain saw few openings for time spent alone with Emily and he sighed with regret. He suddenly paused in trying to work in some time alone with her and stared out at his lands, not sure of what he was seeing.

  Then the fog of a lingering sleep cleared and he cursed. A lot of men were riding hard straight for his home. It was a small army, he thought angrily. He had the feeling that bastard after Emily and Neddy had decided more force was needed. Iain hastily closed the gate and barred it then rang the alarm bell.

  In minutes his brothers were racing to his side, a couple of them still buttoning up their shirts. Iain ordered them up to posts on the walls, hearing their curses as they saw what they faced. Iain hurried up to the top of the stockade and stood next to Matthew.

  “The fool has hired himself a damned army. He is wasting a lot of men,” Matthew said.

  “He doesnae care. He thinks the woman and child stand between him and all he covets. Greed is what drives the bastard. E’en if he thinks they mean to live here, he just cannae take the chance. They change their mind and run back to England and he loses it all.”

  Matthew calmly shot a man out of his saddle. “Where is he getting them?”

  Iain shrugged as he took aim at another. “Any saloon, I would guess. He just makes it known he needs some men to rid him of a woman and a child and names the fee offered for the job. Probably went to a couple saloons to get this many. It would sound like easy money to men like these. Doubt they learned the facts of the place they had to attack until they rode up and saw it.” Iain shot the man he aimed at. “Saw a few at the back who hesitated and then turned round and left.”

  “Not enough. We have to keep them from reaching the gates, Iain. We can’t shoot them easy when they get too close to the walls of the stockade, at least not without one of us exposing ourselves to a bullet, and that gives them a chance to find a way in.”

  Nodding, Iain shot another man. “Then we had best shoot faster.”

  “I dinnae ken why these fools think they can get in here,” Iain muttered, reloading his rifle even as the men retreated back, out of firing range.

  “Aye,” agreed Matthew as he relaxed against the wall of the stockade, “I would have thought they would see it as a fort as so many others have.” He joined Iain in glaring at Robbie when he laughed.

  “Sorry. I just thought on the folk that thought it was a fort at the beginning and sought a night’s shelter. They always looked so surprised to find out it was just us.” Robbie fired at a man trying to get close to the gates and watched as the man ran b
ack toward the others. “They have now taken to staying out of range. Well, my range, as I am a poor aim the farther away a thing is.”

  There was a shout from the back and several shots sounded from behind them. Iain ran to where he had placed Duncan and Nigel. He had placed them there because he had thought it would be safer than in the front. Neither Nigel nor Duncan had the stomach needed for battle. They could do what was needed but they suffered for it. Nigel was sitting down, his face pale and his mouth twisted in a grimace of pain, and Duncan was tying a bandage around his arm. Iain crouched down beside them.

  “Is the bullet still in there?” he asked his brother, who was already looking less pale.

  “Nay,” answered Nigel. “It just took a bit of meat off my arm. Ruined my aim. Think my bullet went into the house. I am not worried. It is much like the wound Emily got and if she can recover easily then I should be able to.”

  Iain peered over the top of the stockade. There was a group of men tucked into the rocks and shadows that marked his land in so many places. It would be difficult to hit them but he suspected they could do it. Iain just did not think it a good idea to waste their ammunition in trying.

  “Do ye think ye can still shoot?” he asked Nigel.

  “Not well but, aye, I can hold the rifle and pull the trigger. Why?”

  “Because I think they are going to make a charge at us soon. They may well have spotted our weak point.”

  “We had to have a back way in, and out, Iain,” said Duncan. “Most times I forget it is there. The door blends well with the rest of the stockade fence.”

  “But nay perfectly. It is barred but I am nay sure it can hold firm against a hard attack. So those men have to be kept from getting close. I need to ken that ye two lads can do that.”

  Duncan and Nigel exchanged looks and then nodded firmly. Instead of hurrying around to the front, Iain went down the wall. He jogged to the house and slipped into the parlor. He cursed himself for giving in to superstition as he grabbed the scabbard and sword that had belonged to his father. It had saved him on the day his parents had died and held off danger time after time as they finished the long journey alone. It might not actually be good luck to go into battle with it, but right now he needed the strength the belief he had in it gave him.

  Once back on the wall with Matthew, and assuring him that everyone was fine, Iain studied the men who had sought cover by the small hills and gullies facing their stockade. Iain had never envisioned the wall proving its worth this way but felt a certain pride in how well it was holding up. It was the land’s dark reputation of being plagued by outlaws and his fear of losing any more of his family that had made him decide they would put their home behind a stockade. The labor they had put into it while building it had been far more than he had anticipated, but they had not suffered from any sudden attack by the thieves or outlaws who called these hills home.

  He looked to the side just as an arrow went sailing toward his house, the flame it carried making it easy to see. He could only hope it did not catch anything alight as he and his brothers could not leave the walls. It infuriated him that they were trying to set his house alight but then he wondered why they had not shot their arrows toward the fence. Because the women and children were in the house, he realized, and swore viciously. They wanted the fear for the others to make him and his brothers err. He tapped Matthew and pointed out the man in the tree on the side of their property. Matthew had a good eye for hitting the more hidden targets. In minutes the man was no longer a threat.

  The men at the front began to move forward and Iain readied his aim. Just as he was about to shoot, the man he was aiming at screamed and fell from his horse. Iain looked beyond the now panicked group of men and grinned. The Powell brothers had come to join the fight. He patted the sword hanging on his hip. Even as he told himself it might be ridiculous superstition, he could not fully banish the sense that the sword had brought him the luck he needed yet again. Now if he could just finish this job up quickly he could check on where that arrow landed and what damage there was.

  * * *

  Emily let Mrs. O’Neal in the back door, her children close behind her. “I think there are a lot more men attacking than there was last time.”

  “There is an army out there,” said Rory.

  Mrs. O’Neal scowled at her son then looked at Emily, who had moved to lock the door. “This fool went up on the walls. Thank heavens Robbie sent him right back down.” She lightly slapped the boy on the back of the head. “I told you to never do that.” Then she looked at Emily. “That man after you and Neddy put down some hard money to get this group. If Rory calls it an army it must be a fair-sized force of men. Boy’s not one given to exaggeration.”

  Emily silently cursed her sister and, at that moment, felt not the slightest pinch of guilt for doing so. “I cannot believe how foolish Annabel was. She knew Albert was out to get rid of our whole family. How could she have been so silly as to write to our mutual cousin and tell her about her son?” She shook her head. “No, I will not let all this make me speak ill of the dead. I must cease gnawing on that bone.”

  Mrs. O’Neal patted her shoulder. “It is all that greedy Albert’s fault.”

  Glad she had told Mrs. O’Neal the full truth as she had found keeping so many secrets hard, Emily nodded. “True. Well, we better get down to the root cellar.”

  “Are you sure we have to?”

  “I have no great love of root cellars, either, but it is the safest place for us. I do not think they can get through the MacEnroys and their wall but we should do all that is necessary to ensure our safety. There are a lot of bullets flying about.” The sound of a window breaking added a lot of weight to her warning.

  “You are right. Come along,” Mrs. O’Neal said to her children.

  Emily grabbed Neddy by the hand and followed the others down into the root cellar. Over the last few days they had done all they could to make it comfortable, putting wood and carpet on the dirt floor and a few chairs. They had also added a cache of food and drink. It had been done just in case they were attacked but no one had really anticipated this. She felt Neddy start to tremble and understood. It all brought back some frightful, painful memories for her, too. Just the smell of the earth had memories rushing to the fore but she fought them off so that she could comfort the child shaking in her arms.

  “It is all right, Neddy,” she said as she sat in a rocker and held him on her lap.

  “Bad men. Where Iain? The bad men will get him.”

  “He is keeping those bad men away from us. He and all his brothers.”

  Neddy nodded but stuck his thumb in his mouth. Emily rocked slightly, hoping to calm him but her mind was not so easy to settle. She recalled the pain of her wounds, the damp smell of dirt as she had crawled out of the root cellar. It was the race for the shelter that played out the clearest in her mind, the need to stop the bleeding of her wounds even while doing all she could to keep Neddy safe. Time had never crept by so slowly nor terror been so persistent and chilling. She did not think she could do it again.

  “The lad has gone to sleep, dear,” said Mrs. O’Neal.

  Glancing down at Neddy, Emily relaxed a little. Better he slept than stayed awake and terrified. She rather wished she could find that peace.

  Her thoughts went to the MacEnroy brothers. They were out there fighting to keep her and Neddy alive. Guilt was a heavy stone in her belly. She should never have dragged them into her troubles. She could go for days forgetting her troubles in the warmth and friendship of living in Iain’s house and then something like this happened and she was ashamed of herself for her thoughtlessness. The MacEnroys had already suffered too much from the greed of her class. She closed her eyes and began to pray that not one of the MacEnroys paid too dearly for what they had to do to keep her and Neddy safe.

  She found herself thinking of her sister again. Emily could not understand how Annabel could have broken their one firm rule, the one they had made when they had r
ealized their parents had been murdered. Emily had worked unceasingly to uncover that dark truth and the one that had told them who was behind it but Annabel had been so slow to believe it, passionately arguing with everyone of Emily’s facts. She had always disliked Albert but Annabel had considered the man the perfect English gentleman. After the first attempt on their lives that had failed, Annabel had appeared to accept the truth and understand what it meant. The mere hint that David or her child could be killed had appeared to make her accept the rules made. It was now obvious that she had not fully accepted the dark truth and the longer they had gone without a threat the less Annabel had worried.

  “I should have known better,” she muttered.

  “Pardon, dear?” asked Mrs. O’Neal.

  “My sister. I should have known she did not fully understand the danger she was in. It was not really in her nature to be able to do so. Perhaps she did not understand that it was a threat that would stand for a long time. Not even the possibility of her husband’s death, or her son’s, could make her fully believe Albert meant to kill us or how it could be dangerous to contact anyone in the family. She always thought he was the perfect gentleman.”

  “It can be hard for some to accept when it is their own blood causing their troubles.”

  “I fear that in our class, it is most often someone of our own blood.” Emily sighed over that hard truth. “She agreed, swore she understood. I know David did.”

  “He was not one of your class though, was he.”

  “No, he was not and I am not sure Annabel always fully understood how not like our class he was. She was a sweet woman but not always the most thoughtful of people.”

  “I am sorry, dear. Sorry you had to discover that about your sister when you can’t talk it out with her, maybe finally get her to see. Sorry that it was such a silly mistake that cost you so dearly.”